Kathy Bero
Kathy Bero’s remarkable recovery from stage IV inflammatory breast cancer and a high-grade tumor in her head and neck took her advocacy work into a whole new arena. She is an award-winning author, certified integrative health and cancer coach, keynote speaker, Reiki master teacher, Jikiden Reiki practitioner, and an accredited handler of a pet therapy team with her boy Leo, working to change the way we look at chronic disease.
Kathy’s award-winning book E.A.T.: An Unconventional Decade in the Life of a Cancer Patient with foreword written by Larry Mullen, Jr. founder of U2 is an inspirational memoir drawn from the 18 journals she kept during her battle with two rare and aggressive cancers. Despite taking advantage of everything her hospital had offered, Bero’s body was failing, leaving her no choice but to evolve into a powerful self-advocate, transforming her mind, body and spirit.
Despite taking advantage of everything her hospital had offered, Kathy’s body was failing under the weight of it all. What ultimately turned the tide for her wasn’t a new drug, clinical trial or a slew of supplements. It was learning to listen to her innate healer - that internal voice we all have and generally ignore. Tuned in, she found mindfulness, meditation, and Reiki, learned to embrace food as medicine, and now more than two decades later she remains cancer-free with a daily practice of mindfulness, meditation, Reiki, food as medicine, and other healing modalities.
Her remarkable recovery caught the attention of Harvard University’s NEER study, examining individuals who had unexpected success battling cancer. Kathy works with clients across the globe and her approach to healing just for today inspires individuals worldwide living with chronic illnesses ranging from cancer and MS to heart disease and autoimmune disease. Now, more than 20 years later, she remains cancer free.
Kathy has designed her coaching method Heal Just For Today, using evidence-based practices and strategies that become a personalized approach to integrative health care for anyone, demonstrating that healing is simple, attainable and sustainable when taken one day at a time. Since 2007, Kathy has guided 1000s of clients spanning the globe from Southeast Asia to South Africa and Europe to North America on their path to healing from chronic diseases ranging from cancer, chronic stress and MS to heart and autoimmune disease. Her method works because every practice is simple, free or low cost, and designed to adapt to any lifestyle. Today, more than 20 years later, Kathy remains cancer free, using the same tools she teaches.
In 2009, Kathy founded NuGenesis, Inc., a nonprofit modeled after her own home practices on her family’s 60-acre farm shared with horses, cows, chickens, turkeys, Guinea hens, dogs, and native fauna and medicinal flora. As subsistence farmers, Kathy and her family grew about 70% of their food. NuGenesis was founded with the support of her hospital and university systems, and with the help of 900 volunteers, three full-time staff, and eight contracted dietitians and educators, taught more than 10,000 people of all ages how to use food as medicine.
It is Kathy’s steadfast belief that true health care reform starts with clean, high-quality food, simple stress management tools and energy-healing modalities that deepen your spiritual connection to not only improve the quality of your life but prevent disease and improve disease outcomes.
Bero’s professional work has ranged widely to include leadership roles in environmental advocacy, facilitation, and consultation along with women’s leadership development in the U.S and abroad through programs sponsored by USAID, UNEP, and the Kellogg Foundation. She served on the Advisory Board for the Angiogenesis Foundation, executive-produced film projects, including the two-time Emmy award-winning documentary Worth Fighting For: People Protecting the Great Lakes narrated by James Taylor, and has been recognized nationally for her significant contributions in environmental education, including the national award-winning campaign It’s All Connected and Great Lakes In My World curriculum.
Her forthcoming book Heal Just For Today:A Simple Daily Path to Beat Chronic Disease through Food, Calm, and Connection is the practical companion to her memoir, teaching how an integrative approach done mostly at home can succeed without breaking the bank.
The intentionally tilted bowl represents life’s imbalances, the three aligned pieces show the journey back to stability, and the central dot reminds you of your inner core. Because sometimes, finding balance requires a little lean in a different direction.
“Healing doesn't have to be hard or expensive. We all have everything we need inside us — most of us just don't know how to tap into it yet."
