An overwhelmed doctor hit the wall. Here’s what she did next.

Dr. Alicia Beal had plenty to celebrate as she entered her late 40s — she had a beautiful new house, was successfully homeschooling four kids and was a popular, part-time family physician in Lewisville, North Carolina.

Still, she felt discouraged and depleted. The needs of aging parents in West Virginia were top of mind, she was logging extra hours to cover for a colleague on leave, grappling with a switch to electronic recordkeeping, homeschooling – and not sleeping. She was also no longer dictating medical notes while walking on the treadmill and instead sitting and typing in her records.

"There was a lot of stuff happening, and I looked at my husband, John, and said, 'I think I'm about to break,' " Beal, 56, recalled. "I was gaining weight. I wasn't getting enough sleep. I wasn't active. I wasn't doing my Bible study. I had no social life. It culminated with a loss of part of my vision with a retinopathy that was stress-induced."

She took a week off to sleep and collect herself. "That was the turning point – when I found the breaking point of my body,” she said. “I realized bodies break."

That realization prompted a push to take charge of her health that would also transform how Beal practices medicine.

She started by working out and eating better. But even after embarking on a demanding exercise regimen that promised a transformation from "regular to ripped" in 90 days and had her dripping in sweat, the scale wasn’t kind. She felt lousy – and gained 5 pounds. It was a story she’d heard many times from patients. She tried Weight Watchers, too, but felt hungry all the time.

“I like to eat and be comfortably full,” Beal said. “I called my sister to ask if she had any cookbooks with more plants since Weight Watchers clearly pointed out to me that I needed to change my approach.”

Her quest led her to the American College of Lifestyle Medicine (ACLM), which focuses on preventing illness through habits of everyday living – from slumber and socializing to diet and exercise. (See this related story: 6 natural, doable ways to better health. No pills necessary.)

“It made so much sense and had evidence to back it up,” Beal recalled. “I started implementing and reached my weight goals easily, losing 23 pounds altogether.”

That was just the beginning.

"All this knowledge had helped me personally, and I still saw my patients suffering with the same advice I had been given since medical school," she said. "And I thought, 'You know, lifestyle medicine is not just good for me. This is good for my patients.' And so, I started teaching it."

In 2021, Beal became a certified lifestyle doctor.

ACLM's six pillars of good health have added a new dimension to Beal's practice at Novant Health Salem Family Medicine in Winston-Salem, which she joined in 2021.

These days, she is as much a teacher as a physician, spending up to an hour to bring a new lifestyle medicine patient up to speed. Some visit often, others check in sporadically as they meet or revise lifestyle goals.

Beal schools them on the health benefits of a plant-based diet, staying active, getting good sleep, managing stress and avoiding drugs and alcohol. She also touts the proved importance of nurturing strong ties with family and friends.

She is well-suited to her new role, which draws on teaching skills honed while homeschooling her kids — Catherine, 24; Eli, 23; John Adam, 21; and Nate, 18. Like her foray into lifestyle medicine, Beal's plans didn't include homeschooling.

The two oldest kids started at a Baptist school, then asked for home-based classes.

"They said, 'We hardly ever get to see you,' " Beal recalled. "And I thought, 'How long will my kids miss me?' We tried it for a year – and I loved it. It became my creative outlet." She's proud that all four kids had enough credits to graduate after three years of high school. They continued under her tutelage for their senior years, getting a head start on college credits.

With its emphasis on a whole food, plant-based diet, Beal’s new practice is a logical outgrowth of her own upbringing. She and two older sisters were raised on a farm in Huntington, West Virginia, where the family grew and preserved home-grown veggies and fruit. Beal never imagined it would lead to a career in medicine. Inquisitive, fascinated with the sciences, she dreamed of becoming an archaeologist.

"The thing that dissuaded me was finding out that I would need to raise my own funding to work in that field,” she recalled with a laugh. “I had been in band from sixth grade through my senior year, and I hated the fundraisers selling wrapping paper and processed meats and oranges and grapefruits."

She toyed with engineering and pharmacy, too. During her senior year at Marshall University, her hometown school, her parents urged her to make up her mind.

"I didn't see how I could be a doctor and a mom the way I wanted to be, and so it just never occurred to me that I could do both," she said. Then, after a night of prayer, Beal received clear spiritual direction. It pointed her to med school and her mission. An unexpected scholarship to underwrite her first year of study soon followed.

"I believe I was called by God to do this," Beal said. "Good health is for everyone."