lisha Timon remembers when she got sick and tired of being sick and tired. It was eight years ago, and she found herself working 12-hour days as an ICU nurse, downing an average of six Diet Cokes and three candy bars each shift, and then coming home too tired to do the things her kids wanted to do. It was exhausting. “I just got tired of it. I decided I had to make a lifestyle change,” she said.
Around the same time, the doctor Timon worked with mentioned that several of the hospital’s doctors and nurses were losing weight; could she find out more about the program they were using? Perhaps it was something his patients would be interested in learning about. It was also something Timon was interested in, and after learning more about the healthy-eating program, she called and asked if she could open her own clinic in the doctor’s office.
“I contacted them and said, ‘I need this in my life,’” she laughed. “I had to jump through some hoops, but they let me open a clinic. Guess who was the first patient?”
Timon went on to lose 20 pounds, 12 percent body fat, and four pant sizes in six weeks. But it was even more of a success for what she gained – a desire to help other people experience the life-changing approach to eating that she had learned. “It was not just about weight or the sizes of clothes I wear, but my attitude and my emotions…the way I look at life changed,” she said.
Now, eight years later, Timon owns Geaux Healthy, where she teaches clients about healthier eating habits, and coaches them through encouragement and accountability. She has developed a passion for sharing a way to wellness that doesn’t include pills. “Education is a huge part of what we do,” she said. Part of that education includes teaching her clients how losing excess weight can have a meaningful impact on reversing some chronic diseases.
Brian Bucker had weight loss as his goal when he joined Geaux Healthy in July of 2021. The 42-year-old self-described food-aholic had recently undergone treatment for a diabetic aneurysm in his left retina, a condition caused by his poor eating habits. “I knew diabetes was slowly killing me off piece by piece,” Bucker said. “I needed to make a drastic change.”
Within three months on the program, Bucker saw the numbers on the scale drop, but it was the reduction in his A1C and blood sugar levels that really made the difference. It’s a trend that Timon sees often with her clients. “Type 2 diabetes is a dietary disease,” she said. “You eat your way into it. And the cool thing is, you can eat your way out.”
For Bucker, the change has been radical.
“I am no longer addicted to food,” he said. “Now, food is just a fuel… I have lost 52 lbs. and feel greater than I have in more than a decade.”
Results like Bucker’s continue to fuel Timon’s passion for helping people learn how to eat healthy. “We all have to grow old, but we don’t necessarily have to grow old and sick,” she said. “People don’t realize that lifestyle plays such a huge part in our future health. And if we don’t start now, it’s going to be too late.”
For more information about
Geaux Healthy
visit www.geauxhealthywellness.com
or call 318.218.9950