Welcome back to Resiliency Radio with Dr. Jill Carnahan, where today’s empowering episode asks a transformative question: Can You Rewire a Dysregulated Nervous System? Dr. Jill is joined by Dr. Cat King, founder of Primal Trust™ Academy and a leading educator in nervous system healing, brain retraining, vagus nerve toning, and trauma-informed somatic practices.

In this heartfelt and science-driven conversation, Dr. Cat explains why safety is the foundation of all healing—and why no protocol, supplement, or therapy can work when the body feels threatened. She shares how cultivating genuine safety, both internally and within therapeutic relationships, can shift the autonomic nervous system out of fear and into healing mode.

🔑 Key Topics You'll Discover with Dr. Cat King

① The Importance of Safety in Healing:
⇨ Dr. Cat emphasizes that safety is the cornerstone of healing. Without it, no protocol or supplement can be effective.
⇨ The discussion highlights how creating a safe relationship with patients, starting from a simple gesture like a hug, can build trust and lay the groundwork for healing.

② Autonomic Nervous System and Healing:
⇨ The episode explores how targeting the autonomic nervous system can send signals of safety to the body, influencing the immune system and promoting healing.
⇨ Dr. Cat discusses the science behind safety exercises and their role in shifting the body's response from fear to a state of calm.

③ Identity and Illness:
⇨ A significant portion of the conversation focuses on how individuals often identify with their illness, which can hinder healing.
⇨ Dr. Cat shares anecdotes about patients who have embraced their illness as part of their identity and the challenges this presents in their recovery.

④ Practical Tips for Self-Regulation:
⇨ The episode provides practical tips for self-regulation, including daily practices that help individuals live their values and meet their needs.
⇨ Dr. Cat introduces the concept of “pattern interrupt” as a tool to break habitual thoughts of danger and promote a sense of safety.

🔑 Key Takeaways with Dr. Cat King

① Upcoming Program:
⇨ Dr. Cat announces a new 40-day program designed to help individuals regulate their nervous systems through daily practices.
⇨ The program is tailored for those who prefer learning in micro doses and aims to make nervous system regulation a simple, daily habit.

🔑 CONCLUSION: The episode wraps up with a reflection on the transformative power of safety in healing and the importance of self-awareness and self-regulation. Dr. Cat encourages listeners to explore her resources and programs for further guidance on their healing journeys.

About Dr. Cat King

Dr. Cathleen King, DPT is a physical therapist who is passionate about teaching neuroscience-based practices targeting the brain and nervous system. She is the founder and CEO of the Primal TrustTM Academy & Community. She weaves together brain retraining, vagus nerve toning, somatic movement, and trauma-informed attachment repair techniques in her online, world-wide platform. Her focus is to help people with self-healing from chronic illness and trauma patterns. She personally found freedom from over a decade of debilitating health chronic Lyme disease, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, mold toxicity, PTSD and more and has been presenting as an expert on nervous system healing to both traditional medical providers and mind-body healing communities.

• 🌐 https://www.primaltrust.org/
• 🌐 https://www.instagram.com/primaltrust_official/
  

Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD – Leading Functional Medicine Doctor

Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD, ABIHM, ABoIM, IFMCP is internationally recognized as one of the most respected leaders in functional and integrative medicine. She is dually board-certified in Family Medicine and Integrative Holistic Medicine, and the founder and medical director of Flatiron Functional Medicine in Louisville, Colorado.

Widely known as a pioneer in environmental toxicity, mold-related illness, autoimmune disease, and resilience medicine, Dr. Carnahan combines cutting-edge science with compassionate, root-cause care. Her clinical approach integrates precision genomics, epigenetics, microbiome research, peptide therapy, and lifestyle interventions to transform health outcomes for patients worldwide.

She is the author of the best-selling memoir Unexpected, which weaves her personal journey through cancer, Crohn’s disease, and mold-related illness with her professional expertise. Dr. Carnahan is also the executive producer of the award-winning documentary Doctor/Patient and the host of the popular podcast Resiliency Radio, which reaches over 500,000 global subscribers.

As an international keynote speaker, Dr. Carnahan has been featured at leading medical conferences including A4M, IFM, EPIC, and IPM Congress, and her work is frequently highlighted in major media outlets such as NBC, CBS, Fox News, Forbes, Parade, People, and MindBodyGreen.

With a reputation as both a scientist and a healer, Dr. Jill Carnahan is regarded as one of the top functional medicine doctors in the world, offering a unique blend of evidence-based research, innovation, and deeply personalized care.

The Podcast with Dr. Cat King

The Video with Dr. Cat King

📘Interview Notes

• Nervous System Mastery: Healing chronic illnesses involves mastering the nervous system to stop immune overreactions and regain function.
• Safety Foundation: Establishing a sense of safety is crucial for healing chronic immune and nervous system issues.
• Personalized Approaches: Programs should be tailored to individual needs, avoiding strict protocols that may increase stress.
• Self-Trust Rebuilding: Restoring trust in one's bodily sensations and needs is essential for effective healing.
• Social Support Importance: Safe social connections can enhance nervous system regulation and emotional safety during recovery.
• New Program Launch: A 40-day program focusing on quick daily practices will start on February 2nd, enhancing accessibility.

Notes

Nervous System Mastery for Chronic Illness

The core of healing chronic illnesses like mold and Lyme lies in mastering the nervous system to shift immune overreactions and regain function.

• Dr. Cat King’s Primal Trust program focuses on nervous system mastery using brain retraining, vagus nerve toning, and somatic movement to help people regain function despite ongoing exposure to toxins (08:17)
  • She personally recovered from over a decade of chronic Lyme, mold illness, and PTSD by calming her nervous system rather than relying solely on detox protocols.
  • The program aims to create a new nervous system pattern that stops inflammatory immune overreactions, allowing treatments to be better tolerated and more effective.
  • It offers a comprehensive sequence that supports patients even if they cannot immediately remove toxic exposures like mold.
  • This approach provides hope and measurable gains in function by targeting the autonomic nervous system as the “master circuit board” controlling immune responses.
• Dr. Jill emphasized the necessity of addressing limbic system fear and somatic responses as foundational for healing complex chronic illness (09:39)
  • She shared how shifting from a “fight” mindset to a peaceful coexistence with illness dramatically altered her immune response and healing trajectory.
  • Both speakers agree that a conscious shift away from immune “fighting” to “ordering” reduces collateral damage from inflammation.
  • This paradigm shift is described as a “quantum leap in consciousness” vital for sustainable healing.
  • Dr. Cat highlighted that the nervous system must tolerate discomfort during this transition to retrain immune responses safely.

Creating Safety as the Foundation of Healing

Establishing a consistent sense of safety is the first and most critical step in healing chronic immune and nervous system dysregulation.

