What Course(s) did you graduate from at CNELM and when did you graduate?

MSc personalised nutrition plus NTPD and I graduated in July 2016.

What did you do before starting this course?

I was a semi professional athlete in pole vault and I also worked part time to support that as admin in a physiotherapy clinic at Loughborough University.

What made you decide to embark on this course of study and what attracted you to the MSc?

In 2012 I missed the Olympics through quite a bad injury which had required surgery and which I had had for years. I decided to carry on pole vaulting and go for this years Olympics, but in early 2013 I ruptured my hamstring and was told I wouldn’t get back from that injury at all. I was in a panic about what I would do with the rest of my life and then my dad died very quickly, so it was an awful time. I needed to find a path through it and it seemed like a good time to start something new, as my athletic career was supposedly over. I also had to watch my dad be unable to do his job as a master mariner and shut down completely because he didn’t want to do anything else. I didn’t want to be the same, where all I could do was be an athlete.

I was diagnosed with depression and that was a turning point. I didn’t want to take anti depressants and my mum is a nutritionist, so we chatted about options. I had always eaten fairly healthily, but after speaking to her I realised how imbalanced I was from a functional perspective.

With the help of supps and CBT I decided that I loved cooking and that was what made me do the course.

I chose the MSc as I knew that if I wanted to work in sport I needed a minimum qualification of a MSc. I didn’t look into it too much and I think it would have scared me if I had, so I’m pleased I just jumped in – I swam instead of sank!

In the end I managed to heal my injury and qualified for the commonwealth games in 2014.

Why did you choose CNELM for your studies?

My mum gave me a load of options of courses that she thought were good in her professional opinion. There were two options for a MSc and she said that Kate had been her tutor at ION and how inspirational she was. The functional medicine angle CNELM take really motivated me further to study with them. Everything happens for a reason – the Functional Model doesn’t have a symptom without a cause and the model is always trying to make you better. It’s so misunderstood that symptoms should just be repressed rather than tackled at the root cause. This resonated with me and what I had been through.

Have you ever practised, i.e. using your dietary educators certificate after the first year of study?

I have never seen clients in practice apart from NLP clients occasionally. I do plan on seeing some private clients. I’m undecided as to what to do with my athletics – I had hoped to make the Olympics but I reinjured my hamstring at the trials. This is the first small injury I’ve had since 2013 and I’ve made good progress, so I’m undecided as to whether to continue or start practising as a Nutritional Therapist. Part of me wants to start something new now and this seems like a good time to do it.

Did doing this course make you re-think your career plan?

Yes! When I first started I thought I wanted to do sports nutrition solely but actually that has changed. I want to work with athletes but not at that high end where they’re looking for 1% gains. The most fundamental thing that’s getting missed with everyone including top end athletes are the basics – they’re all training with eczema, hayfever, stomach upsets, depression etc. There’s no-one dealing with these issues and so they never get the full benefit of training and never recover 100% from anything. This now interests me most. I thought I was coming at this course from a performance angle but that has changed now. I also want to show people how delicious real food is as I love cooking so much.

What do you think made the most difference to your fitness as an athlete, nutrition or lifestyle-wise?

The NLP part of the course was massive for me – I was so mean to myself before! When we first started it I thought failure was what I did best – I was also mean to my body and thought it was my body’s fault that I wasn’t achieving what I wanted to be.

There was a point when I realised that my body was doing everything it could to get me through and all I was doing was punishing it. My belief change was “my body lets me down” to “I love my body for everything it does for me every day.”

Also Leo Pruimboom’s PNI module was hugely important to the changes I made. I massively increased my fruit and veg intake – I had always eaten well but I wasn’t eating anything like enough veg. In the 3 years my veg have almost completely replaced starchy carbs – just because I prefer them. I sleep so much better than I used to. I used to wake 3-4 times a night and now if that starts happening I know how to deal with it. Then it’s mostly to do with sympathetic nervous system and so I’ll put into place lifestyle changes to stimulate the PS system. I try and have a green powder all the time too and if I run out and stop I do notice that.

Is there anything you wish you’d known before finishing your studies that you might have prepared for differently?

Don’t think you’re the only one struggling! I would have reached out and talked to people more for support – I did the whole thing as a distance learner and I retreated quite a lot, which I wish I hadn’t. There is so much support there with tutors etc, you just need to ask for it and not worry about feeling like a dunce!

Do you have any tips, hints, regrets...?

Every paper I read for my dissertation I put onto a spreadsheet of my own that I had put together. It had the name and general conclusions of the paper. I found that when it came to writing the discussion it was so much easier to look at this spreadsheet and write it from that. So my tip is that organisation like that makes a huge difference.

Also, just keep going!! The amount of work was a massive shock – I think I was quite naïve – but it’s so worth it and so interesting and you come out with such a sense of achievement so I would just say keep going when you feel like you can’t.

What sort of athletics plans do you have in the pipeline?

If I continue it would be the world champs in London next year and then finish with the commonwealth games on the gold coast in 2018. Then DEFINITELY retirement!

Last modified: Wednesday, 28 September 2016, 11:54 AM