268. Savvy Business and Health & Wellness Tips and Journey to Overcoming Infertility with Laura Jean Bell
1 Corinthians 10:31 NIV "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God."
Today's episode includes some thematic material. I want you to be aware before you listen in the presence of little ears.
*Transcription Below*
Laura Jean Bell is a believer, storyteller, writer, wife to her high school sweetheart and mama to three miracle babies.
She is a published author of You Can Always Come Home by Laura Jean Bell, in addition to being a Business and Social Media Coach.
Laura also overcame stage 3 endometriosis by taking the road less traveled and now she spends countless hours helping other women take that road with her!
Connect with Laura on Instagram: @laura_jean_bell
Questions and Topics We Discuss:
What are a handful of practical tips you can offer others, especially as it relates to digital marketing?
Will you share your research on Minerals: How do we even determine what minerals we need?
Will you leave us with a few more social media tips?
Thank You to Our Sponsor: Midwest Food Bank
Other Episodes Related to This Topic from The Savvy Sauce:
33 Pursuing Health in the New Year with Functional Medicine Specialist, Dr. Jill Carnahan
132 Pursuing Your God-Given Dream with Francie Hinrichsen
256 Gut Health, Allergies, Inflammation and Proactive Solutions with Emily Macleod-Wolfe
266 Female Sex Hormones, Periods, and Perimenopause with Emily Macleod-Wolfe
Connect with The Savvy Sauce on Facebook, Instagram or Our Website
Gospel Scripture: (all NIV)
Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”
Romans 3:24 “and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”
Romans 3:25 (a) “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.”
Hebrews 9:22 (b) “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”
Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Romans 5:11 “Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”
John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
Romans 10:9 “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Luke 15:10 says “In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
Romans 8:1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”
Ephesians 1:13–14 “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession- to the praise of his glory.”
Ephesians 1:15–23 “For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”
Ephesians 2:8–10 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God‘s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.“
Ephesians 2:13 “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.“
Philippians 1:6 “being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
*Transcription*
Music: (0:00 – 0:10)
Laura Dugger: (0:11 - 1:25)
Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, where we have practical chats for intentional living. I'm your host, Laura Dugger, and I'm so glad you're here.
Today's episode includes some thematic material. I want you to be aware before you listen in the presence of little ears.
Thank you to an anonymous donor to Midwest Food Bank who paid the sponsorship fee in hopes of spreading awareness. Learn more about this amazing nonprofit organization at MidwestFoodBank.org.
Laura Jean Bell is my guest today, and she is a Jesus-loving author and also a business and social media coach. So, not only is she going to share some of her best savvy social media and business tips, but also the conversation takes a detour into health and wellness, and she has an abundance of wisdom to share there as well, even including practical tips that we can implement today for our own flourishing in health and well-being. Here's our chat.
Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, Laura.
Laura Jean Bell: (1:26 - 1:27)
Hi, thank you for having me.
Laura Dugger: (1:28 - 1:34)
I'd love for you just to start us off by giving us a snapshot glimpse of your current life right now.
Laura Jean Bell: (1:35 - 2:27)
Oh, my goodness, my chaotic life. Actually, it's a sweet, beautiful thing, but I am a wife to my high school sweetheart. We have been married, this year will be 11 years, and we have three kiddos. Emmylou, who is six. She literally just turned six. My son Oaks, who is three, and my youngest is Lottie, and she just turned nine months. So, my life is very full. I own my business, I am a published author, and I have three very, very needy children, right? I'm in a season of life where I'm very, very, very needed, and that's a beautiful thing, but it can be a very overwhelming thing at times. So, that is a little snapshot about my day-in and day-out life.
Laura Dugger: (2:27 - 2:43)
That sums it up well. Gorgeous kid names, by the way. Oh, thank you. But I'd love to hear more about your business, too. Would you mind just explaining the work that you get to do as a digital marketer and online income mentor?
Laura Jean Bell: (2:44 - 4:58)
Sure. Okay, so, this has been such a fun journey for me, and just to maybe explain it in like a Reader's Digest version, because I think that there's so much on the internet right now that's like, make $5 million in four minutes. But what I do is actually help business owners.
So, like the average woman who maybe is wanting to build an income or find her place online, that was where I started. That's where I began, like really helping those women be like, “Hey, I can be a business owner, too.” I can actually have like a mark and a place in this space, which I think is often really hard for women to like grasp, because we're so inundated with influencer culture.
But as the business began to expand and grow, I really started to lean into how do I help business owners actually market their business and make it really profitable online? Because a lot of times there's business owners that have these great businesses, but they don't actually have the marketing piece to actually sell the thing that makes their business a business. And some of them have a brick and mortar, and they're brick and mortar as well, but they'd love to increase their income.
How do you do that? You get online; you make sales online. And so, what I do is I teach female business entrepreneurs how to scale their business using Instagram.
I do not focus on any other platforms. My main focus is Instagram and teaching them how to use their messaging to make sales consistently. And so, I help them figure out their messaging and then write it.
Actually, I write content for a lot of my clients. And then I teach them consistency and speed so that their life isn't just consumed by the internet, which is like what all of us feel, right? Like, once you get on, you're like, how do I do this?
And I have to create this, I have to edit this, I have to do that. Like, it becomes very overwhelming. And so, what I do is I just eliminate the overwhelm.
I simplify it and I help entrepreneurs really find their messaging.
Laura Dugger: (4:59 - 5:15)
Wow, that's incredible. So, you clearly have a gift for communication and articulating different things. Is there anything you want to just give us a little peek into practical tips if somebody is running their own social media?
Any tips you'd have for business owners?
Laura Jean Bell: (5:17 - 6:59)
I think that the biggest, the greatest understatement that's happening right now online is followers and views mean absolutely nothing. They are like the beginning of Instagram, the beginning of social media. It was all about like, how many friends do you have?