• Safety exercises targeting the autonomic nervous system form the cornerstone of Primal Trust and are indispensable for shifting out of chronic cell danger responses (19:16)
  • These exercises send biochemical signals from the brain that tell the body it is safe, even in the presence of ongoing threats like mold exposure.
  • Dr. Cat explained that small, repeated safety signals throughout the day alter the nervous system’s default threat mode, reducing symptoms and immune overactivity.
  • She teaches a “pattern interrupt” technique to consciously break habitual stress and fear loops that maintain sickness responses.
  • Establishing safety internally enables better tolerance of symptoms and prepares the body to respond positively to other treatments.
• Dr. Jill and Dr. Cat both highlighted the importance of safety in patient-provider relationships and home environments (16:49)
  • Trust and safety in clinical encounters, as well as creating emotionally safe home spaces, are essential for patients to relax their nervous systems.
  • Dr. Cat shared client examples where repairing family relationships and creating loving home environments helped break immune-nervous system crosswiring linked to trauma and mold exposure.
  • This holistic view integrates emotional, environmental, and physical safety as inseparable parts of healing complex illness.

Personalized and Flexible Healing Approaches

Healing programs must be tailored to individual nervous system types and needs, avoiding rigid protocols that increase stress for sensitive, anxious patients.

• Dr. Cat’s program emphasizes teaching clients to become their own nervous system coaches by understanding which tools to use and when, based on their unique nervous system responses (24:21)
  • She noted that brain retraining and somatic exercises are not one-size-fits-all and can have opposite effects if misapplied at the wrong stage.
  • The program offers a variety of tools and educates on personality types, allowing patients to choose what resonates and adjust their practice daily.
  • This flexibility reduces the overwhelm and trauma created by rigid, time-consuming protocols common in other chronic illness programs.
  • Encouraging intuitive self-care helps patients avoid obsessive “fix-it” mindsets and promotes sustainable daily nervous system regulation.
• Practical practices include daily check-ins for needs and values, simple breathing, and moments of stillness to foster safety and connection with the body (46:33)
  • Dr. Cat encourages patients to identify what “feels like living” each day, whether it’s a walk in nature or resting with a cup of tea.
  • These small, personalized actions create a foundation of safety and self-trust that supports nervous system healing.
  • This approach counters dissociation and helps highly analytical or type A individuals reconnect with bodily signals and intuition.

Reconnecting with the Body and Self-Trust

Healing requires restoring the connection to bodily sensations and rebuilding trust in one’s own needs and inner guidance.

• Dr. Cat highlighted the insular cortex as the brain region key to feeling bodily needs and self-trust, often offline due to trauma and survival strategies (28:15)
  • Successful healing commonly involves “sneaking in” somatic work to gently tone the vagus nerve and reconnect with the body without triggering dissociation.
  • Many clients report a pivotal moment when they “chose themselves” and recognized their needs, marking a turning point in their recovery.
  • Rebuilding self-trust is challenging because it conflicts with protective patterns like people-pleasing and perfectionism developed in childhood trauma.
  • Dr. Cat’s program supports this journey by combining neuroscience, somatic techniques, and trauma processing to restore primal trust.
• Dr. Jill reinforced that loving and accepting oneself is essential to overcoming illness identity and regaining control (43:00)
  • She explained that clinging to an illness identity validated by diagnosis can trap people in suffering and prevent healing.
  • Letting go of this identity requires internal validation and self-compassion rather than relying on external proof.
  • Illness often signals a need to set boundaries and say no; healing involves reclaiming this power without needing to justify oneself.
  • Both speakers emphasized that healing is a hard but rewarding process of “coming back into your truth” and living beyond illness.

Community and Social Support for Nervous System Regulation

Healing is enhanced by safe social connections that support co-regulation and emotional safety.

• Dr. Cat recommends using trusted friends, family, or pets as co-regulators to help modulate nervous system responses (48:30)
  • She described simple social practices like sharing non-illness-related conversations or playing connection games to foster safety and joy.
  • These interactions provide mutual witnessing and validation, which help regulate stress and reduce isolation.
  • Healthy social rhythms build nervous system capacity and complement internal safety practices.
  • Dr. Jill affirmed that community support is a vital, often overlooked part of chronic illness healing.

Program Accessibility and Upcoming Offerings

Primal Trust offers accessible options to meet diverse needs, including a new micro-dose daily program launching soon.

• Dr. Cat announced a new 40-day program launching February 2nd focused on 5–7 minute daily nervous system regulation practices designed for busy or overwhelmed individuals (51:24)
  • This program delivers simple lessons and practices via email, encouraging daily identity-building as a self-regulator.
  • It complements the more robust full Primal Trust program by offering an easier entry point for those who prefer microlearning.
  • Free resources and a book, How Healing Happens, are available on primaltrust.org to support independent learning.
  • The program maintains a flexible approach aligned with the philosophy of personalized, intuitive healing.

Transcript

00:00
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Hey everybody. Welcome to Resiliency Radio, your go to podcast for the most cutting edge insights integrative and functional medicine. I'm your host, Dr. Jill and with each episode we dive into the heart of healing and personal transformation. Join me as I interview medical experts, innovators, thought leaders of all types helping you on your journey to wellness, optimal performance and longevity. Today's no different. I am interviewing one of my favorite people who has developed Primal Trust. It's a doctor Cat. You're going to hear from her how to regulate the nervous system and really change our programming and identity around illness. Today is one of my favorite episodes for really powerful transformation. And even if you've never been part of her programming, I think you'll really enjoy and get some helpful tips and tricks. So stay tuned. I'll introduce her in just a moment. 

00:52
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
In the meantime, if you don't already know, our clinic is now accepting new patients. We've got a nurse practitioner and a physician associate, both who are trained and experts in chronic complex illness. If you want to know more, you can visit jillcarnahan.com and see their bios. You can always call our office at 303-993-7910. If you want to know more, see if there's a good fit there. But I just want Many people have been told that I'm not taking new patients, but we have a clinic, we're open and we are accepting new patients. So please give us a call and let us know if we can be of service. 

01:27
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
And lastly, if you don't know, I have Dr. Jill health.com where I have correlated and collated all of the products and services that might help you on your journey including products for the microbiome, products for the limbic system, products and services for mass activation, mold related illness and complex chronic disease of all types. If you want to know what's available, just go ahead and Visit the website drjill health.com and if you haven't yet got a copy of my book Unexpected, you can get a signed copy if you order from Dr. Jill health.com you can always get that book anywhere where books are sold, Amazon, Barnes and Noble or anywhere you prefer to get your books. 

