In the 80s, 90s and early 2000s, holistic nutritionists (mainly CSNN graduates) were often dismissed or excluded from professional spaces. We were working without regulatory recognition, scientific validation, or public acceptance but we showed up anyway, we built clinics, educated communities, taught our clients to connect to their food, their bodies, and their autonomy. We didn’t have “functional medicine” or “precision health” buzzwords to lean on. We just had whole foods, client-centered consulting, and the courage to push against a system that wasn’t ready to listen.
The field of nutrition has changed dramatically, and quickly. I graduated in 2005, back when holistic nutrition was a new word and few people knew anything about “functional medicine”. Today, the wellness industry is a multibillion-dollar global machine, and everyone wants a piece of the “wellness” pie. The entire nutrition landscape has changed. We are now in a saturated market where MDs, PhDs, NDs, Pharmacists, functional medicine practitioners, and Nurses are offering nutrition guidance. They are fronting the podiums that holistic nutritionists like us built. They are using the language we fought to legitimize, delivering programs we once had to defend, and gaining access to platforms that were closed to us for decades. What used to be our unique lane is now part of a much wider traffic jam.
And we have to be honest: some of this was set in motion by our own community, including me.
When I helped bring CSNN Distance Education from correspondence to online, enrollment grew exponentially. That opened the door for many passionate people, which seemed like a good thing at the time. But in a supply and demand economy, more practitioners mean more competition and with online learning now accessible from anywhere, thousands more have entered the field.
At the same time, the number of nutrition schools has exploded and not just in Canada, but globally. I watched the rise of IHN, Nutriphoria, Alive Academy, and Pacific Rim College within just a few years. Today, even McMaster and Harvard Universities are certifying people in nutrition. The supply of practitioners in nutrition and wellness-based fields has grown dramatically and is being increasingly populated by those with advanced credentials. Meanwhile, those who helped start the food-as-medicine movement, are being affected. Not because we are not skilled but because the landscape has changed.
I welcome an interdisciplinary approach that brings together medicine, nutrition, and holistic care but I think it’s time we acknowledged the people who laid that groundwork: The Holistic Nutritionists from the 80s, 90s and early 2000s were pioneers.We paved the way for others to follow and taught the public how to listen to their bodies before anyone else was willing to say that mattered. We kept food culture and integrative care alive while the mainstream was still scoffing.
I still believe in holistic nutrition, I believe in culture, in the healing power of food, and in the art of working with real people in real kitchens. But I also believe that we need to evolve, or risk being left behind by those who once dismissed us and are now marketing our very ideas.
So, to those of us who stayed in the field, who adapted, who held our integrity while the landscape shifted; thank you, your voice still matters. And the good news is, many of us are evolving, strengthening our skills, and fighting to keep our place in this rapidly changing landscape.