175: Seven Health Update

Chris Sandel: Welcome to Episode 175 of Real Health Radio. You can find the links talked about as part of this episode at the show notes, which is www.seven-health.com/175.

Hey, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Real Health Radio. This episode is going to be shorter than the usual ones, and part of the reason is there’s going to be two episodes coming out this week. There will be another guest interview coming up tomorrow, but I want to use this episode to talk about a number of changes that are coming to Seven Health and Real Health Radio.

One of the things I want to mention upfront is that Seven Health is now open to new clients again. I’m going to share more information about this in a moment, but just wanted to say this upfront. For more information, you can simply go to www.seven-health.com/help.

00:01:00

Why I wanted to hire a new practitioner

If you are a regular listener to the show or are on the mailing list, you know that we recently advertised or a new practitioner position. I’d got to the point where there were just so many people applying to work with me that when I did my most recent intake, within 4 weeks I had all the clients I could handle for the next 6 months. The time before that, at the start of the year, it took about 6 weeks. So in 2019, there were only 10 weeks where I was open to taking on clients.

While I could put people on a waitlist between these periods, most people wanted help at the time that they were applying rather than waiting for an extended period of time. This was one of the big factors in my desire to take on another practitioner, just to be able to help more people.

Another reason for wanting to go down this route is I see the value in collaboration and learning from other people. Typically when I study, I learn doing this on my own. I’m very self-led and like the space to read books and listen to podcasts and go over things in my head. But I also know how valuable it is to be able to discuss ideas with people, which is one reason why I like doing this podcast.

To be able to do that with another practitioner who is part of the team really appeals to me. I know the tiniest fraction of what there is to know, and the more I study, the more apparent this becomes. I know I have blind spots, I have biases, I have areas of weakness, I have areas of complete ignorance and places where I simply don’t know just how much I don’t know. So bringing someone on is also about helping me to become better and be better at helping clients even more, and just knowing how a team can offer something better than what is already happening and expanding into different areas that we’re not even currently exploring.

The third reason for taking on another practitioner is that I want Seven Health to be more than it currently is and to offer services that it isn’t currently offering. Up until this point, seeing clients one-on-one has been the bulk of the business. Over the years, I have dabbled in other areas. I’ve created various online programs, I’ve done workshops for businesses, but neither of these have ever become more than a very minor part of the business.

When I discovered podcasting 4 years ago and decided to make this a weekly show, I really loved doing this. I loved it at the time, and I love still doing this – but it’s a huge time commitment. On average, about 30% of my week is taken up by this podcast – doing the prep work, whether that’s writing the content for the solo shows or putting together the questions for guests, which can also entail me reading their books or their blog posts or listening to podcasts that they’ve been on, and then there’s the editing and doing the intro and writing the copy.

So yeah, on average it’s about 30% of my working week, and there’s definitely weeks where it takes a lot more time than that. Being a weekly podcast show, there really isn’t a break from this. Sure, I’ll put out rebroadcast episodes, but there’s probably a new episode 4 out of 5 weeks.

Admittedly, the podcast has been a wonderful way of me bringing in clients and has definitely helped me get to the position that I’m in, but it’s also something that anyone can access for free, which I don’t get paid for doing, and which takes up a massive chunk of time each week. Between the podcast and then seeing clients and all the other components that go into running a business, there’s just not a lot of time left over.

But I’m aware that Seven Health could be doing much more if there are other options than just doing the one-on-one work that is currently on offer. The goal with taking on another practitioner is also to free up some time to then be working on this, having the time to figure out what that next thing would be and then implementing it.

When I say the next thing, I don’t want it to just be doing another online program because that’s what other people are doing or offering group coaching because that’s what other people are doing, but really figuring out where there is a gap in the market that our skillset can meet. And that may end up being an online program or a group coaching, but I don’t want to simply start at that default place.

This is something that I’ve been trying to figure out behind the scenes for the last year. I’ve been working with a business coach now for nearly 2 years, and it’s been one of the big aspects of the work that we’ve been doing together. But I currently just don’t have the bandwidth to give this the attention that it needs, and even if I could figure out and know exactly what I wanted to do, I just don’t have the time and space to be able to execute it. Bringing on another practitioner is going to be able to help with this by freeing up some time for me, but also getting their input and getting their help in terms of next steps.

It was with all of this in mind that I started the recruitment process at the end of October. It’d been something I’d been thinking about for much longer than then, but that was when I put out the advert.