02:09
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
However, I will personally sign a copy for you if you order from Dr. Jill health.com and again you can check out our products and services including all of my Dr. Jill Beauty brand there as well. Okay, let me introduce Dr. Cat Dr. Kathleen King, Doctor of Physical Therapy, is a therapist who is passionate about teaching neuroscience based practices targeting the brain and nervous system. She's a founder and CEO of Primal Trust Academy and she weaves together brain retraining, vagus nerve toning, somatic movement and trauma informed attachment repair techniques in her online platform. Her focus is to help people with self healing from chronic illness and trauma patterns and she personally found freedom from over a decade of debilitating health chronic diseases like Lyme, chronic fatigue and mold related illness, PTSD etc. She is also does a practitioner course for free. 

03:01
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
So if you are a practitioner you can get that course and we will include all of that in the show notes. But I know you're going to love this show. Stay tuned. As I interviewed Dr. Kathleen King. Dr. Cat, it is so great to be here with you. I have known of you and your work and we haven't officially met before today, but again we have known about each other and I've always had such a great respect because as we kind of framed right before we got on in my world of environmental toxicity and chronic complex illness, I really don't know anymore of any single patient who doesn't somehow need a help with how does our limbic system perceive disease and how do we have to, how do we actually learn tools to help us regulate? 

03:44
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Because I know that at the very top of my treatment protocols there has to be some of this understanding and awareness because it affects everything. Right. So we're going to dive into that today. But what I want to start with is you. I want people to get to know a little bit about you. I love your work, I'm your biggest fan and I want to know more about how did you get into this work? 

04:03
Dr. Cat King
Work? Yeah, well, it's, it was my story and I really am just taking people on the same journey that I took myself on to reclaim my health once I finally found a path that worked for me. And like so many of those out there, I was someone who was sick for many years over a decade and went from doctor to doctor and tried everything. And I, I actually had kind of a medical background as a physical therapist and I worked with chronic pain. So I had some concept of the brain and how it modulates pain. But no one at that time in that decade ever said that my brain and nervous system were highly responsible for modulating the immune response that I was having to mold and Lyme and the mast cell thing. It was always all about these protocols that I couldn't tolerate. 

04:55
Dr. Cat King
I was that patient that couldn't take the drop of the homeopathic. I was, you know, reacting to everything and so, like, so many out there that feel like, gosh, okay, I've got these lab tests, but now I can't even treat it, and it's expensive and it's making me worse. And that is such a dark place to be in when not even the best doctors can help you because your body is at war with everything, including the treatment. And really, I. I got to this place where, because all of my pathways were blocked in healing. Like, even though I had diagnostic tests and I had good doctors, I had to give up on that path because at that time, it wasn't working for me. At that time, it was a. A bit more of an aggressive approach. 

05:46
Dr. Cat King
You know, about 10 years ago, like, we just didn't know as much. And. And so in that giving up, I decided I just needed to learn to live with it. And I lived in a moldy house, and I didn't have money. We were totally broke, living off from church welfare, and I couldn't afford to move. And so I spent a lot of time outside sleeping in a tent like some people have to. 

06:11
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Yes. 

06:11
Dr. Cat King
And I thought, well, what can I do? And I just decided to try to learn how to live outside side with my kids and be a two little children. And there was something about that decision on giving up the fight. Yes. And this wisdom dropped in. And this wisdom bomb was, hey, Cat, you remember those brain exercises used to teach for chronic pain? You should try them because they might actually be effective against the. The way your brain is responding to Lyme and mold. And I was like, no, doctors told me that. So I started doing something called functional neurology exercises, which were eye exercises that I used for stabilizing the upper cervical spine and helping with chronic pain and brain processing. 

06:59
Dr. Cat King
And literally, within a very short time of just doing these exercises, I was able to handle light and sound and starting to drive. And I wasn't detoxing mold or doing any treatments. And so I was like, what? My brain? My. Like, I can rehab my brain with this exposure. Yeah. Now, granted, like, we cleaned up our environment the best we could. I had air filters. It wasn't like I had black visible mold. And I'm not saying that, but what I am saying is that I did start to improve in the mold without doing detox. And I knew that this was my path. 

07:41
Dr. Cat King
So I started researching everything I could on limbic system, vagus nerve, psychoneuroimmunology, mold, immune regulation around that, and over time put together a full protocol using my background as a somatic expert, physical therapist, neuroscience, trauma processing, and slowly wove a sequence together where I walked out of hell. And got my life back and my function back in that home. Now, I eventually moved away from the home, and that. That's great to move out of mold, like, so if you can do it right, And. And I got a lot of function back in it. And so that's one of my biggest things, is that we have this. This feeling that we are totally. I want to say, like, hostage until we get out of it. And some people are like, but I can't afford to, and I can't tolerate treatments. 

08:37
Dr. Cat King
And I just want to be like, you can have some gain of function in it. And I see it, and it was my story. And so, anyway, eventually I started Primal Trust, which is a full journey sequence. It's a very comprehensive nervous system mastery program. Because I'm so passionate that if you can master your nervous system, you can handle almost anything. You can get your function back. And it doesn't mean you don't clean it up and you don't optimize your body. In fact, it works a lot better if you do both. But, yeah, it's a lot of hope because there's an ability within our own consciousness to turn off that switch of massive inflammatory responses. And then treatments do work better from there. 

09:21
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Wow. Wow. Just wow. Because I hate that you had to suffer. But all of the most amazing people who've created the most amazing transformational programs and work in the world have had to go through. It's the wounded healer. Right? Like, you have that story, and. But, you know, there's so many things, and I'll just comment on a few, and then I want you to dive back in. But number one is, obviously, I deal with a lot of mast cell and environmental toxicity and mold. And in my mind, the mast cells are our protectors. Right? So if there's a fear and there's a somatic thing, like you talked about and like I've experienced, and I would say almost 100% of my patients, there's a fear around mold, and there's literally a somatic experience that even inhalation of a noxious substance stimulates our limbic system. 

10:01
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
So to me, 100% of patients, to get well, have to address that part of it, which is the work that you do. And then second, a quick little personal vignette is, for me, I went through cancer at 25 and then Crohn's at 26. And it was always fighting cancer, fighting Crohn's. And I was the warrior. And I was overcoming this in this, you know, a decade of fighting. And I overcame it. And then in my 30s, I got hit with mold related illness, and I started the same fight. And I literally will never forget the day. I'm on a walk, praying and meditating on that walk, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. Wait a second. If I'm fighting mold, that's exactly what the innate immune system does and creates damage collaterally, right? 

10:42
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Like, so in that mindset, in that where our immune system is totally trying to aggressively get rid of this mold, it actually that's the part that does the damage, right? And I'll never forget that moment where I realized my mental game of fighting was going to kill me, like, literally if my immune system kept fighting. That was the damage to my body from the fight. And I thought, I have to have a different paradigm. And I just started thinking about what could I envision or imagine? And I thought of the little minions from Despicable Me. What if I imagined and every day meditated on minions and they were the happy whistling, not fighting, but they were sick, escorting them all down with this joyful, happy, beautiful way. And literally that started my healing cat. I didn't know primal trust. 

