Episode 66: Listening to Your Body — Your Cravings, Need for Rest, Intuition, ALL OF IT with Caroline Dooner

Let’s talk about your nervous system with a bucket analogy…

A lot of people’s buckets are full because they’ve been sitting under the leaky ceiling, collecting water without anyone emptying the bucket or replacing a small bucket with a bigger one.

Need me to keep elaborating?

So, a lot of people have been chasing symptoms with “cures” like heavy metal detoxes, liver cleanses, juice fasts, parasite cleanses, etc. Because this is the lens through which Wellness Culture would have us see through.

It’s true: heavy metal detoxes, parasite cleanses, and juice fasts will probably eliminate some of the toxic burden on the body, thereby “emptying the bucket” a little bit. AND ALSO, you’re not going to juice fast your way out of a lifestyle that’s not supporting your health.

Sure, heavy metals, parasites, mold, and other toxins are burdensome to the body and “fill our buckets”, often resulting in a cascade of symptoms when the bucket is nearly full. But, toxic relationships, lack of boundaries, limiting beliefs, racing thoughts, a job you hate, lack of community, and lack of resources ALSO fills your bucket and leaves your nervous system with less capacity.

I think heavy metals and mold and liver toxins are low-hanging fruit. Once you identify them, you can take steps to clean them out. You hope that your body will return to homeostasis.

The greater challenge — and where most people get stuck — is that they’re willing to do the cleanses and detoxes for their physical bodies, but they’re unwilling to end the relationship, set the boundaries, quit the job, go to bed earlier, etc.

Creating more capacity in your nervous system means you empty out the unhealthy lifestyle stuff and the mindset stuff WHILE also supporting your physical body. Otherwise, your bucket is always full and you stay sick, tired, and frustrated.

My guest and I get into this further in this episode along with lots of other juicy stuff!

This Episode’s Guest

Caroline Dooner is a humorist and storyteller. She spent years as a performer, and dieted like it was her job (because it kind of was). After healing her relationship to food, and embarking on a radical “two years of rest,” she writes about our relationship with food, our bodies, and burnout. She lives with her anxious bernedoodle in Pennsylvania, and they’re just trying to live the simple life. She believes wholeheartedly in the healing powers of food and rest.

Show Notes

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In this episode, author of The Fuck It Diet and Tired as Fuck, Caroline Dooner, and I…

discuss her first book The Fuck It Diet, fixation with food, perceived food addiction, restrictive diets, and fear-based eating
talk about building trust with our bodies and why we live in a culture that rewards an obsession with wellness and thinness but doesn’t reward intuition and self-trust
share Lindsey’s experience with her spontaneous Fuck It Diet, weight gain, and dealing with the mental voice that says, “You can’t keep eating whatever you want.”
share why Caroline intentionally gave herself 2 years of rest, quit pursuing an acting career, and how Marie Kondo’s tidying up helped her with her lifestyle
talk about lifestyle inflammation: what it is, how it shows up, why we have to reduce it, and the guilt that shows up when we do
talk about letting go of health perfectionism and fear-based eating and getting to a place of intuition and care
talk about listening to your body and seeking medical help from a grounded, non-urgent place of sovereignty
explain why most people won’t let themselves heal their relationships with food, intuition, and their bodies
discuss the traumatic impact our thoughts have on our bodies and nervous systems
share Lindsey’s 4 Pillars of Holistic Trauma Healing (first time EVER on a podcast!)

Transcript

Hello, and welcome to the second episode of this week. Can you believe that? I somehow managed to put out two podcast episodes in one week. Look at me, go. Um, so I have some things to share. First of all. I recently took a trip with my 16 year old daughter. We went to Cozumel, Mexico. Spent a week at an all-inclusive resort for a fun mother daughter trip to get the heck out of this deep freeze that we live in up here in the Arctic circle.

And it was simply magical. Um, it was everything that I wanted it to be. I could have laid on that beach for five more years. And it wouldn’t have been long enough. Um, and the reason why I’m telling you this isn’t to brag about my trip to a tropical island, but is instead to celebrate that it was made possible because I’ve done so much nervous system work. And I know that might sound cheesy or like a stretch, but I promise you, it’s not, if you knew my history.

