After stepping away from the podcast in October 2025, I’m so grateful to be back with you. Before moving forward into a new season, I wanted to take this episode to share honestly about why I needed to pause, what unfolded during that time, and what this season has changed for me.
Thank you to everyone who reached out with prayers, messages, and encouragement while I was away. Those words meant more than you know.
Quick Look at This Podcast
- ✅ Title: Rebuilding Health Without Quitting Real Life | 496
- ⭐ Why You'll Love It:
- If you’ve ever had life force you to slow down when you didn’t plan to, you'll understand why I had to step away from the podcast and what my family walked through during an unexpected health season.
- If you’re trying to juggle home, family, and responsibilities while feeling worn down, I talk about how this season reshaped the way I think about health, stewardship, and sustainability.
- If you’re overwhelmed by health advice and don’t know where to start, I share the small, realistic changes we made that helped reduce inflammation, stress, and exhaustion without turning life upside down.
- If you’re in a hard season right now, I offer encouragement and a reminder that progress matters more than perfection, and it’s never too late to begin caring for your health.
Why I Needed to Step Away
Last fall, I was dealing with a severe case of tennis elbow that left me unable to use my right hand. For anyone who cooks from scratch, homesteads, writes, and teaches for a living, losing the use of your dominant hand is incredibly limiting.
At the same time, something far more serious was unfolding in our family.
In September, my husband received a kidney cancer diagnosis.
Hearing the word cancer is a gut punch. It stops you in your tracks and forces you to reevaluate everything. With both of us in significant health challenges at the same time, continuing at the same pace simply wasn’t possible.
An Unexpected Diagnosis and a Clear Answer
What makes my husband’s diagnosis remarkable is how early it was caught. His tumor was discovered incidentally during scans for an unrelated issue. It wasn’t something anyone was even looking for, and he had no symptoms.
The cancer was classified as stage one, the tumor was small, and surgery in December was successful. All margins came back clear, his kidney function was preserved, and no radiation or chemotherapy was needed. We will continue with regular scans, but we are deeply grateful for how clearly God’s hand was in the timing of all of it.
A Season of Reevaluation
Walking through health crises has a way of clarifying what really matters. During that time, we began asking hard questions about our pace of life, our commitments, and whether the way we were living was sustainable long-term.
This included evaluating big areas of life, including work, homesteading responsibilities, and projects we had taken on. It wasn’t about quitting everything, but about asking whether these things were truly serving our family and our health in the best way.
Health as Stewardship, Not Perfection
One of the biggest shifts during this season was reframing health as stewardship. Caring for our bodies isn’t about vanity or obsession. It’s about responsibility. We cannot push through endlessly, even in good pursuits like homesteading, while neglecting physical, emotional, and spiritual health.
We realized that regardless of the diagnosis, changes needed to be made.
Where We Started
We began by focusing on inflammation, stress, and overall load on the body. That meant looking closely at nutrition, toxin exposure, sleep, hydration, digestion, and nervous system health.
Rather than overwhelming ourselves, we focused on foundational support first. Nutrition became central, especially anti-inflammatory and gut-healing foods. We addressed stress and sleep before turning to supplementation. The goal wasn’t perfection, but consistent, realistic changes that fit real life.
Some of the changes were surprisingly simple.
- Adjusting morning routines to better support hormones and cortisol.
- Eating protein before coffee instead of starting the day with caffeine on an empty stomach.
- Making choices that reduced stress rather than added to it.
These weren’t dramatic overhauls, but small daily shifts. Over time, those small changes compounded.
After four months of intentional changes, the difference has been significant. My inflammation has gone down, I can wear my rings again, and I have full use of my hand back. While it’s not 100 percent healed yet, the improvement has been dramatic.
Both my husband and I feel better overall, with improvements in energy, sleep, and resilience. This journey has reminded me that healing doesn’t have to be rushed to be effective.
A New Season and a New Focus
This experience is what led to the creation of the Whole Health Reset Challenge.
It brings together everything I wish I had understood sooner, addressing nutrition, stress, sleep, detox pathways, and nervous system health in a way that works for busy families.
Enrollment opens February 6, with the challenge beginning in March. I’m excited to share more details soon.
Moving Forward With Hope
If you’re walking through a hard season right now, I want you to know you’re not alone. It’s never too late to start caring for your health, and small steps truly matter.
Homesteading should support your health, not compete with it. My hope moving forward is to help bridge that gap, so your home, kitchen, and rhythms of life work together to strengthen both your body and your calling.
Thank you for being here. I’m grateful to walk into this new season with you.
