Ep 34. From Yogi to Naturopath: What Changed, What Didn’t, and What’s Next

After a few years off the mic, I’m back - with dirt under my nails, a herbal medicine apothecary by my side, and a renewed fire in my belly.

In this episode I share why I’ve renamed the podcast The Non-Diet Naturopath formerly Non-Diet Yogi), what’s changed (spoiler: a lot), and what remains the same (like my intolerance for wellness horse shit). I talk about leaving behind yoga spaces steeped in clean eating and labour extraction, the fallout I faced for standing by public health, and why naturopaths need better tools for supporting eating disorders, chronic dieting, and neurodivergence. 

We explore:

• What really happened at the ecovillage I used to call home
• The rise of culty thinking in natural health spaces
• The dangers of misinformation and why critical thinking matters now more than ever
• Why naturopaths need better tools to support clients with eating disorders and chronic dieting
• Building a different path forward, with more earth, honesty, and neuroaffirming care.

You'll also hear about my upcoming online course, Disordered Eating for Naturopaths, launching mid-2026. Sign up to the waitlist and receive a bonus when enrolments go live!

This is the start of a new chapter. Where herbs, fat affirmation, neurodivergence, and calling out crap all belong!

LINKS:

Casey's website: https://www.funkyforest.com.au
Casey's Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/funky.forest.health
Casey's Instagram: @funky.forest.health

Non-Diet Naturopath Instagram: @nondietnaturopath  https://www.instagram.com/nondietnaturopath/

Jump on the waitlist for Disordered Eating for Naturopaths

Grab your copy of my free e-book The Modern Yogi's BS-Free Guide to Wellbeing!
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/a-modern-yogis-bs-free-guide-to-wellbeing.html