Traveling has always been so hard for me. Like such a drag. I don’t sleep well in hotel rooms. I don’t sleep on cars. I don’t sleep on airplanes. Um, my digestion always got really fucked up whenever I would travel. Um, meaning I would get really, really constipated. And I would have to take like, you know, not laxatives, but like herbal, herbal things, herbal teas, magnesium and stuff, just to get myself to go to the bathroom. So three days into a trip, I would always be super bloated because I was really constipated. And then I would be tired because I wasn’t sleeping well.

And it just. It was a drag. Traveling was a drag and. This time though. It was my first time to travel. Um, really, since the pandemic started, I did fly to Utah back in may of 2021. To attend a think tank. Um, and that trip wasn’t the greatest either. Um, my digestion was okay, but the sleep piece was not amazing.

Um, but this time though, foreign country foreign currency, foreign language, taxis, airports, immigration, customs. All the things. And I was by myself, my husband was not with me. And normally when we travel, I sort of rely on him to be. The person who knows everything. He’s the navigator, he’s the trip planner. He’s the one who gets us where we’re needing to go.

He’s the one who takes care of all the things. And this time it was just me and my daughter and I did it. I did it effortlessly seamlessly. It was easy. It was fun. And I give all the credit to nervous system work, like working with my nervous system and reducing the level of activation in my nervous system.

Created so much space and openness to actually be able to have. A great travel experience for the first time in my life. I mean, I’m not joking when I say that it was probably. The best travel experience. Of my life. Not because the place was so amazing or because what we did was so fun. But because I felt like my body was finally normal. I actually felt normal on a vacation instead of feeling like I was struggling to sleep and poop for a vacation.

And I had no panic attacks, even with the language barrier and currency exchanging and all of it. I had no panic attacks. I didn’t have any anxiety. I never felt overwhelmed by anything. And I’m telling you nervous system work works. It works. It works. It works. I just went on a trip that proves. That nervous system org works because nothing else really is different about me. I didn’t need to take any medication. I didn’t have to take any supplements to calm me down. In fact, I didn’t take any supplements at all.

Um, it was just, it was just incredible. It was a mundane travel experience, honestly month, just a mundane experience. But it was also a magical experience because of the way that I was able to have regulation in my body and not feel like I was fighting anxiety or insomnia or constipation for the entire trip. And the reason why I’m sharing this with you.

Is because I am hosting my nervous system 1 0 1 workshop on Tuesday, February 1st at 6:00 PM on zoom. This will be the second time I’ve put this workshop on the first time was back in November, 2021. And this is like my flagship teaching. This is the foundation of my work as a trauma coach and as an educator, and even in my own personal healing journey.

It all started with the nervous system for me. So I’m wondering if any of this resonates with you? Does your life feel limited because of anxiety, panic, attacks, pain, fatigue, depression. Um, not being able to travel because when you do your entire body feels thrown off, like very limited. Have you spent thousands of dollars on practitioners and supplements and fancy health gadgets without sustainable results.

Does your lab work consistently come back, quote, normal, but you still feel quote off and your doctor is like, I don’t know what’s wrong with you. It’s all in your head. Try to sleep better. Try to lose some weight. That’s BS.

Have you been in the situation where you never really struggled with anxiety until you had chronic and mysterious health symptoms pop up and now you just feel like a sick, anxious wreck. Do you feel like you’re missing out on life or that you’ve had to give up activities you love? Because these mystery symptoms are sucking the life out of you.

Have you felt crazy or like you’re a hypochondriac because of all the inexplainable things that seem to be wrong with you. Have you choked down green smoothies or celery juice? Because you hoped it would heal anxiety or PMs or IBS or migraines or pots or something else. And have you cut whole food groups from your diet?

But you’re still searching for the mystery food. That must be to blame for all of your symptoms. If this is you. I invite you to pause and take a deep breath. I see you. And you are not crazy.

