Why You Still Feel Sick: When Labs Are Normal

If you’re living with fatigue, bloating, brain fog, weight resistance, anxiety, poor sleep, or inflammation—but keep being told your labs are “normal”—you are not alone. Conventional testing is designed to diagnose disease, not identify the early dysfunction that causes symptoms years before a diagnosis appears.

In this episode, we break down four key root causes often missed in traditional care. Hidden inflammation quietly drives pain, autoimmune flares, cardiovascular risk, and chronic fatigue. Gut imbalances—where up to 85% of the immune system resides—can trigger systemic symptoms like skin issues, anxiety, hormone disruption, and low energy, even without obvious digestive complaints. Hormone dysfunction is frequently overlooked because lab reference ranges are outdated, allowing suboptimal cortisol, thyroid, estrogen, progesterone, and insulin levels to go untreated. Nutrient depletion, affecting the majority of adults, further compounds these issues by depriving cells of what they need to produce energy, regulate hormones, and heal.

Functional medicine connects these dots, addressing the body at a cellular level rather than masking symptoms. If you know something is off and you’re ready for answers that go beyond “everything looks fine,” schedule a consultation or join us for a Drip & Chill to support immune health, energy, and long-term healing.

The Drip & Chill IV Vitamin Therapy Event on December 20th — a perfect pre-holiday reset to boost immunity, energy, and overall wellness.

🔗 Drip & Chill Event: wellnesscornernj.com/drip-chill-registration

If you are interested to learn more about our services and see how we can help you identify the root causes of your symptoms to feel your best, schedule a consultation. We also offer telemedicine and virtual help.
Click here to schedule an appointment:
https://wellnesscornernj.com/
call us: 973-957-0871
email us: info@drjjeanty.com

Dr. Jennifer Jeanty is a functional medicine doctor and the owner of Wellness Corner NJ, where She helps ambitious professionals access the energy, stamina and health they need to get the most out of the incredible life they are building naturally. Her areas of focus are GUT health, chronic fatigue, anxiety, hormonal imbalance and weight gain. She offers both in person and online consultation and customizes her protocol to meet the specific needs of her patients.  If your symptoms are taking over your life and you want to regain your energy, stamina, improve your moods and brain function, balance your hormones, lose weight to feel like yourself again. Schedule a Root Cause Identification Consultation.  https://www.wellnesscornernj.com/

