We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Dr. Whitney Donohue a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Dr. Whitney, thanks for joining us today. If you had a defining moment that you feel really changed the trajectory of your career, we’d love to hear the story and details.
Most definitely! I am a Naturopathic Doctor but I also use a few modalities that are different than most. Naturopathic Medicine already makes you different, but using modalities like Applied Kinesiology, Neuro Emotional Technique & Muscle Testing make you really different. The way I understand the body and healing as a whole is different, my approach to medicine is different and I was not always sure where I fit in, in the healing world. I don’t remember if there was an exact moment, patient or outcome, however there was this shift because collectively in my practice I was seeing people heal in ways I always knew was possible but they never knew was possible and it became this solidifying moment, that changed everything for me, my patients and my practice. I doubled down on everything I knew, I stood my ground on how I knew people could heal and I stood boldly and spoke loudly about how I can help, with pride and confidence and was no longer having to prove my place in the health and healing world. I owned what I do and how I can help others heal to the very core and it changed everything. People are looking for something different, they are seeking a different approach and way of thinking and they want to do it as naturally as possible. They are no longer looking for the quick fix and they are wanting to understand and live a life of true health and being able to speak how I can help them, lead them right to my door. The lesson is to truly believe in what you have to offer the world, have confidence in your knowing, which will lead to results and proof to back it (for yourself and others). Speak boldly even if you are different because the right people will find you, many will be curious and the others who are not, let them be. Not everyone is going to like you, like what you do or agree with you, but if you lead with kindness, knowledge and good intention, the people that are for you will find you and with that you will have aligned success.
Dr. Whitney, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
My own pain story got me into natural medicine, lead me to naturopathic medical school and then into a weekend course of Applied Kinesiology (AK). By lunch time on the first day, I had no idea what I was witnessing but I knew I needed to know it and I knew I was in the right place. Then I was treated by a local AK doctor, who changed my life in only one visit. That solidified that I was on the right track in pursuing AK. I watched as the most profound healing occurred over the years in these courses and could not get enough. One of the core principles of AK is how comprehensive it is at treating the whole person. It is called the Triad of Health. We focus on the Physical (joint, spine, muscle, tendons, ligaments, fascia, etc.), Biochemical (organs systems, toxins, microbial imbalances, nutrients needed) & Mental / Emotional.
We connect the dots with this as every muscle is related to an organ, every organ is related to an emotion. Each one has influence on the other in ways it causes dysfunction and also in healing. With healing I often describe it as peeling back the layers of the onion, when we cut through the onion we cry (we cannot pick and choose what we want to heal) but when we peel back the layers in which the body is ready to heal, we get to the root cause quickly and efficiently. Within each of those layers is a physical, boichemical and emotional component that must be addressed before the layer is shed. Applied Kinesiology provides us the system in which we evaluate and treat each of these, in the most efficient way possible.
For the emotional component of the triad, I used a modality called Neuro Emotional Technique (NET). This again was presented to be at a time in my own healing journey where my pain was no longer physical but emotional (yes emotions and stress can manifest physically in the body &/or keep it stuck). NET really sparked the trajectory of healing unmatched to anything I have ever experienced before, even more than AK which was hard to believe. Addressing emotions or unresolved stress patterns, I saw chronic pain disappear in an instant, it corrected imbalances in movements patterns and organ systems and allowed for the body to accept the medicine it is receiving. NET works to neutralize the physiology (feelings in your body) of emotions or stress patterns stuck in the body, that are causing or triggering imbalances and issues in the tissues. By neutralizing the physiology related to the stress patterns, we take a load of the nervous system and allow the body to heal. NET provides the body with the most profound healing and is why I see miraculous healing every day.
All these modalities use the tool of manual muscle testing which allows us to communicate directly with your body’s nervous system through neurology (think the 5 senses: touch, taste, smell, etc.) and physiology. This provides feedback that allows us to know exactly what the body needs, when it needs it, giving you the most significant and profound healing that is precise and efficient.
One of the things I am most proud of is my passion and commitment to this medicine. I truly believe and trust in the body’s innate intelligence to heal, I am simply the guide, removing obstacles that prevent it from doing what it was naturally created to do, which is to heal and thrive. These modalities allow that to happen in the most profound ways and I could not imagine practicing medicine without them.
What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?
The most effective strategy has been face to face networking/ marketing. What I do is different than what most people have heard about/ expect, so I found being able to speak to people face to face, learn more about them and their business/ them personally, I can provide more tangible examples they understand. I speak about what I do different to an athlete with an injury compared to a mom who is burning the candle at both ends, compared to another practitioner. I think true human connection is the most effective and that means that you show up as the human, not a piece of you just promoting your business. People want to connect with YOU, so allowing the best parts of you to connect is where the success lies. In a group networking or setting I usually will have a great connection with one or two people, I will offer to take them to coffee or lunch and really take the time to get to know them and share what we each do on a deeper level. This allows us to really connect and foster a relationship and determine if we are a good fit for referrals or other connections. With patients, I offer a free 15min discovery call, to get a chance to connect, hear more about what they are looking for, explain more about how I can help them and what I do and make sure it is a good fit for both. This allows you both to also foster a connection before the first visit, which establishes trust and eliminates surprise on both ends. True human connection and fostering relationships is the key to long term growth.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
I think if you continue to put yourself in a position to better yourself and grow, get healthier, etc. you automatically are set up to unlearn everything you thought you knew previously. I had been in the health and wellness space since college, I was dogmatic about nutrition and exercise, with how and what it looked like. Part of that was my personality, my insane will power and self motivation (at that time) and personal experience but when I was learning to really work with other people in the natural medicine space, I realized not everyone was like me and that everything has nuance.
Nothing is life is black and white, there is space in-between which is often the most powerful. Being introduced to so many new ways of healing, I had to open myself up to the possibility that I was not always correct and that there are other ways of doing things, other paths to get the same outcome. Then learning AK and NET, really changed everything I knew about health and healing. I had to unlearn so many of the basics of the human body in the way they were taught and how I thought they operated, years of schooling and training that wasn’t necessarily wrong but simply missed the mark.
Unlearning is challenging. It hurts your ego the most, especially when you have spent a lot of time and energy pursuing something specific. BUT the best part of unlearning is that once you know/see/learn something so profoundly different, you can’t un-know/un-see it and there is not going back. This puts you in a position to continually learn more moving forward and know that the more you know, the more you realize you don’t know. You will forever be unlearning in the pursuit of knowledge and life.
By trusting the body to heal, with the tools of AK and NET, I unlearn things everyday but I also learn so many new things every single everyday. The body is more amazing than we will ever be able to capture in one place/book/ theory/ mind. Now I have become comfortable in the space of unlearning, because I know how powerful and how magical it is to be surprised everyday, to be humbled by the fact that I do not know everything and I say it everyday. I know a lot of things about a lot of things, but I do not know everything and the body teaches me something new every day. One of my mentors always said that you should always be surprised by what you find, if not, you are not longer learning and you are doing a disservice.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.drwhitneydonohue.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drwhitneydonohuend/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drwhitneydonohuend
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-whitney-donohue-nd-b9b140133/
Image Credits
Nylmar Martinez