09 Feb What I do

Hi! My name is Cristina and nobody knows what I do for a living.

If I say nutritionist, what do you think? Let me guess. Diet, bye bye to all of my favourite foods, avocado on toast (probably without the toast, bread is bad, right?), green juices and hunger, probably losing weight on some sort of regulated starvation plan…and nuts and seeds, bird food is healthy!

My name is Cristina, I’m a Naturopathic Nutritional Therapist and Health Coach (but you can call me a Nutritionist if you like) and a solemnly swear I will never put you on a diet and you’ll never feel hungry. Scouts honour! Ok, technically everyone knows a nutritionist will tell you to eat better, eat more vegetables and move more. It’s all pretty much common sense, everyone knows that, but there’s something you might not know, like everything you eat and drink has a direct impact to how your feel physically and mentally.

So what does this mean? It means that every time we don’t eat the foods that are good for you, you are getting slightly sicker. You might not suddenly feel unwell, but your digestion might suffer, you feel bloated, your IBS flares up, your anxiety worsen, your sleep is disrupted, you feel so tired you just want to curl into bed and eat bread and cheese, and so on. Overtime all this can turn into a chronic disease or worst. But hope is not lost! Small changes to your diet and lifestyle can change all of the above. Choosing the right foods for you can really improve your symptoms and transform your life in incredible ways.

Here’s what is really like seeing a nutritionist and why you shouldn’t settle for anything else.

Your nutrition plan is flexible to fit your lifestyle and goals, both short and long term.

When you see a Nutritionist, like me, after your first consultation, you’ll be It given a nutrition plan. A personalised plan which is filled with straight forward advice, food suggestion and recipes. The perfect plan is put together to make you feel great now, whilst keeping an eye to the future. For example, you might be looking to lose a few of pounds now, feel good and improve the look of your skin but we can do that whilst also laying the foundation for you to try for a baby in a couple of years. Or you might just want some advice on what to eat whilst training for a marathon, but the right foods may also decrease your chances of you having that disease later in life that runs in your family.

Your nutrition plan is feasible and realistic.

If anyone is promising you to fix all your health issues and make you lose 10 pounds in a week: run! It’s just not feasible nor sustainable. Going on any restrictive diet, calories counting, exercising excessively, or removing whole food groups in one go is not good for your body and your brain. Even going 100% vegan, when you’ve eaten meat 3 times a day until yesterday, could be detrimental to your health. A good diet plan is realistic and gives you steady results overtime, whilst setting healthy habits for a lifetime. You can feel a whole lot better within a week or even a few days of starting a plan, but you’ll feel the best after a few months because this is how long your body needs to adjust and most importantly not to relapse.

Your nutrition plan includes health coaching.

At the start everyone is motivated to succeed, completely change their lives, their eating habits, their sleep routines and start to workout every day. You buy kale at supermarket, book a 7am online yoga class, swap your favourite drink with fizzy water, because you know, hydration. But then life happens, you have to work late, night after night, your kids are driving your crazy, you feel like you deserve a treat and reach for the wine, you [fill the blank] … times passes and you can’t even remember the last time you went to the gym and that bag of kale is moulding in the fridge. Here’s where your coach comes in. You know what you “should” be doing, you are an adult after all, but adulting is hard and overwhelming sometimes. A health coach can help you set the inspirational goal you want to reach. Find out what are the barriers in your life that are stopping you from living your best life. You will reach a new level of motivation and self-knowledge that will be driving you onwards, whatever your goal is.

Why doesn’t everyone see a nutritionist?

Well, this is unfortunate. Some people still classify Nutritional Therapy as “alternative medicine”, which is related to some kind of waving-wands-reading-auras style of healing. But it couldn’t be further from the truth. GPs now work with nutritionist because our work is complementary to theirs and not an alternative. A registered nutritionist’s work is science based, meaning it’s all about what has been shown to work in clinical trials. Nutritional Therapists and Nutritionist are strictly regulated (see here my list of qualifications) but one can still go online and do a 2-week course and call themselves a “nutritionist” or show their 6 pack online and tell people what to eat and some will listen.

Fancy knowing more about how we could work together? Have a look here or click on the button below and book a mini consultation with me today.