And then it was how many followers do you have? And you know, how many views are you getting on your stories? And you get all these interactions on your reels.
And like, while that is the mental game of social media, and that is the thing that everybody is going for, because it actually fuels this like dopamine hit in your brain. But the reality is, is that there are people with thousands upon thousands of followers that are making $0 on the internet. And what they need is the actual messaging that says, “Hey, this is how I serve this pain point, and give you the life you want.”
And so, the biggest thing is, if you have five people in one day that view your stories, and three of them actually buy from you, like, that's over 50%. So, you're looking at, while everybody is freaking out about the number, it really is about your messaging in order to convert to sales, you can have a bunch of eyes on you. But if you're not serving the people that are following you, and serving them towards a sale, it doesn't mean anything.
So, don't focus on the numbers, focus on your messaging, focus on your brand, focus on what it is that you are serving your people with. And you will make money, you just will. It's how it works.
So, I hope that answers your question. Well for you.
Laura Dugger: (6:59 - 7:26)
But yeah, I love it, because it's so unexpected, I would have never known. And I've also heard you encourage people to share their stories rather than just stating facts. And you share your own story, both online and in your book, You Can Always Come Home: Following the Breadcrumbs of Your Past to Find the Hope for Your Tomorrow.
So, Laura, how can we all incorporate stories into our own work so that we can better serve others?
Laura Jean Bell: (7:28 - 8:59)
That's such a good question. And I think the biggest thing is, what story do you want people to know? What story is it that like, you really think like, you've been pricked, right, by the Holy Spirit, like, this is the story that I need you to tell.
This is why you walked through this experience. This is why you're doing this thing. Because oftentimes, we can negate the things that we've walked through, and act as if like, those things didn't, weren't that big of a deal because you survived it, right?
Like, oh, well, you know, it wasn't anything, it was a big deal, right? And so, what are the things that you actually feel are important, they keep showing up, they keep becoming the things that people are asking you about? And how do you tell that story to where somebody hears the messy middle, and then the beautiful resolve, the beautiful ending to that story, because there is, right, the beginning, the middle, and the end.
And that's what makes stories so impactful. Facts tell, right? Like, anybody can tell you that, like, a carrot is orange.
But like, if somebody tells you the story of how the carrot became orange, or how this, like, what the soil does to all of this, and how it adds these nutrients, doesn't that make you like, appreciate a carrot more, want to eat a carrot more, want to go buy the carrots more, right? And so, the same goes with our story, like, what is it that actually happened to create this specific result?
Laura Dugger: (9:00 - 9:11)
That's so good. Well, and speaking of stories, are you willing to walk us through a little bit of your own story with your health journey? Yeah, absolutely.
Ask me anything.
Laura Jean Bell: (9:11 - 9:16)
I'm an open book. It might scare some people. I'm an open book about it.
Laura Dugger: (9:17 - 9:33)
I appreciate that. Yeah, just, you're clearly a very healthy woman. But I know you've had a whole past that you've walked.
So, has health always been important to you? Or at what point of life did you start to make some changes because it wasn't working?
Laura Jean Bell: (9:35 - 14:24)
Yeah, you know, it's so interesting. When I reflect on something like that. Um, you know, I grew up in a home, I always start with this, like, my mother was not a dieter.
Like she didn't diet all the time. She wasn't always like, on some workout trend or not eating carbs or not doing this. Like it was never that.
My mom is naturally like very, very, very thin. And so, like that wasn't a part of the conversation. My mom was always obsessed, though, with, like eating food that's good for you.
Like, and in the 90s, like that was really tricky, right? Because they were so many messages about like, what's good for you? What's not that is bad.
Like there's all these things. And while our household, I say was probably much healthier than the average household in the 1990s and early 2000s. I don't think that I ever like cared about my health.
I still ate the Hot Pockets and the Easy Mac and ramen noodles and every opportunity that my parents actually let us eat out like I was chowing down. So, when I reflect on like my years, like 0 to 18, all I cared about was just consumption. I was like, nobody could stop the amount of food that I could consume.
I'm five foot eleven (5’ 11”). I was growing like crazy. You can ask my family like I could out eat anyone.
It was kind of unbelievable. So, that part of my life, like, that was not an unhealthy thing. College is when things began for me.
And when I went to college, I for most of my life, I was a competitive dancer. So, like, I was consuming but I was burning like it was like calories in versus calories out. I had no concept of that.
I did not know how to read a nutrition label on the back of a box until I was like, well into college, like, literally remember learning how to do it in a college health class. So, I go to college. And I noticed that I started gaining weight, right?
Like, I'm eating all the fast-food options that are in our student center. And then the cafeteria food. This isn't my mom's home cooked meals anymore.
This isn't the mostly healthy option anymore. And I start gaining weight. So, when that happened, I started hearing other girls talk about what they were doing.
Like, oh, well, you just eat less than exercise more. And like, I had no concept of like, what, what did that mean? Right?
Like, do you just not eat like I love to eat, right. And so, what I started doing, I didn't know how to like lift weights or do anything. So, I started running, because I thought, okay, I have endurance, I danced forever, like, you have to have that endurance with that.
So, like, I'll run. So, I start running. And I completely gave up meat.
I was like, well, I can just eat. I thought meat somehow made you fat. I don't know.
That was just some weird thing that I had in my head. And I stopped eating meat, and I ate less. So, like, I just kind of narrowed down what I was eating, and then ate less of it kind of thing.
And that was when my health problems began, was when I began doing that. Which is really interesting, right? I was probably eating roughly like 1000 to 1200 calories a day, but I was running four to six miles a day.
So, like, I was not fueling what I was burning. Although I was losing weight. So, like, calories in versus calories out, like the concept of like, just eat less than exercise more, it was working.
I was 19. Like, I was young, I had a like, everything was working right, you know. But all of a sudden, my body was like, you're depriving me.
