About

Hi! I’m Nicole and I am a Registered Dietitian and author of Prevention RD! By day, I am the Director of Nutrition Services at a small, local hospital and by night, a home cook, blogger, and wife. I have diverse work experience in diabetes, weight management, renal disease, bariatrics, food service, management, and teaching. I live in southwest Michigan with my husband (Mark…AKA Mr. P), dog (Lily), and snake (Pinky). I am originally from Chicago, but have most recently lived in Columbus, Ohio and Tulsa, Oklahoma. I enjoy playing ice-hockey, running, cooking, and reading.

My “story” is probably different from most dietitians, and it goes something like this. Since a very young age (practically birth, according to my mother), I was overweight. I was happy, smart, and had the most of supportive family and friends a girl could ask for. The ONE thing I battled was my weight. At 14 I went to my first of many Weight Watchers meetings. My leader’s name was JoAnn, and she was a saint. To this day, I can quote many of JoAnn’s sayings. Over the course of several months, I dropped from my highest weight of 190 lbs to 142 lbs. At 142 lbs, I was wearing a pair of size 6 Gap khakis and I thought I looked great. Having such success at the scale, I ditched Weight Watchers with the intention of going the distance on my own — down to my goal of 115lbs. Needless to say, this didn’t happen. With my new-found physique and uplifted confidence, old habits slipped back into action. Before long, I was back at Weight Watchers (with JoAnn), admitting defeat. I needed accountability. And JoAnn.

While my first 50 lbs just about melted off me, I eventually hit a plateau and dieting was not enough. I required exercise to continue losing. So, I joined a gym within walking distance of both my high school and my home. Every day after school, religiously, I went to the gym. I would workout anywhere from 1-2 hours a day. I also joined my high school cross-country team and the boy’s ice-hockey team. While cross-country was a struggle, it increased my endurance drastically and sparked my love for running. Ice-hockey, however, created some social turbulence, to say the least. High school boys don’t really fancy the idea of being on the team with the girl. Hockey and I, however, were a match made in heaven (I was a former figure-skater for 10+ years) and I play on a weekly basis to this day.

During my junior year of high school, 1 year and 1 week into my weight-loss journey, I had met my goal. I weighed 115 lbs, down 75 pounds. I felt great, I looked great, and JoAnn even had a tiara I wore for the occasion. And you’d better believe mom was sitting in the front row taking pictures. I can remember what I was wearing, even though I haven’t seen that picture in YEARS.

After my weight-loss journey, I had no doubt in my mind that I wanted to enter into the nutrition and health field. I ended up at the University of Illinois at Champaign, majoring in Food Science and Human Nutrition, Dietetics option (an approved Didactic Program in Dietetics), with a minor in Chemistry. During my four glorious years on campus, I played club ice-hockey and met the love of my life (awww!). And did I mention working for Weight Watchers? Yep, that’s right. JoAnn was my rock and I wanted to provide that support for others. I lead Weight Watchers meetings for 2 years during college and my meetings were a great success.

I went on to complete my master’s in Nutrition and Wellness while simultaneously completing my Dietetic Internship and a thesis at Benedictine University, graduating in December of 2008. I passed my RD exam in March of 2009 after many intense months of studying!

I have completed 4 half-marathons and 2 full marathons (PR 4:07:09), and I look forward to completing some distance races in the future!

I started this blog as a way to stay “up to date” in nutrition as I was undergoing a job search in a poor economy. I fell in love with the blog community and have found this to be such a rewarding activity. I hope to inspire, teach, and humor those nutrition and health guru’s out there, and in the process, to form some great friendships and to learn a thing or two, too!

Disclaimer: I am a dietitian, not a perfect person or consumer. I sometimes struggle with my weight and body image like a lot of people. While this is something I strive to better, I do believe health is about much more than weight or inches but about happiness and balance, and achieving a person I love and admire.

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I love mail! Question? Comment? Send it over to me at nicole at preventionrd.com

I receive lots of emails daily. Thank you for writing and for your patience!

Thanks for reading!