11:28
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
I didn't know all the beautiful work you've done, but on my own little tiny way, I was like, I changed my immune system by meditating on minions because I changed the story, right? And I know you get this, so I'd love for you to take off from there and talk more about your work in relation to the fight versus the like. Because what you did too, is you peacefully existed with something that was very traumatic and toxic, and you still got well, right? 

11:52
Dr. Cat King
Yeah, I love that story because it's not often someone can get out of their. Their survival response, which is if you tend to be like a type a go getter. I'm gonna figure this out. I'm gonna fix it. To do what you did, which was to let go of the fight, is a quantum leap in consciousness. Like, that doesn't just happen without some real alignment and willingness. So I just want to say, like, amazing that you did have that insight. And really that is the shift that in the program I'm ultimately trying to get everyone to make in their own way, is to have that flip, in whatever way it is that we are living, that has caused our immune system to react the way it does. 

12:38
Dr. Cat King
And there's just this principle in life that, you know, as above, so below, as within, so without how we interact with life is training the immune system to interact inside of our body. And unfortunately, in our medical paradigm, we do have the paradigm of fight, kill, eliminate for safety. And then if you have a history of trauma, your brain stem has a paradigm of fight, flee, kill, eliminate for safety. And yet the way to heal is a total 180 from those approaches. And so it requires an incredible inner certainty that letting go of the fight is the safest thing you can do and the most effective thing you can do. 

13:28
Dr. Cat King
And that's why we do so much teaching about that shift in consciousness and to have some type of nervous system capacity on board to see, sit with the discomfort of coexisting with the war inside of you for a little while the immune system gets a different message and gets a different order from the deepest part of you. And you know, like you said, there's this innate immune system that's run by your autonomic nervous system. It's out of your conscious control. But what is in your conscious control is your approach to the illness, to your partner, to your job, to your parents, to your children. And it is all the same. The immune system is, is educated by the way that we live our life. 

14:18
Dr. Cat King
And so if you want your body to stop overreacting and over fighting mold, which you're like, well, no, it's bad. But in our situation it got overreactive. We have to shift the overreaction. And I love what you did because you did brain retraining. You literally visualized the minions. And I did a similar thing. I visualized my soldier cells, my immune cells getting this message like, we don't need to go to war, like that we're actually now killing our own country here. Yes. And we need a ceasefire for a little bit. And then with some discernment, we might have some cleanup of some invaders to modulate the population. 

15:05
Dr. Cat King
But I also said this to my body and I think it was, it's really counter to what a lot of people say is that on some level I can coexist with some of these invaders in my body. Lyme, mold, other pathogens, in that my healing was going to be a harmonious ecosystem where it wasn't about fight, but it was more about order and hierarchy and I believed that I didn't need to eradicate everything to heal. Yes. And to this day, like I just recently took a, a mycotoxin test because, and I hadn't for, I don't know, eight, 10 years because my daughter had a test and it was pretty high and I'm like, wow, do we have an exposure? And I have a significant amount of mycotoxins in my system right now, but I'm able to be in mold, and I wasn't. 

15:55
Dr. Cat King
And I have the HLA genes. I am functioning. So is there cleanup to do? Maybe because I never fully treated it. But my story is you can get your function back, and then you can optimize and improve from there as well. There are multiple paths to healing, but it comes to what you've just said, which is this quantum leap in consciousness of, I'm going to approach this differently. I have to approach this differently. So that was a long rant. I'm sorry. 

16:25
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
That was beautiful. I hit on so many things because it truly does have to be this kind of surrender, like a very conscious surrender. And it's funny because I've done little video clips on, like, you know, you don't always have to move out of a moldy home. And people get irate at me. Right? 

16:41
Dr. Cat King
Yeah, right. 

16:42
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
They're like, what, are you kidding me? You know this about kill me. And I'm like, I know, but what I'm trying to do is create something. Safety, which. That's our next topic. We're going to go there. You queen of safety. But what happens is I see so many people that are in such fear, and I know this to be true until I create safety with the patient. You and your program create safety, or they do it within themselves. There is nothing, no protocol out there or no amount of supplements or things. If there's no safety at the core, like you, that's the foundation of healing, is creating safety. So I'm always trying to put information out there that gives people a sense of maybe there's some other way if they can't move or, you know, it doesn't. 

17:21
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
And granted, moving can be great, and many people do better if they move. However, what if you can't? And then you're in this mindset that, well, I can't heal, and those two don't equate. So let's shift to safety, because this is one of my favorite things that you do. And for me, it's like it starts at the door when I greet the patient and give them a hug. It's like when I create a safe relationship where there's trust, that is the foundation of healing. And you do this so well in your program. Tell us about what you found out. Like, why does safety matter? Hey, guys. Just a quick interruption to remind you if you haven't yet taken a peek at my documentary. It's now available on Amazon Prime. It's called doctor Patient Movie. 

18:00
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
You can find it on Amazon prime or you can go to doctor patientmovie.com you can watch it for free on YouTube or Tubi. And many of our patients and people who listen to the show have written in and just told me how profoundly it impacted their life and their health and just knowing that they're not alone in this journey. So if you haven't yet checked it out, go ahead and check out Doctor Patient Movie. You can get it at Doctor Patient Movie.com or on Amazon Prime. Let's get back to our show. 

18:29
Dr. Cat King
Yeah, well, I, it honestly, there's a little bit of science to the safety that I always teach. And I really love Robert Navio's model of the cell danger response. And ultimately, when you're in these kind of chronic conditions, you're in something called an ongoing cell danger response. And when I read his research about how to shift out of that by targeting the autonomic nervous system so that the autonomic nervous system sends these signals of safety to the cells, to the mitochondria, and then that shifts the expression of the immune system, I was like, oh, so that's why, like, doing breathing exercises and silly little, I mean, safety exercises are going to seem so silly. You're going to be like, how can this really help me heal from mold and Lyme and all these things? Like, this can't possibly be enough. 

19:19
Dr. Cat King
But it is, because safety exercises target your autonomic nervous system. And that is your master circuit board of your body. Your autonomic nervous system goes to every single cell and organ of the body. And if that nervous system is moving from a state of vigilance, protection, fear to I'm okay right now. Enough. I'm okay, enough right now. It's safe to start feeling safe. Even with this invader. It's safe to breathe and let myself have some joy, even though I'm having some suffering. The autonomic nervous system starts to send a different message and there's a different biochemical cocktail from your brain. That subtle shift can make a massive difference in your symptoms. And when I realized that, wow, if I can just keep targeting the motherboard, my autonomic nervous system throughout the day in small ways, that's actually going to shift my entire experience. 

