And the Long Story…
Growing up in Southern California, I was always active—surfing, volleyball, softball, sailing, summer camp, cooking—you name it. I was a born and bred "DO-er", and rest was most certainly for the weary in my family. I am grateful that all of the activity kept me out of trouble, but into my late teens I had already begun to see the tremendous negative effects of stress on my body—chronic fatigue, transient thyroid imbalances, and a total inability to relax. Honestly, at 17 I was in tears from stomach pain and was skipping class to sleep in my car.
I had been a vibrant teenager who ate well, whose mother lovingly and naturally birthed her, admiringly breastfed her, and refused gratuitous antibiotics. No doctor had answers to my symptoms, so they set me on an endless dose of Prilosec, and sent me on my way. This is an all-too-common tale.
Into college, it only got worse. Stress from school and my parent's divorce led to silent battles with eating disordered and undiagnosed depression that I kept hidden from everyone. *That was a lonely and hopeless place.*
At 21 years old, something started to change with my first restaurant job at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, CA. I was mystified by what Alice Waters had created—a full-blown mecca for impassioned eating. I was truly humbled and honored to be part of that family, and decided that if I wanted to surround myself with that beautiful food, grown by dedicated farmers, cooked by the most talented chefs, that my relationship with food and my health needed to shift. Even though cooking had been a part of my life long before my first restaurant job as a busser at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, it was working under Alice Waters and her incredible staff that inspired my obsession with quality ingredients, whole foods, slow-cooking and eating to heal. It took several years, and many relapses, but I made it through.
While working at the restaurant, I began cooking part-time with former Chez Panisse cook, Emily Su. She was cooking for clients who were on a variety of highly restrictive therapeutic diets, and I absolutely loved it. As a teacher and mentor, she taught me the importance of having fun and being flexible in the kitchen, and how truly delicious healthy, nutrient-dense foods can be. It's not about always following a recipe, but rather using your intuition, thinking on your feet, and using the best ingredients you can find to make food that's incredibly flavorful and healing.
I became certified as an Integrative Nutrition Health Coach in 2016, and completed the Functional Nutrition Alliance's Full Body Systems program in 2018. I believe that Functional and Integrative Health Coaching are the missing link in helping to reshape the healthcare system, and am honored to be an advocate of these growing movements.