Miriam Wiener, MS, MPH

10/14/2026

10/11/2026

90–95% of your serotonin is produced in your gut. But your brain can’t use it directly.

So how does your gut communicate with your brain?

Meet the VAGUS NERVE.

One of the most fascinating connections in human physiology.

Your gut and brain communicate constantly, exchanging information about digestion, hunger, fullness, and your nervous system.

Although serotonin produced in your gut cannot cross the blood-brain barrier, it can activate nerve pathways that send information to your brain.

And here’s where it gets interesting.

Certain everyday activities can influence your nervous system, including pathways involving the vagus nerve.

THREE WORTH TRYING:

1. LONG, SLOW EXHALES
Breathe in for 4 seconds and out for 6. Slow breathing can improve heart rate variability, a measure associated with nervous system regulation.

2. COLD WATER ON YOUR FACE
Facial cooling can activate a natural reflex that slows your heart rate through pathways involving the vagus nerve.

3. HUMMING
Early research suggests humming may influence heart rhythm and nervous system activity, although more studies are needed.

But here’s what I find even more fascinating.

Your gut-brain connection also helps regulate appetite, digestion, and nutrient absorption.

Nutrition is about far more than calories. It’s about understanding your physiology.

That’s how I approach nutrition counseling.

With 30+ years of clinical experience, I help women improve glucose regulation, insulin resistance, and metabolic health.

I specialize in prediabetes, type 2 diabetes, and PCOS.

AND YES, I ACCEPT INSURANCE.

Aetna • Meritain Health • UnitedHealthcare • Cigna • Curative • Humana • Medicare

Many of my patients qualify for weekly nutrition counseling with $0 out-of-pocket fees.

DM me “COVERED” and I’ll personally check your insurance benefits for free.

Save and share this Reel!

Miriam Wiener, MS, MPH
Licensed Dietitian-Nutritionist

10/09/2026

Your $0 Medicare nutrition hours expire December 31. ⏳

Women with diabetes on Original Medicare: Part B covers one-on-one Medical Nutrition Therapy with me at $0 out of pocket.

✨ 3 hours in your first year

But unused annual hours don’t carry over. If you don’t use this year’s remaining hours by December 31, you lose them.

Here’s what we'll cover in our visits:

✔️ Why your morning numbers are so high, and how to lower them.
✔️ What to eat at every meal, with a plan built around your medical needs, preferences, and schedule.
✔️ What to order when you eat out, without spiking your blood sugar.
✔️ Your questions answered, visit after visit 💬

🏡 All by Telehealth, from the comfort of your own home.

I’m Miriam Wiener, MS, MPH, a licensed dietitian-nutritionist and board-certified nutrition specialist. I’ve been helping women with diabetes for more than 30 years. My patients call me the “best kept secret” in our community. 💛 I’d love to help YOU, too!

👉 DM me “COVERED” for a FREE Medicare Benefits Check.
Once your coverage is confirmed, we’ll help with the referral steps and get you scheduled before December 31.

2026 is almost over. Don’t leave your Medicare nutrition benefits behind!

10/07/2026

Taking metformin? Your doctor may not have told you this.

Over time, metformin can lower your B12. Up to 1 in 3 long-term users become B12 deficient.

Low B12 can feel like exhaustion, tingling in your hands and feet, and brain fog. Most people blame it on diabetes.

And B12 is hard to absorb to begin with. Age, stress and acid blockers all get in the way.

What to do: ask your doctor to check your B12, and ask which form of B12 is best for you.

Why is this important? I want YOU to THRIVE.

Commemorating those who died on October 7, 2023.

Send a message to learn more

10/05/2026

Your labs came back "normal." But are they optimal?

Being within the reference range doesn't always tell the whole story.

Insulin resistance. Glucose regulation. Inflammation. Iron status. Vitamin and mineral status. Thyroid function.

Important changes can show up in the numbers long before a diagnosis is made.

10 numbers I pay close attention to:

1) Fasting insulin

09/30/2026

It’s not too late.

If nutrition education was something you wanted to bring to your students this year, there is still time.

S.T.E.P.S. to Nourishment® is a complete, ready-to-teach high school nutrition curriculum created for Jewish schools — combining evidence-based nutrition science with Torah values.

Eight complete units. One full year. Ready to teach.

No curriculum to build from scratch. No searching for lessons. No piecing together nutrition information from social media.

Your school can start right after the holidays.

Last call for 2026–27 licensing.

Learn more + request licensing information here:
https://learn.stepsnutritiongroup.com/curriculum