And I'm not only being deprived of actual calories, I'm being deprived of nutrients. And what began to happen is it started to show up in my hormones, with my cycle, started breaking out in hormonal acne on my chin, I started having very short cycles. So, like, for any woman listening that maybe doesn't have a concept of this language, because oddly enough, so many women don't, and it's like about us.
But like, a woman has a cycle, your period isn't your cycle, it's the full month that's your cycle. And I was instead of 28 days, I was having 18 day cycles. And the pain during my period was excruciating.
It was so painful. And I'd never experienced that before. So, those were the things that began to show up.
But I just kept going with what I was doing. And just thought I just had bad periods. I had family members that had bad periods, this just must be genetic. And I just have to live with it and pop ibuprofen every 18 days, right. So, that was kind of where it where it started.
Laura Dugger: (14:25 - 16:04)
Let's take a quick break to hear a message from our sponsor. Midwest Food Bank who exists to provide industry leading food relief to those in need while feeding them spiritually. They are a food charity with a desire to demonstrate God's love by providing help to those in need.
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Midwest Food Bank also supports people globally through their locations in Haiti and East Africa, which are some of the areas hardest hit by hunger arising from poverty. This ministry reaches millions of people every year. And thanks to the Lord's provision, 99% of every donation goes directly toward providing food to people in need.
The remaining 1% of income is used for fundraising, cost of leadership, oversight and other administrative expenses. Donations, volunteers and prayers are always appreciated for Midwest Food Bank. To learn more, visit MidwestFoodBank.org or listen to episode 83 of The Savvy Sauce where the founder David Kieser shares miracles of God that he's witnessed through this nonprofit organization. I hope you check them out today. Was that the point that led to what you call your year of rebellion? Or did that come later?
Laura Jean Bell: (16:05 - 23:39)
No way that that was just the start of basically, roughly eight years of undiagnosed endometriosis. So, what started happening is in college, I would have these what I call episodes where I would be roughly like a day or two before my period would start. And I would have this unbelievable pain that would come over me.
And I could feel it literally my lower abdomen, so much pressure, so much discomfort. Oftentimes, it would involve vomiting, passing out, so painful. To this day, I've had an unmedicated birth.
And I'm here to tell you that the pain of pushing out an almost 10-pound baby, and that were roughly the same thing. It was unbelievable, excruciating pain. I would go to the doctor, they would not give me ultrasounds, they would not check anything, they would not even do my blood work, they did nothing.
They would just say you have really painful periods, and we'll give you birth control. That was every year from 2010 until 2017. This was what was given to me.
And so, in 2017, I was on my way to work, and I had one of those episodes. And I called the doctor, they bring me in, and I said, I want an ultrasound, like I will sit here all day, I need an ultrasound. And so, they did an ultrasound and found two cysts on one ovary, one on the other, and they were six and seven centimeters and six centimeters.
I mean, it was just crazy, these large cysts. And they were like, you more than likely have endometriosis. This is, you know, they started explaining all the things.
And fast forward, I ended up having two laparoscopies, which is the surgery to remove endometriosis in 10 months, the average woman can go 18 months between surgeries, and I had mine in 10 months. That's how reoccurring rapidly it was growing and spreading in my body. And I felt zero relief from the surgeries, which everyone promised, like, you'll feel amazing, you'll, you know, you'll get pregnant. I couldn't get pregnant. I was in so much pain, and I go through another cycle of it.
And it's like, these doctors are like, yeah, you're probably just not going to be able to have children. We recommend you getting on birth control, or getting a hysterectomy, like, these are your options. And so, what I did is I went to see a fertility specialist, like anybody would do like, I'm not going to just stick with my OB. I'm going to see if I can actually have kids. And so, I see a fertility specialist, I go through multiple, multiple, multiple rounds of fertility treatments, and I wind up getting pregnant with my first daughter, Emilu.
So, she is a product of folly stem stimulation and an IUI. And lots of trigger shots and lots of synthetic progesterone. I did all of it.
And after my daughter was born a year postpartum, I got pregnant again, and I miscarried that baby. That baby was miscarried March of 2020, which is when everybody went crazy, right? 2020, like who has their 2020 story, right?
And so, my daughter was little, I mean, she was like 14 months old, when I had this miscarriage. And I remember watching, I watched this video, it was called The Pandemic. And a lot of people like didn't actually see it because it was taken off the internet for misinformation.
And it was a woman that was explaining what was really happening with the pandemic, which is funny, because all of it's true now. But it was taken down like, she's crazy. This is a horrible pandemic, nothing was created in a lab, all of that.
And I was like, I went to watch it again, because I thought this woman must be crazy. Like there's no way that this would actually happen. And I went to watch it again.
And it was taken off the internet for misinformation. And this thought came over me, which is so bizarre now. Like, I know more about Kim and Kanye's divorce, than I know about what's happening with this pandemic.
Yet, Kim and Kanye's divorce information is there for me to see. And they're not letting me look at this. Why?
And it was this very strange thing that came over me. But everything that came out that was like, don't take this medicine to help COVID, don't do this, actually, like saturated fats are bad for you, like all of these different things that were popping up. And people were saying, it's misinformation.
I was like, I'm going to research that. I'm going to research that. I'm going to research that the fertility doctor that did my DNC after I had a miscarriage. They actually said to me, you will never again, have another pregnancy.
But if you do, you will not have a normal child. That is what they discovered and decided about me, according to the results from that DNC, what happened to that baby, why that baby wasn't developing, why I lost that baby. It literally like, and him saying that to me, I was like, why?
And it was almost like he couldn't explain to me the reasons why, but that I just never would. And this is what I needed to do next in order to stay healthy and keep endometriosis away. And so, I went on this journey for one year and I committed to one year where I was like, everything that is misinformation, I'm going to research it.
Everything that I have been told is good for me or is the best choice for me because of my condition. I'm going to actually look at what they're giving to me and like, why? Um, every time somebody told me like endometriosis is incurable.
