About Me

My mission

The mission of Your Balanced Health Solution is to help people who want to overcome their chronic conditions reach their goals by guiding them to wellness by balancing the mental, spiritual and physical aspects of their being and by showing and guiding them to be an OVERCOMER!

How I got into coaching

No, my husband and I don't ride cycle in the snow! We were looking at motorcycles and dreaming of warm weather and SUMMER! After dealing with snow and cold for at least five to six months in the winter in Minnesota, you get the "bug" to do something FUN outside in WARM, SUNNY weather! It's like the cold battle you feel in dealing with a chronic condition, like it will never end. You keep waiting for spring and summer to arrive. We bought a 2006 Victory Kingpin Deluxe 1634cc and put on about 5,000 miles last summer. We rode for the Patriot Guard and for charities like Habitat for Humanity.

For 23 years my husband, David, and I had our different health challenges.

David constantly battled joint pain from old football injuries that felt like a toothache in his knees. He’d know when it was going to rain when the pain got worse. His family had a history of joint pain so living with the constant ache was something he was familiar with and it just seemed “normal”.

He’d had surgery to remove the meniscus on one knee and many times over the years had to go in to have the fluid taken off. Prescriptions didn’t seem to do much for the pain. He did find some relief in some natural glucosamine pills but had resigned himself to the fact of always having pain.

David also constantly struggled with his weight. And that, of course, didn’t help the joint issues in his knees either. He tried many kinds of diets of his own design that never seemed to really work.

In 1991, while uncovering the plastic in a corn silo (we were dairy farmers, I know, that wasn’t great for the knees either) he inhaled and ingested a LOT of black corn mold.

When he came down he was disoriented and coughing.

That started our MEDICAL-GO-ROUND experience.

Over the next 13 years he developed swollen, sore feet and ankles, red patches wherever he sweat, he coughed and cleared his throat of phlegm every 15 to 20 minutes and had a problem with ED. He started having pre-hypertension. And the pain in his joints got worse.

His loud snoring became a marital and family problem. Sometimes I slept on the couch. Sometimes he did. You could hear his snoring from every room in the house and even the guys at deer camp threw rolled up socks at him to try to stop the noise. That’s when he knew his snoring was bad.

At night he would stop breathing and gasp for air. That scared me to death! I would always jump at the sound. It was determined he had severe obstructive sleep apnea by having a sleep test done at the local hospital.  He had 73 episodes (skipping one or more breaths) an hour while he slept.  The sleep apnea and snoring was so awful it was affecting our relationship as we started to sleep in separate rooms.

We went to the doctors. And we went back…and back…and back. One of the antibiotics that was prescribed for David’s cough caused him to have pain in his hip which he then had for years. It was an experimental drug that was pulled off of the market about 3 months after David quit taking it. But it had left it’s mark on his body and didn’t eliminate the cough.

My issues had been digestive related and something I thought was genetic and had to just cope with. It affected my choice of foods and distance from restrooms. I took a risk of being embarrassed every time we ate out, which made the whole experience less enjoyable.

Sometimes I would end up on our bathroom floor in cold sweats from the pain. I could never pinpoint what the trigger was and neither could conventional medicine.

Where were the answers to our many health questions?

I was determined to look for answers instead of relying on what we were being told by medical professionals. We were told “You’re getting older, you’ll just have to accept it”, “There’s nothing more we can do, you’ll just have to deal with it”, “Well, we can try this prescription and if that doesn’t do anything we can try another prescription.” These statements were no longer acceptable answers for me. Besides, have you really looked at the side effects of prescription medicines?  I mean really looked?  Have you experienced side effects that added to the problem or have been given additional medicine to help symptoms that a previous prescription has caused?

Prescription medicines cover up warnings that your body is giving you telling you that something is wrong. They do not address what is causing the problem.

Even so, David was willing to accept their advice. After all, we were now approaching our 50’s. I told David that it was not normal to wake up numerous times in a night. He’d reply, “But it’s normal for me.” Well, what’s normal isn’t necessarily natural. A CPAP mask or surgery were the medical recommendations but, were not fixes, they were patches because neither remedy really address the cause.  And certainly prescription medicines are patches.

I kept searching. Truly there had to be an answer. But we weren’t getting any solutions from conventional medicine only a continual revolving door.

Then, by God’s grace, I came across a book that had a two week “experiment”. No processed food, nothing refined or white, nothing artificial, nothing overly sweet, just real food for two weeks. My husband, always skeptical, thought I was off the wall for suggesting we try this natural approach to address our many health issues. David already thought we were eating “healthy”. This seemed ridiculous!

But, if we were going to try this diet he wanted to do it “all the way”.

Could it really be this SIMPLE?

