Uninvisible Pod with Lauren Freedman
by Lauren Freedman (she/her)
An award-winning podcast about invisible conditions and chronic invisible illness, featuring interviews with survivors, their loved ones, advocates, and experts in varied healing modalities, from medical to holistic. Hosted by Lauren Freedman, a health coach and patient advocate, who lives with Hashimoto’s disease and sleep disorders, Uninvisible uncovers real stories of survival and humanity – complete with laughter. In truth and with candor, we offer solutions – and challenge the world to change. chroniccoachlauren.substack.com
Episodes
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My Favorite Breathing Technique for Stress Relief: 4-7-8 Breath
Hi everyone, If you follow me on social media, you might have seen my recent post where I shared one of my absolute favorite stress relief techniques: the 4-7-8 breathing technique. This simple yet powerful practice, developed by Dr. Andrew Weil, has been a lifesaver for me in moments of stress....
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Episode 156: Emily Levy
Overview Last episode as of Dec 2023 Emily Ana Levy is a distinguished social impact entrepreneur, renowned patient advocate, healthcare Key Opinion Leader, and acclaimed international public speaker. Emily's journey led her to co-found Mighty Well in 2016. It’s a startup driven by her personal...
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Episode 155: Hanah Salas
Overview Hanah Salas is the magic mama of three littles; an energy worker and maker, she is the founder of the first and only CBD wellness company that offers sliding scale pricing on its goods: Open Apothecary/Magic Mama Co.! She started consciously making herbal remedies when she was pregnant...
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Episode 154: Carlos Alvarez
Overview At the age of 16, doctors diagnosed Carlos Alvarez as completely blind in his right eye; the sight in his left eye had deteriorated to 73% as a result of congenital glaucoma. When Carlos was 19 years old, he went through eye surgery — but the operation was not successful. He lost all...
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Episode 153 - Michael
CW/TW: this episode includes discussion of violence, both physical and gun-related, as well as in-depth conversations about abuse, trauma, suicide, drugs, and alcohol addiction. It also includes mention of adoption and body weight, and contains some strong language. Overview Michael was born to a...
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Episode 152: Gigi Robinson
Overview Gigi Robinson: if you don’t already know her, then welcome to the party! From making history as a finalist in the Sports Illustrated Swim Search, to her advocacy in the chronic illness and body positivity spheres, all the way to NFT research and navigating life as a small business owner…
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Episode 151: Jared Walker, Founder of Dollar For
Overview Jared Walker founded Dollar For in 2012 in Portland, Oregon. Now a national non-profit crushing medical bills and making charity care known, easy, and fair, the organization was born out of a desire to help folks in medical crisis after Jared witnessed his own family's experience with —...
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Episode 150: Dr. Izabella Wentz, The Thyroid Pharmacist
Izabella Wentz, PharmD, FASCP, is an internationally acclaimed thyroid specialist and a licensed pharmacist who has dedicated her career to addressing the root causes of autoimmune thyroid disease after being diagnosed with Hashimoto’s thyroiditis in 2009. She is the author of three books on...
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Episode 149: BACK FROM HIBERNATION: NEW EPISODE
Chris Armstrong, PhD was first introduced to Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) through research into metabolomics at the University of Melbourne, Australia. As he delved deeper into his work, he discovered its connection to ME/CFS patients, and empathized so much with...
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148: Getting Sexy with Andrew Gurza
Andrew Gurza is an award winning Disability Awareness Consultant and the Chief Disability Officer and Co-founder of Bump’n, a sex toy company for and by disabled people. Andrew uses they/he pronouns and identifies proudly as disabled. Their work has been featured on BBC, CBC, Daily Xtra, Gay…
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147: Bipolar Señorita Dailyn Santana
Dailyn Santana is a first-generation Cuban-American actress, keynote speaker, spoken word poet, and mental health advocate. Her work focuses on eradicating mental health stigma and her personal experience of living with bipolar 1 disorder, depression, and anxiety. Her mission is to be an example...
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146: SIBO Sisters and Hashi Posse Unite — It’s Phoebe Lapine!
Phoebe Lapine is a food and health writer, gluten-free chef, culinary instructor, recipe developer, wellness blogger, Hashimoto's advocate and speaker, and the voice behind the award-winning blog Feed Me Phoebe. Named by Women’s Health Magazine as the top nutrition read of 2017, Phoebe’s debut...
