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INTRODUCTION

MY MOTIVATION FOR EMBRACING GODS GRACE GROWTH MINDSET AND INTEGRATIVE LIFESTYLE- OUR EXPERIENCES BECOME OUR STEPPING STONES TO IDENTIFING OUR PASSION AND PURPOSE AND LIVING THEM TRANSFORMATION FROM A LOW – ENERGY DEPRESSED, ANXIOUS WOMAN TO A GOD- CENTERED,,HIGH- ENERGY, POSITIVE, HAPPY, VIBRANT, PHENOMENAL AND IMPACTFUL WOMAN USING GODS GRACE, GROWTH MINDSET AND INTEGRATIVE LIFESTYLE

I am Dr Ifeyinwa Nwakwesi a conventional medical doctor now passionate about God’s grace Growth mindset and integrative lifestyle which help me become a master – piece I am today.

I welcome you to this training program because I know you want to learn grow and become the best version of yourself .

The Growth mindset and integrative lifestyle are miracles given to mankind by God to help us find solutions to most of our lives challenges

Please read the story of my motivation to becoming a Growth Mindset and Integrative Lifestyle specialist.

I pray this training will equip you with knowledge, strategies and skills you need to live your best life and become an asset to your world.

MY STORY OF TRANSFORMATION

One evening in 1987, my husband and I were driving to Anthony Village to visit his late brother and his wife Nnamdi and Hazel Nwakwesi

Suddenly, I felt a burning sensation on my right thigh, and I asked my husband if the air-conditioner was emitting hot air; he checked and said it was not.

The sensation persisted, and I felt it in different parts of my body.

This was the beginning of an illness I had to deal with for over six years of my life .

Within a week, so many other symptoms appeared. I started experiencing anxiety symptoms and became very moody.

Sometimes, I would have panic attacks, and the most frightening experience was the sudden feeling that I would die if nobody was around me.

I would break out in a sweat, my breathing fast and shallow.

I also observed that I was easily fatigued. In church or at events, I could not stand without feeling that I would fall or lose balance. I had to hold on to somebody or the pew for balance.

After eating, I would feel bloated and had problems with too much gas, constipation, and heartburn.

I remembered that a few years back, one of my husband’s colleagues took a look at my palm and told me that I would be very sick in the future.

His words worried me, and I wondered whether someone was trying to hurt me.

After recalling the incident, I spoke with a friend who inferred that since I was beginning to do well in business, some people were after my life and may have contacted some diabolic people to deal with me.

This state of mind worsened my health. The most dramatic of which was the panic attacks.

I experienced frequent panic attacks and soon had to consult a medical doctor.

After a few consultations, he diagnosed anxiety neurosis with reactive depression. He put me on some medication, including Inderal and Diazepam.

There was some relief, but I experienced uncomfortable side effects from the drugs.

The most significant was dryness of mouth, which I found very irritating.

The drugs did not make the panic attacks disappear. Instead, I experienced a series of attacks and got admitted to the hospital, where I received some intravenous injections to calm me down.

I spent about one week in the hospital, which I found boring.

I am not the best of patients, and I hated losing my freedom.

Luckily, I got a bit better and the doctor discharged me, but my health problems persisted.

Two weeks after being discharged from the hospital, most symptoms reappeared in greater intensity even though I was still on medications.

Someone also introduced me to some Chinese herbs, which I took for a while but discarded when I didn’t get any better.

However, regardless of my ill health, I continued my business.

The interesting phenomenon is that people often told me I was looking good, but I knew I was battling an imbalance in myself that made me unhappy and less productive.

My husband,Dr Maduka Nwakwesi was very worried about my health and advised that I discontinued business because he believed my ill health could be due to stress.

But I did not, I continued to go to work. I was still excited about my business challenges, and overcoming these challenges brought me a lot of satisfaction.

One day at work, I felt weak, and my anxiety attack was more dramatic.

One would have expected someone in that situation to go home and rest in bed, but I did not. I continued with my work until I suddenly began to feel dizzy and severe palpitations.

My heart was beating faster and louder than usual. I could hear my heartbeat, and then suddenly, I heard myself say, ‘Oh, I am dying. Oh, I am very weak, Maduka. God help me’, before passing out.

When I opened my eyes, I was lying in a hospital bed at First Consultant Medical Centre, Obalende, Lagos.

They told me I was brought into the hospital with a feeble pulse rate, and they could not get any pulse rate at that point. The doctors worked hard to resuscitate me, and luckily I responded.

I thank God for the opportunity to recover.

We all know and hear about people who die during such attacks.

The doctor discharged me two days after admission. I am not sure if the doctor conducted further investigations to determine the cause of my collapse, which I believe was attributed to stress.

That may have been the cause, but I might also have suffered from a transient ischaemic attack.

In all these experiences, I continued to look up to my God for healing.

As I said earlier, I was raised in a Christian family and had a strong sense of the spirit of God residing in me. I regularly worshipped at Our Saviours Anglican Church. At that time, one of my sisters had joined a Pentecostal church, and she convinced me that my healing would be faster if I attended some of the Pentecostal Services. Thus, I went from one Pentecostal church to another, seeking instant healing.

The constant prayers helped me to cope better with my health problems, but the symptoms and signs did not miraculously disappear. I decided to return to my orthodox Anglican church.

My ill health persisted, and I was beginning to get frustrated. I became unhappy and lost the energy and enthusiasm to continue my business activities. Everything became a chore, and my productivity diminished.

