Looking back at my student experience in the Academy of Culinary Nutrition and why I chose to go through the Culinary Nutrition Expert program with the certification while in the midst of cancer treatment
Life before the Culinary Nutrition Expert program
Five years before finding the Culinary Nutrition Expert program, I had started to learn that gut health was linked to thyroid health. That led me down a path of investigating more and more about gut health and the role it plays in the immune system, our moods, allergies, and more than just the idea of digestive health. I was beginning to see I needed to tend to my thyroid health through my gut health…beyond taking a few probiotic pills. I needed to tend to my gut health through intentional nutrition choices which meant cutting out gluten and dairy.
I worked on replacing gluten filled items with things labeled “gluten free” and moved from cow’s milk to almond milk. Almost immediately I noticed I had much less bloating and gas. I didn’t know that wasn’t normal. It may be common, but it isn’t necessarily normal to be rootin’ and tootin’ after each meal. I also noticed I was less fatigued.
Choosing to Use Nutrition during Cancer
Fast forward a few years later when after a few regular “well woman” exams misdiagnosed me, I was sent to a specialist who took one look at the bump on my chest and said, “I’m so sorry, but I think this is cancer and we need to do a biopsy”. She was right. The pathology report came back with clear indication giving me a breast cancer diagnosis.
Now it was “GO TIME”. It was time to put everything I had into supporting my body in healing.
I spent time reading academic studies, building my care team, asking experts, listening to fellow patients, and finding out how to support my body using all kinds of modalities including nutrition.
While I love reading, researching, investigating things on my own, I needed someone to bridge the gap for me between my understanding of the evidence I could read about and my need for learning how to create the meals based on that evidence. I understood WHY to use the ingredients but I didn’t have the kitchen skills to go along with it.
What the Culinary Nutrition Expert program is really like
I ran across a short on-demand course about fermentation led by nutritionist Meghan Telpner. She personally understood the difference intentional nutrition choices made in her own health journey. Her quick wit, whimsical style, bounty of nutritional knowledge, and easy-to-follow demos and instructions of HOW to make the various recipes made the course work simple to understand and DO.
And I was HOOKED!
The videos in the course platform are easy to follow, the downloadable PDFs can be printed, and Meghan’s instructions and demonstrations show step-by-step how to take the functional foods knowledge about the nutrition and turn it into recipes that nourish the body without a bunch of junk for ingredients.
As someone LIVING with cancer, I am very intentional about not consuming gluten, dairy, added refined sugar, low quality animal protein, soy (due to my thyroid health), and artificial ingredients, so finding a kitchen skills and online cooking program that easily matched my dietary choices was difficult until I ran across the Academy of Culinary Nutrition.
And the COMMUNITY has been so special to be a part of. Honestly, if it wasn’t for the health crisis the entire world has been living through since early 2020, I am fairly certain some of us in my Culinary Nutrition Expert program would have met up with each other over the last year even crossing international lines to do so. We enjoy supporting each other so much and several of my fellow Certified CNE’s have become my DEAR FRIENDS!
Are you thinking about taking an Academy of Culinary Nutrition course and have questions?
If you are thinking about doing one of the courses from the Academy of Culinary Nutrition, my recommendation is to go for it! If you want to chat with me about it, then send me a DM on Instagram and tell me you want to know more about my inside scoop of what it’s like to be a student.
If you want to see some demonstrations of how to make nourishing anticancer meals along with learning the benefits of the real food ingredients, you can get on the waitlist for this cancer thriver meals workshop!