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Hello and welcome to the non-diet naturopath season two. You might have noticed the name change and that's because things around here are going to look a little different. I'm Casey Conroy and thanks for joining me. I'm coming to you today from the unceded lands of the Djinnahburra and Gabby Gabby peoples and I want to pay my deepest respects to them, to elders past and present and to all First Nations peoples because without their enduring custodianship, resistance and wisdom, this work, my work, would simply not be possible. I also want to acknowledge the land itself and you might have heard a big rooster crowing outside my window just as I said that. So the animals, the rivers, the gums, the wattles, the roosters, the mosses, the wallabies, the fungi and even and maybe even especially the unruly weeds as teachers and kin. I'm not going to edit that out because I think that's kind of perfect. Anyway, these landscapes that I record from, complete with roosters and animals and plants, these are not passive backdrops, as you might be able to hear. I'd say that they're active participants in this work. So thanks, rooster. And right now, as I run a course on poisonous plant spirit communication, I'm especially reminded of this. I'm reminded nearly daily that healing isn't always gentle. And sometimes it's even a bit feral. And sometimes, but not always, but sometimes there can be some sharp edges. And that's exactly what's needed. So it's been over two and a half years, I think nearly three years since I last recorded an episode of this podcast back in 2021, 2022. during peak lockdowns and rising health misinformation and a tidal wave pretty much of wellness culture backlash and at the time I was living in an eco village, a place where I believed community and shared values could hold us through hard times and in many ways they did. There were people who supported me, who fiercely supported me and in fact it was some of those very people who encourage me to speak up in the first place during that whole COVID shitstorm to say you know gently but clearly that staying home when sick protects others that public health matters that science matters that vaccines yes I'm going there and even with healthy skepticism around boosters and valid criticism of how they were rolled out here in Australia um Vaccines are, to me at least, part of collective care. And I mean, in Australia, what was a legitimate public health effort was, I felt, delivered in a way that, you know, at times felt rushed, it felt confusing, or maybe even disrespectful, especially to people who were already marginalized or health cautious. And especially later in the rollout, as pressure to increase vaccination rates grew and you know a lot of workplaces and industries and public institutions and things like that really leaned heavily on mandates and for anyone who is here this led to a really polarized response it could definitely have been done better and as a health practitioner I I made the choices I needed to make so that I could continue to show up for my clients safely and ethically. I don't believe everyone should make the same choices I did, but I did expect a baseline of care for others. Staying home when unwell, understanding public health risks and recognising that our actions ripple beyond our own bodies. My stance at that time, and still is, pro-science. And not in a blindly obedient or dogmatic way, but rooted in evidence and compassion. And with a willingness to evolve and keep an open mind. But at the time, 2022, in the eco-village I lived in, voicing those sentiments... sparked some serious discomfort, and this contributed somewhat to me stopping the podcast, in all honesty, which is why I'm mentioning this. And beyond discomfort, that grew very quickly into disapproval, and that disapproval eventually, again quite quickly, turned hostile. There were emails, public outbursts, attempts to isolate me socially, My home was broken into and vandalised more than once. I was a single mum at the time, so that was pretty scary. And then one of the most confronting moments among many, a resident well-known for his conspiracy theories and extremist views emailed out a meme to over 250 people in the community I lived in And it was clearly crafted to discredit me. Because I'm a fat positive dietitian, he used that, he weaponized it, as if to say, if she thinks fat people can be healthy, what would she possibly know about health? It was disgusting. It was shocking. It was a stark reminder of how fatphobia and pseudoscience often walk hand in hand and how quickly community, I'm doing air quotes, can turn on those who think critically or just care differently. I've spoken about some of this before in earlier episodes of the podcast as it was unfolding in real time. And I think part of the backlash came from misplaced assumptions. Yeah. Because I'm a naturopath, I'm a holistic health practitioner, I work in natural health, some people just assumed that I'd automatically share their views, that I'd go along with the anti-science, anti-public health narrative just by virtue of being in this field. But I didn't. I majored in public health in my nutrition dietetics masters. I could not possibly go along with that anti-public health narrative and the anti-science kind of viewpoint. I just couldn't. And honestly, what made it harder at that time was noticing this really weird trend. Many of the newer residents arriving at the ecovillage at that time were deep in the QAnon rabbit hole or aligned with similarly extreme belief systems. and it felt like the place was developing a reputation like this kind of magnetism you know drawing in people who are actively seeking a community to reinforce those views that kind of mind share was concentrating. And with each month of 2022 that passed while I was trying to do this podcast among lots of other things, it just became harder. In fact, I'd say it became impossible to speak up without being seen as the threat. And it became clear that staying in that place meant sacrificing either my integrity or my safety or both. And so I left. I left. And I was really grateful to those who stood beside me. And at the same time, quietly, like, floored, stunned by the intensity of the backlash. It was sobering to witness how far some people will go when caught in rigid belief systems and fear-driven narratives. The vitriol, the personal