Okay. But like, what is endometriosis? Nobody actually explained to me what it was.
They just told me I had it and that it caused what it caused, not actually what caused it. And so, when I went on this journey, I began to discover and unfold so many things that absolutely blew my mind, broke my heart, made me very angry because as I began to implement the things that I discovered, I healed and I got better. And all of a sudden I don't have endometriosis anymore.
All of a sudden I'm pregnant with a very healthy baby. All of a sudden, like everything is better. How is it that the things that the providers that were working with me, what they were doing for me was keeping me sick.
And as I branched out and did all the things that they said was absolutely crazy. I had one of them literally looking at me and he was holding topical progesterone and he was like, this stuff, like with all due respect to this functional doctor that talked to you, this stuff doesn't work. And unfortunately they sell things to people like you, young women who are desperate for answers.
They sell this stuff to you to make so much money and it's not going to do anything for you. Guess what? Topical progesterone changed my life.
So, anyways, that is kind of a little bit of like my year of rebellion and what happened. I'm happy to go into details for you, but I feel like I'm getting long winded with it.
Laura Dugger: (23:39 - 24:13)
No, that's incredible. I do want to do a deep dive into it because I think it's such a blessing after you've spent over a year researching this and then living this for multiple years. I think it can be such a benefit to each of us.
And I'm recalling this story specifically about toxins where people were saying that means nothing. But in that fertility clinic, somebody told you, there was a sign that said their employees were not allowed to wear certain toxins because quote, it could inhibit the fertility process.
Laura Jean Bell: (24:14 - 24:14)
Yes.
Laura Dugger: (24:15 - 24:16)
Can you elaborate on that?
Laura Jean Bell: (24:17 - 26:18)
Yes. You know, what's really funny is I went to the health department to get some paperwork and stuff for my kids the other day. And, um, there was a sign up that was like any and all women that are getting mammograms, if you're getting a mammogram, do not wear perfume or deodorant for a mammogram because of the radiation mixed with the toxins.
I asked the woman that was sitting there, I was like, why did they say that? And she explained it to me and I was like, oh, okay. So, why aren't you telling us to stop wearing it altogether?
Um, but when I went to the fertility clinic, I was going through fertility. I was like an avid Daisy by Mark Jacobs perfume where I don't know. I still love the way that smells.
It's the yummiest, but I would wear it all the time. And I went in and the woman that was there, she was like, you smell so good. And I was like, it's Daisy by Mark Jacobs.
She was like, I wish I could wear perfume to work. I'm not allowed to. And I was like, why not?
And she was like, oh, because like the people that are working on women who are going through fertility, getting their IU eyes. So, it's like when they're actually inseminating you, like we, it could inhibit the fertility process. She was like, have you ever noticed we don't have any candles?
Like we're not allowed to bring candles here, all of that. And I was like, why aren't you telling me to stop doing that? Is that not interesting to anyone?
Like why is no one paying attention to the fact that like, I'm walking in here with perfume on to get an IU eye that's going to fail because it inhibits the, for the fertility process, like the one that works. Uh, guess what? I wasn't wearing any perfume.
So, it's like, it's one of those things that like, when I heard that, I thought, well, what is it that messes with the fertility process? Like what, what is that? And this was honestly, when I heard this information, this was before my year of rebellion.
So, like, I remember her telling me that and I kind of stopped wearing it to the sessions because I thought, well, I don't want to get this messed up anyways.
Laura Dugger: (26:18 - 26:29)
So, yeah, pretty wild. That's incredible. And okay.
So, from that year of rebellion, what other tweaks did you make small and large?
Laura Jean Bell: (26:30 - 29:38)
Oh man. Um, some big things like I removed toxins from my home. So, that looked like removing Clorox wipes and, um, detergents that are just like your average detergents that you buy from the store.
Um, I stopped burning candles and started burning, not burning, but diffusing essential oils. Um, from there, what I really started focusing on was my protein intake. Um, I spent so many years vegan, vegetarian, refusing meat, refusing proteins.
And those were the years that things were really bad for me. When I started to reincorporate animal proteins and quality animal fats, my cycles went from 18 days to 29 days. I started having painless periods.
My hair started growing more. Um, my nails wouldn't break. Um, my, even my vision got better.
And so, what was really interesting is I started learning that if you are protein deficient, you will be progesterone deficient and progesterone is the pregnancy hormone. This is the hormone you have to have in order to conceive. I always tell it like this progesterone equals pro gestation.
So, if you don't have enough progesterone, your baby cannot survive the first 12 weeks. That's what the baby lives on before the placenta is formed. You have to have progesterone in order to balance out the estrogen progesterone balance.
If it's imbalanced, that's where you have pain, mood swings, acne, discomfort, the growth of endometriosis and PCOS. These things are really important. Progesterone is so important for your mental health.
If you are mentally low, like think about your progesterone levels. Think about how much you're sleeping. If you're sleeping in complete darkness, that raises your levels.
If you eat at least 80 grams of protein a day, it raises your progesterone levels. These are two really basic things. Like it's really simple.
It's not complicated. So, that was probably the biggest thing for me was learning how to eat because for years we're told, at least all of my life, like fat is bad. They would rather you eat hydrogenated oils and I can't believe it's not better than actually eat grass-fed butter.
Why? Why is it bad for you? When you really uncover the work that was done in the studies that were given for explaining that fat is bad, it was all paid for.
It was all paid for by the medical industry, by big pharma in order to push this agenda. They said that it was bad for our hearts, but get this, in the years after they told everyone that it was horrible for heart health, heart disease skyrocketed as people began to eat less animal protein and less animal fats. So, anyways, just to give like a little, some of the things that I discovered and changed, that's the main thing, which really and truly is like not that complicated.
Wow.