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145: Crafted to Thrive: Mindset Business Coach & Spoonie Nikita Williams
Nikita Williams is a mindset business coach and the host of the podcast, She’s Crafted to Thrive. She was diagnosed with endometriosis in 2009 and fibromyalgia in 2010. These diagnoses inspired her to use the training she received from previous jobs to jump-start her career as a business coach....
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144: Endometriosis & Autism Advocate Kendall Rayburn
Originally launched as a means of sharing her craft projects, Kendall Rayburn’s namesake blog has since evolved into her passionate full-time occupation: a place to pour her heart into content across the lifestyle spectrum (see: plus-size fashion, family-friendly travel and activities, home…
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143: Dr. Akilah Cadet, DEIB Specialist Living with Rare Heart Disease & hEDS
Dr. Akilah Cadet is the Founder and CEO of Change Cadet consulting firm, which offers a broad array of anti-racism and diversity services including strategic planning, crisis rebuilding, advising, executive coaching, and facilitation. Cadet (her last name) is a French term that means soldier. As...
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142: Racism Is A Public Health Crisis with Dr. Faith Crittenden
Faith Crittenden, MD MPH is a recently-graduated pediatric resident with her Doctorate of Medicine from the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. While a student, she was an active member of the Student National Medical Association (SNMA) and the American Medical Association (AMA). In…
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141: What We Really Mean When We Talk About OCD — With Pooja C. Danay
Pooja C. Danay is a South Asian mental health advocate who lives with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). An actor, entrepreneur, and dancer who specializes in Bollywood dancing (been doing it since she was 5 years old!), she loves traveling and spending time with family and friends. Born and...
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140: Rare Diseases Lesotho Founder Nthabeleng Ramoeli
Nthabeleng Ramoeli was born in the small southern African country of Lesotho. At the age of 12, she began to experience chronic pain and subluxation of her joints, in addition to extreme skin elasticity, GI and lung issues, and anapyhlaxis. These symptoms persisted through her admittance to...
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139: The Boys of Bolus Maximus on Life with T1D
The idea behind non-profit community support organization Bolus Maximus began in late 2017 when Matt Tarro and Brandon A. Denson started having weekly discussions about their lives with type 1 diabetes (T1D). Coming from completely different backgrounds, the two actually had a lot in common — and...
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138: Morgan Greene — Is, Was, Will Be with MG
Morgan Greene is a chronic illness and holistic wellness blogger and content creator at Is Was Will Be blog. After being diagnosed with rare chronic illness Myasthenia Gravis (MG), Morgan started writing to process her experience — “serving as both therapy and accountability” for her, as she so...
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137: Lyfebulb Founder Dr. Karin Hehenberger
Dr. Karin Hehenberger has close to 20 years of experience in the life sciences sector. She served as an executive at Eyetech Pharmaceuticals and Coronado BioSciences, and had strategic management roles at Johnson & Johnson (Vice President, Metabolic Strategy), JDRF (Senior Vice President…
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136: When It Hurts to Hear — Hyperacusis Awareness Founder Jemma-Tiffany
Jemma-Tiffany is a 17-year-old writer, passionate patient advocate, and founder of Hyperacusis Awareness. Having grown up with severe hyperacusis (a rare and poorly-understood disorder that causes her to experience physical pain from everyday sounds) has motivated her to raise awareness of others...
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135: Defining Heroism: A 9/11 First Responder’s Story
* * * TW / CW : mortality, and graphic discussion of the events during and in the aftermath of 9/11, 2001 * * * Twenty years after 9/11, some first responders are still struggling with long-term health complications brought on by the historic event. For Tom Frey, a former NYC detective, the...
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134: Sara Naveed is Fabulous & Fatigued
Sara Naveed is a Canadian writer, chronic illness advocate, and founder of the blog Fabulous and Fatigued. 14 years ago, she was diagnosed with fibromyalgia following a hit-and-run. Inspired by her experience, she started the blog with the aim of creating awareness and ending the stigma of life...
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133: This Thing They Call Recovery’s Jenny McGibbon on The Nuanced Experience of Living with a Disability
Jenny McGibbon is a disabled graphic designer from Scotland, predominantly living with ME/CFS. She was born with a birth defect known as gastroschisis, and as a result she also lives with short bowel syndrome, chronic internal bleeding, and iron deficiency anemia. At the age of 16, she found...