09/25/2026

The care you’ve been searching for exists.
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I’m a licensed dietitian-nutritionist and board-certified nutrition specialist with more than 30 years of clinical experience helping women and girls with prediabetes, diabetes, insulin resistance, weight-loss resistance and PCOS.
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And I do nutrition counseling a little differently.
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I read your labs for what others might have missed — not only whether everything is “in range,” but connecting the dots and looking for patterns. I take the time required to really understand what’s going on. And I’ve been doing this for decades.
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I review CGM data when available. I listen closely to your symptoms and what you’ve already tried.
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Every new patient receives a customized meal plan and personalized supplement protocol — never a generic handout.
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Your meal plan is customized to your needs, with meals, snacks, superfood beverages and even your grocery list done for you.
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And because supplements can be incredibly confusing and overwhelming, I create a personalized protocol based on your individual needs and preferences — even if that means no supplements at all.
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And here’s something many women don’t realize: your insurance may cover this care.
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I accept Aetna, Meritain, Cigna, Curative, Humana and Medicare, and most of my patients pay $0 out of pocket for weekly nutrition counseling based on their individual benefits.
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My October calendar is filling up, and getting started is simple.
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I offer a free insurance benefits verification so you can find out what your plan covers before scheduling.
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Complete the short form (around 2 minutes) and I’ll verify your coverage in a day or so. Then we can get your first Telehealth visit scheduled.
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Ready to see if you’re covered?
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Check your benefits here:
https://learn.stepsnutritiongroup.com/covered
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Miriam Wiener, MS, MPH
Licensed Dietitian-Nutritionist
Board-Certified Nutrition Specialist
S.T.E.P.S. to Nourishment®

09/25/2026

So many women are told, “Your labs are normal.”
Meanwhile, they’re exhausted. Lightheaded. Having trouble concentrating. Their hair is shedding. Their nails are brittle.
And when I look more closely at their iron panel, I often see a very different picture.
One of the biggest problems is that “within range” does not necessarily tell us the whole story about iron status.
Serum iron sounds like it should be the number we focus on most, but by itself, it tells us surprisingly little about your overall iron stores. It measures the iron circulating in your blood at that moment. It fluctuates, and it can still be normal during the initial stages of iron depletion. It's your iron stores that can fall first while both serum iron and hemoglobin remain normal.
Then there's hemoglobin, which answers a different question. It helps us determine whether iron deficiency has progressed to anemia. But you can have depleted iron stores before you are flagged in the "red zone" of anemia. That distinction is really important.
When I'm looking at your iron status, two of the markers I pay especially close attention to are ferritin and transferrin saturation (TSAT).
A low ferritin is strong evidence of depleted iron stores. Clinical guidelines describe ferritin as the single most useful marker of iron deficiency in the absence of inflammation.
But ferritin has an important limitation. It is also an acute-phase protein.
Inflammation can push ferritin UP—even when iron availability is low. That means a ferritin that looks reassuring can sometimes be misleading when inflammation is present. We need to look at the bigger picture. The World Health Organization recommends accounting for inflammation when interpreting ferritin.
And that's one reason transferrin saturation is so useful alongside ferritin.
TSAT tells us how much of the available iron-binding capacity is actually occupied by iron. TSAT can help when a falsely normal ferritin is suspected.
Ferritin + TSAT.
They tell us different things, and I want to see the larger picture, not whether every result is inside the lab's reference ranges.
Next: Iron-rich foods, supplements, and why absorption and timing are crucial.

09/20/2026

Maybe you’ve never heard the word teshuvah—it means return.

It's usually translated as “repentance,” but the Hebrew word connects a lot better with what Judaism is all about.

Yom Kippur isn't about guilt, it's about knowing you can return.

And your health is the same.

Growing up in the 80s we were sold lies like "low fat" and dieting are healthy. Then the weight-loss medications came out in the 90s and so many teen girls and women were lost in confusion.

We were sent a message that getting healthy should feel like a punishment. Guilt, restriction, deprivation—and then, medication.

We lost our way.

It all fell apart when the studies showed the risks. But for so many women, there was still this disconnect between nourishment and our health. It was almost as if food was "bad" and there was no way out.

A lot of the diabetic and insulin resistant women I work with nowadays feel trapped. The food is more addictive than ever and they feel like they're in a jail of fear around food.

Insulin resistance is literally a "jail" around your cells and the sugar is trapped outside. Women feel as if their bodies are broken and in so many ways they are—but that's OKAY.

Here is what we now know: insulin resistance can improve dramatically, and it doesn't take long. Prediabetes can be reversed and type 2 diabetes can go into remission. Your body is made to heal, to "return."

And it doesn't have to be hard.

The pomegranate is one of the Seven Species (שבעת המינים) of the Land of Israel, together with olives and dates, wheat and barley, grapes and figs.

There are so many layers to this and we're not talking about GMO or processed foods. I call the Seven Species the "original" superfoods because they've nourished our people for thousands of years.

If they've gotten us this far, let's not forget about them now when we need them most.

This is teshuvah.

It's not a diet. It's not a punishment. And it's not even hard. It's simply a return to real nourishment.

We are currently in a pandemic of metabolic disease (diabetes, insulin resistance, PCOS). Turning it around for ourselves and our children is all about nourishing our cells and our souls the way the Torah intended. ❤️

09/11/2013

When breaking the fast, you'll want to focus on 3 things:

1) Hydration

2) Healthy Essential Fats

3) Detoxifying Fiber

I always break the fast with a Superfood Smoothie.

Smoothies are extremely filling, and when prepared properly, they can replenish your body from the inside out. Most importantly, they are very easy to digest.

You need to know that proper digestion is your secret key to a smooth, clear complexion and an energized body.

The very worst thing you can do after a fast – or anytime – is to bombard your body with an improperly combined heavy meal, or with inflammation-triggers such as white flour, sugar, and trans-fat.

Wishing you a Gmar Chasima Tova - a Sweet, Healthy New Year.