In this episode I cover five things that all women should know about high-risk HPV. This information is crucial for women’s health and well-being.

As a naturopathic doctor and women’s health expert, I’ve dedicated my career to helping women understand and navigate complex health issues, and high-risk HPV is certainly one of those.

It’s a topic that often comes with a lot of confusion, fear, and misinformation. My goal today is to clear up some of that confusion and empower you with knowledge and practical steps you can take to protect your health.

1. Most People Are Exposed to High-Risk HPV

The first thing that I think all women should know about high-risk HPV virus is that most of us are exposed to it at some point in our lives. 

Many women are led to believe that they did something wrong – that they shouldn’t have been in a certain relationship, or should have gotten a vaccine, or something like that. There’s a lot of “what ifs” and “woulda, coulda, shouldas” that happen for women when they find out they are positive for high-risk HPV.

I want to help eliminate that for you, including the shame, the embarrassment, and the feeling that there’s something you did wrong to cause you to become positive for high-risk HPV. Ultimately, the way I look at it is we’re all human, we’re all going to have sex, and humans who are sexually active get exposed to high-risk HPV virus.

In fact, according to research and official sources like the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States and medical websites in the UK, most of us are exposed to HPV virus at some point in our lives. They consider it to be 80% of us even by age 50, and often even by age 20. 

In the United States alone, an estimated 13 million Americans become positive for high-risk HPV each year. That’s just an estimate—I think it could even be higher because not everybody’s getting tested, so we don’t even know the full extent of how many people are being exposed to and testing positive for high-risk HPV each year.

Of the people who are being tested, we’re seeing millions of cases. There are over 42 million Americans who are positive for HPV virus right now. So if you look around, you can see that most all of us have been exposed to this virus. 

This should mean that we should not be shaming each other or shaming ourselves about testing positive for HPV.

2. The Human Body Can Clear the HPV Virus

The second thing I think all women should know is that the human body can clear this virus. 

Unfortunately, it’s very upsetting and disturbing to me that so many practitioners and people are telling women that it’s lifelong, and that there’s nothing you can do about it. The research – and I will provide references below if you want to read them – is very clear that the human body can clear the HPV virus. That means it can completely eliminate and get rid of it; it can be gone.

The research shows that in 90% of us, our bodies clear the virus within two years, and for many people, it even clears within six months. We have human defense mechanisms that help us clear the virus. We have an immune system that makes antibodies against the virus and kicks it out. Let alone our microbiome—the vaginal microbiome consists of protective bacteria that prevent against viruses, including HPV.

We’re learning more and more every year about our protective mechanisms and how they protect us from viruses like HPV, including the high-risk types. There are at least 13 types of HPV associated with cancer risk, and our bodies can fight them off. It’s not necessarily going to be there forever. 

So why couldn’t that be true for you? You also have a human body; you have an immune system. Your body can clear HPV too. Anyone who’s telling you that it’s not possible to get rid of it hasn’t been reading the research. This information is well-established and should even be told to you by your gynecologist, but sometimes doctors aren’t aware of this, and there’s a lot of misinformation out there, and that’s why I want to make sure you know that your body has the capacity to fend off high-risk HPV.

You can find this information on official websites like the CDC. This is not me making this up – it’s well-established information that should be more widely shared. I encourage you to write this down, remind yourself of it: your body has the capacity to fend off high-risk HPV. This means you have the ability to protect yourself from cancer caused by high-risk HPV.

Just because you were exposed to it, just because you tested positive, doesn’t mean it will cause cancer. You can intervene. You are the one choosing what happens in your body, and you can intervene to support your body’s natural defenses against this virus.

3. You Can Take Action to Help Your Body Clear HPV

The third thing I think you should know is that you don’t have to wait and hope that your body’s going to clear it. This is where most of the research and websites stop. They say you can clear it, but they make it seem as if it’s a mystery, that there’s nothing you can do to support the process. They even say on some of these websites that there’s no treatment. That’s because there’s not a pharmaceutical treatment; there’s not a surgery you can do to remove HPV. Even if you have surgery, the HPV remains in your body.

However, there are a lot of things you can do to help your body be better at clearing HPV, and this is where I specialize. Remember, I’m a women’s health expert. I’m trained as a primary care practitioner, women’s health expert, and midwife. I could be doing primary care, pap smears, and all of that under insurance, but I know that’s available. I know you can access that under your insurance and find many gynecologists and midwives who are covered.