Laura Dugger: (29:39 - 29:45)
Yes. Focusing on what you're intaking. What about cortisol? What did you learn about that?
Laura Jean Bell: (29:46 - 32:21)
So, cortisol is like your get up and get crap done hormone. Okay. And when you are living in a state of fight or flight, where basically you get up in the morning, I'm going to give you an example of what a lot of women do.
And they end up having issues with cortisol and eventually stop producing it altogether. So, a woman gets up in the morning, she wakes up, she drinks a cup of coffee with no food on her stomach. And she goes and does a 30-minute cardio workout.
And then she comes in and she eats maybe like a protein bar, like a little, like some type of granola bar, another cup of coffee. She goes to work. She works all day or she's home with her kids all day.
And by the time she's got her work done, or she's taking care of her children and fed her children, doing all of these things, you're going all day long. All of a sudden it's three o'clock and you haven't eaten anything and you're in a bad mood and you're really tired. And so, maybe you go get a snack and another cup of coffee.
And then by the time you get to dinner, it's the only meal that you've really sat down and had for the day. Okay. So, what has that done to you?
Your body believes because your body and your brain don't know the difference between a bear chasing you or you running strictly on caffeine and doing too much cardio. And so, all of a sudden she is moody. She's exhausted.
She's running on all this tension. Her hair starts to fall out. She gets acne.
Her skin's doing some weird stuff. Her nails are kind of brittle. All this, you're always moody.
You're always in a bad mood. It's because your cortisol is doing this. It's like, and it's like on, it's like high.
And sometimes when you keep doing this, you actually can get a lot of energy. And then all of a sudden your adrenals, because your adrenals are what produced cortisol. Your adrenals are like, actually we're done.
Like stop running from the bear. Just die. Like literally it like can't do anything for you anymore.
And you go into what a lot of people call, or doctors call adrenal failure, which is where your body doesn't even produce cortisol anymore. And so, that is when you can't get out of bed in the morning. You're so exhausted.
Um, you can't lose weight. You, no matter what you do, you're winded. You're overwhelmed.
Um, but you don't have energy for anything. You have so much brain fog, um, so much bloat and inflammation. It's because your body's not producing cortisol.
So, you don't have the energy to get anything done. Um, does that answer your question?
Laura Dugger: (32:21 - 32:45)
Yeah, this is so interesting because I feel like there's a whole health movement right now. So, there's a lot of buzz about all of this and people, I think, especially after 2020 people are waking up. So, love gathering perspectives as you're talking about inflammation then too, with cortisol, have you researched much about grounding, like actually barefoot on the earth?
Yes, girl. Are you kidding me? Absolutely.
Laura Jean Bell: (32:46 - 35:48)
Um, so, something that was really interesting, I went to see a specialist, um, when I was really healing my adrenals, because a fun fact for you, like when your adrenals are just in overload, if you are experiencing high cortisol, you're constantly up here. Guess what? Your body's going to throw out the window fertility because what in the world is safe about a body that is running from a bear?
Like, no, your body is preserving you because it's not safe for you to host a life. So, I was seeing a doctor who was really helping me. Um, it's called muscle testing.
So, they test each organ according to how your muscles respond. And, um, I was in adrenal failure. And at this point I'd already had my second child and was experiencing a lot of inflammation.
I couldn't lose weight. I was like so tired. I was irritable.
And, um, I did this long session with him and I was in St. Pete, Florida doing this session. And he said, you have an assignment for the rest of the day. And I was like, okay.
And he was like, you need to go to the beach, like go somewhere and actually lay your entire body down on the sand. He was like, I know, like nobody wants to get sandy, but like lay on the sand. And I was like, tell me why.
And he was like, if you lay on the sand, it's your body touching the earth. And God gave you the earth as a battery pack. And this battery pack literally is going to shoot energy back into your body that your body has been deprived of.
And like, there's, he started going into all the studies for it, but he was like, don't you ever know the difference? Like, and how you feel when you've been cooped up at work all day. And then like, you go on a vacation to the beach and you sit on the beach and you put your feet in moving water.
He was like, it's literal living water. This living water moves and it heals and rejuvenates what happens to water that stagnant. It gets disgusting. Yeah.
It turns to mold, right? It actually goes toxic, but that moving water is healing. It's living.
It's rejuvenating. It's very biblical, right? And then you have the earth that God gave you is this battery pack.
There are people, this is going to sound crazy, but there are who have done LSD, like psychedelic drugs that talk about the vibrations of the earth. When they're on this drug, they are seeing the way. And they talk about there's a magnetic field.
They like, you can read, you can watch videos. You can see studies of people who did LSD, who literally can see the energy that the ground gives you. I mean, it's crazy, but isn't it like the Lord, right?
To give us what we need in nature, like magic.
Laura Dugger: (35:49 - 37:17)
Yes. Where we're going back to the way that he designed, whether that's eating whole foods or getting outside in his beautiful nature. There's countless benefits, but I think it's just amazing that taking your shoes off and being on the earth, even for 30 seconds is beneficial.
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You had also talked about previously with your health journey, being deficient in minerals, I think you said as well, or just not getting the nutrients. So, are there any minerals that we all are likely lacking or any that you would recommend from your research and experience?
Laura Jean Bell: (37:18 - 39:36)
Yeah, I would, I mean, every mineral. The most underrated mineral right now is potassium. The amount of women who are potassium deficient and need more potassium is unreal.
But magnesium is huge. You have to have magnesium for your body to even naturally produce vitamin D. Like vitamin D is a hormone, but you have to have magnesium for your body to produce vitamin D.
How many have gone to the doctor and they're like, you are very low in vitamin D, right? Well, get in the sunshine more, take the supplement, but like, where's your magnesium, right? And so, magnesium, potassium, potassium is huge, especially for your mental health.
This is really going to help you in like balancing out, like you're removing the brain fog, really. Sodium, which everyone's like, eat less sodium. You need less sodium chloride.
