Eating Disorders and IFS with Meg Doll
Eating Disorders and IFS with Meg Doll
In this episode of Going Inside: Healing Trauma from the Inside Out, I’m joined by Meg Doll, a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and certified IFS practitioner. Meg shares her personal journey of overcoming struggles with eating disorders and how she discovered the transformative power of Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy.
Key Topics Discussed:
The Depth of Healing
Meg's journey underscores the profound impact of IFS therapy in addressing deep-rooted issues like eating disorders and childhood trauma. It highlights the necessity of delving into underlying emotional and relational dynamics for comprehensive healing.
The power of Unblending
Our discussion delves into the therapeutic technique of unblending, where individuals create space and dialogue with their inner parts. Unblending enables understanding and honoring the intent behind protective behaviors, fostering compassionate self-awareness.
Shifting Perspective on Recovery
Meg's approach challenges conventional notions of recovery, illustrating that healing extends beyond surface-level behaviors. By exploring beliefs, emotions, and somatic experiences, clients can undergo profound shifts in their relationship with themselves and food.
Learn more about Meg at https://megdoll.com/
Interview Transcript:
[00:00:00] Meg: Eating disorder recovery or eating disorders are often compared to addiction, specifically like alcohol, right? But you can just be sober and not touch alcohol ever again. And that's what most people do. But with eating disorders, like you're having to relearn how to be in a relationship With [00:00:30] food.
[00:00:34] John: Going Inside is a podcast on a mission to help people heal from trauma and reconnect with their authentic self. Join me, trauma therapist, John Clarke, for guest interviews, real life therapy sessions, and soothing guided meditations. Whether you're navigating your own trauma, helping others heal from trauma, or simply yearning for a deeper understanding of yourself, Going Inside is your companion on the path to healing and self discovery.
[00:00:58] John: Download free guided [00:01:00] meditations and apply to work with me one on one at johnclarktherapy. com. Thanks for being here. Let's dive in. Meg Dahl is a somatic experiencing and internal family systems informed practitioner through her virtual online practice. She supports women from around the world with eating and body image issues, anxiety, depression, and developmental trauma.
[00:01:20] John: She's the host of the podcast, Unbreakable You, and can be found on Instagram at I am Meg. It's all Meg, thanks again for doing this [00:01:30] and how you doing today.
[00:01:31] Meg: Thank you so much for having me on. Yeah, I'm doing great. Happy to be here.
[00:01:37] John: Cool. Maybe just some, you can fill us in more about like who you are and kind of how you got here with, with this work and we'll find our way into it as we go.
[00:01:46] Meg: Yeah, for sure. So I have a history of eating disorders myself. I personally struggled with anorexia and orthorexia starting [00:02:00] at the age of 10. And that experience led me to go to university and study dietetics. And by the end of my final year of my undergrad, I just realized I really didn't want to be a dietitian.
[00:02:18] Meg: And so I finished the dietetics program, but that really led me to a journey of more like holistic nutrition. And then when I started my own [00:02:30] business and working with clients. Anyone will kind of know this if they've ever struggled with food stuff, but it's not actually about the food. It goes a lot deeper and it's just, you know, the food is like the surface stuff.
[00:02:46] Meg: And so I was just naturally going deeper with my clients in prep, in sessions. And that's what really led me to somatic experiencing and then internal [00:03:00] family systems work. And so just at the end of 2023, I finished the three year somatic experiencing program. And then I also just completed the stepping stone IFS program just this month.
[00:03:15] Meg: Yeah, that's kind of a little bit of a background about me. Yeah,
[00:03:20] John: it's great. Yeah. Congrats again on finishing Stepping Stones. Yeah, I'm. I went to Stepping Stones as well and Derek was my [00:03:30] teacher. And then since then I came back as a support staff. So sometimes I see students around, around, around the town.
[00:03:40] John: Practice groups. Yeah, exactly. But big fan of the program and obviously huge fan of the model given, you know, this podcast and Everything that I'm kind of doing to try to bring the model to more people. So I'm. I'm really happy to hear that you've, yeah, found it [00:04:00] and went through the training. I'm also very curious because I'm kind of doing an inverse of you in a way.
[00:04:05] John: I'm like, I have immersed myself in IFS as much as I possibly can. And I've been sprinkling in somatic experiencing work just kind of unofficially, like with, with no. Certification that but I'm starting to, like, try to merge the two together in my own work. So I'm so curious, like how, how you use both or how fluid that combination is for you?
