Who needs sleep? Despite needing to step up the undereye concealer, I enjoyed a dynamic and really fulfilling day at FNCE yesterday. My day started with a breakfast hosted by the Dietitians in Business and Communications Dietetic Practice Group (DPG). The speaker, Hattie Hill, was inspiring and made me recalibrate a few notions I had about how to achieve my goals.
I made a game-day decision to attend the lecture “Autoimmunity: Feeding your Gut Microbes to Impact Disease” with Ryan Sartor, MD, and Kelly Tappenden, PhD, RD, FASPEN. It was a-mazing. Supremely fascinating. I’m delaying further commentary for a future blog post or possibly a Seattle Times column.
I spent some time at the Nutrition Entrepreneur DPG booths, talking with members and potential members. If there are any dietetic students reading this who do not already belong to NE DPG, I’ll say this: Join…you will be glad you did.
After a lovely lunch with several of my fellow current and former UW students, I attended “Disruptive Success: Moving from Traditional RD to Thriving Entrepreneur” with Joanne Larsen, MS, RD, LD, and Marjorie Geiser, MBA, RD. I picked up some useful information to consider as I plan my future as a nutrition entrepreneur.
My final educational session of the day was “Nutrition and Cancer: From Genotype to Phenotype” with Steven Clinton, MD, PhD, and Colleen Spees, PhD, MEd, RD, LD. Really, really great, and I’m not just saying that because Dr. Spees discussed one of my favorite topics, epigenetics. I will be writing about this issue in depth going forward, probably as a Times column.
Next, I was off to the reception for the Women’s Health, Nutrition Education for the Public and Pediatric DPGs (I’m a member of the first two). My mentor, Judy Simon, presented me with the Outstanding Student in Women’s Health award. So honored! I had a great time at the reception and really enjoyed talking with Angela Grassi, MS, RD, LDN, author of The PCOS Workbook and PCOS: The Dietitian’s Guide and Amy Ogle, MS, RD, author of Before Your Pregnancy.
Angela was presented with the Excellence in Practice in Women’s Health Award, which she so deserved. I used her well researched and written books for as resources when I was researching some PCOS (polycystic ovary syndrome) patient education materials I was writing for UW Medicine last year, and Amy’s book as a resource on preconception nutrition, and highly recommend it. Angela has a website and blog, PCOS Nutrition. Amy is involved in a superexciting project that I will write more about here after my November 3 column on preconception nutrition. I know, I know, I’ve been teasing to a lot of future reveals in this post, but this conference has provided so much great information worth sharing that deserves to be shared properly, not on the fly.
Three more educational sessions tomorrow, then I fly back to home, sweet home!
