Nutrition & Lifestyle Counseling

How we live our life on a daily basis has the biggest impact toward optimal health than any other factor. The most common areas that practitioners focus on concerning lifestyle choices include:

Sleeping patterns:

Most of my patients are sleep deprived when they first come in for treatment. Sleep is the time that our body can reset from all of the stressors that we encounter through our day from the external world and our internal processes. Going to sleep by or before 11pm is essential for our body to utilize this reset according to Chinese Medicine. Every 2 hours throughout the 24 hour period of each day, has an organ assigned to that time to accomplish its primary concentrated job. Going to sleep by 11pm helps the liver detoxify and recover from the toxicity that we were exposed to during the day or that was produced by our body.

A minimum of eight hours of sleep is required for our adrenal glands to provide good, stable energy; for our body to maintain a healthy weight; and for our detoxification pathways to do the job they need to do. Helping my patients to attain their optimal sleep schedule is one of the important parts of my practice.

Relaxation techniques to reduce stress:

Stress is the number one factor involved in almost every disease process. Imagine that we all walk around with a backpack. Every day there are certain things that we experience that put a brick in our back pack; a conflict with a loved one, poor lifestyle choices, overwhelm from our responsibilities, worry about others in our lives and their needs, etc. Every day we need to experience enough balancing activities to take out as many bricks as we put in. Typically, my patients come in with an accumulation of bricks in their backpack. Another important part of my work is to help guide my patients to what is their ideal balance of lifestyle choices and what are the best fitting tools to achieve this balance.

Dietary Choices:

Making the best dietary choices can often be quite challenging. There are many factors that influence these decisions including: food allergies and sensitivities, emotional needs that are compensated with food, boredom, loneliness, social pressure or social events, business lunches, etc.There is no diet that is for everyone except moderation and rotation. The balance of protein, fat and carbohydrates is an individualized process as well as the caloric intake per day. I provide the clarity on what food choices are in best service to my patient’s body. Also, I determine how to achieve their dietary goals to help ensure a healthy digestive system, central nervous system, hormonal system, and optimal weight.

Exercise:

There are many opinions on what type of exercise program is the most effective. This is a very individual process (as is true for all treatments!). The main focus of knowing what exercise program is most suitable is to always remember that after exercise, you should always feel better, never depleted. There are many other factors that I look at to help co-create the right exercise program for you including: amount per week, time per session, alternating types of exercise, cardiovascular, weight bearing, etc.

There are other important lifestyle factors that I have observed in my nearly two decades of practice that if they aren’t addressed, my patients are unable to achieve their health and life goals. These include:

Life Purpose:

We all have a life purpose. Being able to identify and fulfill our life purpose can be one of the greatest factors determining our inner joy and creating a huge effect on our health, well-being and overall life satisfaction. This joy that is attained when we know that our actions are coherent with our life purpose, has not only a great effect on us as individuals but also on every one that crosses our path. I look forward to helping those that request it, to find this purpose and create the path necessary to achieve their goals.

Spiritual Connection:

Regardless of whether we are religious, atheist, non-denominational or any other place on the spectrum of spirituality, it is often helpful to have a belief system that recognizes how all living things are connected. This connection is essential for our survival and our growth. We are not meant to live in isolation, we are meant to be part of community. There are many ways that community can look; as our immediate family, the family we created, a few close friends, non-profit work, spiritual communities or religious affiliations. Regardless of what it looks like, having one is extremely rewarding. Helping to support that community life or create it and stay in balance with our individual needs within our community is an important aspect of work I do with patients if they seek it.