communityspotlight
Concierge Dietary Services Personalized Wellness and Nutrition
by Linda Sechrist I
n the 1990s, a lucrative career as a New York City stockbroker helped to provide Michele Silano’s family with solid financial stability. However, it wasn’t what this mother of an 11-year- old daughter and two sons, ages 9 and 5, considered her life’s work or passion. “Long-term, I couldn’t visualize myself as a stockbroker, which was why I de- cided to apply to Columbia University, a top dietary school in Manhattan that offered the exercise component I con- sidered necessary for a well-rounded education,” says the owner of Con- cierge Dietary Services.
“Our health isn’t just about what we eat, it’s also about how we treat our bodies,” states Silano. Childhood years spent on a family farm in upstate New York provided a touchstone to guide her. “After I moved away from home, I wasn’t eating things like fresh organic vegetables and farm fresh eggs, but be- cause I had a sense of what I’d felt like before, I could tell that my energy level was lower and I was far more suscep- tible to colds and flu,” notes Silano. Her university studies to attain her master of science degree in nutrition and exercise physiology proved her sus- picions to be correct: that our longevity and well-being are maintained by the
quality of food we put into our bodies. “I wanted to feel good and live a long and healthy life,” says this licensed dietician, “and I felt that nutrition was the key.”
Silano’s varied work experiences while attending Columbia provided the foundation of knowledge that she now calls upon to help her clients. “After my internship, I was hired by a nonprofit organization that helped people with HIV and AIDS,” explains Silano, who cooked onsite and gave instructions for healthy menus and other information that taught her patients how nutritious meals allowed their medications to work better.
After graduation, Silano opened
her business of assisting gastric bypass patients before and after surgery. Over an eight-year period, she guided more than 500 clients to an understanding of why their eating habits were the result of their feelings about food. “Their liberation came when they grasped the fact that if they didn’t change their thoughts and habits, they would continue to be an overweight person in their mind, and undoubtedly put the weight back on,” Silano remarks. Today, this young widow credits her compassion for people and ardor for alternative preventive strategies to her experiences while helping her husband with his aggressive form of cancer. “My husband’s death was the most traumatic experience I’ve ever had to live through, and his compas- sion for me, even though he was dying, was inspirational,” says Silano, who now consciously pays it forward. Her empathy plays out in the genuine consideration Silano feels for clients struggling to stay on a textbook diet. The same diet, she emphasizes, is definitely not for every individual. In- stead, Silano uses a confidential genetic test that indicates which type of diet is best for the client and what foods their body needs to lose weight. Armed with this information, she creates a nutri- tion plan specifically tailored to the individual’s needs. “Truth is, I’m simply listening to their body, thinking outside the box and giving them the tools they need to live a healthy and happy life,” says Silano.
For more information, visit Concierge-
DietaryServices.com. Call 866-980- 6089. See ad, page 25.
Every flower is a soul blossoming in nature.
~Gerard De Nerval
26 Collier/Lee Counties
swfl
.naturalawakeningsmag.com
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64