Babbling About: Work, Health, And The Next Step

#226: Nothing catastrophic is happening, and somehow that can feel even more overwhelming. My life lately is a pileup of moving pieces: a demanding healthcare schedule, big questions about my career path, a long health puzzle, and the quiet pressure of wanting the future to come with a clear timeline. So I’m sharing a real, unfiltered life update from the middle of it all.

I talk about what it’s like working as a nurse practitioner doing veteran disability exams, where the work isn’t just patient-facing time but hours of record review, research, and writing medical opinions. I also open up about balancing additional clinical work, the very real risk of burnout, and the hard truth that you can love your job and still be overworked. We get into money lessons too, including how focusing on debt payoff left me behind on retirement planning and why I’m trying to be more intentional about building my 401k and choosing what comes next.

Then we shift into health and wellness: autoimmune thyroid history, hormone imbalance, and the frustration of symptoms that aren’t an emergency but still impact your quality of life every day. I share what I’m learning about gut health, functional medicine perspectives, and why self-advocacy matters when you keep hearing “but you look healthy.” I also talk basics that actually help: macros, whole foods, hydration, sleep support, stress reduction, therapy, and choosing consistency over perfection.

We end with faith, Bible study, and the reminder that growth is usually slower than we want, plus a quick tech detour featuring a new iPad, a new MacBook, and a patience lesson I earned the hard way. If any of this hits home, subscribe, share this with a friend who’s juggling a lot, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

Transcript

Welcome And A Quick Apology

Johnna 0:00

What is up, everyone? Welcome back to another episode of the Babbles Nonsense podcast. First and foremost, sorry that I did not drop that I would not be doing a podcast last week. Honestly, it was so last minute because work has been nuts. But this week, I decided since my life has kind of been all over the place lately, that I would do a little life update episode. Nothing dramatic has happened, which honestly is for the best, but it's actually been one of those seasons where there are just so many moving pieces at the same time. And sometimes that feels more overwhelming than just one big event. So let's just go ahead and get into it.

When Work Becomes Too Much

Johnna 1:05

Just kidding. It's really not a dumpster dive. It's just been so many things going on. And like when I say things, it's mostly work. Like work has been so busy. And when I say busy, I mean like really busy. If you've listened for a while now, you know I'll work as a nurse practitioner. I'm in the healthcare field. And lately it feels like I've been juggling multiple jobs inside one job. Um, there are weeks where I feel like I'm doing great and staying ahead, and then there are weeks where I look at my schedule and wonder who thought this was a reasonable amount of work for one human being. So what I currently do is I do veteran disability exams, and our schedule's not like a normal shift work schedule. It's very hard to explain. But the way I explain it to my friends is like I work quote unquote 12 hours, but it's 12 hours of like exam time because I do a lot of record review. I have to formulate a medical opinion for the VA on the disability exam. So there's in-person examination where you get the information, and then there's the administrative side of everything where you have to look into the records, formulate an opinion, do the research, which I really do enjoy. I've always enjoyed doing research and computer work and all that stuff, but it can be time consuming when you're trying to do the best job for the veteran because that's our job. But it just seems like it's just been a lot lately when normally we slow down in the summertime because everyone's going on vacation and holidays or whatnot. But these past couple of weeks, it's just been crazy busy, which is great, right? Like that's great for our job and our career, but sometimes you get a little burned out. Not to mention, I know I haven't really talked a lot about my jobs on this um episode. I try to keep it kind of like private life and just do my personal life on the um podcast. But as I've stated before when I've done healthcare episodes, I really do need to be more like talkative, I guess, about my job and career because that is 90% of what I do in my life. So I also do a like a part-time, and when I say part-time, it's not like part-time what you would think, like half half shift or whatnot. This is just one day a week, and then the rest of it is over the phone where I go round at an assisted living. Because at my full-time job, we only work four days a week, and then so I do this one day a week. And mostly because I wanted to keep up my clinical experience, because with the veteran disability job, we don't do things like interpret. Well, we still do clinical experience with record review, but it's not like acute stuff going on at that moment. And since my whole career has been either trauma or emergency room, I still wanted to keep up that clinical experience. Um, and I'm not complaining. I'm not complaining about having too much to do. It's just, as you know, like it's a very blessed situation to be able to be busy with work and you know, have a career to go to because especially in this economy, but and I also love what I do, like I really do love what I do. But I've been learning that loving your job and being overworked can both be true at the same time. I'm trying

