On Becoming Your Own Nutritionist
By Judith Shaw Beardsley
As is appeared in the August issue of Prime Time Cape Cod Magazine

As I arrived for my appointment, my mission was clear. I needed to negotiate onion rings. For years, a personal joy of summer has been taking a long walk on Nauset Beach to work up an appetite for a basket of them. Since I started working with nutritionist Maggie Davis in October, though, baskets of anything fried have been verboten. I have lost over 20 pounds – not the stuff of TV movies – but a satisfactory outcome for me. Perhaps most importantly, I haven’t been in a bad mood about doing it. I’ve given up fresh Italian bread with dinner, Oreos before bed, Big Macs on road trips, gourmet take-out sandwiches, ice cream sundaes under the stars, pepperoni pizza and many other foods I used to consider essential to mental well-being. Onion rings, however, were in a class by themselves. They meant summer on the Cape.

Maggie being Maggie, she immediately understood. This was something important. So rather than a sermon, she worked out a way that I could, without immense guilt or damage, have onion rings. Only three or four were permissible, not a basket, and she encouraged taking the walk after eating, rather than before, but still, I didn’t have to go cold turkey.

Davis, who has every possible initial after her name to attest to her fine credentials, will be the first to tell you that food is a very personal thing. For some, it’s nothing more than a way to satisfy hunger. I have sympathy for those people. They are missing a lot. For me, a rack of baby meaty baby backs, a fresh lobster salad, a plate of perfectly aged proscuitto, a bubbly baked rigatoni are among the food things on the planet.

This is why, after being effortlessly rail-thin into my 30’s, I found myself putting on too much weight in my 50’s. My metabolism and activity level changed, but my tastes didn’t. Home grown attempts to count calories were erratic and unsuccessful. Diet books and theories that worked for friends all seemed to be based on food groups with which I’d rather not be intimate. So I asked my doctor for a referral to a professional who could figure out what to do with me.

I first entered Davis' office with some trepidation. I expected a discourse involving broccoli, yogurt and tofu. I anticipated a rational lecture about why the foods I liked were so bad for me, with the need for self-denial being the prevailing mantra. I was even ready for this because I had decided that whatever had to be done, I was ready to do it.

Instead, the first thing Davis asked me was what foods I liked best. Her basic belief is that no one wants to eat things they don’t like. Rather than trying to convince me that Brussels sprouts could be a nicely acquired taste, she worked with me on identifying foods I liked that would contribute to losing weight and eating healthily. Surprisingly, there actually were some of those. I love sardines, dried apricots, pistachios, and shellfish. Some other foods that I had been assuming were helpful, turned out not to be and I cut those out.

Now, for example, instead of my former lunch of a sandwich and potato chips (discipline was eating half of a small bag instead of a whole!), I have a salad with tomatoes, a low-fat dressing, sliced shrimp or chicken, some slivered almonds, and a side of fresh fruit. It takes a bit longer to prepare, but looks and tastes delicious, so it feels like a treat, not a punishment. I discovered I could change menu options as long as I didn’t have to relinquish the pleasure of meal time.

Davis understands this fundamental need because she herself is a foodie. “I love to cook it, eat it, and talk about it,” she says. “I love its color, aroma and taste – I don’t think only of the nutritional aspects. And I, too, have to watch myself every day, so that weight doesn’t become a problem.”

Her empathy, along with her sense of humor and innate calm, make me feel comfortable talking to her about food. I don’t have to apologize for enjoying chocolate cake or baked brie. I just have to resign myself to having a tiny bite of these things and find other foods for actual eating. The difference in the way I look and feel is worth the trade-off. And now that I’ve changed my habits, I look at what I’m doing less as a “diet” and more as routine meal planning. But I don’t think I could have done it solo. Willpower isn’t in my genes, and it’s not an easy trait to develop.

My sessions with Davis have made me appreciate what a complex subject nutrition is. Indeed, as a high school student, Davis planned to be a chemist.

“But it was the 60’s,” she explains, “people said to me ‘you love to cook and it’s wonderful for a girl to be a nutritionist.’ I did love cooking, chemistry, and working with people, so it did, in fact, seem like a great career choice.”

In those days, people who studied nutrition went on to be hospital dietitians. “No one was in private practice” Davis says. After getting both her bachelor and master’s degrees in nutrition, she, too, worked in hospital settings in Cleveland. When she moved to Harwich with her young daughter 25 years ago, she made a transition into practice by making home visits.

“When I visited people, I could actually open their refrigerator and see what was inside. That was very useful,” she says. Nine years ago Davis moved to her own office in Brewster.