You need less table salt. You don't need less salt. Your body has salt.
Your body needs salt. Think about what your t-shirt looks like when you drenched in sweat. It dries and what does it have?
Salt. It's salty, right? When you're sweaty, it's salty.
And it's because your body actually needs sodium. It has to have it. And so, stop using white table salt, like iodized salt.
Go get some quality Celtic salt, like really simple, but put that in your water. Like first thing in the morning, drink some water with some Celtic salt, like get those electrolytes back in your system. So, potassium, magnesium, sodium, and calcium, like your body needs calcium and you can get calcium in multiple ways, um, multiple ways, but calcium is going to support your bones.
It's going to help support your muscles. Cause if you are working those muscles, your body needs the strength. And so, calcium is going to give you that balance as well.
It's fantastic. So, all of them, but like, I think the make sure you're getting magnesium, just like if you just need to start somewhere, just get a magnesium supplement. I recommend magnesium glycinate because it's kind of the overall magnesium.
Laura Dugger: (39:37 - 39:44)
So, it's great. Okay. And you said you can get calcium multiple places.
Do you take that as a supplement or where do you get your calcium?
Laura Jean Bell: (39:45 - 41:04)
So, I actually do adrenal cocktails. So, that is, um, coconut water, orange juice and Celtic salt. That's it.
And just do a little adrenal cocktail in the morning. And in the afternoon, make sure that you have had protein before you drink it, because if you're anything like me, it'll spike your blood sugar. Um, if you're not balanced, so, you need to be balanced.
Um, I've always been very sensitive to things like orange juice, apple juice. Like as a kid, I would feel really bad in the mornings and I just thought breakfast made my stomach hurt. And actually it was like, my blood sugar was dysregulated from the cup of orange juice and the cinnamon toast that my mom gave me.
Right. So, like, it's like butter, sugar, white flour, orange juice, like eat this for a nutrient dense breakfast. And I like would feel horrible after because my blood sugar was off.
So, um, make sure you get some protein on your stomach and drink the adrenal cocktail. Like my parents, my parents swear by it. My dad's like, this has changed my life.
I'm your mom's going to make me one of those little cocktail things that you tell, I tell her about all the time. It's hilarious. And I'm like, it's just juice and coconut water, but it's got the minerals.
That's why it makes you feel so good. It's because it's giving your body the nutrients that it needs.
Laura Dugger: (41:05 - 41:17)
That's incredible. Are there any other biohacks, health hacks, even the role of light that it plays or movement or anything else that you want to recommend with your extensive research?
Laura Jean Bell: (41:18 - 43:19)
Um, I'll give two things. Uh, number one: if you can get up as the sun is rising or a little bit before and actually go outside and stare at the red light. The actual, morning sunrise, and then watch the sunset. If you can get your eyeballs on just like the surroundings where that red light is hitting, that will do wonders for the production of melatonin in your gut.
It's going to help you sleep. It's going to help you sleep really good at night, which is going to help you with your progesterone levels. So, that is great.
Number two is weightlifting. If you can incorporate at least two days a week of heavy weightlifting into your routine, it's going to do wonders. And the reason I say that is that estrogen, toxic estrogen, not the estrogen that's good for you that you need to like make you female, but like the toxic estrogens you're getting from perfumes and food and plastics and all the things it stores itself in fat, in visceral fat.
And so, the best way to burn fat and build muscle is by lifting weights. And so, if you want to keep toxic estrogens out of your body, step number one, get rid of fat, like fight hard for like, I mean, I'm still postpartum. I'm still burning off like weight that I gained in pregnancy.
But the number one thing that motivates me is not like, I want to look better, which of course I want to look better. Of course I want to fit back into my clothes, like all of that. But like Laura toxic estrogens store themselves in this fat.
And so, what, when you are lifting weights, you are burning fat and building muscle to support your family and not be burdened by the imbalance of your hormones. Like right there. That is the reason why.
So, lift weights. It's so good for you. It protects you from so many other diseases, but like that alone, women do not understand the power of that.
It's going to do wonders for you.
Laura Dugger: (43:20 - 43:47)
Okay. This is so helpful. And then I'm thinking it's beneficial to have a specific plan.
So, as we think about where you talked about laundry detergents or limiting toxins, will you share a few of your personal favorite products? And then also what are some recommended things we can actually eat? Like when you walk through a healthy breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack, what would you share?
Laura Jean Bell: (43:49 - 45:22)
Okay. So, some favorite products. I started out using Thieves household concentrate.
Young Living sells it. And it's like $26 for a bottle of the concentrate. That concentrate can be household cleaner.
So, like it can clean any surface in your home. It can be used as dishwasher detergent. So, we use thieves instead of like pods in our, in our dishwasher.
And I'm here to tell you, I think Young Living just came out with dishwasher pods, like Thieves dishwasher pods. We don't use it. We still use the concentrate.
But we use that. You can use it in your laundry so you can wash your clothes in it. And so, we alternate with that.
Sometimes we use that. Sometimes we use Molly's Suds. Those are like little pods.
You can get them on Amazon. It's a non-toxic option. You can also wash your clothes and like baking soda and vinegar, like just be old school.
Your clothes won't smell like vinegar. Don't worry. Like the vinegar gets rid of the odor.
That's like how our grandparents did it. So, those are some really simple hacks. Just because that's inexpensive.
Like you can make 16, I think it's 16 bottles of household concentrate, like spray with the one bottle. So, like you buy the one bottle, it takes a cap full and then you fill the rest of the way up with water and it cleans anything. It's fantastic.
It smells great. You'll love it. What else did you ask me?
Laura Dugger: (45:22 - 45:28)
Food? Yes, food. Like a sample menu. Okay.
Laura Jean Bell: (45:28 - 47:02)
Something that I love to eat. I love to just really enjoy my food. Like if you're on the go, like I'll give it an example.
