Ruth Haney is a wellness strategist, educator, and clinical counsellor with over 25 years of experience at the intersection of mental health, trauma recovery, nutrition, and holistic healing. She holds a Master’s degree in counselling and applied psychology, with a specialization in addictions, grief, and trauma. Ruth is a passionate organic food creator, committed to bridging her indigenous ancestral knowledge with modern science.

 

Ruth is the co-founder of Roots to Renewal and the co-creator of a transformational lifestyle developed over a 2.5-year case study resulting in a biopsychosocial-spiritual model designed to restore balance to the individual’s mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual aspects of health. As an indigenous woman, her work is deeply rooted in the indigenous ways of knowing and being which recognizes that healing is a holistic, relational, and regenerative process.

 

Ruth, alongside Nicole, turned unimaginable grief into a life-affirming mission. As they witnessed the devastating gaps in the conventional medical system during the final days of their husband and father, Ruth made a powerful decision: to reclaim her own health, confront her comorbidities, and break generational cycles through natural sustainable methods. 

 

Starting at 306 pounds with seriously high blood pressure, chronic pain and severe physical limitations, Ruth co-developed a transformative nutrition and movement program. The program blends aspects of three therapeutic avenues together to encompass the entire person: forest therapy, organic nutrition, and fitness training.

 

By reconnecting with the land, moving with the rhythm of the land, benefiting from the natural herbal gifts of the land, and adopting a farm-to-table approach, Ruth achieved sustainable and miraculous achievements in her overall health.

 

Ruth’s voice is one of truth, courage, and holistic leadership. She shares her journey to audiences and through initiatives, advocating for decolonized wellness, trauma-informed care, and indigenous-led solutions that prioritize prevention, wholeness, and relational healing. Ruth’s life has become a testament to what’s possible when pain becomes purpose and healing becomes a partnership.

Nicole began her healing journey at the age of 15; an age when the body and emotions are in constant flux. Each night, after finishing her homework around 9 p.m, she would walk or jog on the treadmill for 30 minutes to an hour. Always having an abundance of energy, and though she didn’t understand her gift at the time, she was instinctively self-soothing.

 

Movement became her medicine. From a young age, she was exposed to the complexity of the human experience and how emotional patterns shape not only individual choices, but also our health, relationships, and sense of community. By the age of 17, she had the eye-opening opportunity to travel across several provinces in Canada, co-facilitating workshops that explored the profound intergenerational impacts of Indian Residential Schools, the challenges faced by at-risk youth, and the destructive cycle of lateral violence that emerges when a community burdened by unhealed trauma turns inward.

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By the time she entered her twenties, she had developed a grounded understanding of the connection between self and environment; how each informs and shapes the other. She formalized her education and immersed herself in the study of functional fitness. Her training, paired with lived experience, deepened her reverence for the relationship between movement and mental well-being. This naturally led her to delve into nutrition, where she became fascinated by the profound impact food has on our physical, emotional, and spiritual health. She experimented, studied, and refined her practices, always seeking to align with the most vibrant version of herself. Then, in 2022, life shifted in a way she could never have predicted. Her father was diagnosed with colorectal carcinoma a lifestyle disease that took him just two months after his diagnosis.

 

"My mother and I spent long days and nights at Surrey Memorial Hospital, where we witnessed firsthand a healthcare system overwhelmed and overstretched. I stayed overnight with my father, keeping vigil by his side until my mother would come to relieve me in the morning.

One of those mornings, as I stepped out of the hospital, I saw the sun rise. It hit me deeply. After weeks of grief, confusion, and fear, it was the most hopeful thing I had seen. There, in the sky, was a quiet promise - the undeniable presence of life continuing. I was struck by the contrast: in one world, I was watching my father’s light slowly set, yet in another, the sun was rising with the same certainty it had done for millennia."

 

That moment held a poetic truth: even in the depths of loss, something ancient and unwavering remains. It reminded her that grief and hope can coexist. As one life closes, another awareness is born: resilient, radiant, and real. A new chapter. A new rising. From that moment of witnessing the sunrise outside the hospital, where loss met light, Nicole felt

something awaken within her. Through the spirit of hope, she committed even more deeply to her healing journey and began to study the yoga of body, mind, and spirit, eventually specializing in yoga therapy. She became especially fascinated by the bio-psycho-social-spiritual model of health: a holistic approach that honors the interconnectedness of emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual well-being.