How nitty-gritty do you get with clients regarding individualizing their meal plans? While it’s always important to honor your client's taste preferences & desires - sometimes we need to dig deeper.

This week on the podcast, Nutrition Strategist Stephanie Shaw breaks down her process of peeling back layers to understand her client's nutritional needs and how she supports women in finding healthy ways to decrease stress and nurture their bodies.  

To read about the interview, keep scrolling OR, tune into the chat by clicking on the big green arrow below.

Hair Mineral Analysis

In Stephanie’s healing journey, she eventually discovered what was really behind her symptoms, thanks to a hair mineral analysis. Since it was so instrumental in her health, she decided that she would use that tool also to help her clients. Based on what those results show, that’s how she works with clients and builds their pathway back to their optimal health status.

How exactly does the process work?

Stephanie simplifies it as

‘...a matter of extracting the hair from various places on the scalp of the head - direct from the root.  The client needs to measure out on a scale if there’s enough quantity to test, and once that’s sorted, it’s sent to a lab, and Stephanie awaits the powerfully informative results!

The Stress Impact

As Stephanie works mainly with women, she is well-informed on the influence of hormones related to the client’s body weight and energy levels. For instance, when women are losing estrogens (common in midlife women), we can start seeing weight on our hips and thighs, but instead, it transfers over to our midsection.

“If you're always anxious, or ‘always on’ or living at 100% all the time - if you're allowing that stress to hold onto your body, you start holding on to the weight.” ~Stephanie

And it could be for various reasons that you’re holding on - for instance, because your body is tight and tense, and it simply can't move things around in the right way. Or a lot of times, people use food as their comfort as well - whether it’s because certain comfort foods help make them feel better, or that's all they have time for.

Clearly, Stephanie understands (& sees first-hand with her clients) how stress levels truly impact your waistline.

“We always work on metabolism, hormones, inflammation, and mindset. The workaround hormones and mindset are about what causes you stress and how you step past that stress.”

Stephanie clarifies that it’s about so much more than food and exercise. There are so many more layers involved in losing weight.

Get Back To Real Life, Get Back to Meal Garden!

While some clients swear by over-exercising and extreme dieting - Stephanie knows that’s not the answer.

“I'm like, that's why you gotta eat back to your Meal Garden plan! You know, you have to eat, you have to eat nutritious food, you need your carbs, your proteins, your fat each day.”

One of the things Stephanie loves about Meal Garden is how she can truly support her clients for exactly where they’re at - and ensure that they get enough of what they need to recover.

She factors where they are in their cycle (if relevant), how much exercise they are doing (or should stop doing!), and all of the specific details from the analysis she has them do when they first start their time together. From that nourishing & intelligent place, she can put together a plan that genuinely supports their most excellent level of health - without making sacrifices or putting them into a vicious cycle of restriction & deprivation.

Links to Resources:

Stephanie’s Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mindbodybusinessmethod/

Stephanie’s Website - https://stephanielynnshaw.com/

‍