[00:04:28] Meg: Yeah, [00:04:30] great question. And I feel like I don't really think about it. It's kind of just something that really, like, comes pretty naturally in sessions, but, but what it was really interesting to me while going through Stepping Stone, so I had completed the three year somatic experiencing program at the end of November of last year, and then I started Stepping Stone Like January 1st or whatever, right?
[00:04:58] Meg: So not much time [00:05:00] between and you do a lot of like practice sessions during the stepping stone course. And I know something that was always reflected back to me was how like my pace of things. So how kind of slow I went in a session and how much space I gave like the practice client time to just notice what was happening inside.
[00:05:24] Meg: And I know like I owe all of that to the somatic experiencing [00:05:30] program. Our instructors were always reminding us that like if we felt Like we were going slow, we probably could go even slower. And so that's a big thing. Just really inviting the client to slow down and notice what's happening inside versus just really kind of focusing on these parts and, you know, stuff.
[00:05:54] Meg: And I mean, Parts work or IFS was so huge [00:06:00] and life changing for my eating disorder recovery journey. So that's why I really wanted to do this course and become certified. But yeah, the somatic experiencing part, just kind of bringing more awareness. to the system, giving things a nice chance to like really slow down and noticing sensations inside because that's also a really big piece of the somatic experiencing work.[00:06:30]
[00:06:31] John: Yeah. I, I find IFS to be very somatic. Even on its own, at least, and even in my experience, this client, I experienced my parts both very visually, like they look like versions of me, but I also experienced them, them very semantically. In fact, 1 of the 1st ways I know, like, a part is up or I'm blended. Is the physical sensation of that happening, like a tightness [00:07:00] or shifting in my body.
[00:07:01] John: And so I also, I also find that's just a great way into the work and getting to know, you know, the part that's tightening the stomach and can we kind of go toward it. Yeah.
[00:07:12] Meg: Yes, exactly. I always say they just go so beautifully, like hand in hand together. So I love having both of them. Yeah.
[00:07:21] John: Yeah. Well, I, I'm going to ask a intentionally really like kind of vague question, which is how do you think [00:07:30] disordered eating develops and this might be framed both through your experience and also through your, your work with clients.
[00:07:38] Meg: Yeah. And I can also kind of even bring some IFS into this too. But I mean, personally I'm an open book and I share a lot about my journey and my history. On my podcast and on my social media pages, but yeah, so from my personal experience [00:08:00] I developed an eating disorder at 10, and then I like relapsed again when I was 15 and both times that I was really experiencing an eating disorder or it like started.
[00:08:15] Meg: I had a death in my family. Someone really close to me passed away. And now I know that it was my way of Coping with these really, really [00:08:30] big feelings and emotions and sensations in my body that I really didn't know how to hold space for or move through during that time in my life. And that's what we'll often see with people who have experienced eating disorders or develop eating disorders or even disordered eating because they are two different things.
[00:08:54] Meg: But. It's usually when there's a stressful time or [00:09:00] something happens, there's usually like this trigger and just even like from an IFS perspective, right, we kind of like have this part come in. And this is the way that it's helping you move through the work. That experience or that situation. Yeah.
[00:09:21] John: Yep.
[00:09:23] John: Yeah. That's a really good summary of how it often takes place. Part takes [00:09:30] on an extreme role because of an extreme circumstance and is very effective at doing its job. Which might be protecting us another part of us from pain or shame or overwhelmed or whatever it might be. And of course, like for folks that don't know, IFS was basically developed in response to the work Dick Schwartz was doing with disordered eating eating disorder.
[00:09:56] Meg: Yeah, I was so excited when I read that in [00:10:00] his book. Right. But and it makes sense, right? Because in traditional eating disorder recovery, and I'm not sure if you know this, but like, As someone who has been through traditional eating disorder recovery, you are taught to, like, see the eating disorder as this, like, separate being, right?
[00:10:23] Meg: You are told that, like, this is not you, this is the eating disorder, right? [00:10:30] And When I learned that at 10 years old, like that was a huge game changer for me, because it was like, Oh, this is not me. Right there. Like this eating disorder has all of these like kind of agendas for me or these behaviors, but something that really sets apart IFS work and traditional eating disorder recovery.
[00:10:57] Meg: Like how we actually interact [00:11:00] with like the eating disorder or that part, right? Traditional eating disorder recovery is like we have to stop this. We have to get rid of this. This is bad. Like the eating disorder is bad and For me, that never worked, you know, when I developed, like, when I relapsed at 15, I continued to struggle well into my 20s and it wasn't until I [00:11:30] found IFS and started seeing that, like, oh, wow.
