25 Years of Purehealth Clinic
How did I get from being in care to running a successful natural health business despite a crap start in life and MCAS? It's a biggie so you may need to view it online as the email will cut off!
I can’t believe it is already half way through January and I’ve not yet written my new year update missive for you! Apologies. My excuses are funerals, emergency dental appointments, a sudden influx of clinic work and, to be honest, I was doing some thinking. You know I like to have a good think for new year and plan what’s coming next!
Purehealth 25th anniversary!
Yep. This is my 25th year since I set up Purehealth Clinic officially in 2000. In truth, I’ve been involved in natural medicine on and off for way more than that - I think 38 years!! - but that was when Purehealth came into being: one day sitting in a rented farmhouse near the beautiful village of Croston in Lancashire. Just me, an old wooden table and a PC in a massive, freezing cold dining room with awful green carpet. I’d left my job at British Gas to focus on full time clinical work. Scary, broke, but SO excited.
I’ve been feeling quite nostalgic, thinking back about how it all started, how I got to the place I am today - personally and professionally. It turns out it is quite a story! So, rather than my usual new year musings, I thought it might be an idea to ‘interview’ myself for you. I have so many followers now who probably have no real idea of who I am and what Purehealth is all about.
So, here goes…settle in, this is a longie - forgive me if it’s a little self-indulgent, but I really enjoyed writing this potted history! I hope you enjoy it too - a more personal post for a change x
How did you get into natural medicine?
No idea where the interest came from initially as no-one in my family had any medical interest (natural or allopathic) as far as I know. Of course, some of you will know I was brought up in care and don’t actually know much about my Mum or Dad. The Dad I thought was my Dad turned out not to be. I found out just twenty years ago that my actual Dad was likely an Italian fisherman. Which explains a lot. My colouring. My passionate nature. My talkativeness. My love of fish :).
My Gran used to take me shopping and my favourite shop was Culpeper The Herbalists in Leamington Spa. I. loved. It. I wanted to work there - I think I was 14 at the time! For birthdays, she used to buy me books from the shop and the interest just grew from there. I had visions of myself concocting herbal mixtures, macerating colourful flowers to make beautiful oils, having a shop with dark walnut shelves lined with those old-fashioned apothecary jars full of interesting stuff. I still do. You should see my pantry!
Culpeper shops were set up by the same lady who formed the Herb Society, I believe. They ended up with 19 stores and closed in 2011, sadly. They were such beautiful shops, full of loose herbs, pure skincare, teas and tisanes. I miss them, truly. They clearly had an effect on me.
My first natural medicine book was Culpeper’s Complete Herbal.
Which you can still get on Amazon here. Of course, I then wanted to become a herbalist.
So, did you get a degree in natural medicine then?
Ha - such things didn’t exist when I were a lad! Truthfully, the first ever degree course in Natural Medicine had just launched at Middlesex University. Just in time for my 18th birthday. I got a place. I never got to go, however, because, as a ward of court in the care of the local council, they had far too much say in my life (IMHO). No-one in care in that region had ever gone to university - a fact that still shocks me today! They had to change the rules so that I would continue to be paid a special living grant as I would no longer be in foster care after my 18th birthday. I told them where I wanted to go. And they said no. I was so mad. They said I had to do a ‘proper’ degree like English or something.
I was really good at English, actually, and enjoyed writing. But I was blowed if I was going to bow down. I was bolshy even then, it’s true.
Funnily, enough, at school I had similar issues. They wanted to make me head girl - imagine the story and kudos for the school of making a girl in care the top prefect. In my interview with the head, they asked me what university I was planning to go to. I told them I was going to a polytechnic as I wanted to do something less stuffy. Not only that, I had chosen Trent Poly in Nottingham where the first ever modular degree was on offer. I could choose to major and minor in whatever I liked and make up my degree from loads of different courses. This didn’t look quite so good for them and I was dropped. Thankfully. I would have hated it.
