Therapist Spotlight: Ayurveda practitioner, Faye Gillery at Treat Norwich
This week we’re delighted to welcome Faye Gillery as our Therapist Spotlight. Faye is an Ayurveda practitioner at Treat Norwich, who offers nutritional and wellness support to clients looking to manage their overall health. Here, Faye explains a bit more about what to expect from a session and how she can support you to live a more balanced life.
What did you do before becoming an Ayurveda practitioner and what prompted the career change?
Before I trained in Ayurveda, I was a senior specialist nurse, working in London. My path was diverted when I was suddenly taken on a debilitating journey of complex health conditions which significantly impaired the quality of my life for more than a decade. When nothing was helping, I eventually decided to discover ways to heal myself with diet and lifestyle changes. I went back to the traditional approach of food being my medicine. It took time, but my body corrected itself, it came back into balance. I am fully recovered and medication-free despite being told I would never recover or work again. I wanted to inspire and show others that the body can heal. I had a calling to share a holistic approach to wellbeing through this ancient “science of life” which deeply resonates with me and my path. Ayurveda has not only become my work but a way of life.
What Ayurvedic treatments and approaches do you offer?
I offer holistic wellbeing consultations. I identify what is happening on a deeper level in the body, beyond the signs and symptoms. According to Ayurveda, disease starts in the gut, so digestion and gut health is always addressed. I create individualised treatment plans to include supporting digestion with changes to what my clients eat, how they eat and when they eat, and look at how to live best for their unique constitution and needs, in a way that fits around modern life. Ayurvedic herbal supplements are also used to support the body.
Ayurveda largely focuses on preventing ill health by maintaining a healthy system. I share this preventative philosophy which I have applied to day-to-day living in the West. My approach is to keep it simple and go back to basics.
Working together towards their wellbeing goals, I nurture my clients whilst teaching them Ayurvedic principles on how to gain and maintain balance by ensuring digestion is strong and the body and mind are fully nourished to bring optimal functioning and calm, inside and out. Sharing insights and holistic practices to encourage people to listen to their body and understand what it needs, enables my clients to nurture their own needs with more inner calm and awareness. I incorporate modern coaching techniques including NLP and coaching methods to help mindset to help sustain positive changes to support overall wellbeing.
What are the benefits of these treatments/approaches?
I look at the whole person, not just the signs and symptoms. I go through a detailed health assessment using non-invasive Ayurvedic diagnosis methods and my specialist knowledge, no laboratory tests. By building a comprehensive picture of someone’s life, using my skills as a practitioner, I identify and treat the root causes of the health complaint. According to Ayurveda, we cannot heal unless the root cause is addressed. Ayurveda teaches my clients to understand their individual constitution better, so they know how to maintain good overall health.
How has ayurvedic helped you personally in the past?
Although I didn’t specifically follow Ayurveda during my own healing journey, since studying this ancient holistic complimentary medical system, I can clearly see the parallels between the changes I made and how and why symptoms such as pain, chronic fatigue, inflammation and digestive issues were resolved.
I realised my love of spices and teas and intuitive cooking were inspired by Ayurveda, as were many of the wellbeing rituals that formed my daily routines on my path back to health. This included tuning into what my body needed at different times of the day, and year.
To maintain balance, I continue to live with the influence of this Eastern philosophy. Understanding that our mind and body are interconnected is key to knowing ourselves and recognising how we feel both physically and emotionally.
Do you have a special interest in this area?
My special interest lies in helping individuals deal with low energy, poor sleep, and digestive issues. By creating personalised Ayurvedic diet and lifestyle plans, combined with holistic coaching approaches, I help support overall wellbeing.
What do you like most about being an Ayurveda practitioner?
It is wonderful to witness people go from suffering to feeling better. It is an absolute privilege to walk this path with them and help people to thrive in all areas of their lives. It feels so meaningful to me to support others on their path to vitality, wellness and feel a sense of balance. When we are in balance, we can have health, harmony, and happiness. This is a principle of Ayurveda - it is a philosophy of living well.
I understand health challenges first-hand, and I can relate to the often long and confusing path, which I know how to support. I do not want others to go through what I went. It is wonderful to be living with purpose and guide and nurture others in a holistic way with Ayurveda, which has been a solid foundation to support optimal health for over 5000 years. Ayurveda brings my love and fascination of health, the body and mind, and nutrition and herbs together. I have blended my role as an Ayurvedic practitioner with my extensive experience as a nurse and a coach, and my personal health journey, to support others.
I love to share my passion for natural health and inspire others to heal as nature intended, with food, living well, and aligning to our individual needs. Encouraging nurturing lifestyle and routines, living how we often forget we are meant to. I love all things natural, and I am an advocate for cooking healthy meals so sharing this within my work, makes my heart sing.
Do you have any hobbies and how do you spend your spare time?
I am an intuitive cook who loves to cook from scratch. I love to nourish friends with healthy wholesome foods so cooking and sharing recipes nourishes my soul at the same time as nourishing others. I grow my own vegetables and herbs. I love being outdoors in nature.
I enjoy sharing the wisdom of the ancient texts, through workshops. I love to travel. I have recently returned from a month-long trip in Sri Lanka living with locals, deepening my knowledge of Ayurveda, learning to cook with spices, and seeing where they are grown.
Yoga, swimming, dancing and music are my ways to relax outside of work.
To book with Faye:
