Meet our dietitians

Megan

My interest in nutrition grew organically. First – I’m from Louisiana, and food is life! I love GOOD food. I love what food does to elevate the time we spend with our family and friends. I love that certain foods remind us of memories with our favorite people. I love the way healthy food makes me feel. I love making food for myself and people I care about. But I wasn’t always confident about what I should be eating, and especially how I was supposed to make it work in my life.

I realized how little I really understood about this thing we all need to do a few times a day. I had some basics from my family, but I didn’t know how to cook – like at all. I didn’t really understand how to put a meal together. Then I kept thinking, if I don’t know this stuff, how many others are struggling with the same thing? Why aren’t we taught any of this in school (really, who needs calculus anyway)? There’s so much conflicting information out there, what should I believe?

I decided to go back to school and earn a degree in nutrition and dietetics while I continued to work in biotech sales. After that, I completed my dietetic internship through Vanderbilt University Medical Center with concentrations in disease management and health promotion. I recognized quickly that I loved being in the outpatient setting where you could work with people on an ongoing basis and see the amazing progress they made with their health through nutrition.

I went on to work for several years at the Vanderbilt Weight Loss Center as part of the surgical and medical weight loss teams. While weight loss is the obvious reason people sought our help, most didn’t have weight loss as their ultimate goal. They wanted to take less medication. They wanted to improve or eliminate their diabetes, cardiovascular disease, liver damage or joint pain. They wanted to be eligible to have a much needed hip or knee replacement or get on an organ transplant list. They wanted to be able to play with kids and grandkids, ride roller coasters, LIVE LONGER. I love being a part of these journeys and empowering people with the nutrition knowledge and skills to achieve these goals.

If you are ready to improve your health through nutrition, but aren’t sure where to start, feel stuck, or just want to make sure you are maximizing your well-being, please reach out to see how we can help.

I look forward to working with you and hope to see you soon!

Kris

I am a Nashville native Unicorn, only briefly leaving the state of Tennessee for college to become a Georgia Bulldog. I had a plan to get a business degree and eventually open my own business, just as both of my parents did. What kind of business? That was not even on my mind at that point! The direction of my life took a quick detour during my junior year of college, when my father was diagnosed with cancer. The only medical jobs that I knew of at that age were doctors and nurses. During this time, I was exposed to the world of dietetics and personally witnessed the power of nutrition in our health.

The year I graduated with my Bachelor of Business Administration, I also started course work to earn a Master of Science with an emphasis in Nutrition and Dietetics. I moved back to Nashville to be with my family as I finished my master’s program at MTSU and completed my internship at National Health Corp in Murfreesboro. I love the idea of helping others learn about nutrition and how to take charge of their health!

During my 25+ years as a Registered Dietitian, I have mainly focused on Wellness and Weight Loss. I spent my last 8 years with the Vanderbilt Weight Loss Center, where I had the pleasure of meeting Megan, developing both a great friendship and a professional relationship. I was blessed to be part of a great healthcare team and am so appreciative of being a part of so many health journeys on both Medical and Surgical sides of the clinic.

Through my experiences I have learned that education is only one part of the nutrition field that I enjoy, but even more so, focusing on the individual and HOW they can apply the information they learn directly to their lifestyle and achieve their goals. Most of the time I hear “I know what to do, I just don’t know how to do it”, which is understandable in the hectic world we live in. I see myself as a problem solver by identifying ways to help my clients to feel successful and empowered by incorporating nutrition in a realistic way for their lifestyle.

I would love to be a part of your health journey!

If you give us the privilege of working with you, you can expect:

HONESTY

I will not provide false hopes or promises. I’ll let you know what you can realistically expect even when it’s not what you had hoped to hear.

We will not provide false hopes or promises. We’ll let you know what you can realistically expect even when it’s not what you had hoped to hear.

RESPECT

We may know a lot about nutrition, but YOU are the expert on you. We will never pretend to know what is best for you, and you can be honest about what you are and are not willing to do. We will never try to force you to eat things you don’t like, and we will never try to “take away” things that are important to you.

INDIVIDUALIZATION

There is not one way of eating that works for everyone. We all have different food preferences, kitchen skills, time and money to spend on food. The plan that works for you requires all of this to be taken into consideration so we can develop a way of eating you enjoy, you can do forever, and helps you achieve your goals.

SUPPORT

WE LIVE FOR celebrating those improvements in your lab work, decreases in medications, being able to do more physically, or wearing something you haven’t been able to for a while. We're also all about problem solving when none of those things are happening and you are getting really frustrated!