So, I got my own way in the end. I chose to do a double major in English, American and African literature with Psychology. But the rest of my degree was made up of human biology, photography, visual communications, art, business and other stuff. I loved it. And was the head of the course student committee for two years there instead. So there.
My true revenge was that on the day I left, I walked into the Holland & Barrett in Leamington and asked for a job. I started as a Saturday girl. Hilarious.
So, Holland & Barrett was your first career - how did that go?
Honestly, I had found my true calling. I loved learning about the supplements and foods, I liked talking to customers and helping them, I was put in charge of the book shelves (yay!) and I really enjoyed retail itself.
H&B couldn’t offer me more hours, sadly, and I needed money to live now I was on my own. When you leave care, that’s it. There’s no safety net, so money was down to me. I left to work as a market research exec. After a year or so, the manager’s job at H&B came up and I got it, returning triumphant! I recruited a new team as the shop was performing poorly. I went around local shops where I knew there was good customer service and begged a few to come and work for me. They trusted me and did, which always amazes me when I think about it.
As a team, we really loved our jobs. At the end of every day, I made the team ‘face up’ all the products so the shop looked nice and full the next day and whenever I shouted ‘stop’ randomly, they had to pick up the product and tell me about it. It was fab training for all of us. H&B had monthly targets and we smashed it every single month getting M&S vouchers for every team member even though they increased it every time. That was purely because we were a happy team and enjoyed learning so we could help people. Happy times.
Eventually, I got noticed as we were the best performing shop of its size and I was asked to work at head office where I became customer service manager, trading manager and internal communications and PR manager. That was all at the same time - it was very stressful. I enjoyed it but I missed the shop. Sadly, also my boss was not easy to work for and one day he went too far. I resigned the next day.
I went straight off to work in a health shop/deli, and took a course in Clinical Aromatherapy with Shirley Price, a pioneer in that field at the time. I bloody loved it. And I was good at it.
Then I got asked to come back as a consultant to H&B because no-one understood how to do my job and would I train them up?! I did. And charged them a fortune for doing so, of course ;)
I got pulled back in and became the PR manager for the Lloyds Chemists group, who had bought H&B. It took me too far away from the jobs that I loved but it was useful to gain business skills etc. I was still writing a training and internal comms newsletter for all H&B staff in 450+ stores and also started writing features for magazines and newspapers to get H&B known more. I actually conceived and commissioned what became Healthy magazine, the best selling natural health magazine in the UK. It closed recently, which made me sad.
Somehow, at that point, I sort of felt I should go off and get a ‘proper’ job just to see if I could hold one down. I always had in the back of my mind that I wanted my own natural health business, and I needed money to do that. So, I applied for a PR job with British Gas Midlands, got it and within 18 months had risen to the Senior Comms Manager for Midlands and the East regions. I earnt tons, had a lovely team of people and colleagues, drove round in a soft-top cabriolet leather-seated car, bought a house and tried to settle in and carry on. I simply couldn’t. It just wasn’t me. So I left. I met P, my now husband, and we moved to Lytham St Annes. Just because we liked the sea, and why not?
Why did you set up Purehealth Clinic 25 years ago?
My new start career-wise took two paths. I started a clinic as a massage therapist using my aromatherapy training. The place I was in needed beauty services as well so I trained in waxing, eyebrows, pedicures etc etc. But all done with non-toxic and herbal stuff, of course. It was very fun! I knew that aromatherapy was really relaxing but a lot of my clients had terribly sore, stiff necks and backs and I wanted to be able to do something about that.
So, I did a remedial massage course in Blackpool with the Northern Institute of Massage - a sort of pre-osteopath level course. I loved it, again. That took almost two years and, during that time, I felt that a lot of the muscle tension and stiffness people were suffering with was actually biochemical - calcium dumping etc. No amount of physical therapy would help some of them. So, of course, I determined to learn about that next. I started training as a medical nutritionist with Professor Lawrence Plaskett - the best scientific but naturopathically-leaning course available at the time - and I still think it knocked the socks off many of the degree courses today.
