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The Plant Centered and Thriving Podcast
Welcome! If you're looking for plant-based inspiration, you've come to the right place! This podcast is here so you don’t have to feel alone on your plant-based journey. You'll hear from individuals who have taken the leap to go plant-based, why they did it, the struggles they faced, their words of wisdom for you, and how they're thriving now.
The Plant Centered and Thriving Podcast
Genny Mack is battling chronic illness. Her weapons of choice? Plant-based nutrition and holistic healing
"I have figured out how to listen to my body and I don’t have to feel lost in this health care society."
My guest today is Genny Mack who bravely recounts her battle with lupus. When the only guidance western medicine provided was prescriptions, she knew there was so much more out there. Genny illustrates the remarkable turnaround she experienced by embracing whole foods and mindfulness, a shift that not only soothed her lupus symptoms but also reinvigorated her life. Equipped with this new knowledge inspired her to help guide others on their path to wellness.
If you want to connect with Genny, visit the following:
Instagram: @gennymack__
TikTok: @gennymack
Website: gennymack.com
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Plant Centered Nutrition Essential Resources:
Welcome to the Plant-Centered and Thriving Podcast. I'm your host, ashley Kitchens. I'm a plant-based registered dietitian and virtual nutrition mentor. I was raised on an Angus Cattle Farm, grew up with a lot of GI issues and used the power of plant-based eating to promote healing. Here you'll find inspiration, ideas and encouragement for your own plant-based journey. I'm so thrilled you're here today. Let's get started. Welcome to the show Plant-Centered Listener. My name is Ashley and I am your host today. And today I have a very special story for you.
Speaker 1:Imagine being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease and your doctor tells you to just take your medication and eat whatever you want. Well, this is where Jenny Max Mission and her story comes into play. She is on a mission to guide lupus warriors on a transformative journey to reclaim vitality through whole food holistic healing. Jenny transformed her overall well-being after being diagnosed with lupus, sle and kidney nephritis and suffering debilitating lupus flares. By transitioning to eating whole, nourishing foods from mother nature and by practicing mindfulness, jenny now has more mental clarity, energy and purpose than ever before. This led her to becoming a certified holistic nutritionist, autoimmune nutrition specialist, fitness coach and has changed many lives through clean eating, movement and mindfulness. Jenny's hope is to empower 10,000-plus BIPOC women and communities in 2024 to live healthier lives and reclaim vitality. Please join me in welcoming Jenny to the show. Jenny, welcome to the show I am so excited to have you here today, looking forward to this conversation, me too.
Speaker 1:So we actually connected on social media, which was incredible.
Speaker 2:Yes, and I've been following you for a while now. I love the work that you are doing, so it was a no-brainer to be here today.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much. Well, I'm honestly curious to just kind of get right into it, and I would love for you to be able to share a little bit about your diagnosis and kind of just how initially this affected your life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so. Okay. So I have lupus, which is systemic lupus, meaning that it can attack any of my organs, and the thing with lupus is that it affects everyone differently, so there could be long involvement. There could be kidney involvement, brain involvement. It's a very it can be a very aggressive and unpredictable disease.
Speaker 2:So the onset of my lupus came about years before my official diagnosis.
Speaker 2:So, on average, the statistics say that it takes about six years to get officially diagnosed with lupus, and it was about 10 years in my case because in my early 20s I was getting the signs of lupus, which is more around joint inflammation and swelling in my hands and my knees.
Speaker 2:But I was in my 20s, so I wanted to live this carefree life, you know, going out till the wee hours of morning, living in New York City. So I kind of, you know, put the what ifs on the back burner until 2017. I was really hit hard with the disease and that meant that I had pneumonia-like symptoms, I had a fever, I had the flu, even more joint swelling, chronic pain throughout my entire body. So that led me to go to a rheumatologist who generally officially diagnosis individuals with lupus, and they said, okay, you had the markers before. Now you're having the symptoms, you have lupus, and that was my journey to self-discovery with learning about this disease. It wasn't completely new for me, which we could talk more about, because my mother also had lupus, so I learned about lupus through her diagnosis. But generationally, individuals that have lupus, you know, for 30, 40 years, they handle it differently to someone that just becomes diagnosed with lupus. So yeah, that's my diagnosis story.
