MICHELLE GERENCSER, MS
Michelle Gerencser is a highly skilled cancer nutrition consultant with particular expertise in blood cancer nutrition and nutritional immunology. She has enjoyed working in the field of complementary cancer nutrition since 2002, consulting hundreds of adult and pediatric clients all over the country and internationally.
Michelle has worked closely with integrative and conventional doctors, including those at major cancer centers, to provide the most safe, comprehensive, personalized nutrition support to individuals undergoing standard treatment and clinical trials. Especially appreciated by clients and health professionals alike is her proficiency in assessing clinically relevant drug-supplement interactions.
Michelle received her Master of Science in holistic nutrition from Clayton College of Natural Health. With educational underpinnings in biochemical engineering, she is intensely analytical and brings a unique point of view to clinical nutrition. Michelle has done extensive secondary research and development of nutritional approaches for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, complementing cancer treatments including stem cell transplant, and epigenetics of myelodysplastic syndrome and large granular lymphocytic leukemia.
Michelle’s technical prowess comes across softly through her compassionate and optimistic outlook. She regards each case as a complex system of variables and is adept at gently orienting each client to his or her particular system. Relating individual characteristics to voluminous cancer nutrition research and delicious foods, she empowers cancer patients to nutritionally leverage body environment against cancer process. Along with seeing the chemicals, genes and systems at play, Michelle values the privilege of witnessing the courage, wisdom, and tenderness in the eyes and voices of those who call on her.
In her own words…
"I like to really get to know a person. I take them into my heart on a social and emotional level, and I also think of them on a biochemical level and a genetic level; I think about the conversation going on in their immune system, and I try to infuse all of that into our work together. Holistic nutrition really comes alive when you can overlay onto it the dynamics of cytokine interactions, genetic expression, and mechanisms of the disease process. Teaching people how to see their own body environment interplaying with the cancer process and the effects of treatment sets them up to take precise and powerful action with nutrition."
My Philosophy
Waging peace during the war on cancer
Just because there is a war on cancer doesn’t mean you have to wage it in yourself. Whether you are undergoing treatment or watching and waiting, there is no one more hungry for compassion than your body, and there is no more meaningful person to offer it than you. You can set your intention on waging peace in your body, and you can wage peace with nutrition in a few ways.
The Oncometabolic Milieu is the body environment that interacts with cancer. Cancer is a process rather than an object, and cancer uses resources in the body to further itself. Gene expression, metabolic processes, hormones, messenger chemicals, cell-to-cell communication, redox balance, cell cycle regulation, and angiogenesis are all normally occurring resources in the body that can be nutritionally influenced to dissuade the cancer process. Layering influence in all of these areas, it is possible to modify the Oncometabolic environment to be less hospitable to cancer growth and in this way practice waging peace toward your body.
Another way to practice is during treatment. When chemotherapy is being used to eradicate cancer cells, it can inadvertently damage healthy cells from the blood, intestinal tract, and other tissues. It is possible to turn your attention to these constantly recovering tissues and send help, send a thoughtful care package of nourishment that says, “I see you are struggling. I know this is hard on you. You don’t have to do this alone.”
Further, it is a gesture of gratitude toward the healthy cells on the front lines to make every effort of encouragement for treatment to work well. Carefully selected foods, nutrients, and herbs can reduce treatment side effects, making it easier to stay on schedule and complete the whole course, while increasing treatment efficacy.
Peace is not just the dormant space between battles. It is an action. It takes strong effort. With nutrition as leverage, peace is possible. Even now.
On Your Side
Jeanne M Wallace, PhD, CNC
Cancer Nutrition Researcher/WriterShe is an independent consultant to oncologists and other health care providers, lectures widely at cancer conferences, and provides educational training to integrative cancer centers.
Dr. Wallace's unique focus is on empowering individuals to harness the power of simple diet and lifestyle changes to modulate the Oncometabolic Milieu, a cluster of nutritional and metabolic factors that translational research has shown can influence the growth and progression of cancer.
A locavore who loves to cook healthy gourmet meals, she has a thriving edible landscape, replete with organic vegetables, medicinal and culinary herbs, edible flowers, and an orchard of rare and heirloom fruits (over 60 cultivars).