If you’ve ever been told it’s all in your head. I certainly was. Um, I’m sorry. You’ve been told that. It’s not all in your head. You’re not making it up. And whatever’s wrong with you unless it’s very severe, probably is not showing up on imaging or blood work. And it’s coming from your autonomic nervous system and your nervous system needs some TLC.

To say that I am passionate about the nervous system is the understatement of the century. I literally do not believe that I would be alive today. If I had not learned about my nervous system. And how trauma affected my brain and my nervous system and how to work with my nervous system to create more resilience, resiliency, and flexibility. Excuse me.

And it’s important that I tell you I’m not a licensed therapist or healthcare provider, but I’ve been where you are. Everything I just described above is something that I have experienced. I’ve been where you are. I didn’t have a therapist who taught me about my nervous system. My psychiatrist, as much as I love him did not teach me about my nervous system. It was something I had to figure out on my own.

So I’ve been where you are, and I know how to help. And two years of trauma education and coaching has taught me that the health of our nervous systems is probably. In my opinion, the most overlooked aspect of modern day healthcare and what we call mental health care. In fact. I believe that the health of our nervous systems and our brains is more important than gut health. And I know that is a bold.

Statement that might make you feel really uncomfortable. My own official diagnoses include generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, chronic insomnia, and PTSD. And I was a panicking anxiety, written suicidal insomniac with PMs, heart palpitations. Fluctuating weight, brain fog. Um, all of it. And now I feel like I am a thriving, healthy and empowered overcomer. So how did I do it?

Simple. I learned about my nervous system and I learned how to heal it. And I don’t even think about my diagnoses anymore. Actually. They don’t even matter to me anymore. Really. They’re just, they’re just labels and labels don’t matter because underneath all those scary labels and diagnoses is a neuroplastic brain.

And a nervous system that can heal. I am evidence of this. My clients are evidence of this. And I am convinced that the autonomic nervous system is the holy grail of our physical, mental, and emotional health. And yet we are not taught this information growing up or by our doctors or by our therapists. So.

Goddammit. I’m going to teach you what you have the right to know. And that is why I created nervous system 1 0 1. This is my one-stop workshop. For discovering the root cause of chronic mysterious symptoms, how trauma impairs your nervous system and what to do about it. Um, Yeah, nervous system education. It is invaluable.

Um, here’s what you’re going to learn in nervous system 1 0 1. I’m going to teach you what your autonomic nervous system is and how it works. I’m also distilling down polyvagal theory in a way that even a fifth grader could understand, it’s going to be very understandable. You don’t have to memorize any crazy terms like dorsal, vagal, and ventral vagal, and all of that.

I’m going to be teaching how the autonomic nervous system is involved in the development of many chronic and mysterious health, uh, symptoms and mental illnesses. I’ll be teaching how the different branches of your nervous system behave when they sense a threat. So for example, what’s going on in your body when you’re in flight mode versus what’s going on when you’re in freeze mode.

It’s important to know, to be able to recognize the nervous system state that you’re in so that you have the ability to shift out of that state. I’m going to be sharing how your nervous system’s responses to life situations has formed. What you believe is your personality. I’ll be talking about what trauma really is and how it affects and impairs your nervous system and your brain.

Why healing is a mostly subtractive process and the importance of nervous system hygiene. A lot of this is the same information that I give my one-on-one coaching clients when I’m working with them. And so I just want to invite you. If you’re looking for nervous system knowledge, education, practical tips for what to do and how to shift out of your state, how to heal your nervous system.

That’s what I’ll be teaching and nervous system 1 0 1. The cost of a ticket is $55. Um, it’s a two hour workshop that’s taught live on zoom, whether or not you can attend. Uh, the live recording, you will receive a replay. So the purchase of your ticket includes a replay, whether you attend live or not, and you have access to that replay.

For life. I’ll be teaching this workshop on Tuesday, February 1st at 6:00 PM central on zoom. Again, if you can’t make it live because of a time zone difficulty, or you’re going to be at work, or you are making dinner for your family or something like that. No worries. You will receive the email linked, um, replay within 48 hours of this workshop.