20:18
Dr. Cat King
It was fascinating because I'm someone who resists doing safety work for like 10 years because I was like, no, I got to fight this. I've got to figure this out. I didn't see the value in safety. And so honestly that's the most important step in my program is seeing the value of safety. Because just telling someone, well, you need to feel safe is almost a cliche thing. They're like, yeah, yeah, well after I fix the mold and all that. But I'm like, no. The value in that being your primary objective is it's everything. It is everything, you know, letting your doctor kind of figure out what the protocol is. But your protocol is self regulation and bringing in moments of it's okay to be right here, right now. It's okay to connect to this person. 

21:05
Dr. Cat King
Even though I'm feeling uncomfortable, it's okay to let what is in my body be here for a little while. Because when we're just trying to escape and crawl out of our own skin, that will not ever allow this immune over response to shift. Especially the mast cell thing like you said, that is, it's, it's massive. So people are often shocked when I introduce and safety is easy. It's, it's easy. It's not rocket science. When I show them the beginning, we can talk about it. The first thing I always help people learn in primal trust is something called the pattern interrupt. And the pattern interrupt is like a mini safety switch that you turn on and off, turn off all day long. And what that is it's interrupting the habitual thought about how dangerous your situation is. 

21:56
Dr. Cat King
The habitual research of Google, the habitual ruminating over what you just ate that might have made you feel this way. So the pattern interrupt is a conscious practice of recognizing that what you're thinking and believing is likely creating more stress chemistry and saying, oh, let that go, letting that thought go, letting that meaning go. And right here I'm just going to be like, yeah, I've got kind of a weird reaction after eating lunch. Okay, Got the weird reaction like, oh, the lab test showed that today. Okay, you have to let these things be here. So the pattern interrupt is what you did, which is. Allowing the symptoms to be there and shifting into a different operating mode instead. And so that's the first step of safety is interrupting the habitual resistance response and fight response. 

22:49
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Wow, I love it. And what I also love is you are so good at taking complex topics and bringing them down. Even now you can hear. I'm sure all the listeners agree. It's just so great of how you simplify these concepts and make them very like, oh, yeah, that makes sense. My history. I'm a super analytical thinker Right. So I want to figure everything out. And it's not always like the fear loops, although that's involved too. But historically, when I've gotten ill or didn't feel well, immediately like, okay, what was the trigger? What happened? How can I go back and fix it? And I want to know, like, what led up to this? And to figure out what the trigger was so that next time I can avoid it. 

23:23
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
And just like you said, often I'll find myself now just being with this discomfort or. And now even I go to a hotel and get a mold hit. Or, you know, I go. The other weekend I was at a friend's house who had a natural gas leak, and I got really sick, and it took me a while to figure out it was natural gas. But stopping that and maybe just being like, yeah, I don't feel good. I'm not sure what it is, and I don't have to figure it out would be one of those ways to kind of be with that. Now, one thing I love about your program, and there's a lot of other programs out there that I think is different. I see a lot of patients who are already in a more OCD state. They're anxious. 

23:58
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
They're just like me as far as obsessively figuring things out. And they're also already the type A. So they, you know, you give them a protocol, and then they're like five hours a day trying to follow that. And I find sometimes that's very stressful to the system. And a lot of the other programs, I think, different from yours are very protocolized, where they say, you must do this for three hours a day, and if you don't, you're not going to get well. And to me, that actually adds to the fear because all of a sudden they're like, stuck in another thing that's prescribed. And for them, sometimes I'll start with like, go get a massage. Go get, like, receive something that is not about you thinking through it. 

24:34
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
But how would you say that your program is a little different from that and that granted, they're still like, you need to practice these things, but it's not. So from my experience with your program is it's very different from this very dogmatic thing that creates more trauma in the patient who's already OCD and type A. Right? 

24:52
Dr. Cat King
Yeah. Yeah. Yes, Good question. So my goal is that, like I said, that you learn about nervous system work from so many different angles that you become your own coach and you decide which tools are resonant with you. So I teach a lot of different tools, but even more importantly, I teach a lot of education about which tool to use when. And so I'm not just telling people what to do, I'm empowering them to understand the ins and outs of their own nervous system and the way that they work. Because, for example, brain retraining is not a one size fits all. And for some people, starting with brain retraining is disastrous. And so I teach you like this personality, this type, we don't start here, we start here. 

25:35
Dr. Cat King
Or if you're having this kind of reaction from somatics, then you need to be doing this. And so it's very nuanced. And that's because I was so nuanced, I realized that I needed different tools at different stages. So really our program is, it's a lot of different approaches and more importantly, it's an overall understanding of the different types of nervous system responses and which tool fits that type. And so. And you might also find that yes, sometimes your nervous system practices. I'm just going to be in nature today because that's actually what my body is craving. It's ultimately like, how can I live and what can I be doing that does send signals of safety? 

26:16
Dr. Cat King
And you might be someone that says, you know, when I go for a walk in nature, I feel so blissed out, more so than I do with brain retraining. And I'd say, great, a walk is something you do today and tomorrow you'll check in and be like, oh, actually today I actually feel like just staying and being cozy and doing some breathing exercises versus some protocol because that, it just hits that same personality again. As you're broken, you need a protocol to fix you, versus this intuitive awakening that we're trying to unlock for people that would have kept them likely out of the storm in the first place had they been in touch with their inner compass of, of what they needed and how they needed to self resource. 

27:01
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Yeah, okay, I want to go there because if I look back at my history in medicine, medical school, to survive, we had to dissociate, or at least I did. I was a super highly sensitive person, didn't know it, and I went to a crazy, masculine, driven, really brutal kind of system. And in order for my sensitive nature, which I didn't even know it back then, to survive, I really dissociated and I kind of like went all into my head. And what you're talking about is when we're all in our head, which works for a while, we don't really feel in our body. And we. For me, I lost touch with the signals that would have told me, you're working too hard, you need to rest more. You maybe need to take a break or whatever things that. 

27:39
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Because the body speaks right, it'll say, oh, I'm tired today. Take a rest. And then we can fulfill those needs. How do you take someone who is very analytical, like my past self, and maybe a little dissociated from their physical body because I think and tell me if I'm wrong, but that feels like that's so critical to healing, to get back into touch like you said, and know through the signals our body gives us. But how do we reconnect that? 

28:04
Dr. Cat King
It's a great question. I'm going to bring in some science again because like you, I was a little smarty pants and I needed science to convince me behind what I'm going to tell you. So when I first started teaching brain retraining, I was like, okay, this is a great method and it is calming people down. But I felt with certain people it was missing something. And I saw them actually get this habit of distraction and dissociation into fantasy land. I'm like, okay, what's going on here? So I did some research and I learned a lot about the insular cortex. And when I learned about the insula, I was like, oh, this is the big daddy. I just knew it. And what the insula does is it's helping you to get in touch with your gut insulated instinct. 

