Photo credit: Unknown/Borrowed from Joseph Strickland’s website NutritionAustin.com.

When people refer to “grace”, nutrition does not usually come to mind. Keeping in line with the idea that “grace” often connotes divinity, mystery, and goodness: I do connect nutrition with grace. Our body’s ability to metabolize nutrients from real food to heal a health condition is one of the most divine and graceful things we can experience as human beings.

If you have a health ailment, maybe one you are at your wit’s end with, you might want to book a week-long vacation in Austin, Texas to visit Joseph Strickland of Better Body Clinical Nutrition. A week will give you potentially the opportunity to see Joseph for an initial analysis and follow-up visit, and also pack in everything else Austin Texas has to offer. (To be addressed in a future post!)

Please note: Joseph does not refer to himself as a wizard! That’s just my label for what appears to be his magic and impressive professional intuition.

Joseph is a credentialed Applied Clinical Nutritionist. He uses a process called Nutrition Response Testing to assess how well body systems are functioning, identify potential disturbances, and provide suggested dietary changes and nutritional food-based supplements so that the body can heal itself. I visited Joe for at least three years while I lived in Austin (beginning 2010) and was regularly surprised and happy at the results.

(I won’t give you my  laundry list of health problems and Joseph’s recommendations over the years, but I recommend reading my one example below.)

Nutrition Response Testing uses kinesiology to measure the body’s (arm) strength and weakness in response to particular substances. Kinesiology, in combination with the practitioner’s insight and experience, helps detect issues as well as provides the appropriate nutritional response.

You have to believe in quantum physics in order to believe in kinesiology.  Kinesiology can come across to some folks as “woo-woo”, fantastical, maybe Harry Potter-esque. From experience with Joseph, I’m not just a believer, but a full-fledged nutrition/kinesiology devotee now. Give me woo-woo!

I moved back to Vermont in 2013, thus ending my regular visits to Joseph, but I did keep in touch as a client. For the record, he has reasonable pricing and different types of packages you can sign up with. Let him know I referred you, and we both benefit.

The real test came in 2018, five full years after I moved away from Austin. I would always visit Joe in person anytime I was visiting my old digs. From the summer of 2017 through the winter of 2018, I had what was an undiagnosed case of parasites. (I suspected as such.)  I almost went on disability leave because my health was that bad. The gastroenterology unit at my local hospital, which is reportedly a top-notch hospital, gave me the diagnosis of Irritable Bowel Syndrome and prescribed a lifetime of Imodium AD and “Fodmaps” diet. No poop-test, no explanation of the “syndrome”.

When my debilitating issue did not improve, I made a last-minute appointment with Joseph during a short visit to Austin in March 2018. He saved my body and, in some ways, saved my life. He identified the presence of parasites (all through kinesiology) and prescribed a $30 herbal formula that eliminated them from my body. To this day I’m beyond grateful.

He also was able to tell me that my brain was not getting enough oxygen. (A month after my visit, due to the long-term self-deprivation of food, I developed full-blown anemia. The anemia was already in progress when I saw Joseph.) Lack of food/nutrition = lack of red blood cell production = lack of oxygen = anemia, and Joe detected this brewing in me without naming anemia. Unfortunately, I had almost starved myself for 8 months because eating was painful.

The microbiome, the “gut”, is a complicated ecosystem that lives in the middle of our body and is comprised of trillions of cells. Mine was completely hijacked for more than eight months by an invasive species. Two years later, here in 2019, I am still in the process of healing, but the initial parasites are gone. Thanks to Joseph.

There’s a way to work with Joseph by phone as a client, but the initial visit or two must be in person. He’s absolutely genius at understanding how to follow body responses (arm strength/ kinesiology) in relation to foods and supplements.

The practice of Nutrition Response Testing can be found in many locations/cities, but like any client/practitioner process, the quality will also depend on the insight and talent of the administering professional. Nutrition Response Testing involves a lengthy initial visit, where the clinician takes many measurements and tests on your body (nothing invasive). The follow-up visits are then more routine and shorter.

Two years later, the middle part of my body is still healing from the leftover damage from the parasites of 2017. I visited Austin recently, and Joseph set me on the proper path once again. I am again improved thanks to him. I will continue to consult with him for the rest of my life, no matter where I live.

When conventional medicine fails or frustrates you, or even if you just want a second opinion, I recommend a week-or-more vacation in Austin and two visits to Joseph. Give yourself enough time to initially consult with him, and then take his recommended diet and food-based supplements. Fine-tuning through follow-up visits is a part of the process.

Although—there are so many delicious dishes in Austin, you may have to follow his dietary recommendations beginning when you return home. =)

Please keep in mind that true healing takes its own God-given, graceful time. However, you might just experience a relatively rapid turnaround. Also—sudden dietary changes in vast proportion are not only mentally and emotionally hard, but they can also create strong and seemingly negative physical reactions in the body. Healing through nutrition is most easily done in small steps, in my experience.

Joseph continually studies and reads in very progressive areas of nutrition. He’s one of those people, like myself, who loves to continually learn and be amazed. He did not get one or two degrees and stop learning—and—he now hosts monthly events educating the public on nutrition.

I hope you get to experience how this wizard of a practitioner can assist your body’s own divine ability, your inner grace, to heal through food-based nutrition.

Please post or email any experiences with Nutrition Response Testing, no matter where you received it! I love to hear from fellow nutrition/kinesiology “woo-woo” devotees. =)