Career Direction And Retirement Catch-Up

Johnna 4:06

to step into that whole realm of like you can have two feelings at the same time. And if I'm being completely honest, I've also been exploring some new opportunities professionally. I'm trying to figure out what I want the next few years to look like, kind of what I want to grow into. Do I want to keep working this much? Do I want to try to do as much as I can now? Um, because I don't know if I've ever talked about this on the podcast, but in my previous career where I stayed at the longest, it wasn't the highest paying job and it wasn't the best benefited job. So um I always worked a lot to pay off my student loans, pay off my car so that I didn't wouldn't have any debt because that's just what I was taught to do. But in the meantime, in doing that, no one taught me, which you know, obviously it should be common sense, like you should be doing half, like you should also be building your 401k at this age because you're at the age where like if something happens, stock market crashes or whatnot, you can still rebuild. But I wasn't doing that. I was paying off debt and not really dumping into my retirement the way I should have. And like I said, I wasn't at the best career where we had um substantial benefits or anything like that. So I was super behind on my retirement. So that's what I'm doing now is just trying to work and build up that retirement. But anyways, yeah, I've like just been trying to like explore some things professionally. Like, do I keep doing exactly what I'm doing because I do love it? Do I add something different? Do I shift directions a little bit? I don't have all the answers yet, but I'm trying to be intentional instead of just saying yes to everything and kind of like looking at my life because I am getting older and the closer I get to 40, the more I'm like, I think it's true, like that midlife crisis, like where you're just like, what am I doing with my life? Every day's a hamster wheel. Every day I get up and it's just very mundane and whatnot.