28:49
Dr. Cat King
And a healthy, functioning insula has this beautiful communication with your prefrontal cortex to help you feel your needs and meet your needs. And when I read this, I was like, yes, as important as a limbic system is, this is the. This is the downstream effect of an insula that's gone offline because of trauma. People pleasing survival strategies. And so when I first started teaching, I'm like, mark my words, in five years, the insula cortex is going to be really understood to be what needs to be addressed and rehabbed. But here's the thing. A lot of people, when they are so dysregulated and you try to start to get them to feel their needs or to feel their body, their protection responses, the dissociating response is so stealth, it won't let you do that. 

29:35
Dr. Cat King
So I have learned that I need to sneak into that by the back door. And so we carefully, like, tone the vagus nerve and we do a little bit of limbic retraining and we start working on the insula carefully, meaning that biofeedback loop and those that heal. In my success interviews and I've had people full healing from Crohn's and rheumatoid and mast cell and all the things, they almost always say this. I said, what was the turning point? They're like something clicked where it felt like my needs came online and I finally chose me. I'm like, what do you mean? They're like, I knew what I needed, I knew what I didn't want. That came online and that's when everything changed. Yes. 

30:23
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Wow. Again, so profound and so clear in how you explain that. And I so resonate because I in my journey post divorce, there's a lot of self healing and somatic work in therapy. Not so much physical, but it actually manifested with far more physical healing than any of the physical supplements and things that I ever did. And a lot of it was around that I realized that if I didn't trust myself, I couldn't heal and I couldn't use that intuition. So there's like this trust you have to build with. Like often we trust everybody else's wisdom except for our own. And the truth is our innate bodies have so much wisdom to tell us what direction to go. 

31:01
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
And I'm not always great at this, but I try to every day with my patients, check in with them because I know that they have more knowledge if they're in touch with their bodies than I do about what's right and where to go and making sure that they feel aligned and that they feel. But this whole trust, and it's also important because if you don't love yourself, if you have self loathing or you have attachment issues or trauma where somewhere there's this like, I don't like myself. I don't like this part of myself. I don't like what I'm going through. It's almost impossible to trust yourself if you don't first love and accept yourself exactly as you are. Right? 

31:36
Dr. Cat King
Yeah. Well, what's the name of my company? 

31:39
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Oh yes, duh. 

31:41
Dr. Cat King
Primal Trust. Let's talk about that. 

31:43
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Yes, let's do. 

31:44
Dr. Cat King
So when I was doing this healing work and I was starting with brain retraining, vagus nerve toning, and I was starting to dislodge a lot of trauma because that's what's going to happen, you guys, when you start putting safety into the system, stored energy is going to bubble up. So it can get a little worse before better. I want to say that anyway, I had a mentor who was going through the Sound healing training. And she said, hey, can I practice some sound healing on you? I'm like, yeah, I'm going through a lot of trauma responses right now, please. And she started playing the sound bowl over my body and this frequency, this vibration filled my body and I was like, whoa, that's the feeling I've been looking for my whole life. I go, what's that feeling? 

32:26
Dr. Cat King
She goes, oh, the name of this sound bowl is called Primal Trust or the Earth's resonance, the Schumann's resonance. Okay, how do I recreate that feeling in my body? So I decided that everything I was going to do was to recreate my primal trust that had been lost as a child. And so you are spot on that it comes down to trusting yourself. And there are some, you know, physical parts of our body that have to come online for us to have access to that. So, you know, and it's a journey. It is a journey to regain your trust. And it's going to go against a lot of your protective strategies because we believe sometimes as children that we're better off and safer. People pleasing, being perfect, working really hard, or sometimes distracting. 

33:16
Dr. Cat King
And so if you're starting to come back into your body and not people please, your limbic system is going to freak out. It's going to try to protect you. And getting into trust is, it's not easy. It is a hard won war to come back. Yeah, I say the word war, maybe I shouldn't, but it is a. You have to hold steady in what feels like a war of withdrawal, of the old way to sit and be unapologetic with your truth. And I'm telling you though, it is worth every moment of discomfort and the shakes and what feels like a heroin withdrawal. Getting off from the old way of surviving to come back into your truth. 

34:01
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Yeah, oh gosh, that's so important. And again, very similar to you. I had trauma around just the people pleasing and the being good and doing the right thing and, you know, not upsetting anyone. I'll never forget with boundaries and starting to learn. What does that mean? And I, I for a long time thought, oh, I can set a boundary and not upset anyone. And I was like, oh, wait a second. A boundary by nature is probably going to. And I didn't like to upset. So all those things are learned. And again, I know you work through that with people, but I really like talking through this because many people may have mold related illness and have no idea that these core safety issues, these childhood traumas of whatever the things that are they actually. 

34:41
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
And I've even seen a lot of times where there might be trauma in a childhood, like even a big T, you know, abuse or some really difficult situation. And just to be clear, I've had little T traumas. I've never had horrific abuse, and thank God for that, but many people have. And they might have had it in a moldy basement or in a moldy home, and then there's this linking of the trauma to that exposure. So then it. Actually, you want to talk a little bit about that, because I think that's fascinating. 

35:06
Dr. Cat King
100%. So when I was first coaching, I noticed this theme with people with mold illness, and it was my story. And almost like, without fail, a lot of them had family trauma and had mold around their environment while they were going through emotional upheaval. And so the immune system, you know, it's. It's feeling both the emotional triggers from family or from abuse, and it's also sensing mold at the same time. So it can get crosswired. And, you know, you grow up, and then all of a sudden you're in a stressful situation again, and you're in another moldy building. And now the system's like, oh, my gosh, the same thing is happening, and it goes into. A full protection response. 

35:54
Dr. Cat King
And so because of that, one of the ways that I would coach people out of this reaction was you've got to find a way to have more harmony in your relationships, because relationships and mold are crosswired. And so. And. And your home, you want to set it up in a way where you love your home, you love being in your home, you want to make it look, even if it's imperfect, you want it to be as beautiful and as pleasurable as much of a sanctuary. And in your interactions in your home, you want to do what you need to heal, whether that's therapy or whatever it is. But this. This. This mold relationship, cross wiring is massive. It's massive. I had one woman who literally was living outside in the woods naked because she couldn't wear clothing because she was reacting to everything. 