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Transcript

0:00

,I believe when you truly know the root causes of your symptoms, disease, illness, you heal your body and break free from the conventional medicine rollercoaster, which is only providing a pill and a bandage solution, keeping you stuck and sick. And to me, that is unacceptable. Welcome to Find the Root Cause podcast. I'm Dr. Jennifer Jente. My patients call me Dr. J. Functional medicine and root cause doctor and on this podcast each week I will be diving deeper on a health topic with the intention of helping you get a clear understanding of why your symptoms do not have to be a mystery anymore and a plan to help you reduce the need for medications, reduce the frustration, the confusion, the anxiety in order to achieve health and well being. wellness, happiness, to feel your very best and improve the quality of your life. If you are ready to take your health, stamina, and life to the next level and stop struggling, keep listening. I got something amazing to tell you. welcome. Happy Tuesday. As I mentioned, we're gonna be doing the Facebook Live on Tuesdays instead of Wednesdays. I'm feeling pretty cozy. Has been a great, wonderful day here. Because when my people are doing well, I'm doing well. And we also got a letter from Google. We are being recognized as the top three holistic clinic in the area, the Skyland area. And they want to, send us something because we, because of the reviews that our patients believe in us of, expressing the gratitude, the blessings, and also how well they are doing. So Google is taking notes. I didn't know this thing existed. Where, you get recognized for that. So this is our Facebook Live. We are, let's see. You guys can hear me. So today I'm gonna talk about why you still feel sick when the lab results are normal. Which is the truth behind symptoms that conventional testing overlooked. We're gonna talk about the truth. And the reason why I wanted to do this topic today, because we have been getting quite a few people, as you can imagine, that are coming to our clinic, to our practice virtual, and also in person letting us know how they are not getting the answers or the solutions they're looking for. They are lost. Like Dr. I don't know what's wrong with me. I know that something is off in my body. I know that I am not the person I used to be. But yet when I go see my doctors, they are, my doctors are telling me everything is normal and even the blood test is telling me everything is normal. So I wanted to do a quick Facebook live, talking about the root causes, the four, I think I have four on the list. I wrote notes. So if you see me looking to the right. But to your left, I'm looking at some notes because I wanted to make sure that I'm covering all the information with you. I didn't wanna leave anything behind, so I wrote notes to organize my thoughts because I can just come in here and just talk, talk, talk, and then my brain, my thoughts are so disorganized, and because you are spending time to watch this, I want to serve you in the best possible way. So as I'm preparing for this lesson, I'm writing notes. Alright, cool. Why you still feel sick when your lab tests are normal? Let's talk about it. So, have you ever been told how you know everything looks great? Like there's nothing wrong with you, Live in your doctor's office. You wake up one day like, okay, I'm gonna see my doctor and my doctor's gonna give me some wonderful. Information is gonna actually tell me why I'm feeling off, why I'm bloated, why I can't lose the weight. My inflammation is increased. My, my hormones are I balance, like I'm gonna get some answers today because I know, I just know my body. I know something is wrong and the doctor is gonna prove it. And then you show up to your doctor's office the appointment, and your doctor said, well, your lab test. Results are normal. The imaging comes back normal, your endoscopy comes back normal. So there's nothing wrong with you, but you're like doctor, doctor, yes. Something is wrong with me. I hear this all of the time. If I have a penny for every single time, a patient will tell me something like this. I'll be a millionaire by now. Because the conventional space is willing, not design. To identify the root causes, and that is why I want you to understand when you have the symptoms that I'm gonna mention, which is very common in our population, these are the possible root causes you need to address. Research shows that nearly 72% of women feel dismissed by traditional. Healthcare and when they report the symptoms that don't match the diagnosis. So picture this, you go to your doctor, you have gut issues. You are having blo like you bloated, and your doctor decided to do endoscopy, and end endoscopy came back normal. Guess what? There's nothing wrong with you. Because the endoscopy did not match the symptoms or the diagnosis of GERD or heartburn or acid reflux, So 45% of women with chronic symptoms are told everything is fine despite ongoing health concerns. This is what we are working with. This is what we faced with. But I want you to know that standard labs only catch disease. Not the early dysfunction that creates symptoms years before the diagnosis. So that's why in the conventional space, we have to allow for the dysfunction to become severe, for the symptoms to become severe before it can show up in the blood tests. And if we are working with a doctor, the doctor's only doing basic blood tests, we are missing a lot. So the next four things I want you to. Take them and then put it in the back of your mind of things that you need to consider healing your body. The first one is hidden inflammation, which is the silent driver of discomfort. If you wake up today and you have some slight discomfort where there's headaches, migraine exhaustion, joint pain, you can't lose the weight, your autoimmune symptoms are flaring up. Think about inflammation. So in my practice I check inflammatory markers on every single person. Everyone. I'm looking at the heart markers, the lung markers, the joint markers. So inflammation is a silent driver that will lead to more severe symptoms if you do not address them. So 60% of chronic conditions begin with low grade inflammation. I was talking to a patient today, because she was just telling me how unhappy she is with the care she has been receiving in the conventional space. I hear this all of the time. I wish I can just show up and be like, oh my God, everybody's so happy and they all like, celebrating. They're just seeing tons of results. But this is the issue that I want us to really look at. We cannot close our eyes thinking that we are getting the best treatment, when in fact it is clearly visible, like it's apparent that we are not healing, We are not getting the outcomes and the solutions that we are looking for. So