What there’s a shortage of is someone who is telling you that you can do things to protect yourself from this virus, to make sure your body clears it and prevent it from causing cancer. That’s why I do what I do. That’s why I decided to step outside of the standard medical model and standard insurance model and teach you the things you can do to protect yourself from getting cancer and needing more procedures.

I work with thousands of women from around the world because this is not just a U.S. issue. This is happening to women around the world. Some of the highest numbers of HPV and cervical cancer are happening in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Europe. We’re in this together; we need to help each other out, and we need to do something about this.

There are so many tools available to us in the field of natural medicine, functional medicine, and nutrition. We can make dietary changes that have been shown in research to help protect us from HPV. We can take specific nutrients that have a lot of research supporting their ability to boost the immune system and act as antivirals, helping our bodies protect us from infections including HPV.

We can use herbs to support our immune system, help our vaginal environment, decrease inflammation, heal leaky gut, and support our adrenal glands. We can use homeopathic remedies. We can make mindset changes and do emotional healing and trauma healing. All of these approaches can help our human bodies recover from stress and build up our internal protective mechanisms.

What I do, with my background as a naturopathic doctor and nutritionist, is help you figure out exactly which diet changes to make, which nutrients to take, and which herbs to use, in the right sequence and doses to be most likely to work. You don’t have to guess or figure it out on your own. You can trust an expert who’s been doing this for over two decades to guide you and show you exactly what’s worked for other women and men.

I see women clearing HPV very fast by using these tools. It doesn’t have to take two years. You can get this to go away in six months or three months even. By implementing these natural approaches, we can make it more likely that your body’s going to clear HPV faster.

4. HPV Attacks When We’re Run Down and Depleted

The fourth thing all women should know is that HPV virus attacks when we’re run down and depleted. This is a crucial point to understand because it explains why some women clear the virus quickly while others struggle with persistent infections.

I often ask my patients: Have you been under a lot of stress in the past year or two? Are you depleted in nutrients, hormones, or microbiome? Have you had to take a lot of antibiotics, steroids, or other medications that deplete your immune system? Have you been taking birth control pills? Are you going through hormone changes during perimenopause or post-menopause?

All of these factors can cause us to be depleted and run down. We become nutrient-depleted, adrenal-depleted, and nervous system-depleted. That’s where the HPV virus thrives. It can tell when we’re run down, and that’s when it sneaks in and starts causing trouble with our cells.

Remember that HPV is not just about exposure. We’re mostly all exposed. What makes the difference is whether you’re depleted. When you’re depleted, run down, and stressed out, HPV stays, persists, and hangs around. Then it causes abnormal cells. 

So we need to build up your defenses. We need to rebuild your internal system. We need to improve your cellular health, your microbiome, your gut health, your hormone levels, and your neurotransmitter levels. We need to help your adrenal glands recover from stress and help your nervous system recover from stress.

When we help you recover and replete yourself, restore your health, you’re going to be able to fend off HPV, no problem. I see women who go through my protocol rebuild themselves. They eliminate what they no longer need, including toxins and negative limiting beliefs, and they bring in what they do need, including more self-care, sleep, stress recovery, nutrients, and herbs to help them restore their healthy function.

By doing this, they’re able to fend off HPV even if re-exposed. It’s not about exposure – it’s not required to avoid sex or avoid exposure to HPV. I see all the time women go to negative on HPV tests, heal their cervix, heal the vaginal tissue, even if they’re still getting exposed to HPV. This is because the body can protect you. 

Even when you’re exposed, we want your immune system and your microbiome to kick that virus out so it can’t hang around and cause trouble.

5. You Can Protect Yourself from HPV and Cancer

The fifth and final point is that you can protect yourself from HPV and cancer, not just by avoidance. Again, it’s not just about not having sex or using a condom. Condoms are not 100% effective because there’s still genital exposure to the virus. Vaccines are not 100% effective either. These things that you’ll hear about have partial effectiveness, but they’re not 100% effective.

It’s not just about external avoidance. This is the same thing with any microbe. We have to understand that as humans, we live in an environment with other microbes, bacteria, yeast, and viruses. The point is not to try to avoid them all. The point is how can we live in this environmental ecosystem with these microbes? How can we expect we’re going to get exposed to viruses, not just HPV but other viruses? We’re going to get exposed to bacteria. So we need to be able to keep our defenses up, and we do that by taking care of ourselves.

How can we learn to take better care of ourselves, our body, our wholeness, this human body that is our home? How can we be our own health advocate? Each day, ask yourself: How can I take better care of myself? How can I be forgiving and gentle with myself? Learn each and every day, step by step, making small incremental changes over time to create the change.