36:48
Dr. Cat King
And I started working with her, and we identified some of this stuff with her upbringing with her dad. And I said, if you want to heal, this is something I just feel really strongly for you, that you've got to find a repair with your dad. And she was so resistant. And I'm like, you know, I just. I'm just really feeling this. But she did. She went through a. A lot of work with her dad. And the moment she said the moment that she was able to like basically let him off the hook, you know, and, and it's not about like making it okay, but she was, she allowed a new relationship to form and she said, oh, I can now like wear clothes and I can come back inside. And it was an instant, like obvious connection. I thought that was really cool. 

37:36
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
That is so powerful. And I've seen those things too when someone heals, which is interesting because I am not a psychotherapist, but I know enough to listen carefully and send people to programs like yours, or to a true therapist or whatever kind of person that we need. Because I often see those healing pieces are crucial to the mold related illness. So the mass activation and it's, we all need to work together on that. So I really love, love that. You know, I've heard you say the top down or bottom up approaches. Do you want to, for those who are curious about what does that actually mean? Give us a little definition of that because I think that's really powerful too. 

38:11
Dr. Cat King
Yeah. So as you start to get into the nervous system world, you're going to hear the term this is a top down approach. Or you'll hear this tool is a bottom up approach. And what that means is that it's the direction that the signal is being sent. So a top down approach means you're targeting your brain, usually your limbic system or your prefrontal cortex. And the goal is to get your brain to send a signal into the body that is safety or a better biochemical message. So that would be top down, bottom up means that we're doing a practice that targets the body and often like the vagus nerve of the body or some type of like somatic, which means body, some type of area of our body where we can tell we're holding on to tension or trauma or discomfort. 

38:52
Dr. Cat King
And you're targeting that part of your body and practicing feeling safe in your body. And then the body also sends signals via the vagus nerve back up to the brain. And so you're trying to get the body to send a signal to the brain of like, oh, I'm a little safe. And then when the brain gets the signal from the body, the brain's like, oh, okay, we're safer. I'm going to send a safety signal back down. So there's this feedback loop that can help you move out of a stress response. So that's top down, bottom up in. 

39:17
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
A nutshell, makes perfect sense. And it's kind of equivalent to like cognitive behavioral therapies. Talk Therapy, you're going to use your brain to send messages or reprogram, whereas somatic experiencing is more. And again, there's many more than just those two. But I feel like from 20, 30 years ago when I was in training, it was all cbt. And now we realize, oh, wait, but then there's still power in like, you know, it's still okay to do a mantra or to write your journal or use your mind, but so it's good to think about both. Another thing I want to talk about before we kind of wrap up that I think is so powerful is identity. 

39:51
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Because so many of my patients and even myself before I started to think about Minions and change the programming, if we identify like I am a cancer survivor or I am, or there's often this thing that becomes who we are. And once again, just like the safety, I find that people, if they truly believe they are their illness, they're never going to heal. I'll never forget, I've said this on the podcast before, but I had a patient who literally on her license plate had lupus. And I thought, sweetheart, that's not going to help you because if you have this identity on your license plate about your illness, you're probably not going to get over it because, I mean, then what do you do with your license plate? 

40:28
Dr. Cat King
Yeah. 

40:29
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Do you want to talk a little bit about identity and identity? 

40:31
Dr. Cat King
Yeah, I want to share why I think that we take on these identities. And how do you, first of all, how do you know you have this? Usually within the first several conversations of meeting with someone, you'll bring up that you have this. You like to let people know. It's something that in your daily life with your family members, you're usually talking about how you feel and you're talking about it with them. So. Meaning it's a daily conversation and it's often a way that you end up bringing into a conversation pretty soon after meeting somebody. That's one indicator that you've got this illness identity. Now why do we do this? I. I was this person. Okay? So talking about myself when we have had trauma and it has gone invalidated in our life and it wasn't seen, it wasn't heard, it wasn't acknowledged. 

41:21
Dr. Cat King
When we get a, an authority figure who gives us a piece of paper with a diagnosis that says this is why you are suffering, and now you have proof from me, this authority to you that this is why you suffer, there is a deep cross wiring that can happen with our traumatized part that says, see everyone I'm not lying. I'm suffering and this is why. And it's been validated by an authority, so you don't have to take it from me. My doctor has showed me and my lab tests prove it. Now that leap of putting those two things together was something that I, I fought against for years. And the truth was that I could see that I was holding on to that validation for my suffering because what happened to me as a child was never allowed to exist and have happen. 

42:15
Dr. Cat King
And this was something that I needed everyone to know. See, I suffer and it's valid and this is why, because I have this diagnosis. So I'm not wrong and I'm not lying and I'm right to have this upset. I had to go through this painfully difficult process of validating myself and knowing that yeah, I had a suffering as a child and it wasn't being acknowledged, but I know it and I'm having some suffering now. And I don't need that paper or my doctor or anyone to know to be validated. I do validate that this is difficult and it's this internal mothering, fathering that has to happen. A new relationship that has to come online to let go of that white knuckle grip of that diagnosis and give yourself the permission field to go back into life as a whole person. 

43:14
Dr. Cat King
That's not about illness and sometimes you might have suffering alongside of it, but you don't need everybody to know it and justify it. A lot of times our illness is our way of being able to say no when we're a people pleaser. It's our way of like not working too hard. And so we get to practice saying, I choose not to do that and I'm not even going to tell you why or I don't need to say it's because I'm not feeling well. So there's a lot of practices that are all about self trust, self validating and recognizing that all you need for that validation truly is yourself and that you can be in the world and have this big beautiful life and sometimes you're going to feel uncomfortable and that illness identity doesn't need to run the show anymore. 

43:58
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Oh, that's so every little bit of this is so powerful. Two things come to mind that I'm sure people can relate to out there. One is that if anyone has had abusive childhood or difficulties, so often the anger is directed towards the parent who didn't protect you or didn't hear you, not the abuser. Right? So there Might be a family member or someone else who's the abuser. But our anger or our actual healing is often more tied to the one parent, father, mother, whoever that didn't either hear our pain or didn't protect us. And it's exactly what you're saying is like that whole idea of back then we didn't get heard or seen or protected can go into this identity. But see, and I have that all the time. Can you write me a note about this? 

44:38
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Can you prove to someone that I have this? And I see that patterning and I get it, there's deep compassion because we both, you and I both have experienced it. But I love being really clear so that if those people listening out there are starting to be like, oh yeah, that's kind of me. So, so powerful. And I even think back. I met my ex husband at 19, married at 21, three stepchildren, medical school. Like it was insane. I don't even know who that girl was who did it all. And I got cancer three years into it. And I know without a doubt there's a piece of that. That was my body saying, jill, if you can't set a boundary, I'm gonna freaking give you something that will cause you to have. 

45:14
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Like, I look back, I'm like, no wonder my body was trying to be like, please give me a break here. And again, I loved that part of my life. I loved my steps. And it wasn't like a. But I wasn't able to say no. And I was completely over committed to all of these things. And my body was like, no, we're gonna set a limit. And I got cancer. 