And I just want to invite you to, uh, open yourself up to a possibility that what you believe you’ve been told about your gut. About health and wellness about, uh, restrictive diets. About chronic illness. I want to invite you to open your perspective and consider that there may be a really important piece to the puzzle missing. And that is the piece about your nervous system.

Or if you’re already familiar with the nervous system’s role in, um, your, your health, your wellness, uh, the development of chronic and mysterious, mysterious symptoms. But you don’t know what to do about it, or you’re looking for more education and more knowledge and practical ways that you can start to shift your nervous system. I’m going to be sharing that in nervous system 1 0 1 as well.

Um, so I also want to share a couple of testimonials from clients. This one comes from Chris. W he said, working with Lindsay has helped me a lot in a very short period of time. I’ve worked with a lot of coaches and therapists in the past, and can honestly say Lindsey has been totally worth the investment. Highly recommend if you’re considering working with her.

And I’ll give you just one more review and this one comes from another client. Named Nancy and Nancy said I’ve had chronic unexplained pain for 17 years. And in working with Lindsay, that pain has moved. Yes. Moved. And is no longer chronic and that’s just after two weeks of working with her. I’ve learned that regulating my nervous system allows trauma to reveal itself and provides a safe space for it to be met, felt and understood.

Learning to do this releases the nervous system from the need. It felt to take on the stress and trauma and manifested physically in chronic pain. I think the phrase life-changing is a bit overused and maybe a bit saturated now. So I’ll say working with Lindsey has been wondrously nervous system regulating. So that’s just two of my clients. Um, I also have a lot of reviews from the last time I taught nervous system 1 0 1. I even had therapists who bought tickets and were in the audience that night, who shared with me later that they learned more information about the nervous system from the workshop than they learned in school.

So. If, you know, it’s not our therapist’s fault that they’re not being educated properly. Um, and I’m not even pretending to be the best person to educate therapists, but I’m honored that therapists saw enough. Truth and relevant information in this workshop to be able to learn from it and then take what they learned and share it with their own clients.

You can find all of the details. Plus save your spot and get your ticket@lindsaylocket.com forward slash N S Y S 1 0 1. I will have that linked below and the description, and it will also be on the show notes@lindsaylockout.com forward slash podcast. And this is episode 66. So, if you’re just even the slightest bit curious, check out the link below Lindsey locket.com forward slash incest 1 0 1. And that will answer any other questions that you may have about the content of this workshop.

About nervous system work about my own personal story and my journey with my nervous system. And most importantly healing. So if that feels like a yes for you, click the link below to learn more and reserve your spot for nervous system 1 0 1, the cost of a ticket is $55. If $55 is too much for you, I do have a link that I can share that will get you $20 off the price. So you can get your ticket for $35.

And if you need that financial assistance, it is available for you. Just send me a DM on Instagram or you can email me. Hey, H E y@lindseylocket.com. And Lindsey is spelled with an E Y not in a way. Very important. All right with that said, let’s get into today’s episode with. Two time author caroline dooner she’s the author of the fuck it diet and her new book that is coming out in less than two weeks tired as fuck

Hello, Caroline. Welcome to the holistic trauma healing podcast. Hi Lindsay. I’m very excited to be here. Can you believe we’ve literally been talking for 45 minutes and I had just now hit record. I actually can. It’s, I don’t think it’s ever happened before this much, but I can believe it based on how we’ve talked in the past.

Yeah, for sure. So all secret stuff that no one’s allowed to know. That’s right. You can’t know about it. We didn’t record it. It’s exclusive. Okay, so I have been following you for. I don’t know a year maybe less six months maybe. Yeah, not very long. And I recently, like within the last three weeks finished your first book, the fuck it diet.

And I just want to tell listeners how I even came to read the fuck diet because I used to be in the toxic health and wellness culture, which is what I call it now of, always chasing symptoms, trying new diet restrictions, trying new supplement protocols, hopping from practitioner to practitioner, like always trying to figure out what the cause of these crazy chronic and mysterious health symptoms that I was having.

And then in 2019 going into 2020, I was like, I mean if kale, smoothies and probiotics and restricted diets had been what I needed to be I would have been like nobody was better than me at being strict with what they ate and in the name of healing. And you talk about that and the fucking diet that it’s like this lifestyle of health and wellness and food restriction and food purity, and all of that is really encouraged and celebrated in our culture.