I knew the Plaskett course would take me 3-4 years, so I set up the massage/physical side of the business first - we created a whole treatment suite in a beautiful three storey house in Lytham St Annes that we bought for a song and completely renovated. We had a soft consultation room with comfy yellow sofas and a lavender massage room with bathroom attached. I even had some of the local Blackpool football team there as massage clients as I recall. It was such fun! We loved it there - made some lifelong friends and many people from those days are still in touch when they need me, which I love.
Once I was at qualifying level and felt I had enough skills, I decided I needed a brand and that’s where the Purehealth Clinic idea was formed.
What does Purehealth Clinic stand for?
I chose that name after much deliberation to reflect that it was clinical, not beauty (as much holistic therapy was in those days) and ‘pure’ to reflect that I was focused on non-toxic care. My strapline was ‘alternative and complementary healthcare’ because I wanted people to recognise that it could be an alternative but also complement their allopathic healthcare.
A lovely local lady in Lytham St Annes made me the logo and I’ve used it ever since!
My aim was always to be able to offer a truly holistic healthcare service, what we’d call helicopter health nowadays. I deliberately trained in physical and biochemical/nutritional medicine and practiced both - internal and external medicine, if you like. I used my essential oil skills to make bespoke remedies and skincare for people, found the purest supplements for them, trained people how to avoid toxins in food and everyday life, how to exercise and use their muscles properly. Basically, anything they needed to lead a truly healthy life and get better from illness, we tried to provide.
One aspect I didn’t have training in was the mental and emotional health side of things. So, when P wanted to leave his job and join me in Purehealth, it gave me an opportunity to plug that gap. He has a gorgeous deep voice, was a former newsreader and is now a voiceover artist, so I said I wanted him to train as a hypnotherapist for me. He was fabulous at it. We helped change many mindsets, lower anxiety, depression, resolved phobias and stopped so many people smoking and over-eating, I can’t tell you! We were a dream team.
But I wanted an even better service. Of course.
So, we rented some rooms above a shop in a beautiful moorland village called Uppermill, near Manchester.
We set up a reception, a dispensary of foods, supplements, pure skincare, herbals, homeopathics, freefrom ranges etc, plus three treatment rooms, loos and a kitchen. Water given was reverse osmosis, bamboo loo rolls, non toxic paint, all in healing colours. We were ahead of our time, this was 2002, I think! Then, we recruited other types of therapists to offer acupuncture, counselling, podiatry, homeopathy, herbalism, osteopathy etc and they worked independently but also as part of a team. I took cases, had the global overview and knew enough about all of their approaches to determine who patients needed and in what order. I sent them off, they came back regularly to report and review and I sent them, off again, until they were well. We also worked with local mainstream practitioners like midwives, physios and the GP surgery.
It was a risk to set it up. But I had no worries it would work. I got our first patient from the woman sitting next to me on a train, wrote a local Q&A column in the paper, features in the local booklet that went to every home in the area and did lots of free talks to WI, local groups etc. Remember, this was pre social media! I think it was easier then, to be honest. We were inundated, and very busy for 5 years. We truly enjoyed it. However, the lease ran out and we decided to move back to warwickshire to be near family and to work more virtually at that point - well ahead of the curve on Skype. You wouldn’t believe it, but I was kicked out of the major nutrition association for doing virtual work! Guess who was right and who wasn’t…? Just sayin’.
What happened after you closed the Uppermill clinic?
Truth was, I was early 40s by then and had started to feel unwell a lot of the time. I think the stress of running the clinic wasn’t helping my sensitivity levels - which were ramping up month by month and which turned out to be MCAS, we now know - and, looking back, I’m pretty certain I started peri-menopause but never even thought of it. Doh. Lesson learned for you all now, though, trust me!