she was telling me how. She knows she has inflammation. She's like, I can feel that I'm inflamed. I know the doctor knows more than I do. I'm not the expert, but I can feel that I'm inflamed when in fact she is. She is very inflamed. Her creactive protein in the cardiac marker and she had a stroke and also she has a lot of cardiovascular conditions, but her C-reactive protein in that, nobody checked proof that she's inflamed, that her heart markers are going up and she's at risk for another stroke. Her D dimer also got elevated proving that her lungs are struggling to expand. There's not enough oxygenation taking place, so she knows herself. She knows her body. She was just like a little upset because she's telling her doctors how she felt, but they are telling her something else. Like, I know me. You cannot tell me that I don't have, palpitations. I'm telling you I can feel it, but yes, the blood test doesn't tell you that I have palpitations, but I know that I have palpitations. You know how, frustrating this can be. She's like, I get into like a, fighting match with my doctor because he's telling me something. I'm telling him no. So like, we don't need to do all that. That's why it is very important that you always have a functional medicine lens when it comes to healing your body, because conventional doctors, traditional medicine can only go so far. Traditional medicine is wonderful when it comes to addressing urgencies. But when it comes to chronic health conditions, when it comes to healing at the center. Uh, level, we gonna lie to ourselves thinking that we can get that with conventional, we cannot. So I told her, I'm like, well, I think it, it is clearly said that conventional cannot help you. She's like, you're right. I'm like, okay. So the second thing I want you to understand, I want you to address when you feel sick, okay? And the labs are normal. Is gut imbalances your gut? Account for 85% of your immune system. Studies show that over 70 million Americans have undiagnosed gut disorders, One in two women have gut imbalances that contribute to systemic symptoms, even if you don't have gut issues, quote unquote gut issues, But you have gut dysfunction that can lead to bloating, fatigue. Brain fog, skin issues, autoimmune flares and anxiety. We always go back to the gut. So that's why when you go to your conventional doctors, they give you a pill. The pills go into your gut. So we are always looking at gut issues, whether the labs is coming back normal or not.'cause some lab tests will not diagnose dysbiosis, leaky gut, parasite, yeast overgrowth, nutrient absorption. Now you might not see all these abnormalities, on the basic blood test, but when you do work with a con functional medicine doctor and they know what to check because they understand that the second. Piece two, the symptom the root causes to your symptoms is gut imbalances. They're gonna give you the proper blood test, urine test, saliva test, or stool test to investigate to identify those, gut issues. So functional gut mapping, reveals exactly what's happening at the center level. Deep down that. That your system can be restored, Like we need to know before we do that. The third root causes or the tech categories that we need to address is hormone dysfunction. Even when numbers look normal, women often hear the hormones are fine because the reference range is used in lab are extremely bored. Now. I was start telling the patients, I'm like, the reference range that we see today are from the 1960s. Laboratories are not able to keep up with the latest reference range. So that's why in functional medicine we have a different ways of viewing normal, okay? When the numbers start going up, okay, we start paying attention. We do not wait for the numbers to severely elevate to do something about that. So suboptimal hormones, even the normal range one can cause irritability. PMS, mood swings, insomnia, which is a sleep problem, wake and half flashes low. The beetle, we don't wanna be suboptimal according to statistics. Up to 80% of women over 35. Experience hormone imbalance. I see them all the time in my practice. 25-year-old, 30 years old, I can't, I don't know Dr. Gent, I don't wanna, I wanna get off the birth control pills. My hormones are in balance. I don't wanna be in IUD, We gotta look at your cortisol pattern, estrogen metabolism, progesterone deficiency, thyroid, conversion insulin. These are the hormones we need to look at. Cortisol for stress. Estrogen progesterone, DHEA. Those are the sex hormones, progesterone, Thyroid, hormones, conversion, we gotta look at that. And also insulin, which is also hormones that many practitioners do not check even to give you story, I took my mom to the doctors not too long ago because, She listens to the doctors. I'm a family member, so I can be a little harsh. I'm like, okay, let's do blood tests just for the blood test. And I asked the doctor to check her insulin. Guess what? Because she doesn't appear to have diabetes. They did not check her insulin, I wanna know her numbers because we practice preventative care in my house. Proactive care at my house. I don't wanna wait for her insulin to go all the way up and for her to be in insulin resistance and then I'm doing something about it. So always check your insulin again. Hormones that you should be. You should check cortisol'cause we all face stress. Thyroid with hormones. Your sex hormones, estrogen, progesterone, DHEA, testosterone and insulin hormones. This is gonna give you a lot more, a deeper look of what's going on and exactly how to address it. The fourth one and the last one I would love to bring to your attention is nutritional depletion, which is the hidden energy. A lot of us have lack of nutrients. Therefore, we're not feeding our cells what they need to produce energy for them, for the cells, and also to produce energy for us because our food is depleted, Like 92% of U US adults have at least one nutrient deficiency, 92%. Yet standard labs really rarely check for intracellular nutrients level for absorption issues. If you have gut issues. You have malabsorption, you are nutrient deficient, You have experiencing nutritional deficiency if you have any inflammation. That's also gonna need to nutri nutritional deficiencies if you have any chronic health conditions. That's gonna lead to nutritional deficiency. So you can see how this deficiencies now fitting your cells, your body, your tissue organ, what they need, can need to fatigue, hair thinning you lose your hair. Alopecia anxiety, skin issues, poor sleep, slow metabolism, hormone dysregulation. Also cognitive impairment with a magnesium for the heart, magnesium for the brain, magnesium for the gut, magnesium for the sleep. We need B vitamins for energy. B vitamins for nerves. We need vitamin C for immune building. Vitamin C for blood tissue