When you’re smack dab in the middle of a Snowpocalypse, it can be hard to focus on eating healthfully. As everything gets covered in feet upon feet of snow, it’s hard not to want the most comforting comfort food you can get your hands on. Personally, mac and cheese, spaghetti covered in provolone and other disturbingly unhealthy choices are my go-to when I’m snowed in.
Still, eating that kind of food for an entire season is not sustainable for keeping my hourglass figure. Fortunately for me, Larissa Spafford from Bend Nutritional Therapy is offering a course at The Workhouse in Bend called, “Eat Your Way to a Better Health.” Now, instead of melting cheese onto a plate of more cheese, I can learn how to eat like a human person. The Source talked to Spafford about the class and about a few easy ideas to eat more healthfully.
Source Weekly: Can you start off by telling me your history with cooking healthfully?
Larissa Spafford: I’ve had a love of holistic health since I was a teenager. This led me to eating and cooking in what I believed was a “healthy” way. Over the years I saw and became frustrated by so many people around me suffering and even dying from health problems that I felt were at least partly preventable with diet. I wanted to do something to help. Then I found the Nutritional Therapy Association and enrolled. In 2015 I graduated as a certified Nutritional Therapy Practitioner. Once I studied the sciences of nutrition, anatomy and physiology, I realized that what I previously thought was “healthy” to eat was wrong in many ways (although it was still way healthier than the Standard American Diet or SAD for short). It has changed my health, energy levels and life forever for the better. The best part is that the food I eat now is way more delicious than before.
SW: What are some steps people can take for eating out?
LS: Seek out restaurants that use the best quality whole food ingredients. Some restaurants use local produce and meats. These are best. Many restaurants offer burgers made from grass-fed beef, elk or buffalo. These are less likely to be factory farmed. Avoid fried food, not because all fried food is bad, but because most restaurants fry in the wrong oils for frying or use the unhealthy kinds of oils like canola, soybean or partially hydrogenated oils.
SW: Can you think of some dishes that are perfect for warming someone up in weather like this?
LS: Soups are my very favorite for warming up in weather like this. It’s easy to made them nutrient dense and delicious. Slow cooker meals like curried chicken served over zucchini noodles and beef stew over mashed sweet potatoes are other favorites.
SW: How can people eat healthfully if they don’t have much time to prepare?
LS: Healthy foods that require almost no prep time include fruits, nuts, seeds, hard boiled eggs, veggie sticks and hummus, cheeses, nut butters, half an avocado and even meats like good quality organic salami. This time of year a slow cooker is a huge time saver. Putting a few whole food ingredients into it in the morning takes little time and coming home to a hot meal is the best. When you do have time making a big pot of soup or other meal to freeze is great for super busy times. Eating healthy doesn’t have to be complicated or time consuming. I think looking at priorities and seeing if you actually would have time if you made some changes is a good place to start. Ask yourself if you would be willing to watch a little less TV, spend a little less time on social media or even wake up a little earlier. If you really are that busy, you are probably stressed and that is not good for your health. I would consider doing less if possible.
SW: What do you hope people take away from your class?
LS: I hope people come away from my class with the knowledge of what really is and is not food, and what is healthy, as opposed to what food manufacture’s and marketers have led us to believe is healthy. I hope people understand that they can take responsibility for their own health and have more information and inspiration to start or continue on their way to better health.
Eat Your Way to Better Health
Saturday, Jan. 14, 2pm
The Workhouse, 50 SE Scott St., Bend
$45
This article appears in Jan 11-18, 2017.
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Any real, qualified, medical doctor will tell you daily exercise and a reasonable diet will eliminate 90% if not 99% of our common health problems. “nutrition therapy” is yet another fad and pseudo-profession, where too many practitioners think they are actually qualified medical professionals…which they aren’t.
Shame on the Source for promoting this “profession” and not doing any due diligence about this so-called nutrition therapy certification. if one goes to the NTA website…it’s a online certification. A self-paced online program where there are only 3 mandatory in-person workshops (10 days total) where you are allowed to miss 8 hours. wow. As far as I can tell, this certification doesn’t even qualify one to be a licensed nutritionist or dietician in the state of Oregon. I don’t even use Uber and their amateur drivers. Why would I trust my health to an amateur?
I’m thrilled to see someone taking their health seriously and turning it into a career. There are loads of para-professionals out in the world with certifications that are doing incredible work. People complaining about your NTP certification haven’t done their research. I know that program covers hours and hours of lecture, reading and in-person study because it’s a 9-month intensive program. More nutrition study than most general practitioner doctors receive in med school. Keep up the good work!