Speaker 1:Wow, yeah well, Jenny, I was looking on your Instagram before coming on here and you have a pinned real right now talking about your journey, showing you in the hospital afterwards. I mean, you truthfully look like a shell of who you are now. I mean just night and day difference I know you talked about like you had lost a lot of weight. You were in and out of the hospital for many, you know, a long time. It's just it's wild to see, sort of looking at you now and looking at you then, how much has changed in just in your journey and these like changes that you have made for yourself which we're going to talk about.
Speaker 2:Yes, there have been different moments throughout my lupus journey. My first diagnosis was in 2017. 2018 was the first time I was hospitalized with this disease, and the same cadence as what you just recently saw. I lost a lot of weight. I was basically malnourished, my body was rejecting food, my organs were attacking my immune system, as they say. So 2018 was my first exposure to what lupus can do to the body, and that's really what started my holistic healing journey, as I described, really tapping into.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, I know Western medication is life saving, it has its needs, but what else can I do to take control of my health? And that's when I started to explore the power of eating plants, using plants as medicine, and that actually got me into remission with this. So I was disease free for almost three years and then COVID hit. Covid hit and I caught COVID in June of 2022. Finally hit me in June of 2022. And that's when my health just started declining yet again, which led me to being hospitalized again in January of 2023.
Speaker 2:I was in and out of the hospital for about four and a half months and it hit me even harder. I lost one third of my body weight again, just malnourished, and had chronic pain from head to toe and there were moments where I did feel like I wasn't going to make it, but something in me said you can do this. You've been here before. Use the experience that you've learned throughout this journey, studying holistic nutrition and really tapping into self. So that is what led me here today. Thankfully, I'm here to share this story, but it was a lot of learning. It was a lot of unlearning, but ultimately it was about really tapping into my intuition to figure out how to transform my health.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm curious. I have two questions with that too is how did you initially maybe get introduced to a holistic approach to managing your symptoms, and then what were those initial steps that you first took? And I'm just curious how that started for you.
Speaker 2:Yes. So initially, when I had my first severe flare in 2018, I'll never forget I asked the rheumatologist okay, I know I have to take all of these medications, but what do I eat? And the rheumatologist replied and said eat whatever you want, take your medication. And for me that was a trigger point. That was a moment where that actually changed my entire perception of the medical industry, because, although I didn't have the answers then, I knew deep down inside that that wasn't the only answer. I couldn't just eat what I wanted to and I shouldn't just only take the medication.
Speaker 2:So that led me into doing research and I came across the journey and understanding about plant-based nutrition and I started studying Dr Brook Goldner, for example, and I heard that she transformed her health by eating more plants, and that really led me down a rabbit hole.
Speaker 2:And then I also discovered that there are only 3% of nutritionists who are people of color right Nutritionists and dietitians. So for me, that led me into this path to really not only figure out what I can eat to feel better with them myself, but how I can help guide and educate others on what they should be eating to transform their health. So that's when I became a certified holistic nutritionist, and then I went one step further and became certified in autoimmune nutrition to figure out how to eat foods that were anti-inflammatory in nature. And, like I said, I'm human, things happen. I got sick again, and that's when I had to figure out okay, how do I actually get to the root cause of my sickness, which is leading me to the path today to really focus more on gut health, because most of our immune system lies within our gut and I know that lupus and a lot of other chronic diseases sort of stem from emotional trauma. So I'm tapping into that space there.