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132: Lupus Advocate Cass Rush
Cassandra Rush is a lupus advocate born and raised in Los Angeles, CA. In 2012, after a two-year battle with an undiagnosed illness due to being uninsured, she was finally diagnosed with Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (lupus SLE). Two years later she was diagnosed with lupus nephritis. An…
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131: Faith Ashenden of That Healing Feeling
Faith Ashenden is the founder and CEO of That Healing Feeling. She is a global patient empowerment mentor, master mindset coach, and biohacking expert who helps women hack the system and get their health back holistically, using 1-1 coaching, online courses, a podcast, and social media accounts...
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130: Actor & MS Advocate Damian Washington
Damian Washington is an actor who’s done 30+ commercials for brands like Fruit of the Loom, Realtor.com, and the NFL. Originally hailing from NYC, he attended the prestigious LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts (Fame, anyone?!). A few years ago, he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis...
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129: ADHD Advocate Dani Donovan, Illustrator & Creator of #NeuroDiverseSquad
Dani Donovan is a purpose-driven designer who creates cathartic ADHD (attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) illustrations and a community of validation and solidarity for adults living with ADHD. Her first infographic, “ADHD Storytelling,” went viral within hours and amassed over 100 million...
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128: Diversability Founder Tiffany Yu
Tiffany Yu is the CEO & Founder of Diversability, an award-winning social enterprise to amplify disabled voices; the Founder of the Awesome Foundation Disability Chapter, a monthly micro-grant that has awarded $49.5k to 50 disability projects in 8 countries; and the host of TIFFANY & YU, the...
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127: Spoonie Artist & Activist Mimi Butlin of @CantGoOut_ImSick
In 2012, while studying at university, Mimi Butlin contracted viral meningitis — from which she never fully recovered. Since then she has been diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, fibromyalgia, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, and ME/CFS (as Mimi wryly notes, “a really lovely…
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126: The Mata Sisters, Founders of Looms for Lupus
In 2009, Juana Mata was diagnosed with lupus. One of three very close sisters, nobody in her family had heard of this illness prior to her diagnosis — or knew how to handle her support and treatment. As the family began to research education, resources, and the history of the disease, they began…
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125: Fight Like A Warrior Founder Alexa Chronister
Alexa Chronister is the founder and president of Fight Like A Warrior (FLAW). She created FLAW after creating the Cards For Warriors program (sending handmade cards of encouragement to chronic illness warriors across the globe, reminding them they are not alone) in 2016. With the goal of creating…
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124: Julian Gavino, @TheDisabledHippie
Julian Gavino (he/him) is a trans-masculine model, writer, coach, and sex-positive disability influencer living with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and comorbidities. An outspoken advocate for both the trans and disability communities, Julian grew up never seeing people in media who “looked like” him…and...
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123: Don’t Judge A Book By Its Cover: Shayla Swint on Life with EDS
Shayla Swint is a 25-year-old college grad from Houston, Texas. Like the old adage, “Don’t judge a book by its cover,” Shayla is so much more than what we can see…she lives with connective tissue disorder Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS), hypermobile type. She’s survived over 15 surgeries thus far…
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122: Rhisa Parera: A WOC VS The System — And Lyme
In the last in our 2021 series on Lyme disease, we are joined by the first WOC to discuss the subject: Rhisa Marie Parera. Though she began experiencing symptoms from a young age, Rhisa grew up as an active young woman in Staten Island, NY, and got heavily involved in the salsa dancing scene and...
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121: Functional Medicine Health Coach Sharon Leggio Falchuk VS Lyme
Sharon Leggio Falchuk, FMCHC found herself bedridden by a serious illness in 2011, and when the mainstream medical system had no answers or help for her she took matters into her own hands. She spent every moment she could doing research, changing her diet and lifestyle, and assembling a…
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120: Lyme & Thyroid Specialist Lisa Hunt, D.O.
Lisa Hunt, D.O., D.O.H. is a practitioner at Holtorf Medical Group in El Segundo, CA. She specializes in anti-aging treatment, natural thyroid replacement, menopause/andropause therapy (including bioidentical hormone replacement), chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, strengthening the immune...
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119: Buenqamino, Lyme & Co.