[00:11:34] Meg: This is a part of me that's actually trying to help me, even though it doesn't really, like, seem that way, right? And as soon as I stopped trying to get rid of this part, but actually started to understand it better and interact with it in a totally different way, that's when I was able to finally fully recover from this eating disorder that I had [00:12:00] for the majority of my life.
[00:12:03] John: Wow.
[00:12:04] Meg: Yeah.
[00:12:04] John: Yeah. It's a huge shift. And you're, you know, there are a lot of parallels to the kind of traditional treatment models for addiction in helping people to stop the behavior and just kind of like white knuckle it or say like there's even I really hate to say, but there's also this kind of like mistrust, at least in the therapy realm, there's this mistrust of clients that have either addiction or eating disorder.
[00:12:28] John: Like you have to kind of [00:12:30] like really be on top of them, you know, because they might be like hiding it, you know, hiding the addiction, hiding the disorder, eating, whatever it is. And then as therapists, we become part of that, right? Like part of the authority, or there's even therapists that are like, I won't work with you unless you're sober.
[00:12:47] John: I won't work with you if you lie to me, whatever it is. And I'm just saying like, again, like stereotypically where Where we've kind of been coming from this whole time there's just a lot of stigma around [00:13:00] disorder eating and a lot of yeah, therapists that really function like they got to be on top of, of these clients and that there's a level of deceit and we have to kind of like manage that or hold them accountable.
[00:13:13] John: And I've always repelled from those types of models or those types of approaches. Yeah. And even just singing out loud, I'm like, it sounds so damaging.
[00:13:22] Meg: Yeah. I feel like I have something to add to that, that you'll think is pretty cool. So at the beginning of this [00:13:30] year, I started working with a client who came to me.
[00:13:34] Meg: She's been dealing with and trying to recover from an eating disorder for such a long time and it also involved purging her eating disorder. So she would purge at least once a day and she really wanted to stop. But anyway, so at the beginning of this year, we started to work together and I introduced like somatic work to [00:14:00] her and IFS work to her and in one of our very, very early sessions, I explained like this part that likes to purge, you know, and I gave her permission to just.
[00:14:16] Meg: Witness the part when it's there and I was like, you don't even have to like not purge You know, I was like if if you purge that's fine but just like next week because we see each other every week and I was like Let's just [00:14:30] set the intention to just notice this part that likes to purge and if you come back next week and you purge that's totally fine.
[00:14:37] Meg: Let's just notice it and She has not purged since like, you know You
[00:14:45] John: Yeah, you were right that I do like that a lot. I'm, I'm in a nutshell, this is why I'm do this work. Not only just the work I do clinically, which is behind closed doors. And I've always [00:15:00] had this sense of like these types of life changing moments that are happening behind closed doors, especially in my work using IFS as a therapist.
[00:15:08] John: But then those moments just kind of happen and You know, behind closed doors and the more that we can bring the spirit of IFS to people and even that piece, the paradigm shift around how we see people and their parts and the, the, you know, IFS talks a lot about the paradigm shift, but the more we bring that to people, The stance [00:15:30] of an IFS practitioner in itself is so healing, right?
[00:15:33] John: It's like, what if we just got to know this part that likes, that, that, that wants to purge, right? That wants to drink, that wants to cut and actually hear its story and hear about how it got this job and go toward it. Can you just send it some love and see what happens? Can you just let the part know?
[00:15:48] John: I get it. Oh, wow. You've been doing this job a long time. Oh, wow. It was so important to do this job when I had. This tremendous loss in my life, and even that, like, edging into the [00:16:00] unburdening process is often enough for clients to get relief. And at minimum, it's often enough to cut through this layer of shame that is often there at the beginning of work with a new client, or especially when they've come from other models or.
[00:16:15] John: The case of addiction, like 12 step where it's like you've got character defects, you've got to, you know, just get 30 days under your belt or whatever. And the shame that builds around the addiction. I just find like this keyword of shame is such an integral part of what we do [00:16:30] and how this type of, issue like addiction or eating disorders develops in the first place
[00:16:36] Meg: For sure shame is something that comes up So often and I think with eating disorders, you've mentioned addiction several times, but Most people struggle with an eating disorder for seven plus years You know, like it's, it's a really long time and so a lot of the times when clients come my way and I start working with them, [00:17:00] there is a lot of shame around how long they've had this, but kind of what you and I are saying here, the kind of traditional models of how we approach eating disorders or addiction, like, it's not really working, right?