formation, vitamin C for, skin. So there are so many things that we need zinc for. Immune, It's not just. Eating the food. You also have to make sure that the quality of the food that you're eating is good. And you also have to cater to your cells, like give your cells what they need.'cause if you take a pill, you only getting 20%. That's why in my practice, in my clinic, so I practice online and in person. So for the patients that are in my area, I highly, highly encourage them to come in to, to get IV vitamin therapy because when you do IV vitamin therapy, which happens to be my secret sauce, this is myself. The celebrities, the rich people, the healthy people, they discover something that many people are not aware of, which is IV infusions. Yes, you can eat the food. Now our food is contaminated and many of our food is depleted of nutrients. Yes, you can take the pill, which you should be doing every day, As long as it's a good quality supplement, yeah, do that. But however, it's gonna take you a long time before you can start seeing results I don't know about you. I love to feel better, quicker, and faster. So I'm always gonna do the things that's gonna get me to the end, results to the solution a little faster. With IV vitamin therapy, we can address so many health issues. Chronic fatigue, IV vitamin therapy is really good with that. Vitamin C, excellent with that. Hydration, stress, like there are nutrients for stress to calm the nervous system. We do cdal practice for that with the CBD for anxiety, CB, D for sleep. So there are so many sources options out there. We just have to be open-minded and explore them. But when it comes to nutritional depletion, eating alone, and also taking supplements might not accelerate results or the healing,, that you are looking for. When you couple that with IV vitamin therapy, you're gonna see how your body can feel better, quicker, and faster. So a woman can have perfect labs on paper. And still feel unwell because symptoms show up long before disease. This function show up long before labs fails. Your body, speaking to you all of the time. And functional medicine helps you and give you the tools and the resource and how to listen to your body in that message. So we need to examine the whole picture. So we're not gonna, say to ourselves, I'm still sick. I don't know why that's normal, but you have to ask yourself, why? Why am I still sick despite normal lab results? What areas of my health, of my life I need to address, I need to look at, that's gonna give me a deeper inside look of things that I need to fix? Do I need to address the inflammation? Do I need to look at the gut? Do I need to look at the Hormones. Do I need to look at the nutritional deficiencies? Like what do I need to do that's gonna help me improve my energy, lose the weight, improve my sleep, Improve my, emotional being that's gonna help me feel good in my body like I did years ago. cause every, symptoms you're experiencing can be addressed. As I tell my patients, if I hear me say this a lot of times here, on my platform, is that we were not born with these conditions, my friend. We're not born with the chronic fatigue. The reason why I have chronic fatigue,'cause your body's trying to tell you and it's help and the fact that we're born healthy, As a baby, you are thriving. You had less disease, less symptoms. And many of these things are not genetic. You can always go back and bring these wonderful feelings back. And yes, taking a pill can only go so far. So you really have to do the deeper work, identify the root cause, create a plan that's gonna get you there, and, but you also have to do the mindset work knowing that everything you face today can be eliminated. It's just a matter of time. So I'm keeping it short, but this is how true sustainable healing happens by addressing the issues at the center level. We do not numb. We address, we tackle, we eliminate, we restore, we rejuvenate, we repair at the cellular level. So if you like what I'm saying and you're like, okay, Dr. Gent, I love everything that you're saying. You resonate with me. I'm into alignment. I've been looking for an alternative and other options into healing my body. I would love for you to schedule consultation or just reach out to us, go on our website. If you are in the state of New Jersey and you are watching this before December 20 20th. 2025. We having a, a drip and chill, which is an, in-person event that we have once a month, on Saturdays where we lower our price of IV therapy prices. And also this year we're going big, we are supporting new, with immune building herbs and vitamins. We helping you with energy. So we're giving people a lot of samples. We're giving you samples. I'm gonna be mixing, Iv. I'm gonna be at the bar, so I'm gonna be the mixologist. So come for the experience, come for the healing, come to experience the iv, and also come to get some free advanced immune herbs to help you go to this holiday seasons.'cause I'm recording this in December and welcoming the new year 2026 on a great note. So if you have. Any questions you wanna explore, how we can help you? You're curious. You have like, you just would like, you hear what I'm saying? You're like, okay. Yes, I know, I know. I don't have to take a pill for the ill, I know I can hear my body. I love this message. Reach out to us, schedule consultation, ask your questions because I guarantee you today that if you really put in the work. You do not give up on your symptoms. You continue to listen to your body and you have hope, and you have faith, and you believe that healing can be yours. You can restore, you can feel energized again, you can experience the quality of life that you're looking for. Functional medicine is for you and I would love to help you. If you know anyone that can benefit from this, please share with them. Because we all have inflammation. So many people are struggling with fatigue, anxiety is just, stress is raising, is on the rise right now. And I would love for you to share this, video with them and let them know, when they are ready, they can reach out and then we can support them. And so then I'll see you on the next lesson. You have a wonderful, beautiful rest of your day.. Congratulations. You just completed another podcast episode. I am so proud of you because you are dedicated, committed to improve your health and feel your very best. But before you go check the show notes below to see what other resources and tools we have available to help you on this journey. And can I ask that you share Subscribe and rate this podcast because other people are looking for this information. That will help me reach others that are struggling and searching for this information. Remember, we are on this together and sharing is caring. So thank you in advance. Until then, I'll see you on the next episode.