attacks, how the gentle hand of community care became, for me, a clenched fist, it felt like. And at the hands of just a few people, mind you. Most people were incredible, respectful, regardless of what their viewpoint was. It was just a few people. And at that time, you know, voicing anything outside the dominant anti-government, anti-vaccine narrative was quickly shut down, at least in the microcosm that was this eco-village where I used to live. I know that wasn't the narrative everywhere. But while I was there, I became the scapegoat for those few people who were just unwilling to hold difference, nuance or discomfort or who were just scared, I guess. And what unfolded just revealed more than I ever wanted to know. But it also clarified a lot. I left that eco-village clearer than ever on what kind of practitioner and person I want to be. So that's one thing. That's one part of why I've been away. Another thing that changed in 2023, so the year after the COVID shitstorm, I finally graduated from my naturopathy degree. That was something I had been chipping away at part-time for nearly a decade through two babies, a marriage, divorce, new relationship, lots of commuting to Brisbane from the sunny coast hinterlands where I live and a couple of house moves and the usual stuff of life. After graduating, I gave teaching a shot, lecturing in nutrition and doing clinics of vision for about six months. It was valuable, but ultimately it was not my path at the time. Also, there was even more commuting. It was like four hours a day and I really don't love commuting. Anyway, I also had a few other jobs in the mix in the time since I've been away, but no matter what I tried, I kept coming back to this, working for myself and doing creative, meaningful work like this podcast, which I absolutely love and I'm so happy to be back. So what now? Now I'm living on a small, slowly blossoming hobby farm, the kind of place where I run my home-based clinic and apothecary. I grow food and medicine. I make herbal tinctures. I chase chickens off the front porch and I hang out with the land. And most days, most days I'd say there's dirt under my nails. There's herbs hanging to dry in the kitchen that I don't get around to. There's a million tinctures waiting to be decanted and there's birdsong and frog calls coming from the dam down the hill after rain. I feel incredibly lucky. You know, the plants, the land, good friends, my kids, they're all teaching me every day what it means to listen more closely and to feel connected to the earth and to grow with purpose. My nervous system is much more regulated than it was when I stopped the podcast back in, I think, late 2022. Thank fuck. So I'm really grateful. I'm grateful for friends and therapy and the tools that I did have to get me through a tough time. So that's in a nutshell where I've been in the past few years of silence and now to come back to the present. Why the non-diet yogi no longer fits? Why have I changed the name? Well, the non-diet yogi was the right voice for a past version of me. It gave me this platform to speak my truth about yoga and wellness spaces and to speak into these spaces that were and definitely still are tangled up in, you know, clean eating culture. And now it's more primal eating culture Idealized bodies, that hasn't changed. Conspiracy theories, that hasn't changed. And a kind of spiritual bypassing that asks you to transcend your needs instead of like just meet them. The Non-Diet Yogi podcast, it let me call out all the ways that these spaces extract labor from underpaid, overextended teachers, usually women, all while preaching abundance and alignment. And it definitely served its purpose. I think there's 33 episodes. I think this is the 34th. Should have checked that. I think it served its purpose. I still stand with everything that I put out there. And now I'm ready for something bolder. My work has shifted, my audience has shifted a little bit and I've definitely shifted. So who is this podcast for now? This podcast is still for a lot of the same people, basically anyone who's had a gutful of wellness wankery. But specifically the naturopaths, nutritionists, herbalists, students and other practitioners. I see you rebel dietitians and cool mental health social workers. It's for those who are ready to untangle the web of diet culture, healthism, neuro-normativity and body control that still runs deep through so-called natural or holistic medicine. It's for anyone who's ever questioned a restrictive gut protocol or if you've seen clean eating or primal eating or any Any kind of eating turn into unhealthy obsession. I'd say this podcast is for you if you have watched scope boundaries blur in the name of root cause. And again, doing bunny ears. I'll talk more about that in a bit. It's for you if you've had to choose between evidence and intuition and wanted both. Because both, yes. Yes. It's for those who've felt unease watching our peers prescribing gut healing protocols without asking about relationships with food and body. It's for you if you've seen neurodivergence misread as disconnection or a crappy mindset. Or if you've caught yourself repeating wellness scripts that you no longer believe. If any of these describe you, friend, you are in the right place. So I also want to touch on why this work must be neuroaffirming, not just fat affirming. I used to think body acceptance was like the final frontier. Bodies, all shapes, sizes, colours, races, etc. But it's not. We also need to understand brains. Brains, nervous systems, sensory processing systems. The ways that people relate to food that have nothing to do with their willpower. My son is neurodivergent. He has ADHD. He's been diagnosed twice. And while I don't have a formal diagnosis, I recognize more and more of my own experience in his. And sitting through both of those diagnoses was kind of like a huge breath of relief and kind of made sense of so much of my life. But anyway, I digress. I can see how the wellness world often punishes or talks down to or just dismisses or entirely misses people who don't fit. It's calm, disciplined, zen, kind of high functioning mold. And that's why this podcast and the course that I'm building are as much about neurodivergent inclusion as they are about body liberation. I want it to be both. So I hope I can do that. Wellness culture still needs disrupting. This podcast is not going to move away from disrupting wellness