It’s oh, look at what you’re doing to be healthy. You’re so healthy. So it’s perpetuated because we get rewarded culturally for being, and I also understand I do understand if someone is experiencing health problems, one of the first things they’re going to be told to do is to do all of these things and make all these changes with their food.

And be super restrictive. And I understand why one would try that. And some people do make those changes and do have improvement in their health. And sometimes it’s only temporarily and sometimes it really was the problem, but there are more people that really actually dig themselves into a hole and don’t actually, yeah.

Find the healing, but their promise. And that was definitely me. I feel like the more I went down, the rabbit hole, the sicker, I. Yeah. That happens a lot. Yeah. It was crazy. So like wellness culture did not make me well. So as I was like deconstructing from that everyone knows that I used to have a food blog and I did not want to even post new content on my food blog because I was like, I’m just done.

This is not me anymore. This I used to be the person that everyone came to ask oh, I have this symptom, what supplements should I take? What food should I restrict? What, how should I eat? That was me. I was the girl that people went to for that. And then it just didn’t resonate with me more.

And I found myself like, not wanting to even talk about food anymore and like being frustrated with people whenever they would ask me, cause it’s just is this all you think I am? This is all you think I am. And I know I’m saying that and I realized the irony of it because you have a new book coming out called tired as fuck.

That’s all about the burnout. You’re like burned out on talking about your first book and talking about, I know that, and that’s not even what the book is not talking about that burnout, but it is true. I am, it’s this thing where, it’s actually good news in a way that, I’ve been doing this.

I’ve been not dieting, actively, not dieting and writing about not dieting for 10 years. And I am so healed with it that I just like it. My brain just doesn’t even think about it anymore. And so it’s so difficult to post the content. The blog articles that I used to post and the Instagram posts that I used to post.

To try and, shit, get my message out there or share the book when it was coming out. It is so hard to do it because my brain just isn’t there anymore. And I know that there are people who follow me who are still like on their journey and they’re like, I wish you would post about it still, but it’s the good news is you’re going to get to a place soon where you don’t even want to think about it either, because that’s the thing.

And I’m sure you can speak to this from your own personal experience. And I know you’re mid journey, but the thing that keeps so many people dieting is this fixation with food and this obsession with food and this what I thought, what I experienced as a food addiction, I was positive that I had a food addiction because I could not stop thinking about food.

I could not control myself around food, I could, but then I would just go off the rails. Diets. I went on the harder, it became to stick to the diet and I was an incredible binge eater. And I would, I did all, I would binge off the diet, but I would also binge on the diet. I would binge on the allowed foods or the more snacky foods.

And it was just this horrible. I felt horrible about myself. I didn’t understand what was wrong with me because I cared so much. It was like, I dedicated my life to trying to heal myself through dieting. It mattered a lot to me. I had these health problems that I believed I could heal with food. It was like my number one life goal.

And I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t do it the way I wanted to do it. And yet still, like when I would look at what I was doing, I was sticking to the diet, even if I was like bingeing on almonds or whatever. And it did not have. At all. And so the thing that people find, the thing that no one will really, or that very few people will tell them is that food addiction for so many people, especially any sort of diet or anyone who lives in this culture, who has all of these subconscious beliefs about how they should be eating or giving them guilt over the way that they’re eating, once you step out of that cycle and truly feed yourself on a physical level and truly work through what I call mental restriction, all of the stress and fear and sheds and rules about food that makes it forbidden in a mental way.

And then the physical restriction makes it forbidden or not forbidden. It makes you quote unquote addicted in a literal, let’s say to your Lifeway, once you work through all that, you don’t give a fuck anymore. You can genuinely. Feed yourself. You be in my experience, you become more and more intuitive.

The more you go through the process and the beginning of it looks and feels a little imbalanced, which I’m sure you can speak to because I think you’re in that kind of stays right now, but like it, it gets to a point where you’re like, I would rather do anything else than think or talk about food and weight and dieting.

