Freedom To Know Wellness

Can "Love and Kindness" unlock the hidden door to healing chronic pain?In this episode, FTKWellness speaks with Rachel Donen  @racheldonen  about how the meditation practice of "Loving Kindness" can support healing from chronic pain. Drawing from teachings by Buddhist monk and author Thich Nhat Hanh, as well as the Tibetan practice of Tonglen meditation, Rachel shares insights on how compassion-based meditation can transform the experience of pain.Rachel is a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction and Yoga practitioner, founder of the ALIGN Community, and a recovering long-term chronic pain sufferer herself.✨ Watch this inspiring and impactful conversation to discover practical tools, spiritual wisdom, and resources that can support your healing and wellness journey.

📝 S2 E3 Transcript

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Timestamps

11:19 — Car Accidents Journey to Love Kindness Practice

15:22 — Being our sources of love

25:10 — Steps to Healing - Setbacks and Breakthroughs

29:16 — Body Perceiving Threat - Healing Journey

39:44 — What We Eat - Does it bring Suffering?

49:44 — Letting Go - Learning to Move with Chronic Pain

#chronicpain #lovingkindnessmeditation #thichnhathanh #healing #tonglen #meditation #yoga #ftkwellness

⚠️ Viewer Discretion Advised: Episode discussion contains sensitive topics, including physical and sexual trauma.

FTKWellness launches the first episode of its Healers Series with wellness and herbalist practitioner, yoga and Pilates instructor Miró Kali Shakti. In this episode, we explore Miró’s personal journey to wellness after living with Fibromyalgia and PTSD for several years — and how reconnecting with her Brazilian Indigenous and African roots, and working with traditional plant medicines, namely Ayahuasca, led to curing her Fibromyalgia and PTSD symptoms.

We ask the bold question: Could Ayahuasca be a pathway to healing Fibromyalgia and PTSD? While there is technically no universally recognized cure for these conditions, FTKWellness has heard firsthand from individuals who have explored different healing modalities, supplements, and foods to manage symptoms and support their recovery, and Miró is one of them. Miró shares her own transformative experience, discusses the powerful link between PTSD and Fibromyalgia, and offers other therapies and modalities that may help in managing — and possibly improving — these complex conditions.

⚠️ Disclaimer: Everyone’s path to healing is unique. The information shared in this episode is intended for awareness and reflection, and may offer insights you can adapt to your own wellness journey.

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Timestamp
00:00 Introduction to PTSD Diagnosis
00:27 Welcome to Freedom To Know Wellness
01:33 Interview with Miró Kali Shakti (Camila Soares)
04:47 Miró's Journey with Fibromyalgia
06:44 Holistic Healing and Nutrition
08:45 Emotional and Physical Symptoms
09:59 Therapy and Mental Health
29:10 Returning to Brazil
45:29 Discovering Ayahuasca
51:39 Discovering the Power of Ayahuasca
52:25 Integrating Plant Medicine into Daily Life
53:39 Navigating the Energetic and Organizational Aspects
54:56 Healing Through Plant Medicine and Personal Boundaries
01:02:50 The Role of Diet and Preparation in Ayahuasca
01:03:44 The Spiritual and Physical Benefits of Plant Medicine
01:10:09 Connecting with Ancestral Practices and Food
01:25:39 Daily Practices for Holistic Well-being
01:38:12 Conclusion and Contact Information

Join the conversation with Freedom To Know Wellness in Season 2, Episode 1—an episode honouring Black Maternal Health Week, April 11–17. Hear one Black woman's powerful journey navigating chronic pain and maternal care within the Canadian healthcare system. She represents many Black women and Women of Colour who face a system often marked by neglect and medical gaslighting. A system built on biased standards—rooted in comparisons based on the race and gender of its original, dominant population.

Black Maternal Health Week, "Emphasizes the power of Black-led perinatal, maternal, and reproductive health organizations to drive systemic change and foster community healing." Quote by Black Mamas Matter.

For references and other important content listed in this episode, continue this episode's conversation on our Freedom To Know Wellnes Substack Blog

🎙️ Freedom To Know Wellness is available on all major Podcast platforms.

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Artist: Q-Black

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Timestamp

0:00 FTKWellness Intro

0:56 Facts On Black Maternal Health

2:27 Interview (Intro on Guest: Efia)

5:42 Chronic Pain, Advocacy, Medical Gaslighting, Care, & Women of Colour

35:48 Anxiety and Silencing: Managing the Medical System 

40:55 TTC/Pregnancy/ Chronic Pain/ Medical System & Race

48:47 Race & Medical System - Reference Intervals (RIs)

56:20 Black-led OB, Birth Mortality Rates,  Maternal Collective Care 

01:14:06 Partners Genes Impacting Pregnancy

01:17:12 Post-Partum Healing with Chronic Pain 

This title may seem sombre— “Alive Traumatic Births…” Urgh, depressing! But don't fear. My guest, Allison Wylie, will inform and expand your understanding of their birth trauma, infertility and IVF journey while giving you some humour within their traumatic and extensive experience of obtaining their two children.

