Welcome to the Hope Dealer Blog!
Tracy shares heartfelt stories, practical tools, and profound insights to empower your healing journey. Drawing from the triumphs over autoimmune disease and cancer, Tracy offers hope to those battling chronic illness, rare diseases, or seeking vibrant wellness.
Discover how to transform pain into power, break cycles of struggle, and rewrite your story with actionable strategies that inspire a ripple effect of health and hope.
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Did you make New Years Resolutions? Want to know how you can commit to those?
Happy Thrive Day!
Do you remember the 90’s Nike slogan “Just Do It”? it was a great marketing pitch! We bought a lot of Nike gear because of that motivational quip! Unfortunately, we do not always have access to the real skills to unleash our Get-Up & Go girl/guy and many of us are FRUSTRATED with the lack of results in our lives.
Read More“It’s a GREAT life if you don’t lose faith.” ~John Herlihy (my grampa)
WARNING-This may be too real for some…
Life Before Cancer (B.C.) was fairly normal. I worked the Monday-Friday schedule, did the dinner, read the books, said the prayers, did the weekend sports, volunteered for church, prepped my food, and hit replay.
My healthy lifestyle did not exempt me from Cancer’s grip and so after the initial shock wore off and a plan was in motion I went into treatment like an Olympic athlete. In an attempt to avoid the darkness from creeping into my every pore I daily posted to Facebook. I shared a sentimental song with a story about an event or a person that had an impact on my life. It was cathartic for me, it kept me from being sucked into my grief and helped me to contribute something positive to the world of social media in an effort to inspire someone else.
Read MoreNo one can prepare us when we stand together at the altar for what that really looks like. We romance the wedding day with preparations that take years, months or in my case 10 days. It was my second marriage, I had cancer and had gotten out of the hospital 3 weeks earlier and doped up on morphine so ya I was a fun bride! There we stood with friends and family (well a few important people were missing) saying vows we created and traditional vows. I remember thinking that day (even with the haze of my Fentanyl patch swarming through my bloodstream) that this was God's way to bless our broken roads together.
Read MoreIf you would have told this fit chick that she would be entertaining the idea of using the Carnivore diet as a strategy to heal her SIBO. I would had said an emphatic NOPE!!
Backstory on my Guts of Health (anything but….) more like Guts of HURT!
I was fine growing up, no pooping (yes I said it, let’s get it out of the way)! issues
At 17 I had contracted the MONO (EBV) virus probably from my boyfriend’s brother who had it…no I wasn’t kissing him but I was running myself between school, sports and work and my immune system was obviously suppressed. So I had a 3 week vacation my senior year-NOT!
Then I had my wisdom teeth out, bacterial can fester there and could have made its way to my gut!
A year after that I ate bad shrimp and was puking at my new boyfriend’s house, first time I met his parents UGH!! nightmare.
Those last 3 events probably created the perfect storm…6 months after the bad shrimp I started having WEIRD tummy issues.
Read MoreHere is the scenario…
Your friends call to say let’s meet up for dinner and drinks. It has been a while, school has been busy, you are working 2 jobs to pay the bills, and a night with friends hanging out sounds like just what you need.
You find some cute shorts and shirt and admire your tiny waistline. You made sure you didn’t eat much today so you could feel good and enjoy your time out. Of course you are running late as normal, you are usually “fashionably late.” You sache into the restaurant feeling AMAZING. Your friends have already ordered an appetizer and a water with lemon. They know soda irritates your stomach issues so they refrain. You begin to scan the menu. Analyzing each item, and asking…”can I have this or will I feel the effects of this later?’ Wondering how the cooks prepare each item, what oils they are using, realizing any dish with breading, beans or cheese is out.
Read MoreAs a Fit Chick & Whole Food Coach I was shocked by the news I had cancer in 2015. The last several years has been a deliberate inquiry of how I can create the cleanest environment for my family. So I’m checking my skin care, my cleaning products, having my water tested, mold in the house tested and now EMF’s.
I would have thought “what a crazy extremist” years ago but yep but when like goes sideways I own that crazy stuff!