Hormones, Thyroid, And Gut Health

Johnna 5:49

But outside of work, if that wasn't busy enough for you, um, I have been really focusing a lot on my health lately. I used to be this huge health nut. And mostly because I was gaining a lot of weight in my 20s. Um and I've all, you know, that was the era of like the skinny, the skinnier you are, the better. And so I just couldn't figure out why I was gaining so much weight, which these are old, old, old episodes. I've talked about this, where I ended up getting diagnosed with my autoimmune thyroid disorder and that had been stabilized. But in my early 30s, or right when I turned 30, like all my symptoms were coming back, and we found out that all my hormones, like my estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone were all low, which I have been to some super smart doctors. I've been sent to Vanderbilt, and it's kind of like a mystery. People are like, we don't know. We just don't know. My theory, I can't prove it. I'm not a scientist. Yes, I'm in healthcare. My theory would be just the extensive amount of time that I was on birth control in my teens and in my most of my 20s. And I just think it suppressed my own natural hormones and they just never rebounded. I personally, this is just a theory, again, if you're into conspiracy theories, I don't know that a lot of our generation were on birth control for a really long time and we're having a lot of infertility issues. And then the more I'm reading um, like hormone books and stuff like that to kind of learn more about hormones, just because I think they are so fascinating. And a lot of doctors don't really know, and I can understand why being in healthcare, like you get a snippet of certain things, and hormones just as we all know with women's research and things like that, they just weren't taught for real. You had to go into a specialty, and even then sometimes I do don't feel like it was taught to the extent of like functional medicine practicing, and especially like as time has gone on, because for the longest time, people, you know, we had that black box warning on hormones for women, just saying that it caused um cancer or you shouldn't start on this early or you shouldn't be having symptoms at a certain age. But really, we just never had a baseline for hormones. Like, if I had a clinic and if I were a professional working in hormones, my personal opinion, because I've experienced it myself, we should be getting hormones at certain ages. We should be checking people's thyroids at certain ages. Because how do we know if they're off if we don't have a baseline to start with? But, anyways, that was a long rambling section to kind of like talk about me going into my own health journey. Because if you've listened to this podcast, some of you may know that I have spent some of the better part of the this year trying to figure out why I haven't really felt like myself. It's been a lot of testing, a lot of tracking, a lot of trial and error, and honestly, a lot of patience, which is not, you know, my fortitude, if that's a word, fortitude, whatever, whatever the saying is. And if you've ever dealt with something that isn't serious enough to be considered a medical emergency, but is serious enough to affect your quality of life every single day, then you know how frustrating that can be. And those are things like I'm talking about like PCOS or you know, endometriosis or um thyroid conditions, hormone issues, because you look healthy from an outside perspective, but you're just internally suffering with all these symptoms where people are like, but you look healthy, but but but but but is all you hear, and it's quite annoying. Um I'll be honest, even being in the medical field, you're just kind of like, aren't you supposed to know? But I feel like the good news is I'm starting to finally get some answers and moving in the right direction. As you all know, I talked about like the dopamine cycle and the um testing idea to see which kind of medication would work there. Um, and just kind of diving more into hormone and gut health, even though I was already like a proponent for gut health many, many years ago, I kind of fell off that journey. I think when I decided to do like macro coaching and whatnot, not that I don't love it, I still do, but I think when you try to turn a passion into a career, it can become a little overwhelming or maybe a little burnout because you realize not everyone is as passionate about something as you are at that moment or even in general. And so you kind of get a little burnout on it. But I'm getting back on that journey and I love that for me. Um, but I'm learning that sometimes health isn't about finding that one magical fix, sometimes it's about finding these 10 small things that can help a little bit at a time and kind of make a bigger picture all in one, kind of like my hormones. Like once you start like learning and about all this stuff and how that kind of all ties together, like your thyroid and your female hormones and um your gut health and how it kind of all ties in together with your serotonin and your dopamine. And what I've been reading is um a book called Um Fix Your Gut Fix Your Hormones, and I cannot remember the author's name, but she's an endocrinologist who even in her book was like, I'm in endocrinology. I even went into um, she went into a specialty with hormone endocrinology, and she was like, they didn't even teach me what I learned on the functional side of medication. So I just thought that was interesting because even if we're being sent to these specialists, if they don't have that passion and that drive to go learn beyond what they're taught in medical school, then sometimes that isn't even the answer, which is kind of disheartening. But at the same time, like I'm here to tell you as a healthcare professional, don't stop giving up. If something, if you feel like your body is off and you feel like something is wrong, advocate for yourself. You don't have to stay with the same practitioner, even if you drive with them, even if you like their personality. If they're not treating you like as a person instead of just lab values, then just advocate for yourself and find somebody that will. But I'll get off that soapbox. Um, I've also been trying to just kind of get back to the basics of just everything that I've been doing, like eating better, because I had, you know, when and and we're all in these different seasons. Like I have a um personal trainer who's also a nutrition coach and she's wonderful. And like even me and her talked about it not too long ago. She was like, you know, we're all in just different seasons and we just have to accept kind of where we are in our seasons of life. Like, not all of us, like, even though we try to look fit and do all these things, I think once we come to that acceptance of like, why am I doing this? I'm not a bodybuilder. I'm not this. I just want to be healthy, I want to move my body, then we can kind of regain that passion for fitness and nutrition or health or whatever it may be that you have in that health and wellness world. Um, such as just like going back to macro counting and trying to eat whole nutritious foods and move my body, um, trying to sleep better when I can. Um, I have a horrible time sleeping, which I wish I could find an expert on sleep to do on this podcast because I would love to dive into that with somebody. But also just trying to reduce stress where I can, like going back to therapy, finding a therapist that just really validates me. And not in a way like, oh, she's just there to validate me, but like really helps me dig into why I think the way I do, or doing the testing for low dopamine and serotonin and do I need an antidepressant and things like that. Trying to drink water. Like I know that sounds crazy, but like even just that staying hydrated can help so many things, which I'll still say is still remaining one of my greatest challenges these days because I used to be so good at drinking water and here lately not so much. Um, and I took a week off from the gym not too long ago. Um, or actually last week, I don't know why I said not too long ago. And I like initially, like I used to feel so guilty from taking off from the gym. But I think the more you dive into health and wellness and you read these things, like sometimes going to the gym too much where you're not sleeping and you're spiking your cortisol and it's just stressing you out more than being a benefit, sometimes it's good to take those breaks and just let yourself recalibrate and so that way you can enjoy it when you go back versus just forcing yourself to do something. Um, and that's where I was saying, like, sometimes even the things that we're passionate about, you can get burnt out on, and just saying that out loud and telling someone like it's okay is okay. Um, but I'm trying to focus less on being perfect and more on just being consistent with these things. And I think that's a lesson that applies to almost everything that we do in life, right?

