Marisa W. Smith, MDA, RD, CDCES
Founder · Type 1 & Type 2 diabetes, PCOS, and making peace with food
Get to know Marisa
- Outside of work: traveling with her husband Matt, hiking, finding local breweries, gardening, and hanging out with her animals
- Morning drink: iced pistachio latte
- Current food obsession: anything churro
- If she were a vegetable: Brussels sprouts. A little polarizing at first, but once you’ve had them cooked right, they grow on you. Same goes for her.
- Myth she loves busting: that diet soda is worse for you than regular because of the aspartame
Marisa helps people with diabetes and PCOS stop seeing food as the enemy.
Food and body image were big topics in Marisa’s family growing up, which made her hyper-aware of what she ate and how her body looked from a young age. That experience shaped the dietitian she is today. She believes food isn’t a moral issue. There’s no “good” or “bad,” just what works for your body and your life.
Early in her career, Marisa worked at a weight loss clinic that ran a very low-calorie, highly restrictive program. Months later, clients came back embarrassed that they’d regained the weight, convinced they had failed. They hadn’t. The approach had. That turning point is why she founded Dietitian Group in 2022 on a non-diet, weight-inclusive philosophy, and why she built the THRIVE Method™ around a sustainable, judgment-free relationship with food. adklsjf
Marisa has a special place in her heart for people living with Type 1 diabetes, a condition she describes as a full-time job that mimics an organ, with no days off. She teaches the practical side (balancing blood sugar, avoiding overtreating lows, exercising without crashing) and takes the mental load and burnout just as seriously. She also works with people with PCOS, who are too often told to cut carbs and eat perfectly. Marisa wants them to know there’s another way.
In her first session, Marisa gets to know the whole person: sleep, stress, movement, family, who does the cooking, and any real-life limits on how they eat. From there, goals become “experiments,” so a week that doesn’t go to plan is information, not failure. Some of her clients have worked with her for more than five years, through many seasons of life.
“Working with me is like grabbing coffee with a friend who happens to know a lot about food, and who can’t resist a good pun when the moment calls for it.”
— Marisa
Our team serves clients in: AZ, CA, CO, CT, FL, GA, KY, MA, NY, OH, OK, OR, TN, TX, VA, VT, WA
Marisa isn’t taking on her own clients right now, but she’d love to hear your story. Book a discovery call and she’ll listen to what you’re looking for, then pair you with the right dietitian on her team.
