Meet

Jennifer

MS, Clinical Nutrition

CNS Candidate • CYT-500

From Discipline to Discovery

I’m a clinical nutrition professional who works privately with women in midlife to help them feel strong, steady, and at home in their bodies again.

Jennifer Mest | Studio is where I provide individualized, physiology-informed nutrition care for women navigating perimenopause, menopause, and the years that follow.

My work blends clinical nutrition, strength-focused training, and mindset-based habit change to support women through perimenopause, menopause, and the years that follow.

I take a science-driven yet practical approach, helping the women I work with reduce cravings, improve energy, stabilize mood, and rebuild trust in their bodies.

Without restriction.
Without shame.

I entered my forties realizing I was walking into midlife without the foundation I needed.

My energy was unpredictable.
My cravings were strong.
My sleep was inconsistent.
My stress tolerance was shrinking.

And my body was responding exactly how you’d expect when alcohol and comfort food were my stress-management plan — soft, weak, carrying more weight than felt right for me, and nowhere near as strong or capable as I knew I could be.

I’d spent years riding the ups and downs of dieting and “starting over,” but midlife exposed every crack in the foundation.

Where I Started

The Spiral

The way I was coping was pulling me further away from the woman I wanted to be.

I was exhausted, inflamed, overwhelmed, and relying on patterns that gave temporary relief but made everything worse.

Beneath it all, I was still carrying the lingering pain, fatigue, and fog that remained years after Lyme disease.

Layer that on top of hormonal shifts and stress, and I no longer recognized myself.

I was spiraling, and something had to change.

The Quiet Turning Point

What finally shifted wasn’t a dramatic moment. It was a quiet decision:


I just wanted to feel better.

Not perfect.
Not smaller.
Not disciplined.
Just better.

I didn’t realize it then, but my body wasn’t failing me — it was responding to stress, hormones, exhaustion, and the way I had been coping for years.

For so long, I treated it like a discipline problem —

when my body and mind were asking for help.

I felt ashamed of my habits, my body, and how hard I was struggling to hold everything together. The harder I pushed — with restriction, willpower, and self-criticism — the worse everything became.

The Shift

So I made a different choice.

Instead of trying to fix myself, I focused on feeling better.

I journaled every day without judgment.
I meditated for ten minutes each morning to create space instead of spiraling.
I stopped attaching my worth to outcomes.
I started paying attention to how I wanted to feel: more energy, better sleep, a clearer mind, more confidence, and stronger in my own body.

Over time, these choices didn’t just become habits — they became part of my identity.

I protected my needs and my energy even when those choices didn’t make sense to other people.

Rebuilding from the Inside Out

Slowly, the habits that once felt impossible began to change.
Not through pressure or punishment, but through consistency and compassion.

I changed my relationship with alcohol — not by fighting it every day, but by becoming someone who simply no longer drinks. It stopped being a constant internal battle and became part of who I am.

I rebuilt my strength by training consistently, even when I didn’t feel strong yet.

I stopped depriving myself of foods I enjoyed and learned how to enjoy them in ways that didn’t derail my goals.

And over time, my cravings stabilized, my weight shifted, and my body responded in ways that felt aligned instead of chaotic.

My energy returned.
My clarity returned.
And strength didn’t return — it arrived.

I built it piece by piece without forcing it, and becoming fit, toned, and strong happened naturally as I kept choosing what made me feel better.

I didn’t just get myself back — I felt like an upgraded version of who I used to be.

Where I Landed

Today, the things that once ruled my life — the cravings, the cycles of guilt, the weight gain, the drinking, the exhaustion — no longer define me.

They’re no longer daily battles I fight.
They’re habits I transformed.

I share this not because it’s easy, but because so many women carry these struggles silently — the weight changes, the hormonal shifts, the cravings, the coping mechanisms, the shame, the feeling of losing control, the quiet question:

“What is happening to me?”

You’re not weak.
You’re not alone.
You’re not broken.

This understanding is the foundation of the individualized clinical work I now do with women navigating midlife change.

There was another layer to this transition that wasn’t as visible, but was just as destabilizing.

Perimenopause didn’t just change my body — it changed how I experienced stress, emotion, and meaning.

I noticed sharp shifts in mood tied to my cycle. Periods of anxiety and emotional intensity that felt disproportionate to circumstances. A narrowing of stress tolerance. A sense of internal friction that made things I once handled easily feel suddenly overwhelming.

Alongside that came quieter, harder questions — about purpose, identity, family roles, and who I was becoming in this phase of life.

None of this showed up neatly on a lab panel. And none of it was fixed by trying harder.

What I came to understand is that these experiences weren’t signs of personal instability. They were expressions of a nervous system and hormonal environment under sustained strain.

That understanding deeply shapes how I work now.

This is why my work attends not only to metabolism and appetite, but also to stress load, recovery, and the psychological weight women carry during midlife change.

The Part We Don't Talk About Enough

I earned my Master of Science in Clinical Nutrition so I could understand—and apply—the same science-backed strategies that helped me heal, rebuild, and thrive.

My work is informed by graduate-level clinical nutrition training, strength-based movement education, and ongoing advanced study in clinical nutrition science.

My work is centered on individualized, long-term clinical nutrition care, delivered through a formal practitioner–client relationship.

My work now is to help women find their way back to themselves — through evidence-based nutrition, strength training, mindful habit change, and lifestyle practices that support midlife metabolism, hormone health, and long-term wellbeing.

You don’t need perfection.
You don’t need punishment.
And you don’t need to do it alone.

You just need a path that helps you feel better — one steady step at a time.

Why I Do This Work

You deserve to feel strong, steady, and at home in your body again.

And you don’t have to do it alone.

Learn About Working Together

Individualized clincial nutriton care is available by application.

Interested in individualized support?
Private nutrition therapy is available by application.