[00:17:17] Meg: And so it, it makes sense as to why recovery. It takes such a long time, you know, so yeah, totally get the shame piece for sure. [00:17:30]
[00:17:30] John: Well, in recovery, you know, for some people can be like having a period of time without The target behavior happening, right? And, and on the other hand, like true healing I think is well, I, I didn't know what true healing really looked like until I had been using IFS for some time and walk clients through this, the unburdening Sequence and saw that in the following weeks to come right, like their inclination to go and drink or binge or cut or [00:18:00] whatever was just not there.
[00:18:03] John: They just didn't have that fire in their belly the way they did before of, like, I get in a fight with my spouse and then I go drink right to not feel the pain. Right? It's like. The part that drinks to protect the one that was about to feel shame because your partner said, you're never there for me. And then I went and I drank or I binged or I purged or I whatever, right?
[00:18:21] John: And then helping a client eventually be able to hang in there with the bumps of life or in the conflicts and the fight [00:18:30] With your spouse or the hard conversation you have with your boss or a coworker or your mom or whoever it is. Right. And just to be able to hang in there and knowing that like life is going to keep happening and coming at you, but these critical inflection points where normally that's the thing would happen and I might get through the moment and kind of white knuckle the moment, but then later I go and.
[00:18:52] John: You know, in secret and binging purging, cutting, drinking, whatever, right. Versus being in there [00:19:00] and having bring as much self energy as I can to those interactions and reassuring my parts that even though I'm hearing something hard right now, or my partner saying, Hey, you're never there for me. I can hear that.
[00:19:11] John: I can handle it. I can be with my parts that want to take that and run with it, you know, and I can respond in a more self led place with. My partner, my boss, my mom, whoever.
[00:19:23] Meg: Yes. Yeah. With IFS and unburdening, like so much less [00:19:30] white knuckling for sure. And I think something else that I'm kind of getting from what you just shared in like eating disorder recovery space or just eating disorder space.
[00:19:43] Meg: I think there's kind of like this narrative that. Like you're always going to have these thoughts. You're always going to have these eating disorder thoughts. And I also thought that too, right? Like I, I thought at [00:20:00] one point, like this was kind of like 2017 ish area. So several years ago, but. I was at a pretty good place in my life at that point, but I would have those thoughts, right?
[00:20:14] Meg: But it was just like, well, this is, this is what recovery is. I'm recovered, but I'm just always going to have these thoughts, right? Because that's what we're told. If you have an eating disorder, you're always going to have these thoughts and so many people [00:20:30] think that's what recovery is and it wasn't until I found Somatic Experiencing, IFS, and did all of this deeper work on myself and unburdening things like that, that, like, I go through my days now not thinking about, like, Any kind of like disordered eating or eating disorder thoughts, like they're not in my mind anymore, you [00:21:00] know?
[00:21:00] Meg: And I think that's, that's just so freeing to know that your daily life doesn't have to look like that. Like you actually don't have to have that noise all the time.
[00:21:16] John: It's huge. And I'm, I'm almost wondering like who sold us on this concept in the first place that it's kind of a death sentence, right? Or like you're going to have, These thoughts are these triggers forever.
[00:21:28] John: And what a [00:21:30] devastating piece of news that is for people that are just at the beginning of. Treatment process. Basically being told you can't grow right or that you can't actually hear from this heal from this. You can just manage the symptoms forever, hopefully, and have periods of doing good. And then possibly periods of very dangerous relapse to the point where it could kill you.
[00:21:52] John: Right. And often does for people. It is often life or death with. This type of work and addictions and whatnot. So that's what I find so [00:22:00] scary and high stakes for this. And also a lot of wife, a lot of therapists will not work with disordered eating is because of that. They literally just fear that the client will be a liability, right?
[00:22:11] John: Or if they're in this active bingeing purging cycle, whatever it might be for that client, that it's a liability to them, to them and their license. And it's like, I can't trust this client. They what if they're deceiving me? What if they're concealing, you know, their disordered eating and then their liability or then they relapse or whatever.
[00:22:29] John: [00:22:30] And it's, yeah, I just think it's a German to shame that there is that, that impasse for, for a lot of therapists that will just turn people away.
[00:22:40] Meg: Yeah. I love working with the eating disorder and disordered eating population. Like, I was telling you before we hit record. It's, it's my jam. Like, I just get it.
[00:22:51] Meg: And I think that's important too, right? Working with someone that just gets it. And I hear that from my clients all the time. I [00:23:00] even personally experienced that working with different psychologists, practitioners throughout my healing journey. And sometimes you work with someone and you're like, whoa, they just get it.
[00:23:11] Meg: Right. And then the other people you work with, it's It's like you're going into a session feeling like, yeah, you're not just, you're not really being met in the way that you need to be met. And so I, you know, I'm grateful for my experience. So I actually can be supporting the [00:23:30] people that I support today.