Speaker 1:Absolutely beautiful and I love it because I, just in following you, I know that you're not just into nutrition, that you're into this like really holistic well-being approach to what it is that you're doing. You're bringing in mindfulness. This morning I saw you dancing in your yard like just different things like that. I mean, we know nutrition is important, but gosh, there are so many other things involved too, even like you're talking about working through or healing past trauma, as emotional traumas like those are, it sounds like a really important part of this journey.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and yes, it's more than just nutrition. We are complex beings, so we have to really bring in the complexity of life through movement, through mindfulness, through intention, through lifestyle, through smiling, through dancing. So, yeah, it's really important for me to show people yes, we should watch what we put in our body, what we put on our body, but how we're living our lives on a daily basis, how are we prioritizing ourselves? How are we bringing back the joys of our life that we used to appreciate when we were younger? Maybe we forgot about those moments that made us smile and laugh. So, really trying to show people that you can live this wholesome life and it can be joyous, it can be fun.
Speaker 2:It doesn't have to be restrictive either, because there's a lot of misinformation out there about what we shouldn't eat. But what about what we should eat? What about those things that we should enjoy? What about the foods that our ancestors ate? That's something that I'm starting to go back into, because in this autoimmune space, there can be areas where they're telling you oh, you shouldn't eat grains or you shouldn't eat carbohydrates, Complex carbohydrates. You know, again, we're complexity, we're complex beings. We need those complex carbohydrates for energy and other vitamins and minerals. So, yeah, it's all about bringing that whole experience into this and having fun with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. I think that fun piece and kind of going back to those things that really brought us joy and childhood are so important, those things that lit us up, that made us smile, where we would just like go out in the yard and act, you know, just like a wild person and we wouldn't even care, and it would bring us so much joy. I think that is so important. So I'm curious, jenny, for you, was this sort of like an overnight thing, or was it something that you sort of like gradually introduced as you were going?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it definitely was a transition. It was a transition to incorporate more plans into my day-to-day, into my lifestyle, because growing up, maybe, we had some collard greens on the table. You know, it was very meat-centric in terms of what we ate on a daily basis. A lot of meats and pork was infused in the collard greens, mac and cheese, you know. So the soulful cuisine was abundant in our household, and we also did come from times where we didn't know when our next meal would be. You know, we had to eat the food that was in our refrigerator, whether that was ramen noodles or mayonnaise sandwiches. So there was also this scarcity mindset on top of you better finish the food on your plate.
Speaker 2:So I had to do a lot of unlearning, as I mentioned before, unlearning about OK, these are some of those traditional foods that I grew up eating, but are they actually hindering us? Are they making us sicker? Right, that was one part of it. But also learning again as I go through this new phase. Those cultural foods some of them I should really celebrate, you know, like the Black Eyed Peas, for example, because they bring the protein, they bring the complex carbohydrates, they bring the vitamins and minerals that my body needs to sustain. So it's really understanding the cultural foods that I should celebrate, but also those foods that can be causing us harm, making our family sicker, and finding that balance there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely Well. And as you are going through this, I'm curious what challenges you sort of faced whether it was other people, whether it was your own health kind of as you started this transition and really started approaching life in a much more holistic way. That was different than maybe how you grew up or how you were eating and living in your 20s.
Speaker 2:Challenge. Indeed, ashley, that's a very good question, because transitioning to this holistic healing space hasn't been easy. Ok, I'll give an example. So I had a vegan Thanksgiving. I had a plant-based Thanksgiving three years ago and I invited my entire family. My mom said she would come. So my mom comes and everything was 100% plant-based. Has never been done before. She's never enjoyed only plants before, so for her she was hesitant. But she also always has been very supportive in everything that I've done. But she enjoyed it. She went for a second. She ate the collard greens. She really enjoyed the sweet potato pie, so for her she was supportive. She was excited to see what I was doing in this space. So it hasn't been an area that I would say my family has jumped on immediately. But they also see how it's transformed and changed my life. And I'll give another example.
