Today we’d like to introduce you to Meg Gerber.
Hi Meg, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
What I learned in my journey that makes me passionate about what I do today is that it’s not just about the food alone. I was diagnosed with Celiac disease in 2013 and given the conventional medicine response of ‘just go gluten-free, and you will get well.’ At the time, I was finishing my degree at the University of Connecticut to become a Registered Dietitian and go the clinical route of working in a hospital. Most of my teenage and college years were spent dealing with gut issues like constipation and bloating and ongoing unmanaged high-stress levels, anxiety, and acne. At the time, though, I was unaware of the impact of stress. I was just a college student staying up into the wee hours of the evening, drinking lots of caffeine and alcohol to keep up with my study and social life. I didn’t know what I didn’t know!
While the Celiac diagnosis gave me peace of mind and validation that there was a reason behind why I felt the way I did, I ended up on a symptomatic rollercoaster the years following as I found I didn’t fully ‘get better’ with just a gluten-free diet alone. And in fact, the initial diet restriction led me down the ‘tunnel of doom’ that is googling your autoimmune disease diagnosis. I began to mentally and emotionally spiral, not to mention my bloating and acne were worse. The stories I was creating in my head ended up more debilitating than my diagnosis of autoimmune itself. Means, I was making more suffering via my ‘story-making’ of ‘I am alone, ‘I am an inconvenience,’ ‘I’m never going to get well, ‘Who would want to date a person like this?’, ‘You’re not eating the right foods,’ ‘What else is wrong with me?’ the noise in my brain was becoming unbearable! My nervous system (in short, this is your safety surveillance system of the body) was on overdrive of ‘I am not safe here!’ And I was becoming more nutritionally depleted than I started, as Celiac tends to increase your risk of nutrient deficiency. My cycles of further diet restriction to feel well had caused me to feel worse than ever.
This leads me to consider alternative therapies for my healing beyond just a gluten-free (or more restrictive) diet alone. Through one of my functional medicine doctors at the time, I started to understand the gut-brain connection and how the gut microbiome communicates to the brain and affects our neurotransmitter production and how this affects our mood. And then, vice versa, how we think about ourselves and our health impacts our healing ability. I started acupuncture, psychotherapy, pelvic floor physical therapy, and mindset coaching. And a deeper yoga practice (leading me to become a yoga and meditation teacher). Through these healing remedies, I understood the power of the breath and how re-learning to breathe fully and into my low belly could create an internal environment that helped my healing rather than hindered it. I thought, ‘What can I add to support my healing and work with my body?’ Rather than against
This is not to discount the healing power of food. I, of course, as a dietitian, have a strong belief in the power of food to help us heal. I believe in individualization, as my journey needed that. It also needed some looser lines in the sand vs. strict/harsh diet restrictions (beyond gluten-free, as medically, it has to be strict for celiac). But, I began finding the foods that in my google search had been labeled as ‘allergenic’ or lacking benefit to autoimmune and instead thought about food from an abundance mindset-what can I have? What makes me feel well? Instead of putting all of my focus on what to take away. I found such an incredibly healing benefit from moving to more whole, unprocessed foods and high-quality, well-sourced animal proteins. These foods made me feel strong and nourished! As much as I could afford, the quality of food sourcing was what mattered.
I now know that addressing the nervous system’s impact on healing a chronic condition is vital. If we are constantly in fight/flight/freeze mode, aka sympathetic ‘stress’ mode, the body cannot optimize healing- alone digest, absorb your foods, and promote healthy bowel function. Physical, emotional, and psychosocial stressors can influence this stress mode. Physical stressors could be too much caffeine, overexercising, or eating too many processed foods; emotional stressors could be negative self-talk or a toxic relationship; and psychosocial stressors could be feeling a lack of purpose or isolation in your community. It’s not about making all the stressors disappear but finding ways to reduce this stress load and support the body by getting into safety mode more often than stress mode. Safety mode promotes ‘rest and digest’ or the calming parasympathetic state. This mode has many access points, but my favorite and most accessible is the breath! The breath is the single changing aspect of our lives that we carry with us throughout every situation- the angry, joyful, silly, grieving moments where we can alchemize how we feel via the breath. And from a digestive perspective, the breath is a direct pathway into ‘rest and digest’ mode where we optimize the output of digestive juices like stomach acid and digestive enzymes, bile acids to breakdown and absorb fats, and support healthy bowel motility (movement of stool) and improve cortisol output and how that impacts our blood sugar. One of my favorite ways to start this practice of getting into ‘rest and digest’ more often is My Rule of 3’s-this is a practice of 3 deep breaths 3 times per meal. It tells the body we are safe and slowing down, and it’s time to prioritize eating and digesting vs. high-stress mode.