45:33
Dr. Cat King
That's right. It's our illness really is. Gosh, it is such a beautiful awakening back to self. It's a, it's a hard one. And I'm telling you, everyone that I end up interviewing, when they're on the other side, they say, I wouldn't change it. 

45:49
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
I got myself back 100, all of my stuff. But there's no way I'd be in the world where I am without those teachers. Right. So in our last few minutes, can you give us a few practical. I want to talk two ways. Like say we're alone or we would just like sit self regulating behaviors or tips that we could do in five or 10 minutes. And then I want to go to community and how we could use other people to help us regulate. 

46:12
Dr. Cat King
Yeah, sure. First of all, one of the things that I teach is that it's so important to live your values every day. So what that looks like or meeting your needs is at some point in your day, you're going to do a check in. This is that practice of igniting that insula and you're going to either say, what do I need right now? I've got, you know, half hour here. What. What do I need? And is that a cup of tea? Is that to just sit and watch some birds outside? Is it to take a little nap? Is it to move my body? Is it to read a favorite book, what do I need? Or you know, it's some type of check in, just some way, or what would feel like living? 

46:52
Dr. Cat King
So another one I would say is what could I do that feels like living? And I was always like, I want to turn on some music and move my body in some way because I loved dance. And sometimes I was on the floor doing it because I didn't have any energy, but that would feel like living. Or sometimes I'd go outside and like lay down by the lavender plants and watch the bumblebees and that felt like living. What is living? You know, maybe it's playing a game with your kids, but something where you're meeting a need and you feel like you're living. Those two things will bring so much safety. Now also, just throughout the day, anytime you can just stop and do a few breaths with a long exhale. It doesn't need to be rocket science. 

47:30
Dr. Cat King
It's just an inhale and an extra long exhale, just a few of them, where you're gonna practice just feeling your belly, feeling your back on the chair, looking at something beautiful outside. Just a stillness moment. And the intention while you're doing this is everything gets to be here as it is. Whatever you're feeling, the pain, the weirdness, the whatever, it gets to stay for these few minutes. And it's a practice of allowing with just a conscious breath for a few minutes. What was the next question? 

48:08
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Community. Okay, that was. Oh yeah, that was so important. I don't want to lose it to the next thing. But the next thing was, I think if we have safe partners, family, friends, pets, we can use other people in a healthy way. I mean, not like using to help us regulate. And what might be a way that we could, someone that we trust and love, that we could actually ask for their help to help us regulate. Is there some ways we can co regulate? 

48:30
Dr. Cat King
Yeah. You know, one of the things that I used to do with my friend is, you know, there's these games where like you can like ask each other Questions to, like, get to know each other. I would. We would play that game because she also had an illness and we would get together, but we would ask each other things that wasn't about our illness and connect over those things and laugh over those things. And so it's important to. Yeah. Your. Your discovery cards, you know, discovering your friend and saying, hey, I want to get to know you a little better. Can we spend 30 minutes just having, you know, tea, whether it's virtual or together. And, you know, everybody loves to share about themselves. Everybody loves to be seen and witnessed. 

49:07
Dr. Cat King
And so you're off also giving to the person that you're co regulating with. And so that. That was one of my favorite things to do. 

49:13
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Oh, I love it. I have tons of those little boxes of cards. I'm the one who brings us to the party. Like, can we go deep? 

49:18
Dr. Cat King
Yeah, can we go deep? 

49:19
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Oh, my gosh, I love it. Kat, I could talk to you for hours. And I just really want to say publicly I appreciate the work. I'm sorry you've had to suffer, but it's been so beautiful what you've done and transformed and how you've used that to catapult you into this work. Because I know many of my patients have benefited and many more will continue. So first of all, just thank you for being in the world and who you are and what you're doing. So, yeah, thank you. And thank you for making it a super proud. You have a really beautiful way of explaining things and making them just very practical and not overwhelming. I just thought of one little thing that you said. And for. On my mirror in my bathroom medicine cabinet for years, I had this little sticky note. 

50:00
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
It was messy, it was just scrawled, and it was, what does she need from me today? Meaning my sweet little girl who's done, you know, healing. And it was so powerful to ask that question. And there were so many times where I'm like, oh, it. Oh, I need a nap. I need a. Because when we haven't had that in our lives and we're relearning it's when I first started to relearn. What do I need? I'd be like, I don't know. I don't know what I need. I was so out of touch. So those little notes and reminders can be so. Something that simple. What does she need from me today? Or what does he need? My little boy need for me, if you're a man or whatever. So love that. Love your practical tips. 

50:36
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Where can people find out more about your program and about your work and sign up to be part of it. Yeah. 

50:41
Dr. Cat King
So primal trust.org is our website. I have a lot of free resources. I have a book that I wrote called How Healing Happens. You can download it on my website. It's. It's super beautiful and it's going to teach a lot just for free. And also we have. I just created a new program which you might be interested in. It's coming out February 2nd and it's going to be 40 days of five to seven minutes, a day of a practice and a lesson that I've made. Super simple because my current program is very robust, which I love, but it's not for everybody. So if you're somebody who likes to learn like in micro doses or you're super Busy, it's a 40 day daily regulate program and you just push play on your email. 

51:24
Dr. Cat King
It's going to come and you just push play and that way every day you're doing a little bit and you can start to develop the identity that I'm somebody who regulates my nervous system every day. And it's easy. So that'll come out February 2nd. 

51:36
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
I love that. And as you're hearing this for probably just of a piece few weeks away from that release. So we'll make sure and include if you're driving or doing anything. As I always say, all this will be in the show notes. And you're on Instagram too. I always love videos. 

51:47
Dr. Cat King
Primal Trustor official on Instagram. Perfect. 

51:50
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
Perfect. 

51:51
Dr. Cat King
And YouTube. I have a YouTube channel with lots of free videos too. Yeah, same thing. 

51:55
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
You'll find we will include all of those links there. Cat, thank you again for being who you are in the world and using your difficulties to really transform the lives of so many. Oh my goodness. I hope you guys enjoy that interview with Dr. Kat as much as I did. I have long admired and used her work and recommendations to my patients and many of my patients have sung her praises and gone through her program. So I hope that even today if you're not part of the program that you gain some just valuable insights in dealing with complex chronic illness. And on this one in particular, if there's someone you know or love who's suffering with a complex chronic illness, mold related Lyme disease has, will you please share this with them? 

52:34
Dr. Jill Carnahan, MD
I think it would be really powerful to share the insights that Kat had today. So hopefully you guys have enjoyed the show and I will see you again next week. We release a new episode every week. If you haven't yet subscribed. Hit the subscribe button and I will see you again soon for another episode of Resiliency Radio.