00:07:15

What happened during the hiring process

Honestly, I was really blown away by the applications. I mentioned this as part of the intro to another episode – I think it was the Alan Flanagan one – but yeah, I really didn’t know what to expect when I first advertised the job.

We got a huge amount of applications, and this was then whittled down to six candidates, which I did the first interviews with, and then from there, it was reduced to two candidates for a second interview.

As part of those second interviews, there was a mock consult, because I think it’s one thing to hear from someone about their views and to have a conversation with them, but it’s another thing to go through a consult and just see how they respond and handle those various situations. I know I talked earlier on about the collaboration side of bringing on another practitioner, but during the consults, they are doing this all on their own. So I wanted to feel confident that they can provide the quality of care that I was after.

In fact, what happened was I actually loved both of the final two candidates. They were both fantastic in the mock sessions, they had solid training and experience, and they are the kind of people I was hoping for when I first advertised for the role. In the end, I actually decided to take on both practitioners, so there will now be three of us at Seven Health who will be seeing clients.

The podcast tomorrow and the one next week are going to be introducing you to the new practitioners.

00:09:00

New practitioner #1

Tomorrow’s episode will be a conversation with Lu Uhrich. Lu is a name that you may be familiar with because she was a previous guest on this show. She appeared in Episode 55 of the podcast – and I will link to that in the show notes, and I would suggest that you check it out.

To quote Lu’s very brief bio, Lu is a Certified Eating Psychology Coach, Body Image Mentor, and Life Coach. She helps women worldwide to grow in self-awareness, find food freedom, and practice body love. Lu graduated with honors from Messiah College and obtained her certification from the Institute of Psychology of Eating. She is the host of the Untamed Podcast and has written for various publications, such as MindBodyGreen and The Beauty Bean.

I’ve known Lu for a number of years, and since having her on the podcast 3 years ago, we’ve kept in contact and had semi-regular Skype catchups. I’m a huge fan of her work and love receiving her emails. Her podcast, Untamed, was incredible. It was how I first heard about Dr. Kathryn Clancy, who then appeared as a guest on the show (Episode 107). I also love her Instagram feed. You can clearly see that she gets it, and her approach really resonates with people.

So when Lu applied, I was extremely excited, and then she interviewed well and was great in the mock consultation, and I’m just incredibly grateful that she applied and she wants to be part of the Seven Health team, because we are in alignment in so many ways, and I know she’s just such an incredible practitioner.

00:10:50

New practitioner #2

Then next week, there will be an interview with Amanda Bullat. Unlike Lu, Amanda was a name that was new to me, but similarly to Lu, I am so grateful that she applied.

A brief educational bio on Amanda: Amanda is a registered dietitian nutritionist. She did her Master’s of Science in Nutrition at Bastyr University and then her dietetic internship at Keene State College. She’s a Certified Intuitive Eating Counselor and Be Body Positive Facilitator. She’s a member of the International Federation of Eating Disorder Dietitians and also the Association for Size Diversity and Health.

Amanda is someone who is very knowledgeable on the science side of nutrition and has extensive training in this area as well as a really solid understanding of Health at Every Size and Intuitive Eating and the ability to guide clients and to help them make the changes that they’re after. You’ll obviously hear more about Amanda and her story during next week’s episode. She’s had her own struggles with food and body over the years, and so has her own experience with navigating her way out of that place and into a more healthy relationship with food and body.

Amanda interviewed really well and was fantastic in the mock consult. She is incredibly down-to-earth and personable and easy to chat with. I’m now on her mailing list, and I’ve enjoyed reading her emails. I love the content that she’s putting out through her blog. So just like with Lu, I’m really excited to have Amanda join the team. We want the same things for our clients and have similar ideas about how to get them there.

I’ve also checked out the work that Be Body Positive does and think it’s fantastic, so I want to chat with Amanda and see how she can start to incorporate this into the podcast and our content, given that she’s done the training and is a facilitator for them.

So those are the two new practitioners, and you are going to hear more from each of them in the next two episodes.

00:13:10

What you can expect from them

Then going forward from there, you’re going to be hearing and reading more from them. They are going to start appearing on this podcast. They will be doing interviews with guests, and they’ll also be doing solo episodes. You may have noticed – or you might not have – that the icon for the podcast has now changed. It no longer contains my photo, but now just says “Real Health Radio presented by Seven Health.” Moving forward, this podcast will become a collective effort. I’ll still be the one that’s providing more of the content, but episodes will no longer be just me doing the interviews or me doing the solo shows.

