Welcome to Transform with Dr. Maggie Yu Podcast, where education meets results. I'm Dr. Maggie Yu, your guide with nearly three decades of experience in root cause medicine. Here, we dive deeper into the root causes of chronic disease through interviews, case studies, and trainings. Hi everybody. I'm Maggie MD and welcome to Transform. I'm a functional and a holistic medicine MD, and our program is transform autoimmune Disease naturally. With me today, I, we have the pleasure of interviewing Antoin and her husband Kean. Has been diagnosed with Sjogren's and had a ton of slew of other symptoms that even preceded quite a bit before her diagnoses. And today we're here to actually see A successful case of study of a couple who did something extraordinary to turn around her Sjogren's and her severe symptoms naturally. So here is Antonin and here's Kian. Hello, uh, my name is Kian Smith. Um, I'm, uh, from Washington, DC uh, IT professional, so I like figuring things out and uh, Antonin Smith is my wife. I'm Antonin Ian's my husband and I too work in it, but I'm a trainer. Um, I'm on that side, so I'm normally in front of folks and talking to people. So what I would love to do is ask you, Antonin and Ian, first of all, when did this journey wish, you know, you joined our program six months ago? Where were you six months ago before you joined our program? I was in the middle of, I. The worst flare of my life that I'd had. Um, I was nauseous and vomiting. I couldn't eat anything. I had really bad brain fog, joint pain, fatigue. Um, it was just really, really excruciating, like just not being able to do anything. Lymph nodes swollen. Yeah. Yeah. Lymph nodes were swollen. Mm-Hmm. Um. Doctors were threatening me with surgery. Yeah, that's true. It was bad. Like it was awful. Um, my joints like, they would just thro, not even a throbbing, just a, a stabbing kind of pain. It was just, it was really bad. And then the vertigo and the nausea, um, and all that, it was really bad. The pain, it, it was about a 10. I would say a nine, 10. And then the food. What was this whole nausea. Were you able to eat food? I couldn't eat anything. Yeah. I couldn't eat anything. I couldn't hold anything down. Um, but I remember the, I remember the meal before I got sick, That's how bad it was because I remember eating, we had like, uh, like a Beyond burger or something like that. Because you get grilled. Right. And I remember, I don't know how I can remember that, but I remember that meal because maybe a couple hours later I couldn't eat and I didn't eat for like a week or Right. It was a weekend, something. I didn't, I wasn't able to eat anything I could drink. I. A little bit, but at first I could drink nothing. Right? Yeah. And so my question is, this is really common, and this is a really good lesson for a lot of people dealing with autoimmunity. I wanna find out how many years or decades did some of these symptoms precede her diagnosis, and how did you guys finally figure out that this was the diagnosis? So the timeframe prior to her diagnosis, um, was approximately like two years prior. Um, and she was having flares. We didn't know what they were. It was just every now and then, maybe twice a year it, and it would typically happen on her birthday 'cause I would try to take her out of town, do something special, and all we do is stay in a hotel room under the covers. You know, everything, everything sick. Um, and she was experiencing the same thing, wasn't under the covers, right? Yeah, it wasn't at all. So she was in pain. Um, you know, uh, fatigue. Everything. Everything. And we, I remember seeing doctors while we were out of town. Mm-Hmm. uh, everything. Yeah. Because I would get like fevers. Yeah. I would just get these really odd fevers. Right. And I would break out in a cold sweat. It was crazy. Yeah. Well then two years of this craziness, did they figure out what was wrong? Did any of the doctors that you saw figure out even what was wrong? Did any doctors recognize that these were even possible early signs of autoimmunity? No. Uh, no Doctors, uh. Pointed that out at all. Like she said, they wanted to do surgery, they wanted to take out a lymph node, and they were looking at, uh, what was it, your, your liver or something like that. Spleen. Your spleen. That's what it was. It they'll cancer probably. Right? Exactly. That's, so I went to oncologist, the hematology oncologist, they were drawing blood. I'm sitting there and I'm like, this is not where I'm supposed to be. So the rheumatologist was. Was telling me I had to do, um, a medication Plaquenil to, you know, I think it's like an anti-malarial kind of drug. Yeah. Um, and so he was like, you're just gonna have to do this for the rest of your life. Right. And I was like, I really don't wanna do medication because I tend to get a side effect. I did. I broke out in highs, my skin was burning. What was the only next option? There was no other option. As a matter of fact, the doctors at time just quit it. I just quit it. Right. You know, at the time when she got it, you know, and different doctors, it was like, oh, it's just Sjogren's. Right. You know, not a big deal. It only affects this, but. Not a big deal. You went to all these doctors, you got Plaquenil, you got reactions to it, and on top of it, it didn't even work. And realizing that the only option was medication, you decided you're gonna find, you're gonna find somebody else and you're gonna go out of the box. And you found me and our program. Yes. So my question is. What possessed you to go outside the