[00:23:32] John: Yeah, I'm, I have a part that's very envious of you in a way. And because so much of my training and this has in part to do with the school I went to and the professors that taught me psychotherapy were deeply rooted in psychodynamics, which is. Deeply rooted in psychoanalytic theory, which is Freud saying you've got to be this blank slate for your clients to project onto.
[00:23:59] John: Therefore [00:24:00] we basically never self disclose. And if we do, the training is like client asks you like, Hey Meg, are you are you married? And then you would be trained to go. It sounds like you're thinking about marriage. So you're asking me about marriage. And rather than answer that, I want to ask you what, what's coming up for you around marriage, right?
[00:24:19] John: Like that's literally how we've, most therapists have been taught around self disclosure So coming to it as a non therapist or at least a non therapist who hasn't been trained in that type of model like I was I'm in [00:24:30] this process right now of like shedding layers and of experimenting with kind of telling more about my story, you know, surprise, surprise as a trauma therapist, I have a trauma history and I'm, I'm, Slowly experimenting with coming out with more of that.
[00:24:45] John: Even this morning in a very hard moment with a client I disclosed some of my trauma history to her. And it helped so much, so much. I probably waited too long to do it. And my fears around that turning the tables or around her seeing me [00:25:00] differently around, like, I've got to be this therapist.
[00:25:02] John: Who's like, has my, my shit together and I'm just here to help you is distancing. And I hit that power dynamic. I've. I've always hated it and I find it really uncomfortable. So, It leveled the playing field a bit of like, I don't understand. I don't get exactly what it's like to be you. And there's a difference between saying like, Oh, I know exactly what that was like versus like, here's part of my history.
[00:25:25] John: And here's something that I've learned through my journey of this or something I've learned about trauma. [00:25:30] By living through my trauma and then bring it back to the client of like, what's it like for you to hear that? And she was like, thank you for sharing. Like, thank you. And it didn't result in anything bad.
[00:25:41] John: So
[00:25:42] Meg: I love that you did that. That's amazing. And I think that's something too. That was a takeaway for me from somatic experiencing is like bringing our humanness into the session too, right? That's so important for the client to feel like knowing that. [00:26:00] You know, there's not this hierarchy, right? Like we're just two humans.
[00:26:04] Meg: I'm holding space for you. You know, I'm here to support you. Yeah, yeah,
[00:26:09] John: yeah. I wanna bring it back to you. 'cause I have a tendency to sometimes make these episodes about me because ,
[00:26:17] Meg: I love it. I interview that are like, it's great .
[00:26:21] John: I interview people that are like wonderful listeners and I'm like thinking out loud.
[00:26:25] John: And then I end up just indulging a little bit. I wanted to ask you like. [00:26:30] You had mentioned, or even I saw you posted something recently about this, like recipe you made or this really yummy looking plate of like pasta and
[00:26:39] Meg: yeah,
[00:26:42] John: which I do want that recipe like for later. Okay. What is it like to walk through the world?
[00:26:51] John: On one hand, like if you are trying to like, not drink a lot of how people start to establish that as like, Don't have alcohol in the house. Don't go to a [00:27:00] bar. Don't go to a party where there's alcohol with food. There's really like there's food in this room. I have my lunch here. There's food. The other therapists leave their food in the fridge.
[00:27:10] John: It's like, how do you walk through the world where there's food everywhere? There's pictures of food everywhere. Yeah, maybe you can just talk about that for a bit.
[00:27:18] Meg: Yeah. Big question. And I think that's, That is something that sets like eating disorder recovery apart from drinking, right? Because eating [00:27:30] disorder recovery or eating disorders are often compared to addiction, specifically like alcohol, right?
[00:27:38] Meg: But you can just be sober. And not touch alcohol ever again. And that's what most people do. But with eating disorders, like you're having to relearn how to be in a relationship. With food and that's really my approach, [00:28:00] right? It's like, how can we support this? Relationship with food and so for me and also for my clients Like it comes with a lot of relearning too.
[00:28:14] Meg: So I don't only specifically work with eating disorders that are restrictive, but just using anorexia as an example, like that's a restrictive eating disorder. And so a lot of the times, [00:28:30] and this was the case for me, I had to learn. How much food I actually needed and what that looked like and be supported in nourishing my body in this way.
[00:28:43] Meg: So there's definitely like that relearning component for sure. But yeah, there's so many layers to that. Absolutely. And kind of also. Depending on what type of eating disorder you're working with as well. [00:29:00] But I would say, I guess, just to kind of answer that is we have, like, at the forefront, it really is focusing on supporting that relationship with food, in whatever way that looks like for that person.
