The Brain Possible

We always love talking with fellow mama warriors—strong women who fiercely advocate for their children, who are constantly asking “what can be next for my child” and going in that direction. Recently, we spoke with Deniece Smith of Wellness Beyond the Spectrum. Today, we’ll be speaking with Lindsay Bachman to learn about her family.

Lindsay and her husband Pete raise their two daughters, Chandler and Landry, on a farm in Central Illinois. In June of 2020, Landry, their youngest, was diagnosed with an ultra rare genetic disorder called CHAMP1. At the time, she was only the 68th person worldwide with this diagnosis. Through partnership with other families and the CHAMP1 research foundation, they are on a mission to raise awareness, advocate for inclusion, celebrate diversity, and ultimately, to find a treatment.

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On this podcast, we meet Deniece Smith of Wellness Beyond the Spectrum. Deniece takes a holistic approach to treat her young son’s autism and her other child with an informal diagnosis of ADHD, focusing on removing toxins from their environment, carefully choosing which foods her family eats and which to avoid, and more. 

She has used her YouTube channel along with other social media platforms, Instagram in particular, to share her family's journey with autism but also to bring awareness to how using nutritional and holistic measures can help you find healing and optimal health.

She has a career background in Pediatric and Obstetric nursing but as a result of her son's diagnosis, has started a new career path into the holistic wellness and nutrition community. I am the founder of Wellness Beyond the Spectrum, where I focus on helping others navigate nutrition, achieve wellness, and healing.

On this podcast, we’ll learn more about her family and her wellness approach that is helping her son heal.

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We talk often about creating empowering contexts for our children, in life and beyond. This is a feeling many of you who know Emily Abbott's story know she's faced first-hand when her son, Carter, passed.

In this episode, Emily has the pleasure to speak to Thorald and Isaac Koren: two brothers who make up the folk duo Francansisco. They have a story of their own to share about Thorald’s late son Jack who passed at fifteen months due to complications from a brain injury he sustained at birth—and how they turned to music in their time of loss. 

The brothers recently released a song to commemorate Jack’s life and the impact it had on their whole family. The song, More Than You Know, is heartbreakingly moving. We hope to learn how art and creativity—in this case, songwriting and music—have helped this family heal.

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Nature can be so incredibly healing. We've covered it in-depth on our blog. On this podcast, we take it one step further by exploring specific therapies that you may not know so much about and also involve nature: surfing and horseback riding (or hippo-therapy). Who better to guide us than Dr. Jillian of Surf and Turf Therapy, a California-based organization whose mission is in “bettering lives through non-traditional therapeutic activities?”

Dr. Jillian has been an equestrian for over 25 years and a surfer for over a decade. She received her doctorate in physical therapy in 2014 and her Hippo-therapy Clinical Specialty in 2017. In her role, she doesn’t teach children how to surf and ride. It’s a clinical setting, rather, in which she and her team focus on improving daily life skills like walking, talking, postural alignment, and more.  

Her goal is to help to improve the lives of exceptional children and to make non-traditional treatments like these accessible and known. Our conversation with her was enlightening! Enjoy.

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It’s not a far stretch to say the world can feel very scary sometimes--and now, especially. If it feels that way for we adults, have you ever wondered how it affects our children? What can we do to guide them--and ourselves--through choppy seas and trying times? How can we work through stress with our children, and what should those conversations with our kids look like?

These are hard questions. Luckily, they’re questions we don’t have to answer alone. Our guest today is Dr. Abigail Gewirtz, a professor at the University of Minnesota who has written a book that could not be more timely: When the World Feels Like a Scary Place: Essential Conversations for Anxious Parents & Worried Kids. Dr. Gewirtz is a mother of four, a child psychologist, and an expert on how stress affects families. 

We clearly have a lot we can learn from Dr. Gewirtz, and we are grateful we get to share our conversation with you today.

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There are so many factors medical teams examine when a baby is born. The standard is pretty clear: in a healthy birth, nurses note length, weight, APGAR scores, and so forth.

One expert on the craniosacral fascial system is hoping to add another check--the Baby Brain Score (BBS). If you don’t know what the craniosacral fascial system is off the top of your head, you’re definitely not alone.

Today we’re speaking with the doctor who discovered it and who has used his program both in private practice and even at The Family Hope Center to help babies get off to stronger starts.

Dr. Gillespie developed The Gillespie Approach, which is a therapy that stimulates cerebrospinal fluid pumping into the fascial web. In laymans terms, it helps babies overcome trauma they may have faced during birth and sets them up for healthier futures. 

That’s a lot to take in, I know. So, how does it work? Who can it help? Where does the BBS fit in? Where can you learn more?

We’ll cover all that and more in this episode!

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We’re so pleased to bring you our latest episode, which features The Brain Possible’s CEO and Founder, Emily Abbott, having a conversation with Chloe Weber. Chloe is the co-founder of a CBD and Chinese Herb company called Radical Roots that features, among other products, Remy’s Revenge—a mixture she developed for her exceptional child, Remy—and also the name of her website where she discusses diet, detox, movement, her experience practicing acupuncture, and more. 

Chloe has been interested in biohacking her way through healing since, as a high school student, she was one of the first cases of cutaneous leishmaniasis (a type of skin infection) diagnosed in Costa Rica. From there, she developed an interest in public health and medicine and went on to study Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at CU Boulder. Eventually to Chinese medicine, Chloe graduated with a master’s in oriental medicine from Southwest acupuncture college in Boulder and also spent time studying abroad. Since then, she’s been busier than ever—co-founding a nonprofit sliding-scale walk-in clinic called Urban Herbs. Though she’s not accepting new patients at this time as she pursues her doctorate and continues to focus on caring for Remy’s medical needs, we encourage you to visit Radical Roots and Remy’s Revenge to read more about how Chloe’s extensive study of integrative neurology and functional medicine has motivated her to find ways to help children with neurodevelopmental issues and seizures.

In this episode, we’ll hear from Chloe on both her personal journey as a mama warrior and her professional journey as she aims to promote healing in her son and others.

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Sally Fallon Morell  is best known as the author of Nourishing Traditions®. This well-researched, thought-provoking guide to traditional foods contains a startling message: animal fats and cholesterol are not villains but vital factors in the diet, necessary for normal growth, proper function of the brain and nervous system, protection from disease and optimum energy levels.

Sally’s  lifelong interest in the subject of nutrition began in the early 1970s when she read Nutrition and Physical Degeneration by Weston A. Price. Called the “Charles Darwin of Nutrition,” Price traveled the world over studying healthy primitive populations and their diets. The unforgettable photographs contained in his book document the beautiful facial structure and superb physiques of isolated groups consuming only whole, natural foods.

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Dr. Lindy Woodard is a partner at Pediatric Alternatives, which is an Integrative Pediatric Medical Practice in Mill Valley, California. Dr. Woodard is a board-certified pediatrician and doctor of homeopathy who found her way to Integrative Medicine through her stomach.  Her love of food, her brother’s battle with celiac disease, and her own digestive problems sent her to her laboratory – her kitchen. In this episode we're going to learn about homeopathy, one to one. 

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In this interview Emily interviews serial entrepreneur, water activist and a New York Times bestselling author, Seth Siegel. Seth's critically acclaimed award winning book, Troubled Water: What's wrong with what we drink, sets forth an ambitious agenda for a fundamental rethinking of America's drinking water system. Seth has been recognized for his thought leadership and advocacy on water scarcity and quality. He's a senior fellow at the University of Wisconsin center for water policy. His commentary has appeared in many leading publications including the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. 

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