Hi, my name is Natalia. I am a Functional Medicine Registered Dietitian. Actually, Integrative Functional Certified Practitioner, and I love food, and I love the way food impacts our body and our mood. So that got me into studying Functional Medicine.

And you probably heard the word functional medicine before, you’re wondering what it is. And in layman’s term is getting to the bottom of why you are feeling fatigued, constipated, bloated, you can’t lose weight, and why you are maybe irritable.

So there’s many root causes for a certain condition, and these root causes can be several. So with functional medicine and functional nutrition, what we do is actually look at the systems in your body that are out of balance that are driving that disease.

So an example of a system that I tend to see out of balance in many people and I’m specialized in, it’s gut health. The gastrointestinal system, it’s out of balance, because of years of poor eating, or drinking too much, or not drinking enough water, not eating the right foods.

Another system that tends to be out of balance is the system that detoxifies and actually transforms the energy from the foods that we eat into actual energy that can be used by ourselves. So that is the detoxification biotransformation, actually, system. And we look at the root causes of why those systems are out of balance.

So how do we find out what it is? Well, very formal interview, a very thorough assessment, and the value of testing. Testing, can yield information that is amazing. I’ll tell– a test that I love is a stool test, where we actually collect sample of your stool, and that gets sent into the laboratory. And then we know what species of bacteria actually make up your microbiome, which is the rainforest where you are roots of life live.

So it yields amazing information. It tells us if you have too much of a certain unhealthy bacteria. It tells us the couple of bacteria that you have. If you have also something that is known as intestinal permeability, where the gut, where everything gets absorbed and metabolized. It’s actually leaky and permeable. So we learn about what is happening in your gut, so that we can actually get to rebalance all that and repair the gut, and replace some digestive secretions that you’re lacking.

A lot of people feel bloated, because their pancreas and their liver are not really making the workers that are needed to digest, and that’s why they feel bloated. So we’re really, really able to narrow down what is that you need, and what is the root cause.

Another testing that I love is toxins. Overall, toxins could be heavy metals. I’ve seen mercury. And people really having a hard time functioning when they have mercury toxicity because of amalgam. So because of eating too much tuna, whether or not that happens. And I have also seen mycotoxins and all sorts of toxins, and also food sensitivities, vitamin and mineral deficiencies that are actually driving certain conditions such as anxiety and depression, an inability to lose weight, and skin issue.

So a lot can be uncovered with the right testing and with the right approach. And that approach is functional medicine and functional nutrition with functional medicine testing. So excited to get to the bottom of why you are not feeling the way you want to feel.

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