— KATHY BERO
Kathy works internationally with clients challenged with chronic illness, including autoimmune, cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular, respiratory, and overwhelming stress, meeting them wherever they are on their path. Her approach is always personalized, always grounded in evidence-based science, and always focused on what's sustainable — because real healing is unique to each of us and happens one day at a time.
Award-Winning Author & Key Note Speaker
Kathy motivates and inspires global audiences to bridge the gap between conventional medicine and a holistic lifestyle. Drawing from her personal triumph over two aggressive cancers and the success of her thousands of clients, Kathy offers transformative insights on food as medicine, stress management, deepening your spiritual connection, becoming a powerful self-advocate, and embracing the art of parenting through chronic disease.
Her presence on stage is more than a presentation. Bero has been described as engaging, genuinely optimistic, passionate, vulnerable, compelling, humorous, candid, and memorable with insights and a perspective rarely heard but desperately needed. Her message provides critical benefits equally to patients, health care providers and those hoping to avoid a chronic disease diagnosis. She embraces a participatory style that welcomes her audience to engage as she moves through her material. It’s impossible to leave one of her presentations without feeling motivated to embrace a new outlook on healing.
Integrative Health & Cancer Coach
Navigating the sea of health information online can be overwhelming, which is why Kathy provides a structured, evidence-based framework to turn knowledge into action. Her Heal Just For Today personalized approach to integrative health care demonstrates that healing is simple, attainable and sustainable when you take it one action at a time. She teaches three tenets to healing with intention, starting with clarity on how to use food as medicine and where supplements fit in or don’t. Then, proven stress management techniques that simply release chronic stress and manage daily stressors with grace. Finally, her clients learn to harness their innate healing abilities no matter how they practice their spiritual beliefs. It’s important to note that her clients that embrace atheism and agnosticism have also found healing using Heal Just For Today practices.
Pet Therapy Handler
Healing often requires a touch of unconditional support, which is where Leo comes in. As a certified therapy dog, Leo provides a calming, intuitive presence that complements Kathy’s work. His role is to offer comfort and emotional grounding, proving that sometimes the most effective path to relaxation involves a wagging tail and a steady, furry friend by your side.
Reiki Master Teacher
As a Western Reiki Master Teacher and Jikiden Reiki practitioner, Kathy utilizes this gentle, non-invasive way to heal, improve quality of life, and find inner peace. Reiki stands out as a practice that is both elegantly simple and deeply profound.
Reiki, pronounced “ray kee,” is generally described as an energy practice that promotes the flow of your body’s energy or life force through the physical and electrical pathways in your body. The research on how it works is growing and it has become an essential healing tool in hospitals, hospices, medical clinics, and wellness centers. Millions of people receive Reiki across the globe. Some use it to relieve pain, promote profound relaxation, strengthen the body’s natural resilience, and after several sessions reconnect to their higher self.
It is a practice Kathy credits for her remarkable lack of side effects during cancer treatment, and the complete healing she ultimately experienced. She finds this peaceful yet powerful tool to be an essential part of the long-term healing process and provides it both in person and at a distance to clients across the globe. Although, she will tell you we all have access to it on our own without a practitioner, and that’s one of the major benefits of practicing stillness each day.
Over the decades, Reiki has transitioned from a fringe practice to an increasingly accepted modlity in healthcare settings. A growing number of hospitals include Reiki as part of their integrative medicine offerings, such as Memorial Sloan-Kettering, Johns Hopkins University, Mayo Clinic, Cleveland Clinic, Dana Farber/Harvard Cancer Center, University College London Hospitals NHS, MD Anderson Cancer Center, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, along with hospitals in Spain, Germany, France, and Switzerland. In general, it is used alongside standard medical care for symptom relief, relaxation, stress reduction, pain relief, surgery recovery, palliative care, emotional support and enhanced comfort during cancer treatments. As current research into how Reiki works gain traction, Kathy believes it will be used as an effective healing tool for all kinds of chronic disease.