I think this is a really good thing. I’ve picked practitioners for the roles because they are very skilled and knowledgeable in their own way, and I want this podcast to be able to be a way of showcasing that, but also for you as listeners to benefit from this.

Given this change, I need to change the intro for the show. In the meantime, like with this episode, there’s not going to be any intro music.

So yeah, that is the change coming to the podcast, and then Amanda and Lu are also going to be contributing to the blog and the written content that goes out. This is an area that has been more neglected than I would like, and really that’s been the case since Ramsay was born a couple years ago. I used to be in a routine of putting out one podcast every week and one blog post every week, but since Ramsay came along, work time has been reduced, and the podcast was the thing that I prized the most and made sure continued to happen.

More recently, blog posts have become something that have happened more during an intake period, and then outside of this have been much more sporadic. I know not everyone listens to the podcast, and whenever I do write a blog post, I get emails from people saying how much they enjoy it. So I know that it is an important medium.

So the plan is to have Lu and Amanda start to be involved in writing blog posts and for me, by having weeks of not having to put together a podcast, being able to get back to doing more of the writing – which I really do love, and I have been missing. So I’m excited to have that come back into my life.

00:15:45

Would you like to work with us?

The final thing I want to mention with the show – and this is something I touched on at the start – is that Seven Health is now taking on new clients. This is for slots working with myself and with Amanda and with Lu. There are a number of areas that we are skilled at when working with clients.

One of the bigger areas is helping women get their periods back, so recovery from hypothalamic amenorrhea, or HA. This is often a result of undereating and over-exercising and is almost always coupled with body dissatisfaction or fear of gaining weight. The work with these kinds of clients – as well as really all clients – is a mix of understanding physiology and how to support the body, but also being compassionate and understanding the psychology and uncovering the whys behind these clients’ behavior and figuring out how to change this.

We also work to help clients along the disordered eating and eating disorder spectrum. Sometimes clients wouldn’t think to use the term “disordered eating” to describe themselves, but they see that they’re overly restrictive with their eating, that they fear certain foods, so breads or carbs or pasta or fats or processed foods, they may feel compelled to exercise excessively or struggle to take time off, and/or they find themselves feeling out of control around food and having binges.

With these clients, there are symptoms that are commonly occurring. They could be water retention or poor digestion or always feeling cold or peeing all the time, often waking in the night multiple times or at least once. There can be no periods or there can be lots of PMS symptoms. There can be low energy, poor sleep, low thyroid. Then there’s also common mental and emotional symptoms that come with this – a compulsion to exercise, fear of certain foods, anxiety, low mood or depression, poor body image, fear of weight gain.

With these clients, again, it’s using that same mix of understanding science and compassion to help them recover. At Seven Health, we really believe that full recovery is possible. I’ve had many clients who’ve had multiple stays at inpatient facilities where nothing worked then get to a place where they’re now fully recovered.

The final area is helping clients transition out of dieting and learning to listen to their body. They’ve had years or decades of dieting, and nothing works. They know it’s this failed endeavor, but they’re struggling to figure out how to be without dieting. How do they listen to their body? What should they eat? They’re just confused. With this work, it’s often a combination of Intuitive Eating, a non-diet approach, nutrition understanding, and being able to guide clients towards listening to their body. That helps them put an end to the dieting habits and truly know how to nourish and look after their body.

It’s these kinds of clients that make up the bulk of the practice, and we’re very good at helping these clients get to a place with their food and with their body and even their life that they thought was impossible.

If any of these scenarios sound like you and you’d like help, please get in contact. You can head over to www.seven-health.com/help, and there you can read about how we work with clients, and you can apply for a free initial chat. The address, again, www.seven-health.com/help. I will also include that in the show notes.

That brings this housekeeping style episode to a close. I’m incredibly excited to have Amanda and Lu coming on board for this next chapter for both Seven Health and Real Health Radio. Thank you, listeners, for all of your support and for continuing to listen to the show. Despite the time constraints or time commitments that I talked about the show taking up, I really do love being able to do this. It is mind-boggling that I get to do this as part of my job because I really do enjoy it so much.

If you have any comments or any feedback, we’re always open to hearing them. You can email info@seven-health.com. I look forward to catching you on the next episode tomorrow with my conversation with Lu Uhrich.

Thanks for listening to Real Health Radio. If you are interested in more details, you can find them at the Seven Health website. That’s www.seven-health.com.

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