HERE'S A LITTLE MORE ABOUT MY STORY...
No matter what I did, I was unable to uptake nutrients even via intravenous infusion. I had a fuzzy sensation throughout my skin, persistent nerve numbness, and muscle stiffness. My lifetime of eating the ‘Standard American Diet’ including the top allergenic foods, inadequate breaks, and chronic sleep irregularity resulted in me being very ill. I was weak, chronically fatigued, and completely burned out.
WHY I'M A HOLISTIC NUTRITIONIST
FUN FACTS ABOUT ME..
I was born on the largest freshwater island in the world making me a haweater, hence the 'hawberries" logo.
My daughter and I enjoy paleo baking together and I've never baked anything conventionally on my own.
The Blue Zone of Ikaria is one of my favourite travel destinations! The food is amazing and the people are so warm and inviting.
I will read medical journal articles and anything nutrition-related for fun.
I will use my personal experience navigating my own gut, food, detoxification, and re-building issues together with my holistic nutrition education to help you get on track faster, saving you precious time to enjoy your life. Let's dig in together and focus on how you would ultimately like to feel.
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HI, I'M AMBER!
You are most likely to find me reading and keeping up-to-date on current nutrition and health research, but I also love baking my family's favourite grain-free recipes with my daughter. I am someone who likes to understand things from every angle.
After many years working as a law clerk and attending university, I completed my Honours degree at the University of Toronto and moved to Germany. I began nutrition studies via distance learning immediately, but quickly realized I needed to focus on my own pressing health matters.
While living in Europe, I spent a lot of time working with my doctor, heilpraktiker, and osteopath in addition to traveling, practicing meditation and yoga, and doing my own health research. I worked diligently on my acid reflux, gut dysbiosis, leaky gut, and eliminating food intolerances. I also spent time detoxifying, chelating heavy metals, normalizing my dysregulated cortisol pattern, and trying to figure out why I was so anemic, mineral, and amino acid deficient. My overall weakness was so bad that I could not even hold my back up during the afternoon cortisol dip.
I later determined that what I thought was a gluten intolerance evidenced by elevated anti-gliadin antibodies was something more severe. After having my baby, I tried gluten again and suffered the consequences. I finally decided the stakes were too high and committed to never being contaminated again. I struggled to absorb any strength or energy from food for a long time and have now been strictly gluten-free since 2015. I currently experience the absence of skin fuzziness, numbness, and trouble with my feet which had always been my normal.
I subsequently tested positive for the celiac gene. This was the final piece of the puzzle for me since I had never presented with "classic" celiac disease. It has taken years to make sense of all of the symptoms and rebuild after long-term malabsorption.
I had to be the hub of understanding my life-long symptoms because each practitioner I saw came in at different times with only end-result, partial solutions. Some of the last things I implemented should have been the first and simply going gluten-free was not enough. Do I wish I had found a knowledgeable and experienced nutritionist to work with at the beginning of my journey? Yes!
I have now completed my natural nutrition diploma, having also spent years working on my own health, and directing my efforts into preconception and prenatal nutrition for the health of my child. My health journey required many years of painstakingly "peeling back the layers of the onion", one layer at a time.