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ABOUT

I'm a certified holistic health coach and certified yoga teacher, but I'm just like you...someone trying to live the best life possible. I get it. Life is unpredictable, but being healthy isn't just about food and exercise and sticking with the plan. It's about not losing yourself in the flurry of life. It's about making yourself your top priority - always. It's about developing an acute awareness of the senses in your body, so that you can steer your journey in the exact direction you truly want to go. It's about doing what you truly want to experience real joy.

Finding this state of authentic wellness inspired me to create my wellness program Feal Real®, which uses unique tools and practices to help you define what you are truly seeking, stay connected to self, declutter your life, reduce stress, eat well, enjoy exercise and sustain this vibrant state of wellbeing for life.  

Choosing the right foods for you is the first step in achieving whole-life wellness. ​It's the fuel that propels you. Having tried every diet out there including going raw, vegan, vegetarian, flexitarian, Paleo, gluten and dairy free, I had developed a really messed up relationship with food. What to eat? What's safe? Deprivation left me binging, crash dieting, yo-yoing and scale obsessed. Frankly, my relationship with food was wreaking havoc in my life. 

 

Getting in touch with my heart got me back on track and inspired me to create my Heartful-Eating® Plan. It is a flexible guide, not a directive, that will teach you about food and how your unique body needs to be fed. My philosophy is based on functional medicine that says our bodies need essential ingredients to work optimally. Functional medicine focuses on prevention and treats causes not symptoms. To support my clients, I created my food blog, The Bread & Buddha, as a resource for healthy living and a much-needed creative outlet for me! Heeding my clients' pleas to just cook for them, The Bread & Buddha Kitchen was born. 

 

As quickly as BBK ramped up, my thriving beautiful business disintegrated before my very eyes due to the pandemic. Heartbroken as I was, this forced reset gave me space to realign and find some much-needed balance in my own life. Following my true desire to teach people how to live a beautiful and healthful life, I've gone back to my teaching roots and evolved BBK into a virtual Cooking Studio and Wellness Workspace. Through my online offerings, you will learn how to fill your fridge and heart with foods that nourish your body and your spirit. Having a front row seat to seeing my clients' hearts open and smiles widen is a true privilege and a special exchange. 

My dedication to a holistic and yogic lifestyle for the last 20 years has offered me a better understanding of my life-long battle with migraines as well as added benefits of increased energy, reduced inflammation, a peaceful digestive system, a leaner body, a focused life intention, a deeper connection to self and others, a sense of lightness and vibrancy, and an overall feeling of authenticity and peace.

Having helped hundreds of people on their own journey, I know this deep connection to self and vibrant feeling of health and authenticity is available to everyone. It is my privilege as a Certified Holistic Health Coach to guide you on your own unique journey toward this blissful state of fealing real.

 

MY TRAINING

 

I earned my Holistic Health Coach Certification through the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Additionally, I received my Food & Spirit Practitioner Certification through internationally recognized lifestyle medicine expert and functional health doctor, Dr. Deanna Minich. This certification enables me to balance our bodies' energy centers, known as chakras, through food, energy and lifestyle. I have also completed the Nutrition Health and Lifestyle Issues and Insights coursework through Vanderbilt University and closely follow the work of The Institute for Functional Medicine, Dr. Mark Hyman, Ultra Wellness Center, Dr. Andrew Huberman, Huberman Lab, Dr. Will Cole, Dr. Sara Gottfried, Dr. David Perlmutter, Dr. Christiane Northrup, Dr. Daniel Amen, Harvard Health and Stanford Medicine.

 

I received my 200-hr yoga certification through Moksha Yoga in Chicago and have studied with master teachers Noah Maze, Jason Crandell, Annie Carpenter, Kathyrn Budig, Gary Kraftsow, Gabriel Halpern, Tias LIttle, spiritual healer Ramaa Krishnan and pelvic floor therapist Judith Florendo.

 

I continue to learn and grow from my students, the yoga classes I take, and from life. 

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