culture. We are living in a time where the so-called wellness rebel has become a brand. Controversial hot takes get clicks. They get attention even when they're untethered from science, when they're not based in lived experience or real world consequences. I think rebellion has become an aesthetic. It's like it gets clicks, it sells courses, it sells retreats, it sells, you know, whatever. But underneath the edgy packaging and the so-called hot takes, which I fucking hate that. I hate the term hot takes. It's just... Anyway, I'm going to stay on track. I think underneath these so-called controversial hot takes and edgy packaging and bold claims, it's the same. It's the same control. It's the same one-size-fits-all protocols. It's just with some sexier, wilder taglines. Um... Recently, a TCM practitioner with a platform many, many degrees of magnitude larger than my own posted a rant about ADHD on social media. And he framed it as pretty much a modern invention and blamed it. disconnection, disconnection from the earth. And pretty much implied that most cases of ADHD these days, according to him, are really just spleen deficiency or lifestyle issues. He even promotes a treat. I just saw this today, this morning or the day before. He's promoting a retreat that subtly suggests that ADHD symptoms can be resolved and all without acknowledging neurodivergent realities, scope of practice or harm reduction. And he claims that most of the ADHD he sees nowadays is misdiagnosed as opposed to 40 years ago when... he saw the real adhd you know yeah so much to say about that it's just you know this is the kind of oversimplified dismissive narrative that i want to challenge and i'll do a podcast episode about that particular incident probably next um because the thing is when we don't understand neurodivergence or we don't understand trauma or we don't understand disordered eating we project We oversimplify. And maybe we offer protocols that might just do more harm than healing as health practitioners. And I don't want that for our profession. I don't want that reputation. It sucks, man. We're already trying so hard to... to rebuild our reputation from the ground up, to gain public trust. And I think the way to do that is nuance. I think that nuance is a new rebellion. And this podcast is here to help you build your discernment and to know when to say, look, this isn't my scope, to know when to say that. it's not weakness it's maturity and if you so desire if you do want it to be a scope to look into it to educate yourself so i guess here is where i'll do a little shameless plug about my course that i'm still creating um disordered eating for naturopaths that's why i'm creating this course to give practitioners like you, the tools I wish I'd had a decade ago. So it's called Disordered Eating for Naturopaths and it's launching in mid-2026. I know, typical me, I'm putting it out there before it is finished because I get excited about things. But it is in the pipelines. I am working on it. And I think... You know, we're in an era now where clients can and do ask ChatGPT or even good old Google, you know, what supplements should I take for leaky gut or what's the best herbal protocol for SIBO? And within seconds, they'll get a pretty decent list of herbs and nutrients and maybe even dosages. But that's exactly the point. Like if your entire value as a practitioner lies in protocols and supplement advice, you're probably gonna be replaced. But what can't be replaced and what this course and this podcast will hopefully help you to build is relational skill, the ability to hold space, to ask powerful questions, to navigate complexity with compassion and nuance. It'll help you build clinical insight, you know, knowing when a gut issue is really a food issue or maybe even a trauma response, a nervous system response or a neurodivergent need. And. Scope aware, discernment, understanding when to refer, when to pause, when to challenge your own assumptions. I was reading a recent survey that found 56% of Gen Z users rely on TikTok for health and wellness advice. And for one in three Gen Zers, it's their primary health resource. Like, what? TikTok. I'm old, so I am not on TikTok and I won't be because I can't fit any more social media in my brain. But I think that's mind-blowing. In Australia, nearly 42% of Gen Z and millennials, elder millennial here, nearly 42% of these folks say they trust health advice on TikTok. more than in other comparable countries. Wow. And troublingly, up to 83% of mental health content on TikTok has been flagged as misleading. But these same clients also report that what they want most from a practitioner is someone who listens, someone who gets it and sees the full picture. That is our lane. That is the gift. And Disordered Eating for Naturopaths, my course, helps you build it. this course I'm intending to teach you how to recognize disordered eating when it's wearing the mask of gut distress or cleanse rhetoric or you know healthy weight loss to stay ethically within scope and yet still do meaningful work you do not have to be a dietitian or a GP to help someone with an eating disorder or disordered eating or chronic dieting I really want naturopaths to know that and to be able to to do meaningful work in this field. I want to help people engage neurodivergent clients with real nuance and care. I want this course to help you unpack and decolonize your own beliefs about food and body and healing. And of course, we want to incorporate herbal medicine into disordered eating care thoughtfully and ethically. And also know, importantly, when not to. So if you're interested, you can join the waitlist now, you can get early bird access if you do join the waitlist and if you do join the waitlist, you'll receive a bonus when the course launches mid-2026. So the link is in the show notes or you can head to my website, funkyforest.com.au. So coming up on this podcast, even if you never buy my courses, it's fine. I want to just get some good information out there. And here's what you can expect in future episodes. What naturopaths need to understand about disordered eating and chronic dieting in order to help these clients, keeping in mind that among females aged 15 to 30 in Australia, approximately one in four, one in four exhibit signs of disordered eating and nearly 22% qualify for an eating disorder diagnosis. That is straight from the NEDC website. Those are not small numbers.