For your information… NTPs do not think they are ‘qualified medical professionals’. We have been trained with a heck of a lot more nutrition information/studies/practices than most MDs have. We are not qualified to treat or diagnose diseases or conditions, we simply collect information from the client, assess it, run some procedures, and analyze all the info to see what the body is saying. We actually want to get to the root of the problem, not just give the client a bandaid in the form of prescription pills. Food is medicine. “Each time you eat you are either feeding disease or fighting it.”
I’ve had a so-called “nutrition therapist” brag about “curing” a “patient” of his. And even offered a “cure” for one of my medical conditions (a homeopathic cure that has been thoroughly debunked and so unscientific a 4th grader would know it) and even try to prescribe some kind of regimen for a relative of mine…not ever having met her. Not even as single question about family history of illness, allergies or other conditions, or current treatment that may contra-indicate their advice or supplements that might do either of us harm or even kill us. There is a happy medium between medical science and holistic and non-western medicine. But, advising quakc cures, spreading misinformation about illnesses, vaccines and medical science is dangerous.. “Nutrition therapy” is a made up term and a BUSINESS. That’s why every other thing on the NTA website has a “trademarked” symbol next to it. “Nutrition” is what all this is used to be called. And state licensed nutritionists and dieticians must go through real schooling from an accredited college or university to study it and pass a state board exam to get licensed to be allowed to work as professionals so they don’t kill people. gee, all those supplements that your NTP happens to have available to sell you is awfully convenient? hmm…. what did they call this back in the day? door-to-door vitamin salesman!
Hey NTA didn’t come up with the idea that Food is Medicine. Hippocrates did that. Surely the medical establishment is aware of that or at the very least, aware of Hippocrates, after which their oath is named. First do no harm….follow mainstream medical/nutritional advice and look where we are. Nutritional Therapy provides nutritional education, empowerment…they DO NOT diagnose or treat disease. Those who say that NTPs do otherwise are misinformed.
Why would anyone feel threatened by the mention of warm soups in the winter? Anyone who gets worked up enough to cry out “quack” and “fake medicine” over the idea of eating real food probably has some serious nutritional deficiencies. By the way, Hippocrates, who founded medicine, has great things to say about nutrition, including “let food be thy medicine and let medicine be thy food.” Nutrition and medicine complement each other. They are not at odds. Why the animosity?
everyone should google “nutrition therapist dangerous”. A consumer group in the UK uncovered dangerous advice being given by so-called “nutrition therapists”. The “profession” here in the U.S. is just as unregulated as the UK…and we have 100 times more sage-burning, crystal-worshipping fruit loops than they do…just here in Bend. C’mon people.
I don’t think any detractors here have anything against nutrition or healthy eating. But promoting the for-profit NTA and an un-regulated “profession” ? the NTA makes big bucks on their self-paced online course. hmm…”sandwich artists” at Subway take an online course also. I think they even get a certificate. They must be REAL artists!
$45 is pretty steep for a cooking class. but throw in dream analysis, chakra reading and prostate massage…you got a deal! ps: don’t eat at kfc more than once a day and don’t drink more than 8 red bulls. y’all owe me $45 each. you’re welcome.
NTPs are smart. they know gluten is bad and causes everything from hangnails to global warming. Vaccines are bad too. 3rd world diseases are good. We should all get those again. Ask Sarah Palin. She says vaccines are bad, too, doncha know? she is smart, too. Science is bad too. Trump says so.
If you think big pharma and regulated professions aren’t out to make big bucks on the ignorance of others then you are sorely mistaken, “Voice of Reason.” Sounds like someone who wants to remain anonymous and come up with creative names, had a bad experience with their own health. I’m sorry to hear that. The only people who want to regulate advice on what foods are healthy, are the ones making lots of money on keeping people sick and unwell. If my grandma told me to eat my vegetables, “Fruit-Loops,” would you try to run a smear campaign against her too? All of these negative posts all sound like the same “anonymous” person to me. I’m sorry you’re so unhappy and I hope you find happiness in some other, more positive ways.
