Welcome to my corner of the wellness world! I’m Susan, a certified health and wellness coach with a passion for empowering others to take charge of their health and vitality. I’m dedicated to guiding individuals toward a healthier, more balanced and vibrant life by helping them understand and transform their automatic behaviors.
Health is a nonlinear journey and requires the development of skills to work with your own body and wellbeing. My approach is rooted in the belief that true wellness begins with self-awareness paired with personal efficacy. I believe that self-awareness is the key to transformation, and my goal is to help people see themselves clearly without judgment, and with the curiosity and compassion needed to make meaningful change.
I understand firsthand how overwhelming it can be to navigate the complexities of life transitions, health challenges, and lifestyle changes. I also know how rewarding it can be to make those changes, and how helpful it is to have someone walking by your side. The pursuit of a vibrant existence and fulfilling life can be fine turned at any point.
Often, we go through life on autopilot, making choices that don’t truly serve our well-being. I help my clients recognize these patterns and empower them to make conscious, positive changes. Through our work together, you will develop the tools to shift the patterns and habits you’ve been operating on autopilot, allowing you to gain a deeper sense of control and alignment in your daily life.
What makes me different? I’ve been there. I know firsthand how easy it is to fall into cycles that don’t serve us, whether it's related to health, mindset, or emotional well-being. The pursuit of health is unique to the individual at a point in time, a particular model or practice only works when it’s tailored to that person. My approach to coaching is an avenue of collaborative exploration of the self to find effective and aligned lifestyle frameworks tailored to who you are.
My Journey
My passion for health and wellness has been a focal point in my life as long as I can remember. Movement has forever been my discipline, expression, therapy, and medicine. I connect with the world through my body, and it’s been a constant source of vitality and sense of self from being a dancer and gymnast through my entire youth, to now being an avid rock climber and runner. I’ve always found myself in movement, and how my body is working and performing is top priority.
In my 20s, I faced a challenging chapter in life when chronic stress and the profound grief of losing both my parents to cancer took a toll on my well-being. At 25 I lost my mother to cancer and 11 months later lost my father. I dove into climbing and hiking as a means to move through it you might say. The movement in nature was the only way I found to tolerate the emotional distress I was in, and the physical capability and perceived control over my life that I gave myself in climbing probably saved my mind during that time but my body kept a score. After skyrocketing in my athletic performance in the immediate years following my parents passing, I developed a cascade of health issues ranging from allergies and gut distress to chronic fatigue and symptoms resembling an autoimmune condition. It was a period marked by physical discomfort, emotional struggle, and a loss of trust, connection to, and confidence in my body.
I needed to seek other avenues of coping, and working with my body and mind. Life has a way of leading us to discover our own strength. My recovery began with a transformative journey of self-discovery and healing. I kept running, dancing and rock climbing as avenues toward both physical and mental resilience. Resilience was just one piece of my framework for wellness. Learning to listen and the awareness of my body’s voice and compassion for its requests for rest, gentleness, and expression was another. As I embraced movement, I also immersed myself in understanding holistic health, working closely with a Functional medicine doctor, seeking therapy, and reigniting creative practices in ceramics which ultimately guided me toward my beliefs in food as medicine and holistic health and seeking my coaching certification with the Institute of Integrative Nutrition.
Why Work with Me?
The reason I coach is because I know health is a nonlinear journey and requires the development of skills to work with your own body and wellbeing. I understand firsthand how overwhelming it can be to navigate the complexities of loss, transitions, and health challenges and how transformative it can be to have help. I know how difficult it is to see ourselves, how overwhelming it is to know what step to take, and the impact of support and a new perspective.
Wellness can be enhanced with or without the demands of a traumatic experience. The pursuit of a vibrant life is available and deserved by us all, and we don’t have to do it alone. This belief is the root of my desire to coach.