Speaker 2:I just celebrated my niece's teen, tiniata, which is a 16-year-old birthday party in El Paso, texas, because my brother's family is married to a Mexican family and we stayed in the Airbnb together and I decided that I wanted to cook breakfast every morning. So I made oatmeal and you dressed it with nuts and seeds and fruits. Again, you get that initial resistance because some of the family is used to baking an egg in the morning, but they also wanted to have those family gatherings and moments eating together and they were very appreciative of the oatmeal. My sister came home from the trip and she asked for the recipe. So I also see that not everybody has been on board with me from day one, but they are very supportive of me along the journey and I do see the small changes that people are making In their own personal lives, which has been exciting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely, and it sounds like you showed people that oatmeal doesn't just have to be like oats and brown sugar. It can be so much more Beautiful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you sweeten it the way that you want to. You know, okay, maybe brown sugar, maple syrup. There's so many ways you could use dates to sweeten it too. So, yeah, it could be your own beautiful bowl of goodness.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, absolutely so, Jenny. How is your Journey? Because it sounds like, I mean, your family has truly noticed how this has massively transformed your health and your life, with your mom having a similar, same diagnosis, and we know that it affects people differently. How has that maybe your journey impacted hers?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, you know that is a very profound question because I'm grateful that my mom is still here to, you know, have her own personal experience. But we share the experiences together. I do find that I've gotten closer to my mom over this time of me being diagnosed. So it's been a good six, seven years Since I've been diagnosed, with the best and just experiencing the disease together. So, you know, there's been times where I've been hospitalized, there's been times where she's been hospitalized and we're there to support one another. So she's always been supportive Along the way. She's made a lot of changes in her own life as well, being very mindful about what she's eating. You know she wants to do more. We all want to do more, but you know, I know she's trying her her best to show up for herself and the way that she Shares her love is through her support. What's my journey as well?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's beautiful. Yeah, I'm curious to like, just with your own journey, how you tailor nutrition advice for the clients that you work with as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, big, big one, because, having a chronic illness, what I've learned for myself and with others is that Nutrition can mean something very different for individuals with a chronic condition.
Speaker 2:So, for example, I learned along the way that I wasn't able to Tolerate raw foods, for example, for a long time because I didn't have the gut microbiome to break down and digest the food Right. So I do find that working with individuals in the chronic illness space, it has to be individualized. The care has to be individualized. So what I do to work with individuals is first understand what are their most pressing symptoms, right, what are their most pressing challenges that way. But we also work together in an integrative way to Come up with questions for their doctors right, to really understand what's happening to their body, to really understand how to Interpret their blood work and their results, to advocate for themselves, to get specific testing Based on sometimes. So I do find that, you know, having that holistic mindset is very important because, again, it's not just about the nutrition but it also isn't just about this one-size-fits-all approach. It really has to be individualized.
Speaker 1:Yep, yep definitely makes sense. I appreciate that and to I know that you're really big in in movement and moving your body in a mindful way, in a joyful way. How do you feel like physical activity, movement, plays a role too in managing your symptoms?
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, it plays a huge role. Movement is the paramount to healing. I mean, the body requires movement, not just from a circulation perspective, but from a blood flow perspective is very important for the blood to flow, to Transport nutrients, to regenerate the cells, to eliminate waste. So movement is very important. I will say in that same regard that movement can be challenging for many, especially if you're dealing with chronic pain. You know I've been there before, where I Was a fitness instructor and one of my former lives, and you know movement was always the forefront of my mind. It still is.
Speaker 2:But there was one point in my healing journey last year where I felt like I couldn't move. I felt like my body was restricted and the more movement that I did, the more pain that I would be in. So I know that there is that challenge as well. When someone is dealing with this pervasive pain, this chronic pain throughout their body, it feels like that their body is incapable. But I will also say that if you Get up and stretch, go for a walk, dan, do something very gentle on the body, the body will appreciate that and with the more practice and repetition and Consistency you'll become stronger. You know things don't happen overnight, so it's really about Turning those moments into momentum.
Speaker 1:Oh, turning those moments into momentum, I like that. Yeah, that's fantastic. So I'm curious too and you touched on this a little bit, jenny with that doctor who had just said you know, basically you can eat whatever you want. But I'm curious how your Experience with the healthcare system, how that sort of shaped, how you approach working with your clients, maybe what you saw or didn't see, and how you handle that with working with people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, very powerful question. Okay, so just for baseline to answer that question, with my first player up in 2018, I was given care by the medical team, by the rheumatologist. I was giving medication and I would say that I recovered fairly quickly, although I made that transition into eating more plants. But this next time around, in 2023, the flare was so much more aggressive. The medical care was much more unpredictable. I experienced those microaggressions where my symptoms were disregarded. I was told that I wasn't supposed to feel this much pain. So it was a very tough part during my journey, as you can hear, to experience that in the medical industry, because I experienced gaslighting and a lot of microaggressions throughout the process. So it did make me more. It has made me more resilient.