If you're on the go, I recommend like boil some eggs. Okay. Take like three boiled eggs.
Get like a chopstick to get your protein and like an RX bar. RX bars are going to have the carbs, but it's also going to have more protein. You'll get six grams of protein per egg and then about 10 grams in your chopstick.
So, it's like 18 grams of the eggs plus 10 is 28 grams plus the RX bar. You're going to get over 30 grams of protein and then you'll have some carbs. I do recommend getting a little bit more carbs, but if you're on the go and you're in a hurry and you need to feel balanced, that's a good start.
If you're home, like I love doing scrambled eggs and air frying sweet potatoes, peppers, and onions. It is delicious. Just trust me and season it with garlic powder and salt.
It's so simple. Some avocado oil and literally just allow, like think about all the carbs, all the protein, everything. The best hack though, that I learned with eggs is do two regular, like the full egg and then do two egg whites and then add cottage cheese to your eggs, blend it in a blender and then cook them and just thank me later.
So, you're getting extra protein, it's creamier, it's so good. And then eat that with sweet potatoes and peppers and it's primo.
Laura Dugger: (47:02 - 47:12)
Okay. This sounds amazing. I love it.
And this is my post recording meal, the RX bar. I love it on busy days.
Laura Jean Bell: (47:13 - 48:27)
Yes. For lunch, I mean lunch, I honestly, I keep like ground beef patties just ready. And my air fryer stays on. I literally use it for every meal.
Sometimes if I don't have it ready, I just pat it out, put it in the air fryer, it cooks. Do that with a bunch of veggies, get lots of fruit, mainly berries, like berries, apples, and just adding that in is your carb. You can do, if you need a snack, I highly recommend doing Greek yogurt and mixing in your favorite protein powder and mixing that up.
It's so good. The Greek yogurt gives you the carbs, the fats and protein, and then you add the extra protein in it. And so, it's excellent.
For dinner, our favorite meal, we eat a lot of grass-fed beef because we buy cow every year. So, we'll do bowls and we'll do like a bed of rice, sweet potatoes, peppers and onions, and then ground beef. And then we drizzle the Japanese barbecue sauce over it.
And we call it Japanese barbecue bowls. It's literally just like a bunch of vegetables and meat with sauce, but it's really good.
So, there's some meal ideas for you.
Laura Dugger: (48:28 - 48:49)
That's incredible. Thank you for just rattling those off. We've got a plan now.
And I love how this conversation took a turn toward health. So, before we leave that section, any other healthy rhythms or best practices or ways you've simplified your life that you would recommend? Just sleep.
Laura Jean Bell: (48:49 - 49:34)
I know that sounds ridiculous, but people aren't sleeping and go to bed without your phone. You're going to be okay. You really are.
If your kids can go to bed without their phones, without a phone in their face, you can do it too. It's not the best way to turn your brain off. So, go to bed.
When you lay in a dark room without any blue light, you actually are helping your nervous system reset itself. And it needs a moment to rest and digest. So, get in the bed without a blue light and close your eyes and go to sleep.
You can do it, but it's so simple. And try to get eight to 10 hours of sleep a night. Truly, it's so important.
Laura Dugger: (49:35 - 49:54)
That's so good. And you're all about simplifying. You even help people simplify their digital marketing.
So, as we turn it back to business, I know you can't give away all of your secrets, but will you share just a few more business or social media tips with all of us?
Laura Jean Bell: (49:55 - 50:43)
Oh, man. I think the number one thing that I would tell anyone who's wanting to do anything in the online space is don't spread yourself across every platform. It's not worth your time.
And the more you hone in on one thing, the more of that thing you will sell, like plain and simple. And you will make way more money. You will spend way less time working on it.
You will enhance the lives of the people that choose to work with you. That is what you will gain.
If you simplify your offers, number one, sell less. Just sell more of one thing and stop spreading yourself thin across all the platforms. It's just too much work.
Laura Dugger: (50:43 - 51:03)
That's wise counsel. And will you also tell us, I mean, I'm amazed as I'm thinking of all this research that you've done. You're living a healthy lifestyle.
You're raising young children, consulting with others as their coach. Also, you wrote a book. Can you share a little bit about that?
Laura Jean Bell: (51:03 - 52:50)
I wrote my book. I actually have it right next to me because I was like, if somebody is going to ask you what this book is about, it's a book of short stories. And it sounds really simple, but it's a book of short stories that really draws you back to who you are in the Lord and understanding your place, like your identity in Christ, your belonging, fighting against fear and really coming home to who God created you to be.
And so, this book is a compilation of short stories of my own life where these things were very disrupted. My identity, like a total identity crisis, like not just having so much fear, learning how to come back to who God made me to be, but really writing out the moments of when I was living in that season and the people that helped me kind of find my way out and the things that God really showed me in that journey. And so, have it right here.
You Can Always Come Home: Following the Breadcrumbs of Your Past to Find the Hope for Your Tomorrow. It's really what my heart was and I learned a lot when I left my hometown and I moved to small town, North Alabama. And although this is where my dad is from, this was not where I was raised.
And I walked into a total identity crisis when I moved here. And I write a lot about that and about the moments when I was living in that season. How the Lord would reveal to me, like, remember when this happened, or remember when this happened and how you handled it or what that person said to you. And I wrote those stories in here.
And so, the goal of this book is for anybody who reads it to know that God's on your side and everything's going to be okay.
Laura Dugger: (52:51 - 53:06)
Thank you for sharing that, Laura. And we'll certainly add a link for that in the show notes for today's episode, but also what links can we give for your social media? And then if somebody wants to reach out and work with you, what would that process look like?
Laura Jean Bell: (53:07 - 53:47)
Yeah, so, my Instagram is Laura_Jean_Bell and Jean is J-E-A-N. And if you want to work with me or reach out, you can email me at laurabellwrites@gmail.com, or you can literally go to my Instagram account and click the link in my bio where I explain what I do. And it offers an ability to hop on a call with me where we can talk together and see if we would be a good fit to work together.