How could something so simple be so difficult? Reducing or eliminating foods that we had been eating for years was hard. But, we kept coming back to the phrase, “It’s only two weeks out of our lives. We can do this”.

And we did.

We stuck by the protocol to the letter. What we had discovered at the end of these two weeks was unbelievable! How could something this simple be so profound?

By following the book’s advice, my health concerns, that I thought were inherited and couldn’t be resolved, were gone! I thought it was a life changing experience to enjoy a meal and not worry later about how I was going to be affected.

David is now able to sleep through the night with no snoring, no gasping for air, no rashes, no cough, no sore feet, and the pain in his joints is gone!!

Dave and I have fun traveling and attending many events together; business conferences, marketing seminars, charity events. We love to experience and learn new things. Leaving home and traveling wasn't always pleasurable. I often had to be careful what I ate and worry about knowing where the closest restroom was. Nights in hotels were horrendous. Dave's snoring and sleep apnea drove the family out of the room. I would end up sleeping in the hotel room's bathroom or Dave would go to the lobby or out to the car to sleep. We now look forward to traveling together.

We have gotten our lives and our relationship back!!

In general, we had discovered just how important good nutrition is to the body and to health. That was God’s wisdom for us.

We’ve also have become more aware of how spiritual realities affect health.  How anxiety, fear, bitterness, unforgiveness, guilt, self-hatred, feelings of unworthiness affect  health in ways we have not understood before.  We’ve learned what the Bible truly means when it says “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high [places].” Ephesians 6:12

We enjoy helping others by being active ourselves:

By dancing:

or by getting muddy:

My personal values, beliefs and philosophy

I believe that wellness involves the whole person, body, mind and spirit. That’s why when you’re stressed you get a stomach ache or headache. When you have an injury you can get depressed. Health not only involves what you eat or drink but also what you see, read, speak and hear. “Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ” 2 Corinthians 10:5   I incorporate Biblical resources into my coaching because it renews and strengthens Christian truths and mindset that may have gotten weakened with time and trials.

Education/Training/Schools/Associations and Credentials

Alexandria Technical College, Alexandria MN - Certified Laboratory Technician

Graduate of Health Coach training - Hilton Johnson Productions, Inc.

Certified Maximized Living Mentor - Dr. Ben Lerner, Body by God: The Owner’s Manual For Maximized Living

Be In Health - Conference attendee

Hobbies and family

Travel, hosting exchange students/adults, dancing, motorcycling, Patriot Guard Riders, sundry crafts, flower gardening and straw bale gardening.

David and I have two grown children, Shane who is married to a great gal, Sarah. And Stacey our very active, adventurous daughter.  We have one granddaughter, Briana and a grandson, Gavin!

Statement of Faith

The Holy Scriptures. I believe that the Bible in its original documents is the inspired Word of God, the written record of His supernatural revelation of Himself to man, absolute in its authority, complete in its revelation, final in its content, and without error in its statement. The Bible is truth. 2 Tim. 3:16-17; John 10:35; 2 Peter 1:20-21; Luke 24:25-27, 44, 45; 2 Peter 3:16.

The Trinity. I believe there is one God who eternally exists in three Persons – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, co-equal in power and glory, having precisely the same nature, and attributes, and worthy of the same worship, confidence, and obedience. Matt. 28:18-19; Mark 12:29; John 1:1, 14; Acts 5:3-4; 2 Cor. 13:14; Heb. 1:1-3, Rev. 1:4-6

Jesus Christ. I believe that the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, became a Man, without ceasing to be God, and was born of a Virgin that He might redeem sinful men (John 1:2,14; Luke 1:35). I believe that the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished our redemption through His death on the cross as our substitute and assured us of our justification through His literal, bodily resurrection from the dead (Rom. 3:24-25: 1 Pet. 1:3-5; 2:24). His death provided a payment for the sins (past, present, and future) of all men and, therefore, made eternal life available as a gift to all those who believe.

The Sovereignty of God. I believe that God is absolutely sovereign and, in His sovereignty, It is God’s will that all would be saved and that none should perish.  1 Tim. 2:4; 2 Thes. 2:13; 1 Pet. 1:2; 2 Pet. 3:9; John 6:64-65; Acts 10:34; 1 Cor. 1:21; Eph. 1:5-14; Rom. 8:29-30; 9:30-32.

Satan. I believe that Satan, as a created being, is the author of original sin, that he attempts to keep us separated from God by accessing our thought processes because Adam and Eve opened the door to the spiritual evil world, and he and his angels shall be eternally punished. Ezek. 28:15-17; Isa. 14:12; Genesis 3:4-5; Ephesians 6:12; 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 ; Rev. 20:10; Matt. 25:41 .