I spent 16 years of my life believing that my diagnosis with IBS was going to be the story of my life. I believed it wholeheartedly because that’s what my doctor once told me. I was told stress was making me sick, I was going to have to live with this for the rest of my life, and that it didn’t really matter what I ate so I kept on eating all the foods that not only made me feel very sick but caused me to become very sick.

I lost an alarming amount of weight. I was nauseated all the time and afraid to eat food so I would often skip meals so that I could have a social life. It was very hard to imagine that at the age of 22, this was going to be the rest of my life - but I also accepted it because that’s what the doctor’s told me.

I finally had my had my wakeup call in my mid-30's. I had a young child, I was married, had a career and I was sinking. My IBS symptoms were so bad that I was missing out on my son’s life, I was afraid I was going to lose my job and I was afraid of what would happen to me if I didn’t get better. 

Hi, I'm Barb Handy and I get you because...I was you.

I went onto Google and came across what is known as SIBO ( small intestinal bacterial overgrowth) and when I showed it to my then Naturopathic Doctor - we both had this “aha” moment. See, at the time - SIBO was still a very new buzz word and I was very excited because it meant that not only did I finally understand what was going on with me but that I could actually move towards healing my gut.

I truly thought this was my shining moment. I thought this one SIBO diagnosis was going to wipe away everything that happened the 16 years prior and that I was going to get a new lease on life.

But unfortunately, this was only the start of my journey. Shortly after, I found out I also have gallstones (explained all the severe nausea!), H.Pylori, parasites…and the list just went on. I went from one doctor to another (a total of 9) not getting much better. In fact, there was a time where things got even worse than I could have imagined it after a being treated with antibiotics.

It was a rollercoaster of a ride but each doctor and practitioner that I saw peeled back a layer of the mysterious onion I am to show me what I needed to heal. I learned from some of the best and also from some of the worst - which is also what has made me the practitioner I am today so that I could learn from both the successes and mistakes in my own healing journey.

Today, I am thriving and have accomplished so much in my health after I put hours each day for years into researching how to heal from SIBO and IBS, how the gallbladder plays an important role in digestion and everything else that was to follows. I went back to school to become a Nutritionist so that I could understand how the body systems worked and how to properly address digestive dysfunctions. I learned from world-class doctors and experts in the field of IBS, SIBO, the microbiome and so much more.
I have a thriving private clinic in Ontario, Canada that I have been running since 2018. I also have created two online self-paced courses which contain the same wildly successful protocols I’ve used in practice so that you can get to your health goals, on your own schedule.