box, go rogue and join an online program with me. I found, uh, your program, uh, I found it on, uh, Facebook. Um, and what caught my attention was, of course, you said, you know, uh, feel better from your, uh, autoimmunity, uh, in a couple of months, uh, and do it naturally. And so. Kind of got us, uh, because we wanted to get away from the medications. And, uh, you know, do things naturally. But I think what set us, uh, up what, you know, the writing on the wall was, the fact that you also experienced, uh, this autoimmunity thing and the people that work with you experienced, experienced it too. And I, that's when I told my wife, I, I said, I really think we should do this. Where are you now with your, what are your results? Where are you now? So my pain level has diminished substantially. Um. I don't really have a lot of pain. Um, the only time I will say that I experienced any pain is if I cheat If I cause Yes, Yeah. So I know what's doing it to me. Right? So when, you know, if I feel something like, oh, or, or before I even eat it or try, I'm like, oh, I'm gonna for this, I know what. Different food intolerance I have. I know you know which things kind of cause what? You know, like for me, sugar is a big pain. Uh. Now, you know? Yeah. It's, it just brings on pain. Like I can't have a lot of sugar. Mm-Hmm. because things will, it starts with my elbow, then it goes to my knee. Then I'm just, you know, Well wait a minute before we go to cause and effect. First of all, pain level you said was a 10 outta 10. What level is it now? Gimme a number now. Like a two. Okay. Two. What about food and stomach problems? Oh, I don't really have those. Nope. Ain't nobody got time for that done right. brain fog. Where the heck are you? Brain fog. 'cause you were almost dysfunctional with the brain fog when we met. Where's brain fog now? Girlfriend? Maybe a two. Maybe? Yeah. How important would you say is the role of community in your autoimmune turnaround and continue improvement? It plays a big part. I know in the beginning, my pod, I call them my pod mates, I really enjoy talking to them, bouncing ideas off of them when, when one of us would be going through something new or different. Um, it was just good to have support because it's so hard to get that outside of the program because a lot of people don't e even if they had this, they don't know how to talk about 'em. They don't know what's causing them. Um, and so with the pod mates, it was easier to talk about those things, easier to bounce ideas, easier to, even if you didn't feel well, you thought something wasn't going well. Just to kind of figure those things out, um, together really helped kind of glue us a little stronger in our thinking, in the way that the program runs. Right. What, what I'm hearing is it was more personalized, more supportive, and you actually learned more and faster. Yes. Yes. What's something that you do now effortlessly, almost take it for granted that six months ago you thought was impossible? So, six months ago I was not able to just bounce out of bed in the morning. Like it took me a a a long time to get from. Lying down to sitting up to go into the shower, you know, to start my day. And now I just get up like, like there's no struggle. Like I don't feel tired when I get up. I just bounce up and it's like the oddest thing. And I know it sounds silly, but it's just weird. 'cause I remember when. I couldn't do that. Like I couldn't do that. Giddy. You're joyous and giddy right now, just even talking about being able to bounce out of bed. Next Saturday I'm gonna be speaking at a women's conference. About my journey, And so I didn't know that I would be doing anything like that, you know, to tell somebody else, okay, this is what happened to me and that I'm okay. Right? Because a lot of people don't really have that. Testimony. Right. So that's one thing that, you know, I learned that, okay. I can do something like that. Congratulations for both of you. I mean, for Ian, for put, for, you know, finding us and for, you know, supporting her and pushing her into doing this program and believing in her. And Antonina, you are a leader. And you are an inspiration. I mean, and thank you for being on this interview. I know that you're a shy person, and a private person, so I really appreciate this. And the thing that brings me the most joy is that I. You're living your life with joy, with curiosity, with fun, with mischievousness. Yes. Yes. Congratulations, you two. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for joining us today. If you're inspired to dive deeper and work directly with me and my team at Transform, click the link in the podcast description and book a call. For more resources and discussions, be sure to check out our YouTube channel and join our thriving Facebook community with over 90, 000 members. The link to join is in the description. Talk soon. Lupus lung fibrosis, Hashimoto thyroiditis, fibromyalgia as which is a form of arthritis that's too far, extremely fatigued. Pretty much zero joint pain, much more happy. I don't have brain fog anymore. How much weight I have lost, I wanna say remission. Maggie and her approach is very different than the traditional doctors. I'm a totally different person. I got a better understanding of what those intolerances were. You're not alone. The community is, I'm learning from all of everyone else's issues, but it's not just helped me. It's helped my entire family. We are transformed. We are transformed. Transformed. We are transformed. We are transformed. We are transformed.