And that’s where I am right now. So that’s the good news. The bad news is got to figure out what else. Yeah, and I don’t want to spend too much time on the fuck a diet because I’m really excited to talk about your new book. That’s coming out in February called tired as fuck, which I love your abundant use of the word.

Fuck. Like my love language. But I remember, I don’t even know what was it like two months ago or something I reached out to you and I was like, Because we, you and I have been texting and like establishing a friendship for a few months. And so I reached out to you and I was like, look like I’m past the I love myself, eat whatever I want.

If I want to go to a restaurant, any cheeseburger and chicken wings and cheese curds, I do. I, there are some weeks now that I might only eat one vegetable that whole week, because the rest of the time I want to eat like chips or chocolate or, whatever. And so I was allowing the physical eating, but when you talk in the book, you were like, you should read my book because where I was getting stuck was even though I was allowing the food, every time I would eat it, there was still this voice in the back of my head.

That was like, you can’t sustain this, this is going to cause inflammation, right? You shouldn’t be eating this, better than. How long are you going to keep this up and expect that you won’t have health consequences? And I was gaining weight and I’m still gaining weight. And I never called the way that I ate when I was deep in health and wellness culture.

I never called it a diet. Like I was the lifestyle, it was a health, it was a fucking healthy lifestyle. So I didn’t call it a diet. And then the crate, like I’ve never followed eating disorder accounts. I didn’t really know anything about eating disorders. I’d never have even identified with that because I’ve always really loved food and I’ve always been a mostly small person.

And now here I am like 30 pounds heavier than I was in like a year and a half ago. And I know it’s because I quit eating so clean and I quit. I started eating gluten and dairy and sugar and fast food and processed food and food out of a box. And I just didn’t care anymore, but I still had that voice in my head.

And that’s what I’m still working through is that voice in my head. Wow. And it was so crazy whenever I realized like probably mid 20, 21, I was like, holy shit. I had an eating disorder. And I never, it never occurred to me before. Like culturally, we are told that’s good that obsession with exercise or eating quote unquote clean or quote unquote healthy or whatever you want to call it is good and responsible and what you should be doing and being obsessed with it is a responsible, wonderful thing.

How could it possibly be a disorder? What we don’t understand is so many people who consider themselves health nuts have a disorder and no, it’s not the textbook eating disorder that think of where you’re associated and don’t eat any food. That would be a version of anorexia. It’s usually some sort of.

People call it like ed nos, eating disorder, not otherwise specified or orthorexia, which is obsession with purity and toxins. And that’s one of the things that I experienced. And I want to say for anyone listening, who’s yeah, but like toxins are bad. Yeah. Toxins are bad. Like they are, but being super obsessed and afraid of food is also bad.

And so going through this healing, and also, I would say that processed foods may not be as bad as we think they are. And to get over that fear will help us get to a place where we can actually feel what our bodies want. And, but in the beginning, and by the beginning, that can be a couple of weeks to a couple years, depending on the person and what their body and their brain needs to get to a place that’s more balanced.

Eating food that even if we cerebrally are like, look, this is probably not going to kill me. This probably not going to hurt me. But I don’t think it’s like necessarily really extremely good for me. Like I can, I don’t need to lie to myself. There are a lot of antidote people who were like, every food is equal.

Like every single food that you eat is good for you. And I’m like, okay let’s, I understand why you’re saying that. You’re saying that for people with an eating disorder and yes, you could look at, okay this, weird, like tasty cakes still has like carbs and fat that your body can use and all of that.

And that’s true. But I actually think it’s insulting to people to be like, every single food is the same. It’s no, we fucking know that it’s not okay. We know that it’s not, but that doesn’t mean that. Letting go of that, like precious obsession with purity, with your food, isn’t going to be good for your mental health.

And then ultimately your physical health in the long run to get to a place where you’re not afraid of food, you’re not doing it for fear-based reasons, right? That’s really what’s happening. We’re eating in a way that is being stoked by fear. And we want to get to a place where we’re eating in a way that is healed and stoked by intuition and care.