Read MoreOne of the few Gifts of my Broken Road🎁
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~my TOLERANCE for UNCERTAINTY and DISCOMFORT has grown immensely
Those early days learning I had cancer were excruciating
Read MoreLaughing is and always will be the best form of therapy. I am a big advocate of therapy, self-discovery and improving emotional health. Over the years I have experienced how important acknowledging ALL of our emotions can be if we desire a lifestyle of authentic wholeness.
Read MoreBreaking a habit ultimately is about rewiring your brain. Habits are found in an area of your brain called the basal ganglia. The more often you perform an action or behave a certain way, the more it gets physically wired into your brain. This amazing adaptive quality of your brain is known as neuroplasticity.
Read MoreWe are 6 weeks into this new year and this is when the resolutions written down created with much anticipation become part of the recycle bin.
Have you ever considered what your personal values were and how to integrate those in your daily life? Some may be easy for you because they simply are in your nature. Other values may be more challenging like patience, have you ever heard someone say they are praying for patience? That may not be an answer you want!
Read MoreRead below to find a few workouts that you can do inside or outside. The first 2 workouts will be about 30 minutes, with jump rope or cardio intervals in between each set of exercises. The last one is a 6 week progression, which would be good for a beginner because it is only 2 sets and builds using time each week.
Read MoreBack in 2005 the motto we had for our Bootcamp program at Lifetime Fitness was; “No Excuses, Just Results.” As the program designer of the Bootcamp program the personal training department ran, I made sure every workout gave the participants a fitness challenge, fun and results. The program was 5 days a week so if you cam every day, participants were bound to get results.
Read MoreWinter is the coldest season of the year here in the Northern Hemisphere. The sky is covered with dark, gray clouds and there are less daylight hours which can make the days seem dreary. Some may experience a lack of motivation in their pursuit of health and wellness goals. Those same goals that encouraged you to sign-up for that new membership or start eating healthy can become monotonous and insignificant. This is especially true if the goals you set were unrealistic and you expected to see more progress at this point. So how can we pull ourselves out from the muck and mire, reevaluate our goals, and set our feet back on the ground towards a healthy lifestyle?
Read MoreWhen Shakespeare wrote “thinking makes it so,” he meant that our thoughts guide our actions and often become self-fulfilling prophecies. Having been in the fitness world for the last 18 years I have seen how “mind over matter” really comes into action when a new skill is presented to a client. Regardless of the age of a person, the ability to reframe and retrain our thinking in the positive and staying focused on the present task makes the difference in being successful with our physical health and wellness.
Read MoreMost who are on the journey to lose weight will utter the “M” word: Metabolism. If asked most people would be unable to explain that word but they know we need to get it faster. We believe the faster our metabolism is the skinnier we will be. The stress of trying to answer that question may actually make us grab for a donut, but truth be told we have no idea what Metabolism is and most of us don’t care…we just want it to be faster…but how?
Read MoreI saw a meme a few years ago that read, “The comeback is always stronger than the setback.” Today, 4 years after my original cancer diagnosis I fully agree. I did not always feel that way because as much as I am all for a great motivational quote the reality is the climbback can be grueling.
As much I know you would enjoy the details of my climbback I think for this blog, I instead will focus on HOW you can start over after a setback. Here are my 3 ways to start over.
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If I could get a dollar every time someone said “Oh I’m sorry but I am going to eat this in front of you, don’t judge”, I would be rich! In this blog, I’ll share my story. My goal is to help others transition to a whole food mainly plant based lifestyle, improve their gut health and create healthy eating habits that are sustainable. You will read my 8 Tips to get started with a Whole Food Life.
Read MoreWe’ve all been there. You’re getting great results and then all of sudden everything stops working; yet, you haven’t changed anything. In this blog we take a look at what’s happening in the body. And, you’ll get 9 ways to break through the plateaus.
Read MoreThree Ways to Begin to Change the Mirror
1 - Interview Yourself
2 - Make a Choice
3 - Commit to Practice
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