Truth Lasagna: Your recipe for navigating loaded questions when you're between jobs, relationships, or chapters

Truth Lasagna: Your recipe for navigating loaded questions when you're between jobs, relationships, or chapters

You're in the middle of something — a career pivot, a business transition, a relationship shift — and someone asks a perfectly innocent question like "How's life?" or "How's work going?" Your throat clenches. You either say too much or nothing at all, and walk away feeling like you lied either way. This solo episode introduces one of Julie's most-used client frameworks: Truth Lasagna. Rooted in her grandmother's wisdom — you can't tell everything you know — Truth Lasagna is a practical, body-based way to navigate the messy middle without oversharing, shutting down, or betraying yourself in the process. The framework is simple: your truth has layers, like lasagna. Your deepest, rawest, most unprocessed truth belongs to very few people. The middle layer is real and honest, but considered. The outer layer is brief, diplomatic, and true — it's just not everything. Choosing the right layer for the right person isn't hiding. It's discernment. Julie unpacks why high-achieving, empathetic women are especially prone to the all-or-nothing truth trap, how the fawn response quietly masquerades as dishonesty, and why ethically nondisclosing or withholding isn't the same as hiding parts of yourself or lying. You'll also learn about Truth Buckets — how to pre-sort who gets which layer of your truth, so you can stay connected to people without flooding the room or going silent. If you've ever avoided a networking event, a coffee date, or a family dinner because you didn't have a clean answer to a loaded question — or you've ever overexplained until you regretted it — or you've walked away from a conversation quietly wondering if you could have shared something better — this episode is for you. 06:09 — Truth Lasagna: The Framework Your Grandmother Already Knew  08:41 — The Wobbly Middle: Why Identity and Belonging Make This So Hard  10:55 — The Fawn Response and What It's Actually Trying to Do  18:23 — Oversharing Isn't Honesty — It's a Stress Response in Disguise  30:15 — The Three Layers: Who Actually Gets Your Deepest Truth  36:51 — Truth Buckets: Pre-Sorting People So You're Not Frozen in the Moment  42:38 — How to Practice This When It Feels Messy and Imperfect If this episode speaks to you, hit subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a friend 👉Looking for more of where this came from?  Sink deeper with coaching support from Julie and Book a Soul Story Mapping Session [https://www.illuminatefreedomcoaching.com/soul-story-mapping] Keep up with what's going on by joining the Notes from a Fart Walk Newsletter [https://illuminate-freedom-coaching.myflodesk.com/email-club] and don't miss an episode or update Watch full video episodes and clips on Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5pnvs17ub-2d2B7NedN_ShnUz6sGKHej] Social Media: Follow Julie for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week. You can also shoot her a DM to connect! Instagram @drjuliegranger [https://www.instagram.com/drjuliegranger/], Substack @drjuliegranger [https://substack.com/@drjuliegranger] LinkedIn  juliegrangerdpt [https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliegrangerdpt/]

You Don't Have to Do it All: Dr. Mbong Henry on Sporty Pelvises and the Fun and Success in being Fiercely Yourself

