Today we’d like to introduce you to Casie Shepherd.
Casie, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Health has always needed to be a focus of mine with many things I have gone through my entire life.
Growing up, I always was working through something. I had chronic and reoccurring UTI’s as a child and was put on round after round of antibiotics. Around 6 I started therapy and figuring out what my diagnosis were with a lot of issues I was having and figured out I had Tourette’s, anxiety, OCD, depression, and ADD as a child and was medicated for it. When I was in 9th grade I decided to ditch the medication and finally hit puberty. That brought on a ton of other issues with what they thought was asthma at the time (later to find out it was just inflammation and issues from hormonal imbalances). I became an all star basketball player getting recruited heavily across the US and signed to Colorado State on a full ride scholarship. I continued struggling to ever feel in condition with restricted breathing and my sophomore year ended up getting very sick with double pink eye, double ear infection, asthmatic bronchitis. It took me months to recover as I was pushing to continue to play and traveling with the team. I was on round after round of antibiotics and that’s when things really got bad. I then started focusing on nutrition and cut out gluten and lactose. I ended up giving up my full ride scholarship after a coaching change and started focusing on my health.
Getting into the nutrition and training on my own led me down the path of bodybuilding which was an amazing experience that brought me to earning my IFBB pro card in Women’s physique after my 7th show, but then also pushed my stress levels and body through more than I should have. This created many other issues and ultimately more hormonal imbalances from the stress and the requirements of the industry. I pushed through 3 pro shows and decided to hang it up when I knew my body wasn’t cooperating and I was pushing it past its limits every single day.
From college through the following couple of years past competing, I went to countless doctors, naturopaths, and energy medicine practitioners to try and get a handle on my system but unfortunately not one person could figure my system out. I was always being told everything was “normal” or was being looked at by doctors that had no idea how to treat my system and look at everything as a whole including my history. I became an expert and my own guinea pig in the world of hormones, energy work, and nutrition. I had to learn how the body worked through many many lab panels, journaling my intake every single day, and analyzing every single part of my life. It took me a really long time to figure things out along with putting trust into myself.
I always worked in the health and fitness industry but my business shifted slowly the more I learned into healing the body and looking for the root cause in every person in order to allow their system to function as it should. Instead of just putting everyone on some cookie cutter plan, I am able to take a deep dive into symptoms, their lab panels, and other info they give me to create a plan that will help their system work on it’s own and function properly. We control the stress, workouts, supplements, nutrition, and cardio so that I can look at everything as a whole.
I work completely remote with all of my clients through weekly check ins and this enables me to learn their system over time and track how they are responding to everything we are doing. Every person is so different and this allows me to cater things and make changes as we go.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It definitely was not. I have been in business 11 years now and many of those beginning years I was just a struggling personal trainer that was doing 1 on 1 sessions. Like many other business owners you have good months or chunks of times and bad ones. It can take a toll on your confidence. I had many times I questioned my purpose or if I was taking the right steps, but ultimately it’s paid off.
As I transitioned into doing more of the health coaching and healing work with clients, I really found my passion and knowing this was where I truly changed lives. Actually healing people’s long time chronic issues and explaining things to them they hadn’t ever gotten answers to is the ultimate…however it took time to build the confidence that I could really do this by itself and didn’t need the in person training for my business. I had many months where I was struggling to make the money and keep things organized. It took a very long time to find the right people that could do lab work for me, refer to for the right medications if needed, and build a reputation for my niche.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I struggle to know what to call myself anymore haha! I’m a health coach of sorts but specialize in hormones, gut health, and overall balance of the body. I’m known very well for this locally because I take a deep dive into the body and am able to really put the pieces together of every symptom, lab panel readings, workouts, and nutrition.
From beginning to end I do a full intake process with the client to see what they are experiencing, their goals, and what they are currently doing. Health history is a huge part of how I look at everything as a whole. I refer the client in for a lab panel and am able to use these labs to structure the plan along with all of the other information I collect on the client. This gives me such an edge over what anyone else is doing anywhere. You can’t out diet or out train an imbalanced system and many times make it WORSE! We use all of the information to structure a plan with workouts, their diet/nutrition, stress management, supplementation, and lifestyle. The goal is to always bring the body into balance so that it can function as it should optimally. This allows the client to not only reach many of their goals faster, but more efficiently and without such drastic measures. Most people can make changes temporarily but when you don’t address the root cause and actually FEEL good doing it, it doesn’t last and most times creates more issues.
I’m most proud of how I have built up my business to what it is today. Networking with the right people, learning everything I have, and implementing systems all on my own so that I can work with hundreds of clients anywhere took a ton of time and organization. Trial and error with the right programs, software, and developing what works best for me.
We’d love to hear about any fond memories you have from when you were growing up?
My favorite childhood memories always bring me back to being a tomboy. I was the kid that got dirty playing outside for hours. Building forts in the woods and trees, collecting bugs, frogs, salamanders, and running around with the neighborhood boys playing in the sprinklers and baseball in the park. It’s truly joyful thinking back to being so carefree and just enjoying life.
Contact Info:
- Email: casie@spectrumwellness.biz
- Website: https://www.spectrumwellness.biz/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cshepherdifbb/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Casie.spectrumwellness/
- Other: https://casie.nutridyn.com/
Image Credits
Dustin Samplawski
