I am grateful every day that God saw fit to bring Ammi into my life. It’s not hyperbolic to say that she played a big part in saving my life. Literally saving my life.

Except for anything urgent, like walking my dog or going to the front door to pay the delivery driver for food, I had barely been out of bed for almost two years when I started working with Ammi. My house was a disaster, I was overweight, nearly to the point of obesity, and sleeping 3 or 4 hours a night at the most. Four hours was a good night. I was always exhausted and I was deeply in financial debt. My joy and peace were gone. I was averaging a bottle of Chardonnay daily and didn’t even realize I was waking up with a hangover every morning. That’s how accustomed I was to feeling bad. All. The. Time.

When I made my first appointment, I was expecting Ammi to tell me what to eat and what supplements to take so I’d feel better and be able to get out of bed and maybe get some better sleep. As part of new client intake, Ammi asked for a three-day diary of everything I ate and drank. One day I didn't eat anything until 7:30 that evening and then, I ordered pizza (yep; a whole pizza to go with that day’s bottle of vino). I told her how embarrassed I was that I'd eaten a whole pizza and nothing else. Even now, more than 4 years later, I get teary eyed when I think of her response: “Girl. What you ate is not what I’m concerned about. What I’m concerned about is what is going on with you to make you think you’re not worth nourishment until the end of the day."

That comment stopped me dead in my tracks. I started bawling and as I recall, I spent the better part of our sessions for at least the first six months crying. Ammi wasn’t content to tell me what to eat and what supplements to take. She was determined to get to the bottom of the so not normal place I was in. Eating? Supplements? It's true that what we put in our bodies is all tied up with emotion. I'm not saying it didn't take some effort to change how I was feeding myself. But there’s something deeper and harder than that. From our first session, Ammi called me to do the really hard work of looking at why I was where I was while simultaneously giving me concrete, doable baby steps to get to a better place.

That whole-person approach, based on Ammi’s deep care for those she works with, has helped guide my journey from a sad, dark, joyless place into the light of day. From the labs she ordered that diagnosed my auto-immune disease, to the simple, daily tools she gave me to dig myself out of the pit, including helping me understand how to nourish my body, Ammi’s embrace of full-spectrum work has made me a forever fan! Her heart is the confluence of personal, emotional insight and practical guidance.

She has the whole tough-love-combined-with-tenderness thing down 100%. She didn't echo my own harsh words to myself. She didn't tell me to get off my lazy butt and clean my kitchen so I could cook real food instead of calling Amante Pizza and China Palace every night for dinner. No. She told me to clean just enough space on my kitchen counter to put my blender so I could start the day with a protein shake. Instead of telling me to do my laundry and clean my house so I wasn’t living in a filthy sty, she said, “Get a notepad and walk around your house and write down everything that needs to be done. But don’t write down ‘clean the living room.’ Write down all the things you can do in 5 minutes in your living room. Everything you write down, throughout your house, be sure it’s something you can do in 5 minutes or less.”

That advice was so Mr. Miyagi telling Daniel-san "wipe-on-wipe-off"! It didn’t just help me get my house back to a livable space. It helped me stop being such a lush. I really wanted to stop drinking so much, but that daily bottle of Chardonnay was my fall back on bad days. And back then, pretty much every day was a bad day. Instead of telling myself I had to stop drinking so much (which I had been doing for years already) I started micromanaging those cravings like Ammi told me to. “Can I get through this moment right here without going to the store for a bottle of wine? Just this moment. We’ll deal with 5 minutes from now in 5 minutes.” It only took about two weeks to break that nearly 18-year habit. Wild, right?

There’s so much more I could say. I could write a book on Ammi’s huge part in my journey to health. Her creativity, inquistiveness, compassion, and her love of science work together to make her the dedicated and effective practitioner she is.

Nutrition and a clean house feel effortless to me these days compared to the old days. I sleep better. I’ve lost a lot of weight without even focusing on that. I can make a salt and pepper martini and enjoy it without drinking the entire bottle of gin. I rarely think about wine anymore at all, which would have seemed an impossibility 2 years ago. Getting clear minded helped me figure out what I needed to do to get out of debt. All of these are direct results of Ammi's guidance and patience and compassion.

I'm not perfect. I live a two-minute walk from the best pizza in my entire state. Sometimes I eat some pizza. And when I do, Ammi's voice is what I hear: "If you fall, don't beat yourself up and don't think you've ruined all the work you've done. You don't have to go down a dark hole. Just move on." Ammi has helped me find what I never dreamed I could have: a healthy, balanced relationship with food and drink.

Let me leave it at this: God has blessed Ammi with an amazing calling and uncommon gifts; I’m convinced no one else could have done what she has done to help me and I encourage anyone who's thinking about working with a nutritionist to call Two Birds Nutrition.

Ammi helps me find a path to my health goals with her deep curiosity, tenacity, support, and fun wit.