P decided to become a voiceover artist and I carried on doing face to face and virtual appointments for a good couple of years. I gradually had to stop seeing patients as I was more ill than most of them. The migraine had started, I was giving up foods left right and centre to find what the culprit was. I found I was coeliac, cut gluten out - I’d been off wheat and dairy since about 2000 because of severe IBS. Not enough help, so I did an elimination diet for 10 days, thinking I would add foods back in one by one and find what was triggering these awful migraines - and now agonising TMJ pain too.
Trouble was: I could hardly get any of the foods back in. I was left with about 12 foods and that lasted 14 years!!
I needed to keep my mortgage paid, so I set up a lab service as that was the thing that people asked for the most when I stopped seeing patients. I felt awful not helping, so I started the email clinic service and started writing stuff down a lot more, creating the ebooks and factsheets, developing the A-Z on the website. I wrote features for FoodsMatter and other places.
And essentially, that’s where the clinic has been ever since. Happily, it seems to work for me - and for you - so it’s kept going quite well!
Along the way, I discovered I loved interior design and P loved DIY, so we bought, did up and sold several houses to top up our money so that neither of us had to work so hard or do anything we didn’t enjoy - we’ve always had the mantra of earning enough to pay our bills and enjoy life. We don’t earn tons, never have. But our work-life balance has been fabulous.
What happened about your foods and the MCAS?
I realised when I just couldn’t get well, take supplements, meds or any new foods that I was going to have to think in a different way. I was down to a size 6 and felt I was, quite literally, starving. It was a scary time. We moved to Cornwall as I needed sea air and space to heal - and the day boat fish from Looe harbour was a bonus!
I began to investigate what I called ‘non-ingestive’ healing methods. As part of that, I realised that it all got much worse after some family stuff happened, not least when a private investigator showed up and told me our ‘brother’ was looking for us! It was a mad, stressful, happy, confusing, but ultimately, for me as it turned out, very triggering time.
It took several practitioners to convince me I had PTSD - I ignored them - and then I was diagnosed with it formally. Oops. I began researching trauma-triggered illness and ACEs (adverse childhood events) and the impact those have on future health, which is mind-blowing. I did loads of things to get past it and regain my foods - and I wrote the Healing Plan to document it for others.
It took two years to start to regain any improvements in my health. I felt miles better but I just couldn’t keep it stable. Mainstream medicine was no help - some sympathetic, most dismissive, telling me I couldn’t be so sensitive to innocuous things. But no-one could actually do anything much. I gave up and tried to accept things ala the Healing Plan. It did help, but I was depressed, frankly, and missing the old me, my vibrancy, my ‘normal’ life.
A moan on the blog one day elicited some help from several of you - thank you x - and one person said I sounded like her with MCAS. I had thought about it before but not really looked into it in any depth - physician heal thyself and all that! I almost fell off my chair when I read the symptom list - it was me! I knew my GP would never have heard of it and, around the time of Covid (2020), I was getting scared about having to go into hospital and not being believed that I would react to drips, meds and suchlike. So, I determined to find an MCAS specialist and get a diagnosis if it was MCAS.
Not so easy! I eventually found a doctor and I remember at the first session, I had done the MCAS diagnostic questionnaire beforehand, and the first thing he said was of course you have MCAS. Now, what do we do about it? Dear Reader, I cried. Just to be believed. And I know many of you understand that.
It took me 8 months to get the trial MCAS meds in. I had tried quercetin and many other MCAS supplements, but couldn’t tolerate anything. So, I started with a tiny bit of the first med in water and a drop on my tongue and worked up from there. Once I’d got to full dose of two of the meds - the 3rd just wouldn’t go in - I wasn’t any better. Before giving up, I decided to blast them at high dose for a few weeks just so I could say I’d given it my best shot before sinking back into hopelessness. It didn’t work.
Until 5 days after I stopped them!
I couldn’t believe it - I just somehow ‘knew’ my sensitivity level had dropped. I suspect it was a combo of blasting them, it was 7 days after we’d excitedly moved back to Cornwall, I was doing a lot of meditation and my hormones were changing, periods stopping.
