Today we’d like to introduce you to Christina Santini.
Hi Christina, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
After finishing my degree in Human Nutrition in Europe, I worked for a private hospital here in Denmark a couple of years with eating disorders and co-occurring addictions. That experience really turned me on to understanding the link between (mal)nutrition and how it can affect our behaviors, cravings, mood and just overall brain chemistry. I started reading more and more books on brain chemistry, addictions and nutrition (what little there was back then) and couldn’t help stumble upon the work of Dr. Carl Pfeiffer along with Dr. Eric Braverman.
Shortly thereafter, I left with a one-way ticket to New York to work for one of the pioneers in brain health: Dr. Eric Braverman. This gave me a deeper understanding of what it means to work cross-disciplinary in health care. We had a team consisting of psychiatrists, chiropractors, sleep specialists, medical doctors, nutritionists and so forth. Still to this day – over a decade later – I find the missing link in health care is working cross-disciplinary together for the sake of the client. We can’t work holistic or understand the root cause of disease as long as we don’t value each other’s professional backgrounds or understand the need to work together to collect the pieces of the puzzle which our health essentially is: a giant puzzle that needs to be assembled the right way to show up beautiful and whole.
After a couple of years in New York, I left for California, which has always been a love of mine: the free-spirited energy and living your best life in embellished flip flops, a tan and that anything-is-possible mindset. This very American mindset that each American kid is born and raised with more or less unconsciously also played into me starting up my own business. Somehow it is not as scary to fail in The States as in Scandinavia, where failure can be very stigmatizing and paralyzing. Almost making it mentally impossible for people to dare go against the grain of kids, dog, car and a 9-5 job. And while that can be a very nice life indeed, I think many people feel boxed into a set lifestyle from the get-go and into eternity. And gosh almighty – making a promise into eternity when you’re only 21 on how and what you want work and life to be like is quite a long time and can sound pretty suffocating. Making that type of commitment when you marry is enough already.
Today I have my own clinic, The Nutrition Clinic, in Copenhagen along with an office in LA – I peddle back and forth due to family ties. At my clinic, I work as a nutritionist in my day-to-day job and have been used as a keynote speaker along with featured in magazines like ELLE and VOGUE which is always fun.
Right now I am, however, also at a place where I am in the midst of changing my main day job into another model. I am good at what I do today, so it is risky to change that model, but I fear rigidity more than I fear failure at trying something new. But until that chapter launches, I’m keeping it under the wraps.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Working solely for myself and actually earning enough money to live off it took many years. Iøve always lived according to my own ideas. However, while I think constructive criticism is very important, especially when you are working on your own ideas and you should be getting some feedback from the outside, we also need to have a belief in our own skills. If we are surrounded by naysayers, it is better not to ask their opinion but just learn by doing in my opinion. You don’t want other people’s limitations to tarnish yours. I think too many who want to quit their 9-5 job give up when the money is not there. Rather than quitting your 9-5, I think it is a better strategy to start your own dream business up while you still have a paycheck, so you don’t freak out and have to live in your parent’s basement all of a sudden. In the beginning, I would get up 2 hours earlier every morning before my “real job” just to work on my own project. Nothing super drastic but I did it consistently. And consistency is key. There was a lot of learning to be done before I could monetize on my skills, and I think most people get demotivated when the money is not there. That’s why it is essential to work on something you believe in and are passionate about, so it’s not all about the money.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
At the clinic, I work cross-disciplinary with my international team consisting of American doctors and biochemists to design customized health programs.
I’ve specialized in environmental toxins and how they are linked to a myriad of the so-called chronic health issues many of us seem to accept as normal today: chronic fatigue, migraines, infertility, skin disorders, digestive disorders, sensitivities, etc. I’ve been one of the first practitioners to treat mold and environmental toxicity based on clinical lab testing in Europe.
I find it incredible fascinating to discover how many of the same toxic compounds and nutritional deficiencies can activate very different genetic dispositions. This means that many different symptoms can be traced back to ultimately the same triggers! If we test for it, we can take active steps to prevent genetic disposition from becoming genetic determination.
At The Nutrition Clinic we do: Personalized Nutrition + Advanced Biochemistry Testing (incl. mycotoxins + chemicals/ pesticides + toxins) + Medical Thermography + Plant Medicine
And we specialize in: Cancer + Autoimmune Diseases + Weight + Metabolism + Diabetes + Heart Health + Addictions + Eating Disorders, Men’s Health + Women’s Hormones + Fertility + Pregnancy Nutrition + Heavy Metal Detox + Mold/ Chemical Toxicity + Stress + Chronic Fatigue + Digestion Disorders + IBS + Mental Health + ADHD
What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
I adore the laidback vibe of the beaches in South bay and that we have so many fingerlicking places to eat both fresh, healthy and decadently delicious. On the flip side, there is a growing issue with homelessness and mental health being left on the streets – there needs to be found a solution for this if we all want to thrive together in the long run.
Pricing:
- Top-to-toe health check packages start at $1500
Contact Info:
- Website: http://www.christinasantini.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/forkmedicine
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/christina.santini
- Other: https://clarity.fm/christinasantini