Since I was getting easily irritated, my staff struggled to cope with my frequent criticisms.

In the same vein, my family also had to deal with a depressed and irritable mother and wife, as they did not quite understand what was wrong with me.

It was not a case of a definite disease: asthma, diabetes, liver disease, or any disease they knew about.

They were confused and did not know how to take care of something they didn’t understand. My husband and mum were distraught and insisted I travel abroad for medical treatment.

I first travelled to Germany, and after extensive tests, nothing abnormal was detected. I returned to Nigeria with relief, knowing I was not about to die, but the symptoms and signs continued. Fortunately, someone introduced me to Dr Rodney Adeniyi Jones, a well-known holistic practitioner in the UK, and I travelled to the UK to consult him.

Dr Rodney Jones is a brilliant integrative medical doctor whose compassion for his patients is unrivalled.

He spent quite some time inquiring about my medical history; he carried out a complete blood workup and other tests not typically done in orthodox medicine.

The tests were not necessarily looking for a disease state; instead, the tests aimed to detect metabolic dysfunctions in the body, which may not have reached the stage of actual disease.

Most orthodox tests were normal, except that I had elevated SGOT and SGPT – indicative of some liver dysfunctions.

Dr Rodney also tested my body for toxic substances, and he found out that even though I did not drink alcohol, my body had a high level of acetaldehyde and some toxic substances, which are by-products of yeast and fungus.

These substances are very toxic and can damage the cells of any organ and lead to different types of unpleasant symptoms.

He explained that I was not digesting my food correctly, which was more of starch and meat than salads and greens.

The undigested food attracted organisms like yeast, bacteria, and fungi generally residing in the body of every human being.

After feeding undigested food, these organisms release these toxins into the blood, leading to free radical damage and chronic inflammation.

These were some of the root causes of my unpleasant symptoms.

In my toxic state, I was not absorbing the nutrients my body needed for good health, leading to my low energy and frequent irritability.

He recommended diet modification, lifestyle changes, and some vitamins and herbs.

For the first time, I saw a window of opportunity for my recovery. I returned to Lagos with renewed hope and enthusiasm about my health. I began practising everything Dr Rodney taught me and religiously took my prescribed vitamins and natural herbs.

A friend advised me to consult Prof Adeoye Lambo, who was already combining orthodox clinical practice with some effective and scientifically proven alternative methods. I consulted him, and he introduced me to an acupuncturist, Dr Alphonsus Ekwerike, who treated me with about twenty-five acupuncture sessions.

This treatment resulted in significant relief from my anxiety attacks and helped to improve my depressive episodes.

Prof Adeoye Lambo told me that most of my problems were stress-related and gave me a book titled “Be Stress Wise”to read. The stress awareness that I acquired contributed immensely to my improvement. I was on my way to recovery with all these treatment modalities, and my health further improved.

Not all of my symptoms disappeared, but it was much easier for me to cope because I now had more precise information on my problem. Also, the fear of death, cancer, and one chronic disease or the other disappeared.

These experiences exposed me to the other world of medicine: the alternative healthcare world. Even though I was trained as an orthodox medical doctor, I gradually expanded my knowledge and developed the desire to explore other healthcare modalities.

The more I read books on Alternative Health Care, the more I became convinced that the approach to medicine, which focuses Primarily on curative medicine, ignoring other aspects of Natural Health Care and Preventive Medicine, had to change.

In 1991, I set up Healthy Living Services to provide these other health approaches to Nigerians, and I am convinced that this was the real purpose for my ill health. God was preparing me for this job by giving me first-hand experience so that when I am counseling and managing a patient, I can quickly identify and understand their problem because I have been through a similar situation.

Many people today are not necessarily ill or confined to a bed. But so many move around and go to work with myriads of health challenges. They know it and feel it. Sometimes people around them notice, but sometimes they don’t. The individuals know they have problems. They may consult one doctor or another, undergo a series of tests, and the doctors may find some abnormal results or nothing.

These people may have been given drugs and may experience some relief, but usually, they do not completely recover. Their doctors may alternate from one drug to another, but their symptoms never improve.

As I continued battling my health problem, I became exposed to different healthcare modalities, some of which were instrumental to my recovery. Through divine intervention, I became experienced in these other modalities to facilitate my healing and benefit my fellow humans. I acquired the knowledge through reading health books and attending trainings abroad.

God helped me use the knowledge consistently to improve my health. My productivity and energy have increased. My enthusiasm for life is much greater. I have moved on to a higher spiritual plane. I have also packed it all in this training to help you live your best life .

As you go through this traning , get ready to learn about the modalities that have significantly contributed to my phenomenal, passionate and impactful life and the vibrant lives of others I have had the opportunity to counsel. The modality is the miracle mindset and lifestyle – the Growth mindset and integrative lifestyle – that can help you work on becoming the best version of yourself so you can be an asset to your family, community, and society.

My FAMILY LIFE

I am married to a peaceful man, Dr Maduka Nwakwesi. We are blessed with three sons, two daughters, their amazing spouses, and thirteen adorable grandchildren.

I am very excited that you are doing this training on how to become an asset to yourself family community and society through the growth mindset and integrative lifestyle by Gods grace .

I can assure you that doing this training will be a life-changing experience for you.

The Growth mindset and integrative lifestyle are commitment to a daily routine of prayers, being intentional about ones beliefs, thoughts, and feelings, living with a positive mindset, and taking care of your body. It aims to help you achieve good health and gain energy to accomplish your goals and aspirations so you can become better version of yourself and be asset to your world