Faith, Bible Study, And Slow Growth

Johnna 14:10

Well, since we're on the thought of consistency, I've also been spending a lot of time in Bible study. I know I've mentioned it here and there on the podcast, but I kind of wanted to just give a little snippet since we are doing a little live update here. But that's one of that's been one of the biggest blessings this year for me. Um, no matter what you believe in, like I'm I believe in God. I'm, you know, I consider myself a Christian and I've been reading through scripture in a much deeper way than I ever have before. Um I'm almost 40, like it's never too late to start learning something. I would, I would say that I would had already considered myself a Christian and I, you know, tried to do what was right, but I wouldn't be someone that I would say grew up in the church. Um I remember my mom wanted to start taking us to church when I was in my teens, and then the the church she took us to was just how do I say this nicely, just in my opinion, not the best. Like it was one of those churches where it's like if you do this, you're going to hell, if you do that, you're going to hell. And like, although maybe in their own way, they were trying to teach scripture the way they felt was best, it just didn't resonate with me. And it made me kind of turn away from church in in that aspect. Um, I've felt like I've always considered myself spiritual, but just kind of trying to dive more into scripture and understand it has been the goal this year. Um, I can thank my friend Lori. She's one of my best friends. She's, you know, got me into it on the Bible app. And we do this daily um Bible study together and we talk about it. And we were doing weekly, but she's got three kids, so that's kind of hard with scheduling sometimes. And like I find it interesting because like you always hear these Bible stories as a children or a child, and like you go, maybe you visit a church with someone and they're readings. I remember when I first started going to church with my friend Tracy, I'm speaking of, and they were reading scripture, and somebody would say, like, oh, I'm sure someone's heard this verse, and I'd be like, I actually don't know that story. And now that we're going through these scriptures, and now that I'm sitting in church on Sunday, I'm like, oh my gosh, I read that. I know what that means. I kind of or I kind of know what that means. Or you're always going to learn something because the Bible is extensive, and like everyone's interpretation of it is just different. And I think that's kind of unique in what it's about because we all read things and interpret things in our own way. I mean, obviously we should get someone to help guide us. Um, we we do a Bible study where this lady actually tells us about the scripture when we're done because it can be misinterpreted. And if we think about it in today's culture and time frame where we have to remember the culture that it was written in and um the time frame that it was written in. Because there are some verses where I'll talk to my friend, like where it's stuff about women or whatnot. And I love the way this lady um breaks it down because she'll explain, like, I know some of y'all might be disheartened by the way this was spoken about a woman in this section, but it's really if you think about the culture and you think about the time frame that it was written in, and then you go back to the context, this is actually what it means, and you're like, okay, okay, I can see that. I like that better. And so it's always good to have someone, I guess what you would call an elder in the church or someone who understands scripture more to help teach you. But we also have to be aware of we're we're getting our teachings and whatnot. But one thing I've been learning is that growth is usually a lot slower than we want it to be, whether that is your faith, health, relationships, career goals, and most things don't happen overnight, even if we want it to. We live in this fast-paced cultural society, especially in the US, where we're supposed to work all the time, never take a break, say yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And sometimes I think when we just slow it down and realize like that's not what life is meant to be, and it's okay to make mistakes and take detours and get back on it. Because we're all looking for that breakthrough moment, but most of life is actually built in those ordinary, mundane figuring life out, going through some stress, going through some struggles. That's when I think we grow a lot because we have to, you know, depend on our spiritual thoughts or God or whoever you believe in, and we have to depend on, you know, learning and knowledge and wisdom to kind of get through it and come out on the other side of it just more thankful. All right.