Many women who come to work with me in my program and one-on-one say to me, “I’m not sure I can do it.” They feel stressed about being perfect and are hard on themselves if they’re not doing everything exactly as I described. I encourage them by saying it’s not about perfection. It’s not about creating a huge drastic change overnight. It’s about making small incremental changes over time to take better care of yourself, little by little. In the process, become more loving of yourself, more forgiving of yourself. Not that you’re going to dismiss things, but you’re going to make positive changes and learn each and every day.

We never learned in elementary school or college how to take care of ourselves. We learned how to stress ourselves out and how to push harder. So now is your chance to learn how to take care of yourself, to learn how to take care of this beautiful body that you live in, and to feel grateful for this body, this beautiful home to live in, this safe place to live in. Develop a daily routine of self-care: what you’re eating, when you’re sleeping, stress recovery, exercise. Let’s take good care of this beautiful body that you’re living in and lean into the possibility that your body can protect you from viruses like high-risk HPV.

Your body can protect you even if you’re in an intimate relationship. My hope is that we can all have intimacy with other humans, knowing that we can protect ourselves from high-risk HPV. You should not have to live your life in fear of cancer caused by high-risk HPV because there’s so much you can do to protect yourself.

I see this in my patients from around the world who implement these steps. They say, “Okay, I’m worth it. I deserve it. I’m going to start taking better care of myself each and every day, little by little, step by step.” They start implementing and using the tools we have available to us to help build up their internal protective mechanisms so that their bodies can clear high-risk HPV as well. I know it’s possible for you too.

Your body can protect you even if you’re in an intimate relationship. My hope is that we can all have intimacy with other humans, knowing that we can protect ourselves from high-risk HPV. You should not have to live your life in fear of cancer caused by high-risk HPV because there’s so much you can do to protect yourself.

Conclusion and Next Steps

I’d love to hear from you. I’d love to hear anything else you would like me to cover in the future. I hope this has been inspiring for you. I hope you can take these five things and remind yourself each day: It’s nothing you did wrong. It’s not your fault. Most of us are exposed to this virus. The human body can clear this virus. It can go negative, and it can stay negative. There’s so much you can do to protect yourself, and you can start little by little each day.

Remember, the HPV virus attacks when we’re down and depleted, so we need to build ourselves back up again. By doing that, we can protect ourselves. By learning to really take care of our body as a fortress, by taking better self-care little by little each day, we will build up incrementally to greater and greater change and greater potential to protect ourselves from HPV-related cancer.

I believe in you, and I look forward to helping you. If you would like more help with any of the steps I’m mentioning, don’t hesitate to reach out. I have both an online group program that’s available around the world and one-on-one care where I can work with you individually and guide you through my protocol of diet changes, nutrients, herbs, even detoxification, mindset, and emotional healing. All of this is possible. I can guide you through the research and the most effective products, including those that can help you get this HPV to negative and prevent it from coming back again. 

If you are ready and would like to start taking the first steps towards clearing HPV, there are two things you can do. I encourage you to sign up for my Heal HPV Kickstart Program.

Register Now

Or for a more comprehensive 12-week program, you can register for my Say Goodbye to HPV Program, which includes online access to my complete protocol and wonderful healing community.

These programs are great ways for you to access my protocol, products, doses, stress recovery, and dietary support from online. You’ll also get access to order testing and vaginal suppositories. I’d love to teach you how to heal and protect yourself from HPV. 

If you are looking for supplements to start your journey to get HPV to negative you can find my HPV Support Bundle here. 

To learn more about my approach to healing using my Stress Recovery Protocol which involves optimizing cortisol and adrenaline levels to heal the adrenals, as well as neurotransmitters, using nutrients, herbs and C.A.R.E.™ – my proprietary program to support clean eating, adequate sleep, stress recovery and exercise – I encourage you to read all about it in my latest book Master Your Stress Reset Your Health.

You can also go to https://doctordoni.com/hpv. There, you’ll find lots of resources and stories from women I’ve worked with. You can see that this approach really works, and it can work for you too. Or you can set up a one-on-one appointment here.

Thanks so much for joining me here today. Please make sure to comment if you have questions or any thoughts, and also to subscribe and put on your notifications so you don’t miss my next video. I look forward to connecting with all of you very soon. Remember, you are worth it. Your health is worth it. And you have the power to make positive changes in your life that can have a profound impact on your health and well-being. Don’t let fear or misinformation hold you back.

We’re here to help you!

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