Mbong Henry is a physical therapist specializing in sporty pelvises, a health coach, mom of three, and — as of her 40s — a competitive Olympic weightlifter. But this episode is really about something underneath all of that: what it looks like to build a life and a business around what actually feels good, not what you're supposed to want. Mbong walks us through leaving the hospital system after years of feeling unsupported, building Radiance PT on her own terms, and discovering that being unapologetically herself was the most effective business strategy she had. She talks about fun as a values filter, fierceness as a skill she had to learn (and then brought straight back into the birth room), and what it means to have a reach goal you've completely untethered from your identity. If you've ever wondered what it looks like to say no to the thing that looks like the right thing — this one's for you. 00:01 — Welcome and introduction to Mbong Henry 01:48 — Hitting the wall: the hospital years and what finally broke 12:08 — Building Radiance PT and learning that being yourself is the strategy 24:11 — Fun as a values filter: how she knows when she's drifted 27:07 — Olympic weightlifting at 41: how it started and what it unlocked 33:13 — Fierceness, the birth room, and the mighty morphing power ranger uterus 42:00 — Kindergarten, margin, and the next chapter 48:23 — Lightning round 55:06 — Where to find Mbong Love what you hear and want to stay connected to Mbong? VIsit her website at https://www.radiancept.com/ by tapping here [https://www.radiancept.com/] Follow her on Instagram: @mbonghenry.dpt [https://www.instagram.com/mbonghenry.dpt/] -- If this episode speaks to you, hit subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a friend 👉Looking for more of where this came from?  Sink deeper with coaching support from Julie and Book a Soul Story Mapping Session [https://www.illuminatefreedomcoaching.com/soul-story-mapping] Keep up with what's going on by joining the Notes from a Fart Walk Newsletter [https://illuminate-freedom-coaching.myflodesk.com/email-club] and don't miss an episode or update Watch full video episodes and clips on Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5pnvs17ub-2d2B7NedN_ShnUz6sGKHej] Social Media: Follow Julie for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week. You can also shoot her a DM to connect! Instagram @drjuliegranger [https://www.instagram.com/drjuliegranger/], Substack @drjuliegranger [https://substack.com/@drjuliegranger] LinkedIn  juliegrangerdpt [https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliegrangerdpt/]

You built the 6-figure business. So why do you now want out?

You did everything right. The credentials, the business, the team, the referrals. And now you're sitting in the parking lot before work, not tired, not late — just unable to make yourself go in. In this solo episode, Julie tells the story of Marjorie — a composite of the clients she's walked alongside who hit this exact wall. PT, business owner, fully booked, deeply respected. And quietly falling apart on the inside. What unfolds isn't a roadmap or a pep talk. It's an honest look at what it actually costs to keep following a map someone else designed for you — and what's really missing for the high-achieving women who can't seem to move from the life they've outgrown into the one that's pulling them.  Spoiler: it's not a new certification. It's not better boundaries. And it's definitely not more progesterone. 00:01 — Meet Marjorie (why Julie tells composite stories — and who this one is really about) 02:21 — She Had It All and Still Sat in the Parking Lot (the voice that started quietly and got impossible to ignore) 06:22 — Everything She Tried to Make It Stop (supplements, sabbaticals, yoga, dog walks — and why none of it touched the voice) 08:17 — When Resentment Moves In (watching the clock, dreading sick calls, and the guilt that comes with both) 27:26 — What She Finally Said Out Loud (the Soul Story Mapping session, and the thing Julie didn't see coming) 34:40 — Surrounded by People and Completely Alone (the relational reckoning, and the co-regulatory nutrient nobody talks about) 51:34 — The Three Things Actually Keeping Her Stuck (co-regulation, financial safety, and learning to follow your own compass) If this episode speaks to you, hit subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a friend 👉Looking for more of where this came from?  Sink deeper with coaching support from Julie and Book a Soul Story Mapping Session [https://www.illuminatefreedomcoaching.com/soul-story-mapping] Keep up with what's going on by joining the Notes from a Fart Walk Newsletter [https://illuminate-freedom-coaching.myflodesk.com/email-club] and don't miss an episode or update Watch full video episodes and clips on Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5pnvs17ub-2d2B7NedN_ShnUz6sGKHej] Social Media: Follow Julie for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week. You can also shoot her a DM to connect! Instagram @drjuliegranger [https://www.instagram.com/drjuliegranger/], Substack @drjuliegranger [https://substack.com/@drjuliegranger] LinkedIn  juliegrangerdpt [https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliegrangerdpt/]

Tell Me More with Dr. Ashley Martinez: On getting broken open, the body that never lies...and how both become your greatest practitioner tool