New Tech And A Patience Lesson

Johnna 18:23

Now, moving on to technology because apparently I decided I needed more gadgets in my life because why would I, why would I not? But I have needed some new things like for work and stuff like that. So I recently got a new iPad and then the new MacBook I traded my MacBook in because it was older, and I just needed something that was faster with one of my jobs, and then the iPad helps me like because I needed like the pencil that goes with it to like sign documents and things like that. I wish Mac would just make their you know iPhones compatible with a pen, andor you could just make your computers touch screens, and that would just make my life a lot better. Um, but sometimes, even though technology is wonderful when it works and absolutely infuriating when it doesn't, I definitely had some setup issues with my MacBook. But first, I guess I decided when I traded my MacBook, I had a 13-inch, it was probably five, six years old. Um, and now with the new technology, like with the desktop and the Mac, you can like go between screens. And I really need two screens for work. So I was like, okay, let's just upgrade it. And um I was like, let's just go with the 15 inch because my eyesight's getting a little worse because I'm getting older. And when I got it, I was like, ooh, this screen just too big, don't like it. I I also just I'm I'm a creature of habit. So I was like, let's just take it back, get the 13 inch. So took it back, got the 13 inch, and I was like, hey, can we just transfer what I have from this computer to that computer? Why I did that? I don't know. I had it for like a week and I set that whole computer up as new, but I just didn't want to have to like download all the apps and all that stuff again. It's just like, yeah, just go sit over there and we'll get someone to help you. I was like, okay, I'll sit here, but I don't need someone to help me, like I know how to do this. So I I started the transfer and it said it was gonna take three hours. And I was like, and I had just gotten off work. I needed to get home to feed my dog, and I was like, I'm not sitting here for three hours. So I just canceled the transfer and you know, I left. And that was the moment when I questioned every life choice that led me to purchasing this new device because when I got home, it would not connect to the Wi-Fi and it would not complete. Guess what I had to do? I had to go back to the Apple store the following day and get them to set it up, and I had to sit there for an hour. So, moral of the story: learn more patience and just sit there for the transfer. And you wouldn't have had to go on back. But it when I say three hours, it did say three hours initially and then it went down to an hour. So either way, I was there for an hour, which a which is a life lesson on patience. But we're finally getting there. I'm also trying to use them more intentionally for work, all these devices like podcasting and organizing my life instead of just collecting another screen to stare at. I've also been trying to take more notes in church. And I'm I'm still that person who likes pen to paper, especially calendars, but I'm trying to get more into using a notepad to take notes on, like on my iPhone or the iPad, or using my calendar to get away from the paper. Trying, it's hard. I know if you're younger and you're listening to this, you're like, how is that hard? Because when you grow up with paper calendars, you just love them. And it's just, again, creature of habit.

Boundaries, Uncertainty, And Listener Messages

Johnna 21:29

But as for the podcast itself, thank you to everyone who's continued listening to me babble about this. This podcast has never been about having all the answers. It's really just been a place where I can talk about whatever random thoughts are floating around in my brain that week, kind of like a verbal diary. That's what it was always intended to be. So sometimes that's dating, sometimes it's gonna be health and wellness, sometimes it's gonna be faith or health care. And sometimes it's gonna be completely random topics that I became obsessed with for 48 hours. And honestly, I kind of like that for me. Life doesn't fit neatly into one category ever, so neither does this podcast. And speaking of dating, we're not doing a full dating update today because that could probably be its own episode. But let's just say I've learned a lot about boundaries, communication, and paying attention to action instead of words lately. And that's all I'm gonna say for now. And one thing I've been thinking about lately is how easy it is to get caught up in trying to figure out the future. I'm very guilty of this. I'm someone who always wants answers, timelines, certainty. I want to know how everything is going to work out before I take that next step. But life doesn't really work that way. I know I've mentioned that multiple times on this episode, but sometimes all you get is the next step, or maybe not a next step at all. And maybe that's supposed to be enough for us. That's where I am right now, currently. I'm trying to take that next step in life, whether that be, you know, with my health, spirituality, trying to make decisions professionally, trying to enjoy the present instead of constantly worrying about what's next. And that's probably a good place to be. So I'll end it there. Thank you for listening. Thank you for sticking around through all the random topics, life updates, and occasional disappearing acts when I'm supposed to put out a little note to say catch up on some old episodes. Um, but if there's something you would like to for me to talk about in the upcoming episodes, just send me a message and let me know. You can do that a couple of different ways. Um, you can reach out to me via email or you can um Instagram or there's a new feature um in the podcast itself. If you click in the show notes, there's a way to send a message. You can do it anonymously. I think you can even send voice notes now. Um, but it's all in the show notes where you can just click all of the different things. So yeah, I think I'll just end it there. And until next time, guys, bye, I think.