[00:29:17] Meg: But for me, because I had a very restrictive eating I had to relearn a lot of things about what it actually looked like to [00:29:30] nourish my body and also something that maybe you've noticed about me or some people do know about my approach to things. It's like, everything I do and everything that I support my clients in doing is really coming from this place of love.
[00:29:46] Meg: And so, Moving from that point to, right, like understanding, like, this is a act of loving ourselves and taking care of ourselves is nourishing ourselves and kind of like, what does [00:30:00] that look like? And we get to explore that together.
[00:30:05] John: Yeah, that is huge. I'd love for you to keep going on that for a little bit in terms of This journey, because I think this idea of like loving yourself is tossed around a lot, and it ends up feeling like this pie in the sky thing of like, how can I love myself if I also have these things that I do that are not only like causing ripples in my life or my health or whatever?[00:30:30]
[00:30:30] John: Or my relationships or whatever. So it's like, how can I love myself while I'm also doing this thing? So how, yeah.
[00:30:40] Meg: For sure. Well, I think this love for ourselves or this compassion for ourselves. Is obviously like that self energy coming in, right? And also even from a somatic experiencing perspective, it's more of that like ventral state [00:31:00] where we're not in these like survival responses, right?
[00:31:04] Meg: And so as we do the somatic experiencing work or get to know these parts that maybe like to restrict or feel that It's only safe when they restrict, or it's only safe when they binge, or it's only safe when they purge, right? Really getting to know these parts. And that is when this [00:31:30] access to more love and compassion for ourselves is available.
[00:31:38] Meg: Yeah. So really working with those parts and then that's when that starts to emerge, right? Because you're right. Like we can't just kind of like start from this place of like, okay, let's just start doing all this stuff from a place of love. It's like, well, I have no access to that right now, but I do believe we, and I know you [00:32:00] believe this too, but like we all have access to compassion for ourselves.
[00:32:05] Meg: It's like this endless. Source of compassion for ourselves. And I really love that. That was a big part of my healing. And sometimes that doesn't feel available. A lot of the times it doesn't feel available to the clients we're working with initially, but as we start to work with these parts and unblend from these parts, then we can [00:32:30] like sit in this.
[00:32:31] Meg: See of compassion and start making these more loving choices for ourselves and nourishing our bodies is one of those things, right?
[00:32:41] John: That's right. Yeah, that's wonderful. I, I find that a lot of times when we start conversations about IFS, we start with parts and talking about parts. We're all multiple. We have these parts, managers, firefighters And yet I almost feel like we [00:33:00] should be talking about self and self energy more, or even when I'm introducing the model to clients, like starting there, that the you that is actually you is kind and compassionate and knowing and wise and loving all these things.
[00:33:13] John: Basically like self is Love and the model is basically like bringing love to the parts that are hurting the parts that are protecting the hurt parts. That's basically the model. If you were to like pitch it as that or [00:33:30] if that was like the headline that like this model is basically love. I think it would actually turn a lot of people off or even me like a few years ago.
[00:33:37] John: Coming from a very practical therapist, like that sounds kind of out there, like some hippie shit. And yeah,
[00:33:41] Meg: Right. I've been, I've been called fluffy so many times in my career. It's like, ah, so fluffy. And it's like this, this works, you know, like it is actually about like Stepping into this love for ourselves.
[00:33:59] Meg: Yeah, [00:34:00]
[00:34:00] John: and I've, I find bringing it back to like loving yourself. I just don't even think of that term anymore. But I think about loving my parts and bringing love to my parts. And loving like a hurt seven year old part of mine is so much easier than like, how do I love this guy who is imperfect and like sometimes is moody or sometimes is really anxious or sometimes like does something compulsive, right?
[00:34:27] John: That's really hard to love just like [00:34:30] at first glance, but When I see the goal is like me accessing more self, more self energy, more spaciousness, more love, bringing that to parts of me that are hurting or parts of me that are impulsive, right. Or whatever it might be a parts that are scared. It helps me tap into that.
[00:34:49] John: Almost like parental energy of like going toward these ones inside me that are hurting. And then that's just a way for me into this kind of like self love piece. So just even like walking away from that [00:35:00] term, self love altogether has, has helped me.
[00:35:03] Meg: Yes. That makes a lot of sense. I, I always say like, when we just get some space inside or that little bit of like separation for, from ourself and the part.
