About Nutrition Street Online

 

For nearly 20 years, we’ve been helping people learn to make conscious food and nutrition choices for good health.

Our mission is to reach as many people as possible to help them learn the important, inseparable role these choices play in holistic health and wellness.

We aim to encourage people to add wholesome and nutrient-rich foods and supplements to their diets while teaching them how to make better food choices – not just in the short term, but for life.

We believe by raising awareness around food and nutrition, people can connect quality of health with success and happiness. With that connection made, we can stay well, feel great and become supportive and proactive in making our world a more positive, loving and peaceful place.

 

Jennifer’s Story

I grew up in the 1970s eating fresh vegetables from our backyard gardens. My dad made our yogurt, and we ate it with fresh blueberries and granola. Visits to the health food store for Scottish oats, real maple syrup and vitamins were frequent. My mom baked fresh bread, and we had pancakes made from scratch on Sunday mornings, my personal favorite.

This foundation for real food – healthy food – was built during my childhood and has stayed strong ever since, thankfully! It helped me through the many challenges our bodies (and spirits) go through in adolescence and our early years as adults.

As a teen, I struggled with emotional eating. Eventually, I developed a taste for alcohol. By the time I was in college I was already showing signs of alcoholic tendencies. Also, to “regulate my period”, I was put on birth control pills early in my teens. (I put this in quotes, not because it was a cover up for the real purpose of birth control pills, but because doctors sometimes put girls and young women on the pill when there are issues like excessive pain, heavy flow or acne to treat the symptoms instead of figuring out the actual cause – which I believe can be diet related or stress related – as I’m convinced it was in my case). My feelings were that alcohol mixed with these daily “hormone manipulators” was a toxic cocktail for my young developing body – especially my digestive system.

Thankfully, I became hooked on exercise and had a strong will to be healthy. This allowed for an outlet for some of the toxins, but it wasn’t enough. I battled with myself all through my twenties. I wanted to be a healthy happy person, and I was able to maintain a surface image of health.  But underneath, I was hurting. I was depressed, exhausted, foggy-brained, achy and often bloated. I had low self-esteem, difficulty focusing and trouble digesting food.

Finally, in my early thirties I gave up alcohol. I also decided to go off the pill. The detoxification process that went along with giving these two things up – especially at the same time – was frightening and fascinating! I couldn’t believe what was happening to my body. When my skin began to break out excessively from the release of toxins, I went to a conventional dermatologist for cream. It didn’t seem to help much, so I researched a bit. That research brought me to the office of a special doctor, a pioneer and national leader in developing the field of Integrative Medicine, which combines the best evidence-based therapeutic approaches from conventional and complementary medicine.

Learning about this doctor’s East/West approach to health and healing opened my eyes to a new way of caring for myself. Now I was able to heal. It took several months to clean out my system and get it functioning normally again. It had been damaged for so many years, and I had to use medicine at first to help kick-start the detoxification process. A very strict diet was necessary for the first few months to re-balance the flora & fauna in my gut – basically I had to deal with the massive yeast overgrowth in my small intestine. It was not fun, but I was eager to get to the other side of this process. After a few months I felt noticeably better, my energy level increased, and I was more productive at work. Now the challenge was to maintain this new found state of health and well-being. I was determined. It wasn’t easy, but I learned more and more about how best to support my immune system and keep my digestive system running well.

This required finding out which foods worked best for me. What foods gave me energy and were easy to digest and what foods brought me down. I sorted through and tried all different diets until I finally found what worked for me. There’s no name for it since it’s unique to me, but it’s built on a foundation of organic, local farm-based, seasonal, fresh wholesome foods including what you would guess: green vegetables, root vegetables, fruits and berries, farm-raised poultry/meats, wild salmon, some grains, nuts and seeds and lots and lots of pure spring water.

I became hooked. I loved to cook and create new recipes. As I gained more energy, I found I was able to really dive into this world of alternative healing and holistic health.

After completing three-years of course work at a special school for healing arts, I went on to complete another two-year course on Integrative Nutrition. I then started my career as a holistic health coach. I’ve never felt so at home.