Christina Kantzavelos (@buenqamino // @beginwithintoday) is a Lyme warrior, award-winning freelance writer/content creator, chronic illness advocate, and licensed psychotherapist. She was diagnosed with Lyme disease and co-infections in October of 2018. However, she struggled with debilitating...
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118: LLMD Dr. Casey Kelley
Casey Kelley, MD, ABoIM is the founder and medical director of Case Integrative Health. Dr. Kelley is relentless about getting to the root cause of chronic disease and transforming health through Functional Medicine. On faculty at Northwestern's Feinberg School of Medicine, she is Board Certified...
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117: Alex Moresco, Lyme Advocate & Co-Founder of Advocacy Express
Whether it’s hiding the likes of Pamela Anderson from paparazzi or helping NeNe Leakes pretend to sell furniture…Alex Moresco has a story about it. A PR executive from Chicago, four years ago her life was turned upside-down by undiagnosed illness. It took her two years and eight specialists (a...
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116: Lyme Survivor & Life Sherpa Gena Chieco
Gena Chieco is a coach, adventurer, and connector who loves inspiring clients to step into their best lives by providing tools to help them tap into their inner wisdom and dreams. She grew up in a rural suburb of New York City running around barefoot in the summer, obsessed with nature, with…
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115: Integrative Rheumatologist Dr. Micah Yu
Dr. Micah Yu is an integrative rheumatologist who incorporates complementary medicine with traditional rheumatology. He is double board-certified in internal medicine and lifestyle medicine. He obtained his MD from Chicago Medical School, and holds a Masters in Healthcare Administration and...
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114: Black Disabled Artist Rana 2.0
Artist Rana Awadallah grew up surrounded by poverty, abuse, and trauma. Diagnosed with major depression and extreme anxiety at the age of 18, she always felt there was something “wrong” with her body. Then, at the age of 24 — after having dealt with chronic pain for a decade — she was diagnosed...
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113: Myositis Thriver Michole J
Michole J lives with rare muscle disease polymyositis (PM), which falls under the umbrella of muscular dystrophy. PM is an uncommon inflammatory disease that affects the entire body — and while Michole began to exhibit symptoms in her late 20s, she was diagnosed at age 30 with the rarest form....
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112: Somatic & Spoonie Therapist Rachel Otis Lives with Crohn’s Disease
Rachel Otis (she/they) is a somatic therapist, yoga teacher, abolitionist, writer, and pleasure activist who works directly, compassionately and non-judgmentally with the mind-body connection, infusing sessions, groups, retreats, and articles with radical self-love, exploration, and expression.…
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111: P4AD’s Samantha Reid on Patient Advocacy & Life with Crohn’s Disease
Samantha Reid is the Digital Director for Patients for Affordable Drugs. Growing up in Illinois, she suffered from a “bad stomach” and weakened immune system, having caught pneumonia nine times by the age of nine. But it wasn’t until she was in her late teens that she sought answers. A diagnosis…
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110: P4AD’s David Mitchell on Drug Pricing and Living with Incurable Cancer
David Mitchell has an incurable blood cancer called multiple myeloma. The price of his current drugs is more than $875,000 per year. Like millions of Americans, David needs innovation and new drugs to survive, but he believes drugs don’t work if people can’t afford them. After more than 30 years…
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109: Breath, Movement, and Chronic Pain with TN Advocate Kayla Harley
Kayla Harley is a certified GYROKINESISⓇ instructor, Optimal Life Breath Pathologist, doula, and energy healer helping dancers, athletes and everyday movers alike improve their quality of movement: for breath integration and to prevent injury. She is an International Practitioner and among the...
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108: New Series! Innovators — Part 1
Join us as we launch a brand new series on Uninvisible Pod — INNOVATORS! In this series, we will periodically release episodes including short-form interviews with founders whose work is creating waves of change in chronic and invisible illness and disability. First up, as we dive in to the end…
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About this show
An award-winning podcast about invisible conditions and chronic invisible illness, featuring interviews with survivors, their loved ones, advocates, and experts in varied healing modalities, from medical to holistic. Hosted by Lauren Freedman, a health coach and patient advocate, who lives with Hashimoto’s disease and sleep disorders, Uninvisible uncovers real stories of survival and humanity – complete with laughter. In truth and with candor, we offer solutions – and challenge the world to change.
chroniccoachlauren.substack.com
Hosted by
Lauren Freedman (she/her)
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