I will be forever grateful for Nutritional Therapy. I suffered from Multiple Sclerosis and Lyme disease for 8 years. The drug options my MS specialist and other doctors had for me were making me sicker. I met an NTP and they helped guide me to a whole foods diet. In the end I chose the Wahls protocol which is a diet based on Paleo philosophies written by a Medical Doctor to help her own Multiple Sclerosis. This doctor who I now work for has clinical trials and they have been successful for MS. I have been in remission for 3 years! My MS specialist told me at our last follow up that I no longer need to come in for follow ups as long as I have no more symptoms. She let me know I am the first MS patient she has ever said that too and the first MS patient she had to go that route. Is she a QUACK? I think not! Food is powerful medicine. I loved my NTP so much that I went back to school to become an NTP. The Nutritional Therapy Association is a great school. We do not diagnosis or treat disease we help people find the best foods for them to live the best life they can. There are many doctors who have went through the NTA program and absolutely love what they learned! You are what you eat, think and feel. Be kind and eat real food!!!!
NTA is not just an online course for NTP’s. Hands on training workshops are required, and the mid-term and final exams are proctored, not open book. NTA belongs to the NANP organization which has very high standards for its member schools, and graduates of the NTA program are eligible to sit for the examination with NANP and become board certified. I went through the program, and chiropractors, nurses, physical therapists, massage therapists and two doctors were students in my class. It is a top notch school. I became interested in nutrition when my daughter was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease. I had doctors tell her she could eat “whatever she wanted” and that food didn’t matter. What kind of nutrition advice is that from a medical doctor? After doing my own research and putting her on a special diet (with the blessing of a wonderful gastroenterologist that we hired) all her symptoms disappeared, and lab tests/bloodwork returned to normal along with many other wonderful improvements. Her GI was impressed and started telling his other patients about it, and now, years later, the Seattle Children’s Hospital has completed a study on this diet that shows it is a very promising treatment for Crohn’s Disease without medication. Maybe “Voice of Reason” needs to do a little better homework before denouncing the NTA that is not all about making big bucks- purposely keeps class sizes small because of the hands-on training, and new classes only start once/year.
Wow I feel like everyone should take a class like this, in the world we live in today it is so easy to get caught up in eating horrible or be tricked into thinking you are eating healthy. I have had different health issues and not once did a dr ask me about my diet and I ever really thought about it until this year! Shame on them and shame on me. I wish I would have had a class like this in high school before I went out to live on my own so I could have this skill set! Proud of anyone taking this class or taking steps toward true health. think of if they have kids and what a positive lifestyle they are demonstrating
The only fad I see here is the modern practice of feigned outrage, excessive personal attacks, and name calling that social media seems to bring out! I love the one that admits 90% of what ails us is what we put in our bodies and then attacks people who helps others do just that in a healthy way!
I can tell you 50 horror stories of doctors and hospitals that just flat got it wrong and injured or killed people, I believe they are in fact the #1 cause if death in the U.S. Malpractice, wrong prescriptions, hospital infections, operating on the wrong limb….So all doctors are bad? Of course not! But I had a bad nutritionist, so they are all bad? I have to bring my Mom food in the hospital because they are literally incapable of providing a diabetic diet! That is sad. Until mainstream medicine is perfect it’s rather hypocritical to attack others!
Intelligent adults look at everything, research and make intelligent decisions whether from a Nutrition Expert or a doctor, I am pretty sure they are all fallible! I respect anyone who dedicates themselves to helping others, I choose wisely and realize the ultimate responsibility lies within myself! I am not going to blindly follow anyone’s advice without study! There are bad practitioners of every ilk, why must people attack instead of engaging in sincere questions and respectful dialogue?
By the way science is inquiry, it is never settled and always evolving! We discover new things every day! And thank God, people still have choices in this country. Much of what is accepted today will be ridiculed tomorrow and visa versa!
I also am an NTP. I also have been a Registered Nurse for 25 years. I have worked from the ICU to Home Health care. I’ve “been around” the disease care system. I have NEVER seen or heard the beneficial information that I have learned from the NTA program. It has changed my own health, my families and the hundreds of clients that I have worked in ways that I could never have imagined. I HAVE frequently seen hospitals serving very poor quality food to patients. Diabetics getting sugar filled foods REGULARLY, no diet considerations for someone who has had a bowel resection, salt on the trays of patients with CHF; almost no nutrition teaching from half hearted dietician’s who follow FDA guidelines (no regard to bio-individuality)- I could go on and on. As an RN, I may have suggested a patient avoid salt due to high blood pressure, but NEVER have I told them how to do that to be successful and MOST PEOPLE DON’T KNOW HOW !!!! Food effects every cell in every tissue in every organ of your body. Let’s all get on board to a nutrient dense, whole foods diet using traditional cooking methods and it would be a much better world.