I had two years of much less sensitivity - still off grains and dairy but, oh, eggs, tomatoes, wine, coffee. I did go a bit mad, I’ll admit. I was allowed to after all that time.
Because of that and menopause, I gained well over a stone - my body didn’t know what to do with real food anymore. It was hard to digest and my evolutionary switch to hold onto fat because of being starved had clearly been switched on in case I starved again.
So, what’s happening now?
About 8-9 months ago, I started losing foods again and becoming more sensitive. Nowhere near to the old levels, thankfully, but enough to be causing problems. I’ve tried starting the meds again - massive jaw pain for 5 weeks - so no go so far with that approach. I had constantly tried to get some repair supplements in during those less sensitive two years, to no avail - just will not go in. This time, though, I am aware of the hormone element to all this for me, so I recently had some tests done - the Omnos Wellness 360 - specifically to see what might be going on hormone-wise. I could also feel my blood sugar control getting worse - severe PCOS and gaining meno-belly, no doubt.
Even though I know the reason for the meno belly is because fat produces hormones to keep levels up when your ovaries and adrenals are not producing enough, I have hated seeing my shape change so much. That’s been stressful in itself - I get it now, after having been pretty stable weight and shape-wise most of my life - despite severe PCOS and the ever-present threat of diabetes that comes with it. I did go through a stage where I didn’t even want to leave the house as I felt so uncomfortable, ashamed even - I’m a nutritionist for goodness’ sake! -and just wrong in my skin. I’ve had to work on that!
I hate having tests done as I can never really do anything about the results and they always look terrible - that’s what a very restricted diet with no meds or supps will do for you after 16 years. As I thought: oestrogen and progesterone flat as a pancake, as are levels of Vitamin D, folate, magnesium etc, testosterone is high (PCOS history) and liver enzymes raised - my liver is not happy. I assume this latter is the wine and because the MCAS doc asked me to take ibuprofen daily to control pain so I could sleep. It really works but is not good for my liver, clearly! I do also sometimes wonder if I’m somehow suffering with my Mum’s liver - she was an alcoholic - as my liver enzymes are always raised! And thanks to the PCOS, I am now in diabetic HBA1c range. Oh, the joy!
Cut sugar out, they said. Er, I have 2-3 dates and a little honey most days. that’s it. I don’t eat simple carbs much, my diet is high protein, lots of veg, admittedly fruit (apples, pears, berries, cherries mainly, so pretty low GL), lots of wild and unfarmed fish, a tiny bit of beef - every few months maybe - lot of nuts and seeds and legumes like chickpeas and lentils. Pretty much the diet I would give a diabetic, lol. Except for wine, I admit. I have become quite partial to a glass of Shiraz here and there. Blimey, you have to have some treats after such restriction!
Someone up there does not want me to eat!
So, over Christmas, I made myself a big list of foods and supplements in the form of powders, patches, oils, essential oils and teas that I am going to try to get in. I’ve started with mast cell and histamine dampeners to try to bring my sensitivity down enough to get some anti-diabetic, hormone, liver and nutrient help in.
Food wise, so far, I’ve managed cinnamon sticks for blood sugar control, flaxseed for fibre and phyto-oestrogens and invented a kind of high protein porridge made from ground almonds, coconut and ground linseeds, although it does taste a bit like wallpaper paste without any sweetness - maybe I’ll allow a little banana or a tiny drizzle of raw honey?
First up was hibiscus tea, which seems to be going in OK, yay! Very high in Vitamin C and good for the liver. I tried CherryActive juice - within hours felt my body going into spasm. Today is rosehip powder - very anti-inflammatory and high Vitamin C. Next is acerola powder, extremely high in Vitamin C. Then I have things like black seed oil, flaxseed oil, milk thistle oil, berberine, myo-inositol etc etc. I have also invented some essential oil mixes for inflammation, hormones, liver, diabetes etc. Maybe I’ll do a series of posts on the various items, if that would be useful?