[00:35:16] Meg: Right. Like it all changes as soon as we can start, like you said, you seeing like this seven year old version of yourself or whatever it is, like it changes so much. And that's why [00:35:30] I love this model. Yeah,
[00:35:33] John: and that's why the work always. Starts with unblending generally, right? Like there's this part that binges this part that purges.
[00:35:39] John: Can you get to know it a little bit today? How do you experience it in or around your body? What does it look like? Sound like can you breathe a little space in between you and the part and just get to know it or just say the part like I'm here? Is it okay to get to know you? Or can we just be in the same room for a second?
[00:35:54] John: That is like tremendously therapeutic. For, for people. And it's often enough to start getting [00:36:00] them some traction, even to your point with your client before of like, just going toward that, that part that binges or purges was enough to, to get relief, right. You didn't even have to go toward the symptom to, to get relief.
[00:36:13] John: Right. So definitely not underestimating that the power of unblending.
[00:36:19] Meg: Yeah, it's incredible. And even like noticing how. You feel towards these parts too, is big, as you know. Yeah. Because that's a big [00:36:30] one in like the eating disorder space, right? Like I said before, we're often told that this is something bad.
[00:36:37] Meg: We hate this thing. We need to get rid of this thing. And so when we can start exploring that too, And see how it has been showing up for us. And it's not like this big, scary thing that needs to be rid of, or we need to let go of it or whatever. Yeah, big changes happen and it's pretty cool. [00:37:00]
[00:37:01] John: In these types of.
[00:37:03] John: Especially, you know, IFS calls some firefighter type behaviors. We often disagree with like the method of the part, like the binging, the purging, the cutting, the whatever. But when we get to know its intent, we can. We can see and agree with and honor its intent of trying to help protect me, right?
[00:37:21] John: And that's again another part of the paradigm shift of understanding these parts in the first place and why they do what they do
[00:37:29] Meg: Yeah, [00:37:30] yeah, and eating disorders are often Like people think they kind of like have this Control issue, right? A lot of the time eating disorders, it's like, Oh my gosh, I just, I need to control everything.
[00:37:45] Meg: But that might be kind of like this outward behavior. It looks like you need to control something. But at the core of it, like for me personally, a lot of it was because of like lack of self trust. [00:38:00] Like there is this part that In me that felt like she couldn't trust herself, right? So it's again, like not about these like behaviors, but it's really about how these parts feel or the beliefs that they carry and hold on to, which again, was just this huge shift for me.
[00:38:20] John: So cool. Yeah, it's about. Making it relational and starting that, that two way relationship with a part, starting that [00:38:30] dialogue.
[00:38:31] Meg: Yeah. And just getting to know it. Yeah,
[00:38:35] John: totally. What, what do you feel like is missing from the conversation so far with like, yeah, five or so minutes left. What do you want to make sure people kind of hear today?
[00:38:46] Meg: Oh gosh, I think we touched on a lot of really great things, right? I just kind of to almost summarize, Like it's not like with eating disorder recovery and disordered [00:39:00] eating. A lot of people do think that it is about the food, but if you've been struggling for quite some time, I guess I haven't said this yet.
[00:39:09] Meg: And so this is important, but if you feel like you've been struggling for quite some time and only focusing on the food, right, we know it goes so wrong. so much deeper than that. And so that's what I would say about the food piece. And then also, if someone has been [00:39:30] really following like the traditional eating disorder recovery model, and It hasn't been working and they feel like it's, you know, they're stuck in their journey, trying something like IFS.
[00:39:43] Meg: I said, I had an eating disorder at one point for the majority of my life. And it wasn't until I found this work that it completely changed things for me. And yeah, I'm just so grateful to be doing this work today because I know, like, [00:40:00] what a, How different it is than feeling like we have to stop doing something or get rid of something.
[00:40:07] Meg: Right? Such a huge change. Yeah.
[00:40:11] John: Yeah. Yeah. And such a needed change. Yeah, that being said, I mean, maybe you can spend a few minutes just talking more about how you actually work with clients, what your work looks like what a typical session looks like, stuff like that. And then, of course, you know how people can actually reach out to you if [00:40:30] they want to work together.
[00:40:31] Meg: Yeah, for sure. So I live in Canada, but I work with clients from, all around the world. So my practice is all online. So if anyone is watching this, listening to this and interested in working with me, it really doesn't matter where you live. All of my sessions are done on zoom and I typically work with clients.
[00:40:55] Meg: Every week or bi weekly so I offer weekly and bi weekly sessions [00:41:00] I don't do I personally just really love working one on one with clients I know there's all sorts of like group coaching programs and things like that, but I Just love one on one work. So that is what I do So if someone is looking for one on one work that's what I really love doing.