Speaker 2:But I also say that things happen for a reason and I know that I was supposed to go through this experience so that I can be more compassionate to the people that I work with, so I can be more understanding when someone tells me that they are experiencing chronic pain and their doctor is disregarding their pain, I understand and I get it. So through those experiences, I have been able to be more compassionate but also work with people so that they can really start to dig deeper and figure out what's actually happening in their body, gain a better understanding of their body, a better relationship with their body. But, most importantly, because we have to work with the Western medical healthcare system, it's inevitable, especially in the society that we live in today, how can we work with these doctors in a more integrated way? So I feel like I had to go through all of that, that experience for me to really understand how do I navigate this? But how do I help people advocate for themselves?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely Advocate for things that they're struggling with that might not be seen or heard or just not being listened to it's fullest, and it sounds like you really try to provide a space for that for the people that you work with, especially and I know you do it online as well.
Speaker 2:So yes, yes, yes. It's not easy, especially having a chronic illness myself, but I also know that it's very important.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Because it's a space that we don't have access to. You know, again, just looking around, there are not many people that look like me that can be able to say I have figured out how to listen to my body and I don't have to feel lost in this healthcare society because I know that I am listening to my intuition. Yeah yeah, absolutely Very important.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So what advice would you have for someone who maybe was recently diagnosed with lupus, or has had the markers for a while, or has been suffering with their symptoms for a while? What advice? Would you have for them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say, the first thing is to keep asking questions right.
Speaker 2:I mentioned before that it takes about six years to officially get diagnosed with lupus. So some people are more fortunate, depending on their circumstances, to get diagnosed sooner, but it does take a while to get diagnosed. I would say continue to ask the doctor questions. So why is? Why am I experiencing these symptoms? Get second opinions. It's okay to get second opinions and third opinions. That would be the first piece of advice that we give, and the second piece is if you are very serious about the holistic healing journey, because it is work you have to commit you have to commit and you also have to trust the process Right.
Speaker 2:You have to really tap into your intuition, listening to what your body is telling you, and find a community, find a space. Listen to podcasts like this. There are many support groups out there. There are many lupus support groups. You could go to lupusorg. You could go to the Lupus Foundation of America. You can go to the Lupus Research of Alliance. There are many resources out there to find individuals like yourself that understand what lupus is, and there are many resources out there to you know. Again, get support with the doctors, but also get into the holistic healing space and you know that's why we have resources like myself.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Yeah, I was curious because community is so important. I think that's such an important part of this journey as well. But if someone maybe is looking for a higher level of support, jenny, where is the best place for them to connect with you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so if you would love to connect, if you have any questions, my DMs are open. Jenny Mac On Instagram. You can find me on most of the channels at Jenny Mac, but also my website, wwwjennymaccom. I provide a free clarity call if you're just curious to learn more about holistic nutrition or holistic healing. And yeah.
Speaker 1:I would start there. Yep, yep, definitely go over to Jenny's Instagram because, speaking of community, I mean that's a great, just really supportive, encouraging what I believe to be, even like empowering community to kind of help you at least like get you started on this journey and finding a community as well.
Speaker 2:Thank you, thank you so much, Ashley.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Well, Jenny, thank you so much for being vulnerable and sharing your story. I really appreciate you coming on this podcast and talking to us about your journey.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me and looking forward to reconnecting.
Speaker 1:Sounds good, all right, thank you so much for tuning in today. Go ahead and check out Jenny at wwwjennymaccom and at her Instagram at Jenny Mac, which we'll link below in the show notes. Thank you so much for listening to the Plant-Centered and Thriving podcast today.