So, that’s where I am health-wise. I did feel about 80% better. Probably now more like 60% better than I was. That’s still a win. And I’m taking my own Healing Plan advice again too - to calm my nervous system down.
What about Purehealth - what’s happening workwise?
Well, not a lot, to be honest. I think the system we have currently seems to be working. Tell me if it isn’t for you, but that’s my impression. I am doing the email Ask Micki service, Mini EConsults, running the lab test service, analysing and reporting on results, plus the Case Reviews and some mentoring of other practitioners. I would like to offer face to face again, or at least Zoom, but that doesn’t seem to want to happen - I am never quite sure how well I will be on a given day still.
Instead, I am writing more. The Hormone Plan first draft is finished. I did want to teach it/do some videos for you, maybe make a course, but not sure about that now either. The MCAS factsheet is almost there - I confess I really didn’t want to think about MCAS whilst I felt better so it got put on the back burner a bit - forgive me!
I’ve started the advanced Dr Kharrazian diabetes training (of course) so that will be the next book. I’ve several planned after that over the next few years. I really should try to get one done every few months - maybe I will!
Theme of the year?
Everyone seems to be having a word or theme of the year, have you noticed? In general, I feel the theme of my year is going to be CREATIVITY.
I feel I want to write more - really concentrate on the books/factsheets etc and maybe get them published and out there properly, possibly get some features or tips in mainstream mags/sites to really raise awareness of things that can truly help people’s health. That’s really my aim after 25 years. I’m so full of what could be useful information for people that I should try harder to get it out there more, you know.
That said, don’t get me started on social media. I’ve fallen massively out of friends with Elon and Zuckerberg given their recent shenanigans. I have to hold my nose (metaphorically) every time I even go on Facebook now, and Twitter/X went ages ago. I really don’t want to give them my data or money! I am enjoying Substack - I think maybe I may stay on there mostly soon - until it goes the same way probably, although I hope not - there does seem to be a less snarky, more intelligent and thoughtful sort of user on there! I’m trying BlueSky and Reddit but I’m not convinced. Honestly, I still like Pinterest and You Tube the best!
I want to work on my essential oil blends as I really enjoy the concocting, stirring etc and I think they could be really helpful for some people. Essential oils have saved me a lot in my life - I never seem to get sensitive to those - apart from sage for some reason, as I have just discovered! I invented an anti-perspirant as I needed one and couldn’t tolerate anything. It works really well but the sage in it got me so that one’s out for me! More witchy-blending for me - yay!
I may do more on my Hushed newsletter/site again as it answered a real creative need in me, if not a business one so much. But we musn’t just do things that make us money - I am bad at that. That safety-net need again, I assume. Hushed is all about creating calm, simple, quiet, but beautiful lives that nourish us and make us feel good. It gives me a bit of time away from illness (my own and yours) and, I think doing something completely different is good for me - and you because it makes me enjoy the clinic work even more when I do it!
Away from work, I have been making flowery things - see my Winter wreath below - and I have signed up for a couple of local sessions in crochet and cross stitch to start with. Really to try something new, to get away from my screen and meet some people! I feel a bit makey! So, that might be fun.
And, of course, now we have finally bought what I truly hope will be our forever home in Cornwall, I need to decorate it. Curtain and blind samples have just arrived. Yay :)
So, a massive post - unusually - for you there. Well done if you got all the way to the end! I hope you’ll forgive my nostalgic indulgence. I enjoyed having a look back, and I hope you enjoyed reading it, or at least know a bit more about who I am and why Purehealth exists - hopefully for another few years at least! It’s actually given me some lovely memories, reminded me of the work elements I’ve enjoyed the most and my mind is now planning even more, ha! Here we go again…
Happy 2025, whatever your plans are. Do share any thoughts or your plans so we can encourage you and enjoy yours too x
Read the whole post. You're such a talented, bright, full of energy woman who's done so much with her life and still doing it! Just wanted to express my admiration.
So glad you took the time to share all of this Micki—truly heart warming and inspiring!