Now she sees patients with specific eating issues – diabetes, high cholesterol – but also people like me, who need help in losing weight.

“Sometimes,” Davis says, “all a client needs is one assessment visit – just to get on the right track.”

Other times, people come once a week or once a month for as long as needed. In the last couple of years, insurers have realized the impact of eating habits on overall health, so some are now covering the cost of “nutritional therapy.”

“Therapy is the right term for it” Davis explains, “because it’s about change.”

When asked why some people are successful in dieting and others aren’t, the nutritionist’s answer is rooted in psychology.

“There are five phases of change,” she explains: “pre-contemplation, contemplation, preparation, action and maintenance.”

My own experience involved about two years of “precontemplation” and another of “contemplation.” I had never had to seriously watch my weight before, so giving up foods I loved was a daunting prospect. Some days, it still is. I also worried about what would happen if I was one of those people who succeeded for a while and then fell off the wagon. Davis told me that at that point, you may have to go back through each phase again.

“Sometimes, during the ‘contemplation’ phase, a client will need a refresher visit,” she says. “But that’s fine if it’s what will get them back on track. People with emotional issues that block success are actually a small minority.”

Davis herself is an excellent role model. She and husband, Steve, a retired NYC police detective, grow fresh vegetables as well as flowers in their garden, and both enjoy outdoor sports, both summer and winter, so exercise is routine. When time constraints or weather prevent fresh-air exercise, Davis turns to her treadmill. The couple loves to travel and especially enjoy Italy.

“But I never gain weight when I go to Italy,” Davis says. “First of all, there’s lots of fresh, delicious fish and vegetables, and secondly, the portions are smaller, so even a pasta course is manageable. Also, we walk all the time, so we burn off those calories quickly.”

This is advice I’m filing away for future trips.

When she travels, Davis enjoys visiting local markets and trying new foods. The name of her practice, Live (pronounced with a short “I”) Nutrition is a perfect fit. Food is always an important part of her daily life.

While her Cape clients literally range from 4 to 104, the majority are men and women from 40 to 70.

“Baby boomers are getting very pro-active about health and aging,” she observes. “There’s a real growth in physical fitness, stress reduction (like massage and yoga), as well as diet strategies. Probably the most common first sentence I hear from a new client is ‘I want to find a way to stay off medication.’”

It’s no surprise to Davis that the boomer generation is fighting a battle with weight. Indeed, she believes this has become an epidemic.

“It’s a combination of so many things,” she explains. “We get less exercise, from using a remote control for the TV to putting our clothes in the dryer rather than hanging them on a line. We are scheduled tightly, so we tend to rely more on take-out or processed food. And we’re always surrounded by a variety of treats.”

She goes on to talk about another key factor these days: “portion distortion.” According to Davis, “You can get three meals out of some restaurant servings today.” Indeed, taking home half or more of a large restaurant portion is a strategy she strongly recommends, and it’s an appealing option for me because also means not preparing one meal the next day.

Davis has a very full schedule and says that everyone who comes to her for treatment is different.

“I never get bored because I never see the same picture twice,” she explains. “It’s the person who drives the treatment, not me.”

And this, I think, is the real lesson here. At the end of the day, your diet is your responsibility. First, you must decide that weight loss is a serious goal. Then you need to have a plan. You can talk with a nutritionist or your family doctor, and/or find reliable resources on the Internet. Davis has a website that can help you get started: www.livenutrition.com. You may decide that the South Beach Diet fits you or that the Weight Watchers system is just what you need for motivation. It’s important to be honest with yourself, because everyone hears their own food drummer.

“Eventually,” says Davis, “the goal is to become your own nutritionist.”

Quickhits

A nutritionist’s dinner party menu
Maggie Davis modestly says that her friends call her a gourmet cook. I asked her for a recent dinner party menu:
• Arugula Salad (grown in the garden)Shavings of parmesan cheese, proscuitto, tomato, and olive oil & balsamic on the side
• Home-made Egg Ravioli with mint, ricotta, fresh asparagus and fresh peas (the pasta sits in a puddle of pureed peas & scallions)
• Rhubarb (from the garden) Bavarian with Fresh Strawberries.
Note: Wine was served, but no bread

About the author
Judith Shaw Beardsley wandered into public relations after graduating with an English degree from Smith – mainly because she couldn’t find a journalism job, she says. She stayed for 35 years, including 10 years as PR director for the American Hospital Association in Chicago. She has two adult sons and a great daughter-in-law. Judy lives in Orleans with husband Chris, and their cockapoo, Tarifa.