Ashley Martinez is a women's health pelvic floor PT, integrative nutrition health coach, single mom, and highly sensitive person who spent years leading with her credentials — until life made that impossible. In this episode, Ashley shares her story publicly for the first time: the deployment, the divorce, the infidelities on both sides, the church that excommunicated her, the family that demanded achievement in exchange for love, and the body that quietly kept score through it all. What emerged on the other side wasn't a redemption arc with a bow on it. It was something messier and more honest — a woman who stopped trying to be righteous and started getting curious. We talk about what it really means to create healing space for patients (hint: it starts way before the intake form), why your symptoms are your body speaking and not your identity, the difference between a groove and actual health, and what happens when you finally stop running from the uncomfortable thing and just... sit in it. This one went beautiful places. Come ready to feel something. 00:00 — The Ick Factor of Polished People 16:50 — Floor to Flourishing: The First Three Years of Single Motherhood 29:14 — There Are No Villains Here 34:02 — Boundaries Are Between Me and Me 47:06 — Your Body Was Always Speaking 58:46 — Stop Making Your Diagnosis Your Identity 01:00:39 — What She'd Whisper to Her Younger Self If this episode speaks to you, hit subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a friend 👉Looking for more of where this came from?  Sink deeper with coaching support from Julie and Book a Soul Story Mapping Session [https://www.illuminatefreedomcoaching.com/soul-story-mapping] Keep up with what's going on by joining the Notes from a Fart Walk Newsletter [https://illuminate-freedom-coaching.myflodesk.com/email-club] and don't miss an episode or update Watch full video episodes and clips on Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5pnvs17ub-2d2B7NedN_ShnUz6sGKHej] Social Media: Follow Julie for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week. You can also shoot her a DM to connect! Instagram @drjuliegranger [https://www.instagram.com/drjuliegranger/], Substack @drjuliegranger [https://substack.com/@drjuliegranger] LinkedIn  juliegrangerdpt [https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliegrangerdpt/]

The Good Patient is Dead: How the medical system trained me to stop trusting myself — and how I got out

On April 1st, 2026, I opened a patient portal and read the words that officially closed an 11-year chapter of cancer surveillance. No fanfare. No one else in the room. Just me, the screen, and a quiet exhale that had been building for over a decade. But this episode isn't really about a scan result. It's a story I've never told publicly — the plot twist that added an extra year to my surveillance, the six-month stretch of unexpected medical news that cracked me open in ways cancer treatment never did, and the slow, devastating process of wriggling my identity free from both the Good Patient and the Good Provider I'd been trained to perform. From Christmas Eve biopsies to crying through Taylor Swift at the Eras Tour in Paris, to throwing myself a 10-years-cancer-free party before I was technically "done" — I trace how I rebuilt my relationship with my own body, reclaimed sovereignty inside a system designed to strip it away, and learned what true co-regulation in medical care actually feels like. And how rarely I'd experienced it. This one is for the high-achieving women in healthcare who have spent years knowing their patients' bodies better than their own. Who go full provider-mode at their own appointments. Who brush off subpar care because they understand the system. Who have never once been asked — really asked — how they're doing in the middle of it all. I'm asking those questions out loud in this episode. The ones most of us have never let ourselves finish. 00:00 — The Portal Moment: What 11 Years of Waiting Felt Like in Two Seconds 09:17 — Benedict and the Backstory: The Cancer Diagnosis Nobody Saw Coming 13:49 — The Good Patient™: On Surveillance, the Sick Cycle, and Handing Over Dominion 22:14 — The Plot Twist: When the Year-Nine Scan Added a Year You Didn't Have to Give 31:08 — Defiant Joy: How She Held Lung Nodules, Dog Crises, and the Eras Tour in Paris at the Same Time 47:52 — The Beet-Red Breast Specialist and the Nurse Who Reached for Her Hand 01:00:49 — Declaring Yourself Free Before Anyone Else Does If this episode speaks to you, hit subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a friend 👉Looking for more of where this came from?  Sink deeper with coaching support from Julie and Book a Soul Story Mapping Session [https://www.illuminatefreedomcoaching.com/soul-story-mapping] Keep up with what's going on by joining the Notes from a Fart Walk Newsletter [https://illuminate-freedom-coaching.myflodesk.com/email-club] and don't miss an episode or update Watch full video episodes and clips on Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5pnvs17ub-2d2B7NedN_ShnUz6sGKHej] Social Media: Follow Julie for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week. You can also shoot her a DM to connect! Instagram @drjuliegranger [https://www.instagram.com/drjuliegranger/], Substack @drjuliegranger [https://substack.com/@drjuliegranger] LinkedIn  juliegrangerdpt [https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliegrangerdpt/]