S1: Episode 14 Transcription

*Viewer Discretion is Advised*

Aisha shares her journey managing Pelvic Reproductive pain, enduring medical gaslighting and her struggle in search of a gynecologist and pelvic floor therapist to treat her. Aisha's chronic pain began as a teenager-- impacting her quality of life. Despite living with chronic- even debilitating pain, she went on to be a professional dancer and a Reiki Master using this technique to help manage her pain. Aisha trained at GTA Reiki, in Markham, Ontario.

*VIEWERS' DISCRETION IS ADVISED*

This is the final episode from our highlight series Seniors Voices, 2024 year. Join FTKWellness as we discuss the benefits of Medical Cannabis for PTSD and seniors' health with the owner of Bayview Concierge- an online health, home, legal and finances resource for seniors, and the podcast, Let’s Talk Cannabis, Sherry Bennet. Sherry shares her journey to using cannabis to manage her PTSD and physical pain issues and the historical atrocities that helped lead to the criminalization of cannabis in Canada.

*Podcast interview is Closed Caption*

Episode Resources: ⁠Resources Listed in Podcast⁠:

Seniors Voices Resources: ⁠FTKWellness’s Seniors Voices Resources⁠

📰 ⁠Freedom To Know Wellness Substack Blog⁠ 

Host: ⁠Michelle Samuels (Instagram) ⁠

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Timestamp

00:00 Prologue

00:23 Intro & Warnings

00:56 Interview

02:09 Bayview Concierge Services 

10:49 Sherry’s Story

24:16 Pain/PTSD Marijuana Benefits 

1:02:18  Suggestions For Seniors

1:04:00 PTSD Survivor Suggestions

1:07:23 Sherry’s Contact Info

1:09:26 Racist History: Marijuana Laws

1:12:59 Endocannabinoid System & Benefits

#PTSD  #chronicpain  #cannabiseducation #medicalcannabis #cannabistalk101 #cannabisbenefits #pensioners #seniors #seniorsmatter #cancer #fibromyalgia #arthritis #ms #multiplesclerosis #autoimmunedisease  #anxiety #anxietydisordertreatment #psilocybin #treatment #psychodelictherapy

Welcome to Freedom To Know Wellness’s, Seniors Voices, episode 3 with guest Linda. We continue this series with Linda, a retired Production Manager from the Canadian theatre company Famous People Players #disabilityinarts, as she shares about her disability due to a car accident that caused a spinal injury and her life now as a disabled senior using an accessible wheelchair managing post-injury cognitive impairment. In late 2021, Linda's wheelchair broke down and she couldn't afford to fix it. Linda shares her experience, but due to her cognitive impairment, certain important details surrounding fixing her wheelchair were left out. Listen until the end as I share the missing details of her lengthy journey to reclaim her electric wheelchair.

Seniors Voices is an FTKWellness highlight series featuring seniors with different disabilities, telling their life stories transitioning from government disability to government pension and resources that can help others who have already transitioned or will be transitioning from disability to pension. 

For resources listed in this series see Freedom To Know Wellness's Seniors Voices Resources 

https://freedomtoknowwellness.substack.com/p/seniors-voices-podcast-seniors-resources

Woodgreen Meals on Wheels

https://www.woodgreen.org/programs/meals-on-wheels

Woodgreen Seniors Day Program

https://www.woodgreen.org/programs/seniors-day-programs

Podcast Transcript

"Seniors Voices" is Sponsored by Digital Main Street R.A.I.S.E Grant @digitalmainstreet8974  

📰 Freedom To Know Wellness Substack Blog:  https://freedomtoknowwellness.substack.com/

💰 Support Freedom To Know Wellness

🎵 Music: Hold You Artist: Q-Black 

Soundcloud: https://on.soundcloud.com/o2WJMeTNBKFNHuGz8

**Music rights owned by Freedom To Know Wellness**

Timestamp

00:00 Sponsorship

00:10 Alert: Format Change 

00:45 Introduction - Seniors Voices

03:38 Advisory Warning

04:08 Linda’s Story

04:33 Working in Theatre

06:00 The Car Accident - Disability

09:22 Creative Careers w/ Disability

12:40 Life as a Senior w/ Disability

19:00 Seniors Activity Programs

23:46 Food Services + Financial Planning

27:27 Wheelchair Fix Story

36:19 Words of Advice

38:04 Linda’s Real Wheelchair Fix Story

40:20 Next Episode / Conclusion

#seniors  #disabilityinclusion #pensioners #accessibility #affordablehousing #pensioners  #canadiangovernment #ontario #toronto  #hardshipfund #OliviaChow #accessibledevices #supportseniors #devicefund

