Aletha Erpenbach

My "why" is my family. To help you understand why I am so passionate about full body healing through functional medicine, here is my own family’s health story:

 

My husband and I settled into married life on the acreage that he grew up in in 2006. We loved living in the old farm home that he had grown up in and started our family just 1 year later. Our oldest son was born in 2007. He was a perfect and wonderful addition to our story. If you ask anyone that knows us well, they will tell you though that poor Evan was sick from about 2 weeks of age until age 2. He had severe acid reflux, moderate to severe persistent asthma, chronic sinusitis, allergic rhinitis, and eczema. He underwent EGD’s, swallow studies, multiple ear surgeries, tonsillectomy, adenoidectomies, and multiple other medical procedures from the time of his birth until age 2. None of his tests really gave us ANY answer as to why he was so sick. We managed his asthma with inhalers, oral steroids, and his sinus symptoms with allergy medications. At age 2, he finally was given a diagnosis of milk, soy, and peanut allergy. We removed these foods from his diet and continued the allergy and asthma medications and he was maintained on this regimen for many years, and we did ok. As a new momma, I was worried about sending my son upstairs to sleep. He slept in the pack and play in our dining room for the first 2 years of his life (this to me is a defining factor in his profound symptoms, more on that in a minute.)

In 2011, my beautiful daughter Aubry was born; outside of multiple ear infections and subsequent myringotomy tube placements and 1 hospitalization for a severe bacterial infection in her jaw, she was a much healthier baby. She slept upstairs in her crib after 3 months of age. We were blessed with our son Eli in 2012. He slept upstairs too. He had ear infections like his sister, asthma, and pneumonia hospitalizations x’s 2 as an infant, but all in all also fared better than his older brother. So, in a nutshell, illness plagued my babies’ infant and toddler years.
In 2014, my husband’s career lead to a major change in our life, and we moved off of the farm. The farmhouse was in severe need of repair and ultimately it was torn down. Within 1 week of us moving out of this wonderful house we called home, the mold that began to grow out of our carpet was indescribable. The mold that was hiding in the carpet, no longer was suppressed by moisture control, and it went rampant. The carpet was like a sponge of mold! My oldest son had slept inches from that carpet for 2 years…I wept.
In 2015, we moved into our new construction home and within 6 months both of my sons were off of their asthma controller medications and within 2 years were not regularly needing their rescue inhalers at all. Sinus symptoms for all 3 of my children were greatly improved, and we were so much healthier-Environment matters!
In 2016, my Evan at age 8, had started to show signs of depression, anxiety, and was struggling with recurring bouts of reflux and other GI symptoms. I began researching common causes of these symptoms in children and gluten sensitivity was highlighted with every search. (This sensitivity was very likely triggered by his immune system being so stressed for years). At this point, even after the correlation of how my children’s environment had negatively affected their health, I was still skeptical of the gluten free movement sweeping our country. However, as a nurse practitioner who has always been a big proponent for improving health with diet and exercise, I opted to try a gluten free diet rather than an anti-depressant for my 8-year-old. I was amazed at the results; his mood drastically changed; his anxiety improved; and his stomach symptoms were healed- Food matters!
Outside of Evan’s and my 3 children’s health struggles,

I have had my own personal battle with

migraine headaches, Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis, and joint swelling.

A gluten-free, anti-inflammatory lifestyle has changed my life as well!

I continue to travel my own health journey through the use of functional
medicine and am ready to help you do the same.

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