It sounds like there is confusion and misinformation about what an NTP does and does not do. We do not treat or diagnose disease, which I clearly state on my website. What we do, is make dietary (and sometimes supplemental) recommendations based on very thorough information we gather from each client. In the first visit, I spend 2 hours with each client asking extensively about their health history, goals, obstacles to health, etc. I use a 324 question Nutritional Assessment Questionnaire, a computer program and a unique set of functional tests to gather more information. I can also use Lingual Neural testing to determine if a particular supplement or food will be beneficial to that particular client. It’s personalized holistic nutrition tailored to the bio-individual needs of each client. There is no one size fits all diet. Nutritional Therapy helps each person find a way of eating that is right for them.
By learning about our bodies and how to take care of ourselves we can prevent disease. If you look at the rates of diseases including type 2 diabetes, heart disease, autism, etc. they are on the rise at an alarming rate. This is horrifying to me and I want to be part of the solution. The way I see it, we can’t afford to not learn to take better care of ourselves. What we are doing as a society is obviously not working.
I found the NTP program to be an excellent program. The training is firmly based in the sciences of anatomy, physiology and nutrition. We were encouraged to think critically and for ourselves and encouraged to continue to learn and read the scientific studies for ourselves and draw our own conclusions.
No_quacks is correct, certification as an NTP doesn’t qualify one to be a licensed nutritionist or dietician. In the state of Oregon it is completely legal to practice with the certification of an NTP. I would never claim to be a licensed nutritionist or registered dietician. I am proud to be an NTP and make a point to tell people that it is very different from those professions.
If anyone has further questions or concerns about Nutritional Therapy, feel free to contact me at BendNutritionalTherapy@gmail.com. I offer free 15 minute phone consultations for people to learn more and decide for themselves if Nutritional Therapy is right for them.
Bad NTPs and other naturopathic/alternative medicine practitioners give their respective fields a bad name. All alternative medicine isn’t all bad. Bad medical doctors give medicine a bad name. The whole field of medicine is not bad. All Having said that, in our zeal to strike a blow for the common person and tear down down the establishment…we shouldn’t abandon reason, empirical evidence, or facts. Isnt’ that how Trump ended up in the White House?
as an NTP you “run some procedures, and analyze all the info to see what the body is saying.” sounds very scientific. do you feel the patient’s nose and see if it is wet and cold? spin a soft-boiled egg and see which way it points? are you using the officially issued NTA(TM) crystal ball? does the crystal ball come with the certificate or does it cost extra? exactly how many lab hours of clinical pathology did you take in the conference room of the Holiday Inn?
“Lingual Neural testing”. hmm…that doesn’t sound fake or completely made-up at all. NOT.
This comment is for the people who have chosen to spend their valuable time spewing negativity about something they seem to know little about….
I hope you experience a long and happy life free from discomfort and dis-ease in your body. If one day you find yourself experiencing less and seek out medical help, I hope it cures you. If you find yourself (like so many do) with a condition that your doctor does not recognize and know how to treat, I hope that you will remember Nutritional Therapy exists. I hope you will open your mind and consider that just maybe, what you put into your body does in fact affect your health.
Weather you like it or not, or believe it works, Nutritional Therapy is here to stay. NTPs are doing amazing things with our time and energy.
holy frijoles. I’ve been following this discussion and can’t keep my mouth shut any longer. If some doctors get a “god complex”, apparently some NTPs suffer from “hero complex” or “hero syndrome”. (Maybe should consult a medical professional about that.) why is it so hard to admit that some of your colleagues are going off-the-script and doing their own thing? do you know exactly what other NTPs are telling their clients? and crossing the line between nutrition advisor and faux-medical-expert? recommending hoax remedies and therapies? after all, the business is totally unregulated and unlicensed as others have pointed out. Funny how some of these NTPs will say they aren’t doctors out of one corner of their mouth…and out of the other corner brag about how much smarter they are than doctors. The NTA is good at instilling hubris in students…that’s for sure. I’ve had friends in this alternative medicine field offer a mishmash of folk remedies and hocus pocus mixed w/ a teeny bit of sound advice. Since the good ol’ days of snake oil salesmen…we’ve known the best most convincing fakery goes down much smoother wrapped in just enough real science and fact to make it palatable.
Here is an example of a situation where a person may not get the answers they need from a traditional doctor (my opinion is that they would be more likely to find answers from a Doctor that practices Integrative Medicine or Functional Medicine) and where working with an NTP could be beneficial. This of course is dependent on the individual Doctor and individual NTP. The ideal situation is for an persons NTP and Doctor to work together with the optimal health of the client/patient as their common goal.
