My Holistic Nutrition Counseling and Coaching Have Gone International!
I am happy to announce that I am now accepting clients not just from throughout the United States, but also from other English-speaking countries including Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and the United Kingdom. I continue to emphasize integrative holistic nutrition focusing on the whole individual, the particular health conditions and health history a person has, the habits/lifestyle he or she has, and the health goals he or she wants to achieve. I specialize in customizing gluten-free diets, grain-free diets, and/or low-carb/low-glycemic diets for the individual and am increasingly educating and counseling clients on the dangers of genetically modified foods (often called GMOs or genetically modified organisms) and how to avoid them in their diets.
I hesitated to take on international counseling because I thought there might be potential problems in telephone, Internet or Skype connections as well as difficult-to-bridge differences in measurements and parameters used in blood test results. However, this past autumn a few clients from outside the United States contacted me and explained how they were getting no practical help for their health conditions that were clearly tied to their diet, how my Going Against the Grain book helped them more than their doctors did and how they just needed a bit more fine-tuning of their diets one on one with me. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that it was easy for people out of the country to pay for my nutrition services on my website using PayPal and the people could either mail me their completed consultation forms (which those from Canada did) or I could send the forms in a different format and they could fill them out and email them to me (which those from other countries did). Some had international calling plans while others could phone me for our sessions using Skype. These new people convinced me to try working with them and I was pleasantly surprised by how well the process went for each of the clients. Whatever differences in measurements or words (such as for various vegetables) that we had did not cause difficult communication problems or hamper the nutrition advice I gave them, and they were extremely pleased and grateful for the help I gave them.
Here is a testimonial from one of my clients in Australia:
I had struggled with food cravings, ranging from bread to semolina, all my adult life. I was vegetarian and for 20 years tried every vegetarian/vegan diet I could find to solve my binge eating. Eight years ago I became debilitated with ME/CFS [Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome]. On a dietary therapist’s recommendation I added fish and chicken to my diet, also eating rice and veges. My cravings persisted and I’d have grain and sweet binges. My health improved but reached a plateau.
Finally, as a last resort, I contacted Melissa. It was easy to email her, fill out her forms, and pay for her services. I talked with her and tried her recommendations. I stopped eating all grain products and very reluctantly added pasture-raised red meat to my diet. Nearly four months down the track, I have no cravings whatsoever and my energy and health has rapidly ascended and continues to do so. If you’re struggling with health issues or food cravings, I strongly recommend Melissa.
– Amanda M, from Melbourne, Australia
Another client of mine from Denver had multiple health problems, including eosinophilia-myalgia syndrome (EMS, a mysterious condition that was caused a dozen years ago by tainted L-tryptophan that had been genetically modified) and especially bad allergies and excess weight that she and her doctors could not get to budge. After working with me for close to three months, she lost 25 pounds. Also, her allergies improved so much in that time that she used a lot less allergy medication and is now working with her doctors to safely wean herself off some of the medications she had been taking. She was so encouraged and thrilled with the results we accomplished in just a few months that she has signed up for another coaching program with me to continue her improvement in health.
I have worked with clients with a wide range of different conditions over the years and I am happy to say that virtually every client I counsel tells me that they have been helped more by the advice I have given them than by many different doctors they have seen – at a fraction of the cost. I am particularly interested in working with people who intrinsically believe that food is our best medicine but haven’t yet been able to determine how to customize their diet to promote their best health.
A few other notes to keep in mind: I accept clients who take medications and still get good results working with them (as evidenced by my client from Denver that I described above). But pharmaceutical drugs cause many side effects. I actually get the best health results with clients who take few or no medications. Also, if someone comes to me with a condition I have not worked with before (such as EMS), I do individualized research to offer the best nutrition advice for that person and the condition he or she has.
If you live in the United States or another English-speaking country and have an affordable way to phone me for counseling or coaching sessions – and if you want to use food therapeutically to improve your health but don’t know how to do that – consider working with me as one option you might not have considered before. It’s increasingly easier to communicate all around the world; long distances don’t mean much anymore. To learn more about my long-distance nutrition services, visit Scheduling a Personal Nutrition Consultation or Coaching Session or Programs for New Clients. I hope to work with more of you in the near future.
Copyright © 2011 Melissa Diane Smith
