I wasn’t always professionally focused on nutrition. I started my career working in the legal field, but was always drawn to health and nutrition. I recognized that all the “advice” I was seeing in television, in magazines, and elsewhere was bad. It wasn’t just that the science behind a lot of it wasn’t always accurate, but also that it seemed purposefully confusing and manipulative.

Eventually, my passion for nutrition became professional and I received a second Bachelor’s degree in Nutrition and Dietetics from West Chester University of Pennsylvania. After graduating, I spent four years at Nazareth Hospital, where I was immersed in clinical nutrition. I worked with patients who had little education about what proper nutrition looked like. I realized then how important it was to encourage open dialogue with my clients in order to ensure that they left armed with more knowledge than they arrived with and could feel confident about how they were eating at home. Often, this process took more time than my hospital schedule would allow.