Full Capacity Living…
“You’d never know I exercise as much as I do”
That’s what a client of mine used to say. She came to me with weight gain, mood swings, poor sleep, and a general flatness about life. She was doing everything “right” — eating healthy (even when her family teased her for it, especially for skipping the wine), and pushing through intense cardio nearly every day.
And still gaining weight. Still snapping at people she loved. Still feeling like she wasn’t handling life the way she wanted to.
Here’s what her body was trying to tell her: her cortisol was through the roof. All that punishing cardio wasn’t burning stress — it was adding to it.
So we did what might sound backwards. We tweaked her nutrition, cut the daily cardio, and shifted her toward walking, Pilates, strength training, and restorative movement. Slowly. Tweak by tweak.
Then one day in a session, she said something I’ll never forget:
“I feel like I’m on Zoloft, but I’m not. I just feel calmer, less moody. I can laugh at things I couldn’t laugh at before.”
Why would food change her mood that much? Because your gut and your brain are in constant conversation. Roughly 90% of your serotonin — the same neurotransmitter that medications like Zoloft target — is made in your gut, not your brain. When we calmed the inflammation, balanced her blood sugar, and fed her gut what it actually needed, her brain got the message: you’re safe now. Her “I feel like I’m on Zoloft” moment wasn’t a coincidence. It was her gut-brain axis finally working with her instead of against her.
And here’s the thing — we had barely touched nervous system work at that point. This was nutrition and lowering cortisol. That’s it. That’s the power of lifestyle.
But the story goes deeper. As we kept working, we uncovered what her body had been carrying for decades — fear rooted in childhood, a relationship with her mother she could never fully rest inside of. When I asked, “Do you startle easily?” she laughed: “Oh yes. It’s a joke in our family.”
It’s not a quirk. It’s a trauma response. Most of us don’t realize we’re walking around with fear living in our bodies — and no amount of cardio will run it out.
She wasn’t doing microdosing work with me at the time, but knowing what I know now, I can only imagine how much it would have deepened and accelerated what we built together.
The peaks and valleys took time. Real change always does. But it started with the basics: food, movement, and giving her nervous system permission to stand down.
Maybe some of this sounds familiar — exercising hard but gaining weight, reacting with more anger than you want, startling easily. If it does, know that it’s not a willpower problem, and it’s not permanent. Your body is just asking for something different. That’s worth sitting with this week.
As always, I’m here if you ever want to talk it through.
With you on the journey,
Karen
