Introducing Functional Medicine Health Coaching LIVE – New Video Series

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to work with-or to BE-a Functional Medicine Certified Health Coach?

In our new video series, Functional Medicine Health Coaching LIVE, you’ll watch as Functional Medicine Coaching Academy trained health coaches help their real clients start a transformation.

This inside look at the coaching process started with a casting call to our community, looking for clients who wanted to share their coaching journey on video. Real people who were ready to finally address their chronic health challenges responded!

We matched them with a coach and filmed their sessions once a week for 6-8 weeks. We’re excited to share the resulting video with you.

Throughout the series, you’ll see a range of coaching styles, client health challenges, and client-coach dynamics as each pair works toward better health together. It’s a realistic look at the broad range of experiences and styles you can find in Functional Medicine Health Coaching sessions.

We’ll start the series by following the journey of coach Gina and client Amanda, who met weekly via online video conference for 6 weeks as Amanda worked through some particularly challenging life events.

This episode is the first of their 6 sessions, and it’s completely unedited (other than a few tweaks for lighting and sound) to show you what health coaching is really like. P.S. We piloted the series last spring on Facebook Live with our Alumni Program community, so if Gina and Amanda sound familiar, you probably caught them the first time around!

Health Coaching Session 1 – Gina + Amanda

Meet coach Gina: Fueled by the passion she gained from her own health transformation, Gina was drawn to become a Functional Medicine Certified Health Coach to help others find healing too. With a background in coaching, training, and mentorship as an Organizational Psychologist, Gina believes that a strengths-based approach to life is the key to unlocking your potential.

After completing our Health Coach Certification training in January of 2017, she’s stepping into the field of cognitive health through an internship with ApoE4.Info while also taking our new specialty course, Reversing Cognitive Decline For Coaches, and continuing to build her own health coaching business.

Meet client Amanda: A mom, wife, and medical coder with a personality that lights up a room, Amanda has faced her share of internal battles. From a struggle with weight loss to losing her home and cars, she’s never lost hope in being able to better herself.

After years of researching and self-work with little results to show for it, Amanda began losing herself and her connections. With the support and love of her family, she realized she needed help from a Functional Medicine Health Coach. “When I lost all hope, life got dark. Now I can see some light, some possibilities,” Amanda says.

In what we call the “foundation session,” Gina asks Amanda to use a tool called the Self Care Questionnaire to help zero in on her focus areas.

This questionnaire can help clients identify areas of their lives that are well-tended and areas that could use more time, attention, and support. And what at first seems like a simple task to Amanda turns out to be much more emotionally challenging than she imagined.

Follow up next Monday to see how Gina coaches Amanda through her Self Care Questionnaire and watch as they dig into one of our all-time favorite tools: the VIA Survey of Character Strengths. Interested in Functional Medicine Health Coaching? Do you want to become a coach? Then perhaps our Health Coach Certification Program is for you!

Start Your Application HERE

Interested in becoming a client? Click HERE to find the right coach for your needs.

Find a Health Coach

About the Coaching Process: A Functional Medicine Certified Health Coach (FMCHC) partners with individuals and groups in a client-centered process to support better health. FMCA trains our graduates to work closely with clients around all of the lifestyle factors (sleep/relaxation, exercise/movement, nutrition, stress, and relationships) that influence health.

Coaching concepts like motivational interviewing, character strengths and positive psychology enable health coaches to create the connection, trust, and rapport that facilitate lasting change. The coaching process is successful because it empowers clients to draw on internal strengths, develop self-knowledge, and embrace self-management strategies in order to make the often-challenging lifestyle changes necessary for optimal health.

An FMCHC’s solid understanding of the foundations of Functional Medicine informs their approach. They are fully trained to utilize many of the resources provided by The Institute for Functional Medicine (IFM), such as the Timeline, Matrix, and Food Plans. Their background in Functional Medicine, combined with their training in positive psychology coaching skills, allows coaches to understand and support clients as they implement Functional Medicine treatment plans into their lifestyles. In this way, coaches move beyond the diagnosis-prescription model to co-create and execute a plan with the client that inspires them to a path of better health. When working under the delegation of the treating practitioner, an FMCHC may be able to provide further assistance related to labs and supplements. An FMCHC does not assess, prescribe, diagnose, treat, or interpret results.