Adrenal gland dysfunction is common in our society. It can cause people to feel run down, exhausted, be susceptible to sickness, experience anxiety and depression, etc.
When a person with adrenal dysfunction goes to their Doctor, the Doctor may run tests. If the person has severe adrenal dysfunction it could be classified and diagnosed as Addisons Disease and treatment would go from there. If a person has dysfunction that is not extreme enough to qualify as Addisons Disease, it might not be recognized by the Doctor. Sometimes the Doctor says it is psychosomatic and the person is prescribed antidepressants. Some people accept this. Others, seek other opinions. One other opinion is that of an NTP, who says, no, it is not all in your head. One possible root of the problem is that your blood sugar may be imbalanced, due to eating in an imbalanced way and that is causing your adrenal glands to need to contribute too much to keep your blood sugar stable. They are overworked and need a break. Here are some dietary recommendations to give them a break. If you would like to take a supplement for additional support, I can test you to see which particular supplement will work best for you.
An NTP told me 5 or 6 years ago that vitamin E oil would get rid of my stretch marks. And today…..I just have oily stretch marks. Fake fake fake fake fake!
Wow, what is wrong with us? Why do we become so hateful?
Nothing brings us together quicker than a common hatred.
If you don’t agree fine, but whew….relax Bend 🙂
relax? we have all become too complacent when we abandon fact-based, and evidence-based reasoning. this is how people deny climate change, and also how the alt-right using false correlation and logic to justify racism. When emotion replaces reasoning it’s a dangerous thing. Trump wants to believe he won by a popular vote landslide. Evidence says otherwise, but it makes him feel better to believe it. When doctors don’t have a concrete answer for somebody…people feel better when someone offers a solution that may or may not be real. Knowing something that may not be real feels better than uncertainty. regardless if it’s snake oil or not.
We can’t choose when an where we accept the scientific method and when we don’t. There is no such thing as “adrenal gland dysfunction” or “adrenal dysfunction”. it’s a made-up diagnosis base on a broad collection of symptoms. (and NTPs aren’t supposed to diagnose conditions? but apparently they do…) There is a reason the medical profession does not recognize that diagnosis. it’s not supported by research and data. There is a reason why the NTA is not an accredited learning institution.
When people in so-called “alternative medicine” actively undermine science and spread misinformation….we shouldn’t just “relax”. if nothing else, we should be a little bit outraged. Just because modern medicine doesn’t have all the answers…it doesn’t mean we should just make stuff up.
“Nutritional Therapy” is here to stay….someone said? Tarot card readers have been around a long time as well.
Once again, NTPs do not diagnose disease. There is a difference between diagnosing a disease and considering (and using functional tests and gathering information to support) that a gland, organ, system, etc. may not be functioning optimally.
With any gland or organ there can be a wide range of function that varies from individual to individual. At one end of the spectrum you can have optimal healthy function and on the other end you can have disease (where the Doctors come in to diagnose and treat). Anything less than optimal function is by definition dysfunction. (Straight from the dictionary the definition of dysfunction is “abnormality or impairment in the function of a specified bodily organ or system”).
I personally know what it feels like to experience less than optimal adrenal function. I was able to improve my adrenal function by applying what I learned at the NTA. I am very grateful there were simple dietary adjustments I could make that had such a huge impact on my quality of life.
that cracks me up. such awesome logic. I had this mystery condition myself, so it must be true! I can cure other people, too.
endorsing one’s own business is sooooo convincing. what does that sound like? oh yeah…that guy from the 80s hair plug commercial, the Hair Club for Men..”.I”m not just the president, I’m also a client.” Only the hair plug thing is probably more realz.
how many miracle tonic peddlers also said they took their own product daily and cured themselves? only they probably used fake remedies but addressed real medical conditions and didn’t have to make them up.
tomato, tomatoh…whatever you want to call it. Made up, non-scientific ailments, maladies, oh wait…NOT a disease, but a condition…a syndrome or dysfunction…just vague terminology and a matter of semantics (seems very much like diagnosing and prescribing to me) The bottom line is you are identifying supposed problems and prescribing a course of action, based on psuedo-science, or do we call them “alternative facts”? in Post-truth era? isn’t that what we are calling it now? I guess alternative medicine practitioners beat Trump to the punch a while ago.
maybe to clear up all this confusion of what NTPs do or don’t do…change the name to “certified gland optimizers” or “certified body whisperers”.