Located in the Blue Mountains, Sonya Byron Plant Medicine offers consultations at Lower Mountains Health & Healing in Blaxland (update January 2024: please note that I’m temporarily between clinic spaces and all consultations are currently online).
Sonya Byron, Naturopath & Yoga teacher
BHlthSc(Naturopathy), BA, Cert Yoga Teacher Training, MNHAA, MGYAA
I completed my Bachelor of Health Science (Naturopathy) degree at the Australasian College of Natural Therapies in Sydney, and am an accredited, practicing member of the Naturopaths and Herbalists Association of Australia (NHAA). I continue my studies today under the guidance of a great elder, a traditional herbalist from England with 35 years’ clinical experience, giving you, my clients, the best of both worlds…
At the heart of my naturopathic practice is a deeply caring, individualised and holistic approach. I love to meet new people, listen to their stories, and truly understand their needs and motivations. I believe in collaborating with my clients to create comprehensive, empowering, achievable and affordable plans to help them achieve their health and wellbeing goals.
I employ a range of modalities in my clinical practice, including herbal medicine (my great love!), nutritional medicine, and dietary and lifestyle support, and I love to combine the best of naturopathy’s traditional wisdom and practice with the latest academic research in order to ensure excellent outcomes for my clients.
I work with people of all ages, genders and life stages, and with a broad range of health symptoms, conditions, and goals. My clinical interests are ever evolving, but particularly include:
mental health care - stress, anxiety disorders, depression and burnout
digestive health and healing, especially IBS and inflammatory bowel diseases
women’s reproductive health, especially PMS, menstrual problems and endometriosis
chronic conditions, including fatigue, sleep disorders, fibromyalgia, skin conditions, and autoimmune diseases
pain management, particularly headaches and migraine, osteoarthritis and chronic pain
preventative health care, including personal nutrition planning, healthy weight management, and healthy ageing.
I’m also an accredited Yoga teacher (Gitananda Yoga Association of Australia), having completed over 1500 hours teacher training. This included a six-month residential course at the International Centre for Yoga Education and Research in Pondicherry, India. In addition to my naturopathic consultations and personal nutrition plans, I offer therapeutic Yoga consultations individually tailored to my clients’ health care goals, as well as regular therapeutic Yoga courses.
I also offer personal and planetary health and sustainability workshops and events, and medicinal and edible landscaping consultations within my beautiful Blue Mountains community!
My Naturopathic Healing Journey
I’d always been blessed with relatively good health, but a bout of dengue fever in Southeast Asia changed that. I just couldn’t seem to recover. Even six months later, I was exhausted, I couldn’t think clearly, I felt weirdly unmotivated, and I’d lost my appetite and a lot of weight. A doctor suggested an anti-depressant, but I didn’t feel that depression was really my problem, so I tried another, who suggested the same thing. I left feeling frustrated, both for myself and the doctors, who were genuinely sympathetic, but really didn’t have the time to listen to me. I tried a third doctor, who ordered tests that revealed a major problem with my thyroid gland, and was referred to a specialist, who recommended irradiation and thyroid hormone replacement for the rest of my life. I sought a second opinion from another specialist, who recommended much the same.
I really didn’t want to follow this drastic course of action, and my instincts told me that there had to be a better answer. I’d always been interested in natural health, and in the incredible healing powers of the human body, mind and spirit given the right support. I advised my specialist that I wasn’t ready to follow his recommendations yet, and asked if he’d be willing to monitor me for a few months, to see if my condition might improve on its own. He didn’t think that this was likely, but he agreed to do so, and at that point, a friend suggested I see a naturopath.
Our first appointment together lasted for almost two hours, as the naturopath took a very comprehensive health history and conducted a physical exam. Initially, I couldn’t understand why she was so interested in aspects of my health that were of little concern to me at the time. I’d always had a sensitive digestive system, I’d been anaemic since I was a child, a routine scan had revealed low bone density…but none of these complaints were new and I couldn’t see how they had anything to do with why I was feeling so ill now. But the naturopath explained that all of these signs and symptoms were offering her vital clues, helping her to put the pieces of my health puzzle together. By the end of the consultation, she explained her suspicion, that the deeper cause of my health issues could be a malabsorption problem. Further testing was ordered and I was finally diagnosed with Coeliac disease, an autoimmune condition in which the body reacts abnormally to gluten, causing inflammation of the small intestine and poor digestion and absorption of nutrients.
I was prescribed a strict gluten-free diet, nutritional supplementation, and a little brown bottle of liquid herbs to help with my fatigue and stress.
One month later, my thyroid hormone test results had returned to within their normal ranges, where they have remained ever since.
Within three months, I’d regained my energy, my capacity to think clearly and my motivation, not to mention my appetite and most of the weight I’d lost.
For the first time in as long as I could remember, I felt like myself again! And I decided that as soon as possible, I’d return to study to become a naturopath myself.