[00:41:21] Meg: And yeah, I don't specifically only work with clients who have active eating disorders or [00:41:30] actively disordered eating, but a lot of my clients. Do struggle with those things, but some of my clients to, you know, it's kind of like very much a thing of the past and now they just want to work with me related to like other things.
[00:41:50] Meg: I know you mentioned before I work with like emotion such as anxiety, depression, and then, childhood trauma, stuff like that, bringing in like the somatic piece. [00:42:00] And honestly, all like what a session actually looks like, it's so different. And I think that you probably get this all the time too. Right.
[00:42:10] Meg: But we don't follow a structure. And I think that's best thing we can offer to our clients is just like. showing up without an agenda. So, you know, if someone kind of has an idea of what somatic experiencing is and kind of has [00:42:30] an idea of what IFS is, or maybe they don't, but they're just open to this different type of approach, then I think that that makes sense to just like book a session or start working with someone like you or I without actually, Having to know exactly what a session looks like because they all look different, you know and I guess just even adding in a little bit of a piece because I I get this too just like [00:43:00] with my Background in nutrition.
[00:43:02] Meg: I do help my clients With the food piece as well. So sometimes we do talk more about food rather than doing more of the somatic experience and IFS stuff, but sometimes we blend them together. And then I've had other clients. I actually just finished working with a client. Her and I were working together for several months and she came to me [00:43:30] with Eating disorder stuff.
[00:43:31] Meg: She wasn't, you know, really struggling, but it was what I call called the lingering bits It's like you're not like really deep in an eating disorder, but it's kind of you're still dealing with like the lingering bits of it anyway, so She came to me. Not a single session did we ever talk about food. We were always talking more about the childhood trauma stuff and doing more [00:44:00] somatic and IFS work together and just recently she shared with me.
[00:44:05] Meg: She's like, you know what we we haven't even talked specifically about food and she's like, I am doing so much better with food and that's kind of what I was saying before it. It really doesn't have to do with the food at all. But everything kind of underneath that, you know,
[00:44:25] John: does that answer your
[00:44:26] Meg: question?
[00:44:26] Meg: Oh yeah.
[00:44:27] John: Yeah. And I [00:44:30] have a lot more questions for you, which will just mean if you're up to it, I want to have you on the show again. Cause
[00:44:35] Meg: my gosh, I would love that so much. Yeah. Just
[00:44:39] John: scratching the surface. Right. So Yeah, I can't thank you enough for, for being here for this conversation really just for your openness about your story.
[00:44:48] John: Like I said, I have parts that really envy. You and also I'm inspired to share a bit more of my story because you make it look almost effortless to share it and just kind of own [00:45:00] it. And I'm sure people trust you even more because you're so yeah, honest about it.
[00:45:06] Meg: Yeah. I would, I'm so up for a part two.
[00:45:10] Meg: That would be fun. And you'll come on my podcast too. Yeah.
[00:45:14] John: Yes. I would love that. That being said, yeah, Meg, remind people how they can reach out, learn more about you, both like websites, social stuff like that. And then yeah, yeah,
[00:45:24] Meg: absolutely. So I actually have been podcasting since 2015, believe [00:45:30] it or not.
[00:45:31] Meg: So yes, I have many podcast episodes. So my podcast is called unbreakable you, so you can just search that wherever. And I do talk a lot about IFS, somatic work. Eating disorder recovery stuff also hypothalamic amenorrhea if that interests anyone because that's often an issue with people that have eating disorders and so those are kind of like Big topics on my podcast And then [00:46:00] on instagram i'm definitely the most active over there.
[00:46:03] Meg: @iammegdoll over there And then my website is megdoll.com And even on instagram just like The link in my bio, I offer free discovery calls to anyone who's just interested in working with me. And we can just meet, make sure we're a good fit and then take like next steps from there.
[00:46:27] John: Amazing.
[00:46:28] Meg: Yeah,
[00:46:28] John: we'll, we'll of course add [00:46:30] links to all that stuff in the description.
[00:46:32] John: And like I said, Meg, I just love to have you back sometime to keep talking about this stuff. Thank you again for being here and for. For the work you're doing to help your clients. So thank you. Oh, I'd
[00:46:44] Meg: love that. Thank you.
[00:46:46] John: Got it. Thanks for listening to another episode of Going Inside. If you enjoyed this episode, please like and subscribe wherever you're listening or watching and share your favorite episode with a friend.
[00:46:57] John: You can follow me on Instagram, [00:47:00] @johnclarketherapy and apply to work with me one on one at johnclarketherapy. com. See you next time.
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