The functional nutrition approach to healing Fibromyalgia focuses on identifying and addressing the root causes of symptoms through diet and lifestyle changes. This whole body, root cause approach is individualized based on a comprehensive functional nutrition assessment, individual symptoms, health history, and labs aiming to restore balance to the body.

What is Fibromyalgia?

Fibromyalgia shows up as chronic musculoskeletal pain, fatigue, anxiety, sleep disturbances, headache, and postural hypotension. (low blood pressure) It’s exact causes are still unknown and more research still needs to be done in this area.

The whole body, root cause approach to Fibromyalgia from a functional nutrition perspective:

Overall from a whole body, root cause approach, to heal fibromyalgia we would look at using a therapeutical diet to first manage symptoms, targeted practitioner grade supplements, and then work to fix mitochondrial dysfunction. Any potential root causes are identified using the STAIN method specifically looking at stress, toxins (mold, plastics, heavy metals), adverse food reactions, infections, and nutritional imbalances.

During the initial comprehensive functional nutrition assessment, we will look at:

• Past Medical History: initial comprehensive patient questionnaire, symptom questionnaire, root causes: STAIN (stress, toxins, adverse food reactions, infections, nutritional imbalances), family history of mitochondrial disorders (celiac disease, IBS, autoimmune conditions), current medications/OTC’s and supplements, lifestyle factors such as sleep, stress, exercise, etc.
• Anthropometrics: changes in body weight, weight loss, weight gain.
• Nutrition Focused Physical Exam: dark circles under eyes, muscle tenderness, edema (fluid retention + swelling), abdominal bloating, stiffness, limited mobility.
• Dietary and Food Habits: meal pattern & timing, nutrient density, caloric intake, macronutrient balance and quality (carbs-proteins-fats), glycemic load, fiber intake and sources, intake of ultra-processed food, intake of refined sugars, micronutrient and phytonutrient intake, any adverse food reactions or food triggers, food intolerance or allergies, prebiotic sources, probiotic sources, fermented foods, gut microbiome diversity.
• Conventional Labs: Comprehensive metabolic profile (CMP), CBC with differential, fasting insulin & HbA1C, complete iron profile including serum ferritin, serum 25-OH Vitamin D, serum B12, complete thyroid panel.
• Functional Labs: GI-MAP by diagnostic solutions or OAT test by mosaic diagnostics.
• Wearables Data: apple watch for exercise/HRV (heart rate variability), whoop for exercise/HRV, oura ring for sleep tracking.

A personalized functional nutrition care plan will be created for you based on the data from the initial comprehensive functional nutrition assessment that includes personalized diet therapy, targeted supplements, probiotic strains, as well as lifestyle changes in stress level, sleep quality, and exercise which are important for gut and hormone health.

By addressing these underlying causes — through personalized approaches like nutrition, simple lifestyle changes, and targeted supplements — functional nutrition aims to bring the body back into balance and resolve fibromyalgia at its root.

What are common symptoms associated with Fibromyalgia?

Symptoms are a sign that something is off internally within one of these systems: Inflammation, Gut Dysbiosis or Gut Imbalance, Impaired Detoxification, Hormonal Imbalance, Mitochondrial Dysfunction, Circadian Rhythm Disturbances, Oxidative Stress, Neuro-disruption, or Immune dysregulation. Symptoms are essentially your body crying out for help in the only way that they know how to communicate. Symptoms associated with fibromyalgia include:

• Six consecutive months of severe, chronic fatigue (primary symptom)
• Chronic pain resulting in tender points (primary symptom)
• Anxiety
• Widespread chronic musculoskeletal pain
• Sleep disturbances
• Headache
• Brain fog
• Digestive distress

What are root causes of Fibromyalgia?

• Mitochondrial Dysfunction: the impairment of mitochondrial cells which are energy producers or the powerhouses of the cell. This leads to overall impaired energy or energy deficits.

Conditions that Are linked alongside Fibromyalgia:

• 30-60% of people with fibromyalgia also have Irritable Bowel Syndrome.

How can I help treat Fibromyalgia using functional lab testing?

There is no specific lab testing that is used for fibromyalgia. There is also currently no FDA-approved treatment for it, instead we can use a functional nutrition care plan to restore mitochondrial dysfunction, reduce pain, and reduce “brain fog” that includes evidence-based nutritional recommendations, lifestyle changes regarding stress and sleep, targeted practitioner grade supplements, as well as functional lab testing.

My storefront is linked here to order functional labs, which is signed off by a nationally-licensed physician, to assess for gut health issues, hormonal imbalances, or vitamin/mineral deficiencies. If you need help creating a personalized functional nutrition care plan based on the interpretation of any of the above functional labs, you can work with us here.

Functional lab testing would be a good idea if you really wanted to hone in on the specifics of gut microbiome imbalances, hormonal imbalances, vitamin/mineral deficiencies.