I realize now how much my brain was impacting my physical healing. Once I began addressing my nervous system, the diet adjustments and targeted supplements for things like bacterial overgrowth and gut repair were able to ‘work.’ I saw my acne improving, and my bowel movements were happening daily. My current work as a dietitian is giving back the healing support to clients that I needed when I was in the trenches. This is why I ask all potential clients of mine on their intake forms: ‘Do you believe in your body’s ability to heal?’. Yes, you cannot heal your acne or constipation with your mind alone, but we can create a foundation of safety by supporting the mind so that the body can open up to the other aspects of the healing. Think about the energetic impact of how you feel when someone yells at you vs. someone calmly talks to you. Your body also ‘hears’ the energetic impact of your thoughts. We can focus on healing mantras that support and nourish the body vs. fights against it. This helps us lay a foundation of trust with our body that it always wants to find its way back into healing balance. I like to remind my clients that the uncomfortable symptoms they are experiencing are their body’s way of alerting them to listen, to slow down, and take time to support it-it needs some extra attention to get back into balance. Instead of asking ‘what’s wrong with my body’ we ask ‘what do you need? How can I support you?’
Would it have been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
No! But I’m grateful for all of it. My biggest struggle was adjusting my social life post-diagnosis to one that better served me. I continued the college-influenced partying/drinking after college (right after my diagnosis) and felt worse than ever. This lifestyle didn’t serve me, but it took me a long time to let go of it and become the version I could meet with acceptance which wasn’t defined by being ‘the fun girl at the bar.’ This seems silly, but it was harder than I imagined moving away from this as so much of who I thought I was and the friends I had at the time were defined by that lifestyle. Our society has a way of glorifying alcohol and labeling drinkers as more ‘fun, carefree, life-of-the-party than those who don’t. But to work on healing my gut, drinking alcohol often was holding back the supportive practices I was integrating from fully ‘working.’ Alcohol is a significant gut stressor and can have a sterilizing-like, irritating effect on the gut, especially in those with autoimmunity who are already prone to reduced commensals (good gut bacteria) and intestinal permeability (damage to the intestinal lining). I had to ask myself who I was in the world without it and pursue the things that brought me true, joy-like being in nature, cooking in the kitchen, and spending time with friends and family.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Grounded Nourishment?
Grounded Nourishment is a virtual functional medicine nutrition practice specializing in gut health and autoimmune. My passion as a functional medicine dietitian, now almost 10 years into practice, is to work with those who deal with ongoing stress and gut issues and desire an approach to gut healing beyond food. My approach combines individualized nutrition and functional root-cause testing with nervous system practices (my signature ‘breath work for digestion’) and targeted supplementation. My goal is to leave my clients feeling well and resolved of symptoms and empowered with tools to take with them for the long run. I’m extremely proud of how my approach to healing the gut was born from my unique journey. Therefore, my inclusion of teaching breath work and mindfulness practices for gut healing is extremely significant to me and uncommon as a dietitian.
Before we go, can you talk to us about how people can work, collaborate, or support you?
I work with clients in a deep-dive, 1:1 capacity. We work intensively over a 4-month timeline to puzzle piece a holistic approach combining individualized nutritional counseling, functional stool, and mineral testing with private breath work and healing mindset sessions. The focus of our sessions is getting away from the ‘noise’ of social media and identifying the foods, habits, and supplements that are necessary for your particular body to feel its best.
I also work with clients in a group setting via my group program, The Stressed Gut Solution. This group program is for women who have dealt with ongoing, frustrating gut issues and high-stress levels. They are looking for a supportive and empowering roadmap. They want to leave feeling less bloated, more digestively regular and better understand how to support their body through life’s stressors.
I also offer a Grounded Membership- a low-touch offering focused on accountability to the stress management practices I teach that help calm the nervous system. It includes access to 40+ video archives that teach gut healing breath work, yoga, meditations, and a live monthly guided group ‘breath work for digestion’ session with me over zoom.
Later this year, I will co-host my 2nd annual retreat for women in Vermont called Full Circle Feminine. I host the retreat with a mindset, embodiment coach, and pilates physical therapist. It melts mind, body, and soul nourishment in a like-minded community. You can find out more under ‘retreats’ on my website.
My cookbook, How To Glow Gluten Free (available on Amazon), is another way to access my abundance mindset around cooking nourishing recipes that are gut-healing and provides more of my story with Celiac disease and those who need support going gluten-free.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.groundednourish.com
- Instagram: groundednourish
- Other: tik tok: @groundednourish
Image Credits
Mica McCook