Welcome to Freedom To Know Wellness’s “Seniors Voices” episode 2 with guest, Robert. In episode 2, Robert shares his life as a senior using accessibility devices due to conditions like COPD and diabetes- to name a few, and his activism to make the Canadian government aware of the needs of seniors and people with disability. Seniors Voices is an FTKWellness highlight series featuring seniors with different disabilities, telling their life stories transitioning from government disability to government pension and resources that can help others who have already transitioned or will be transitioning from disability to pension. For seniors resources in the Ontario Canada area, see Freedom To Know Wellness blog's, Seniors Voices Resources "Seniors Voices" is Sponsored by Digital Main Street R.A.I.S.E Grant @digitalmainstreet8974 📰 Freedom To Know Wellness Substack Blog 💰 Support Freedom To Know Wellness 🎵 Music: Hold You Artist: Q-Black Soundcloud**Music rights owned by Freedom To Know Wellness** Timestamp00:00 Intro & Sponsorship00:10 What is Seniors Voices03:05 Advisory Warning03:39 Robert’s Story 10:32 Medical / Accessibility Programs25:12 Government Funding30:12 Increase Accessibility42:38 Hardship Fund / Helping Each Other47:42 Family Doctors53:02 Phone Companies Medical Support01:00:21 Robert Update Post Interview#disabilitysports #seniors #pensioners #diabetesmanagement #affordablehousing #dialisis #canadiangovernment #ontario #toronto #accessibility #hardshipfund #accessdevices

Freedom To Know Wellness's “Seniors Voices” are stories, shared without being interviewed- by individuals managing various disabilities and medical conditions, telling the difficulties they faced transitioning from government disability to Canadian pension, the frustration and financial hardship they encounter now without disability support- yet the various great support they discovered during their process to provide some aid. But the journey and the needs continue.

FTKWellness provides listeners with an online resource for seniors, sharing the support services shared in these interviews and more. Click the ⁠link⁠ for details.

NOTE: The current online resources only cover the province of Ontario with a focus on the GTA (Greater Toronto Area).

📰 Freedom To Know Wellness Substack Blog: https://freedomtoknowwellness.substack.com/ 💰 Support Freedom To Know Wellness: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/FTKWellness🎵 Music: Hold You Artist: Q-Black Soundcloud: https://on.soundcloud.com/o2WJMeTNBKFNHuGz8*Music rights owned by Freedom To Know Wellness Time Stamp:00:00 Intro & Context02:36 Stipend for Guest03:03 Advisory Warning03:34 Senior Voice - Brenda10:29 Pension Education15:52 Yard Sale to $ Meds 19:10 Food Bank & Support

The Freedom To Know Wellness podcast interviewed Meghan French @thefaithfulfibromyalgiawarrior  last year, discussing her healing journey from debilitating Fibromyalgia pain using the controversial Carnivore Diet. It's been 6 months since that interview to this recording, and to see her improvement and mobility are beyond remarkable. Watch this episode to catch all the details on how Meghan achieved her newfound freedom from chronic pain and mobility issues.Connect with Meghan@thefaithfulfibromyalgiawarrior https://www.facebook.com/meghanfrench.fibrofogwarriorhttps://www.instagram.com/thefaithfulfibromyalgiawarrior/

Episode Transcript👩🏾‍💻 FTKWellness Podcast Host Michelle Samuels: https://www.instagram.com/michelle.samuels.8/📰 Freedom To Know Wellness Substack Blog: https://freedomtoknowwellness.substack.com/ 💰 Support Freedom To Know Wellness: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/FTKWellness🎵 Music: Hold You Artist: Q-Black Soundcloud: https://on.soundcloud.com/o2WJMeTNBKFNHuGz8Music rights owned by Freedom To Know Wellness 📸 Thumbnail Image by: Shawn B. Jennings https://www.instagram.com/photographybyshaunj/

Time Stamp

00:00 Intro

01:02 Interview: Update

32:08 Pain Reduction + Overcome Fear of Movement 

44:25 Transitioning + Gut Rot

49:24 Blood Type + Carnivore Diet

51:22 Remain Disciplined

57:09 Conclusion + Update Post Interview

#podcast #carnivorediet #fibromyalgiawarrior #fibromyalgia #chronicillness #chronicpain #chronicpainwarrior #chronicpaintreatment #chronicpainmanagement #fibrofog #mobility #accessibilitymatters #accessiblemobility #wellnessjourney #healingjourney #faith