So, those are the ways that you can contact me. I have a website, laurabell.co, and you can contact me through that as well.
Laura Dugger: (53:48 - 54:07)
Wonderful. Thank you for adding that. We will make sure it's accessible for everyone.
And Laura, you may be familiar with why we're called The Savvy Sauce, which is because savvy is synonymous with practical knowledge. And so, my final question for you today, Laura, what is your Savvy Sauce?
Laura Jean Bell: (54:09 - 56:38)
For life in general? You got it. Okay.
Well, I have two of them. And so, one of them is kind of silly and one of them is not. So, I'm going to go with the non-silly one.
Oh, share both. Yes. But I will say like this, there was this line that I heard, and I don't know who like trademarked this line, but it was very simple.
It said, “You are the CEO of your life.” And it was very simple, but it changed everything for me because for so much of my life, like if your knee jerk reaction to things not going your way is to blame someone else, you're not living as the CEO of your life. And I have spent a lot of my life, like when something doesn't go my way, I look for a person to blame instead of looking at myself and my own flaws. Being able to see that, “Hey, sometimes Laura, you're to blame and like, it's okay.”
You're the CEO of your life and you get to see what you did wrong, see how you messed up, see how you needed to shift something and then move on. And I think so many of us, whether we want to believe it or not, we can fall victim to that and live our lives so attached to this idea that somebody else is always to blame. Somebody else did this to me.
Sometimes things do happen to you that are not your fault. Sometimes you are a victim of horrible crimes and horrible things happening to you. But the question is, what are you going to do about it?
Who are you going to talk to about it? Are you going to go to the Lord and ask Him what it's actually supposed to look like for your life moving on from this place? Are you going to stay in a mindset that's small and traumatized, small and victimized?
Or are you going to say, “I'm the CEO of my life and I'm going to link arms with the Holy Spirit and keep moving forward.” And so, that was a huge thing for me to learn. And I feel like it's kind of been my savvy sauce in the last probably year, because 2024 was a year of a lot of things happening to me that weren't my fault.
And finally, one day I thought, you know, Laura, you can sulk in this, but it's not going to change your circumstance. What's going to change your circumstance is you saying, “I'm in charge of my life and I'm going to pick up the pieces of this and I'm going to ask God what to do with it.” And so, anyways, you're the CEO of your life and it's time to take charge of that.
So, yeah.
Laura Dugger: (56:38 - 56:42)
I love it. And now you've got to share your silly one as well. You've left us curious.
Laura Jean Bell: (56:43 - 57:01)
What is The Savvy Sauce? Let me just tell all of my, all of my geriatric millennials out there, you need to put castor oil on your face. Okay.
Just know that like castor oil, you need to look like a glazed donut when you go to bed and your skin is going to be, your skin will thank you. Just trust me.
Laura Dugger: (57:02 - 57:26)
That's incredible. I was so grateful you shared. And Laura, I can see why clients are so drawn to work with you.
It is so delightful to have conversations with you. You are gifted in so many different arenas. And I think what really stands out is your generosity and just your willingness to share all of this with us.
So, thank you so much for being my delightful guest today.
Laura Jean Bell: (57:26 - 57:29)
Oh, it's such a gift talking to you. Thank you for having me.
Laura Dugger: (57:30 - 1:01:12)
One more thing before you go, have you heard the term gospel before? It simply means good news. And I want to share the best news with you, but it starts with the bad news.
Every single one of us were born sinners, but Christ desires to rescue us from our sin, which is something we cannot do for ourselves. This means there's absolutely no chance we can make it to heaven on our own. So, for you and for me, it means we deserve death and we can never pay back the sacrifice we owe to be saved.
We need a savior, but God loved us so much. He made a way for his only son to willingly die in our place as the perfect substitute. This gives us hope of life forever in right relationship with him.
That is good news. Jesus lived the perfect life. We could never live and died in our place for our sin.
This was God's plan to make a way to reconcile with us so that God can look at us and see Jesus. We can be covered and justified through the work Jesus finished. If we choose to receive what he has done for us, Romans 10:9 says, “that if you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
So, you pray with me now. Heavenly father, thank you for sending Jesus to take our place. I pray someone today right now is touched and chooses to turn their life over to you.
Will you clearly guide them and help them take their next step in faith to declare you as Lord of their life? We trust you to work and change lives now for eternity. In Jesus name we pray.
Amen. If you prayed that prayer, you are declaring him for me. So, me for him, you get the opportunity to live your life for him.
And at this podcast, we're called The Savvy Sauce for a reason. We want to give you practical tools to implement the knowledge you have learned. So, you're ready to get started.
First, tell someone, say it out loud, get a Bible. The first day I made this decision, my parents took me to Barnes and Noble and let me choose my own Bible. I selected the Quest NIV Bible and I love it.
You can start by reading the book of John. Also get connected locally, which just means tell someone who's a part of a church in your community that you made a decision to follow Christ. I'm assuming they will be thrilled to talk with you about further steps such as going to church and getting connected to other believers to encourage you.
We want to celebrate with you too. So, feel free to leave a comment for us here. If you did make a decision to follow Christ, we also have show notes included where you can read scripture that describes this process.
And finally, be encouraged. Luke 15:10 says, “in the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” The heavens are praising with you for your decision today.
And if you've already received this good news, I pray you have someone to share it with. You are loved and I look forward to meeting you here next time.
Welcome to The Savvy Sauce
Practical chats for intentional living
A faith-based podcast and resources to help you grow closer to Jesus and others. Expect encouragement, surprises, and hope here. Each episode offers lively interviews with fascinating guests such as therapists, authors, non-profit founders, and business leaders.
They share their best practices and savvy tips we can replicate to make our daily life and relationships more enjoyable!
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