Are there any therapeutic diets used in healing Fibromyalgia from a root cause approach?

Therapeutic diets for fibromyalgia typically include a whole foods therapeutic elimination diet trial. Elimination diets involved the removal of certain foods that are considered potential triggers from the diet until symptoms subside and then gradually re-introduce “trigger foods” to determine which food, if any, are triggering symptoms. These are short-term therapeutic diets that are not meant for you to stay on the rest of your life. We are aiming to heal mitochondrial dysfunction and then heal, repair, and rebalance the gut using the 5R Treatment Protocol linked here.

Looking at it from the STAIN framework — Stress, Toxins, Adverse Food Reactions, Infections, and Nutritional Imbalances — we aim to identify the root causes and design a personalized nutrition care plan based on your unique biochemical individuality. Biochemical individuality is the concept that each of us has a different nutrition blueprint to achieve optimal wellness. We each have our own, unique genetic expression and that is shown in a personalized nutrition care plan made just for you.

Tip: Keep a food journal so that pre and post meals you can become more in tune with your body and see how certain meals make you feel. Continuously check in with yourself to see how you are feeling, this is the type of subjective information that only you can know for yourself and make sure to share this information with the dietitian that you are working with!

Ask yourself: How do I feel after eating this specific meal? *insert symptom here* It’s helpful to have a dietitian that is able to look at your food journals so that they can decipher what specific ingredient or a combination of ingredients that may be causing these symptoms. Having a food journal is also helpful to look for any potential food reactions that may be related to fibromyalgia.

Are there any supplements, probiotic strains, botanicals, or herbs that are helpful in healing Fibromyalgia?

Targeted supplements, alongside a therapeutic diet using a food as medicine approach, are often used in treatment of fibromyalgia aimed towards healing mitochondrial dysfunction and digestive health. Remember supplements are there to “supplement” or to help the main treatment which is using a food as medicine approach to healing.

Make sure to order from a high quality and third party tested brand instead of purchasing from Amazon where practically anyone can sell anything without any rigorous testing. To make it easier for you, you may order from my supplement dispensary below through Fullscript’s catalog where each brand and product meets strict top quality standards. You can learn more about third party testing here.

My supplement dispensary is linked here (with a 30% off discount!) and you do not need to be a client to place an order.

What are some diet and lifestyle tips that can help me during the process of healing Fibromyalgia?

Look at sleep, diet, exercise, and stress management.

Here are some helpful tips for you to begin the process of healing fibromyalgia:

• Limit intake of ultra-processed foods and foods with refined sugars.
• Have a stress management routine! (traditional yoga, yoga nidra, breathwork)
• Yoga helps to reduce anxiety and stress resulting in improved overall symptoms.
• Having a routine that includes any form of daily movement: walking for 30 minutes daily has been shown to improve symptoms and lower inflammation.
• Chew your food mindfully and thoroughly
• For bloating, you can use herbal teas such as teas with fennel, licorice, chamomile, and peppermint.
• Pre-meal deep breathing to encourage MMC (migrating motor complex) function.
• Having proper mealtimes where you are sitting down (not standing up!) and making sure to properly and mindfully chew your food. By carving out a special time to eat, you are telling your body to relax into the parasympathetic state (rest and digest state) which is essential for optimal digestion. Allow your body to slow down, make sure that you are in a seated position, rest, remove any distractions, and simply enjoy your meals for better digestion.
• Try eating with your hands in order to eat less portion sizes, to get more in touch with the texture of your food, and to eat more mindfully and slower. The skin microbiome on your fingers will positively affect your gut microbiome. (make sure that you have clean hands and use your right hand preferably)
• Using a bidet

Gentle reminder: Don’t stress yourself with an all or nothing mentality where you feel like you have to implement everything on this list all at once. Sometimes in order to reach the end goal, you need to take baby steps at first and build these habits bit by bit.

How can I heal Fibromyalgia with the help of a functional nutrition dietitian?

Each person is unique and this is recognized in a personalized functional nutrition assessment and intervention plan that engages and empowers the patient in this process to restore optimal function, manage symptoms and promote overall health and well-being.

Functional nutrition addresses the whole person, not just an isolated set of symptoms. We look at it from a root-cause perspective and create a focus on prevention through nutrition, therapeutic diets, targeted supplementation, exercise, interpretation of conventional and/or functional lab testing, botanicals, detoxification protocols, and stress management tools.

Overall from a whole body, root cause approach, to heal fibromyalgia we would look at using a therapeutical diet to manage symptoms, targeted practitioner grade supplements aimed at healing mitochondrial dysfunction, and then work to rebalance the gut using the 5R Treatment Protocol linked here.

By addressing these underlying causes — through personalized approaches like evidence-based nutrition, simple lifestyle changes, and targeted supplements — functional nutrition aims to bring the body back into balance and resolve fibromyalgia at its root.