UNKNOWN: 26:33

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00: 26:33

So basically, if you see 100 naturopathy or nutrition clients per month, the odds are that 20 to 30 of them are experiencing disordered eating or chronic restriction in some form. That is huge. And given the overlap with mental health and body concerns, these clients may also seek you first. Not a psychologist, not a medical provider, not a dietician, you, their natural health practitioner. So what else can we expect in future episodes? Well, maybe stuff on how to support neurodivergent eaters without pushing them into control. And herbs, of course, my true love, herbs, herbalism. What truly holistic herbalism looks like beyond buzzwords, beyond biohacking. You know, I want to talk about looking at herbalism through a decolonial lens. Quiet magic, you know, slow herbs, nourishment, remembering that rest is medicine which is so important for us us practitioners and also just how to be bold and ethical and deeply nourishing in your clinic in your practice and most of all in your own body so a little side note did you know that studies show nutrition students and dietetics professionals are significantly more likely to engage in disordered eating behaviors it's up to 35 to 40 percent report orthorexia like behaviors and high High rates of dietary restraint. Now, I haven't done studies in naturopath students and natural health professionals, but I would guess that there would be similar findings to that. Just a hunch. So, in closing, the collective nervous system is frayed. I feel that. Maybe you feel that. Wellness culture is noisy as fuck. But the land is still speaking. The plants are still whispering. And if you're a naturopath or a herbalist or a holistic health practitioner of any kind, chances are you've heard the plants whispering. You've felt the land speaking. I believe that there's a quieter rebellion growing and that it's rooted in integrity and complexity. Nuance people, not controversial hot takes. It's rooted in real care, not just getting likes. So if you're ready to fuck off the wellness rulebook and rebuild something wilder and wiser and more inclusive and more nourishing to yourself and to your clients, welcome, you're home. So if you like what you're hearing here, please subscribe, share, give us a nice review, jump on the wait list. It all helps this information to get out there so that we can hopefully change the landscape of wellness for the better. This is the non-diet naturopath, where nuance is a sacred practice, where protocols don't replace presence, and nervines and co-regulation speak louder than diets. This is a place where plant medicine is not a detox. It's a conversation, a conversation with your body, with your history, with your personal story and with the land. And healing is messy because, well, sometimes the mess is the medicine, right? Sometimes healing can even be magical sometimes. And sometimes it's just plain hard, but healing is always, always worthwhile. Thanks for listening and I'll see you next time.