And it’s impossible to snap your fingers and go from fear to care because there’s a literal physical healing process that has to happen. And then there’s this mental healing process that has to happen. And that’s why so many people don’t let themselves go through the process. Cause they’re like, shit, I’m taking away food rules and I want to eat the entire world.

And I’ve been doing it for a week and a half, or I’ve been doing it for three months and it’s still not changed. There must be something horribly wrong with me. I must actually be a food addict. I need to go back on a diet and then you’re never out of the cycle and you never. Yeah, so I have had I would say a surface level experience with what you just described because I’ve had this awareness of like food addiction.

Isn’t real, you can’t be addicted to something you need to survive. It’s like saying like you’re addicted to water or air breathe for a little while you’re going to be like desperate gasping for air, like literally bingeing on air. Cause you’re asking. So I haven’t, I’ve been like at a surface level of that and I’m still physically allowing myself to have the things, but I still definitely hear the mental voice the sheds, the critic.

And I know that even that mentality is still creating a state of restriction in my body. And so my body is going to keep I’m letting my body take over and then noticing how my mind is in response to it. So that’s been a tricky thing for me. My audience is never going to see me ad like recovering from an eating disorder to my profile on Instagram.

I’m not going to start making eating disorder content because I don’t have a fear of it or like a bad taste in my mouth. It’s just I don’t need that as an identity marker, but it was for sure, but it was pretty eyeopening to have this like gut feeling of I think I might have an eating disorder.

And then whenever I reached out to you and you were like, I can see you’re hung up on the mental aspect of things. I really think my book would help. So I read it and it was interesting to me how I got through parts of your book. And I was like, I’ve already done this. I’ve already done this. I’ve already done that.

And even you told me, you were like, I think you went on a spontaneous. Fuck it died. Yeah, for sure. You had all this anxiety about the process. And I was like, I do think that reading, it will validate your experiences. It totally did. And. Maybe answer some of your questions and fears about what’s happening and if it’s just you or you, this like lone crazy woman, who’s like eating all the food and gonna regret it one day and and make you understand that this is the process and it’s terrifying for everyone, I’m really curious what you thought about the emotional part, like the trauma part and the embodiment part.

I was like, you were speaking my language. That’s how I felt about. I was like, it’s so amazing how, what I do with my clients on a daily basis, not in the realm of food, usually how it translates. And and since I’ve read your book, I’ve had a couple of clients who are also like noticing that they’ve been in that restrictive health, nut, health freak, food fixation, if you food purity stage of their lives, and they’re wanting to let it go and I recommended your book to them and they’ve been like, oh my gosh, I love this book so much.

I feel like they’re like, I feel like she’s reading into my soul and writing this just for me. And I was like, I told you, you would love it. And I guess maybe this is a good next step into talking about your new book, but the bridge for me is that Listening to my body and my hunger and eating.

And even though I have this voice, that inner critic, that’s telling me this isn’t healthy. You’re going to cause inflammation. You can’t sustain this. How long do you think you can keep this up before you have high cholesterol? Like shit like that. It has actually in noticing that voice and just being aware of the voice and choosing not to listen to it like I’ve been in a restaurant hearing that voice and been like, okay, I hear it.

I’m eating the food anyway, I’m doing it anyway. But it’s allowed me to have a level of trust in my body that is even, I have a lot of trust for my body. So this isn’t even deeper level of trust that even if the food is quote unquote inflammatory, even if it causes weight gain, even if it’s high in cholesterol, even if it’s high in, in GMOs, even if it’s high in.

Plant oils or whatever, like the tie and all the no, no things I’ve been able to say, yes, I know that this food is probably not ideal, but I trust my body to handle it. Exactly. Exactly. And you’re in a state now with your nervous system where your body is probably able to handle all of the foods a lot more than it would have been able to handle that every single state, every single one.

Yeah. Even eating cheeseburgers, going to restaurants, like date nights with my husband and ordering like the pasta off the menu and not having a salad and maybe having a drink and always ordered, like I’ve already made a commitment to myself. If there is a dessert on the menu that I want, I will order it and I don’t care how full I am.

Because the other thing that I’m trying to invite in is plus. And that’s the mental piece too, like right now in the beginning, which you are in you’re in the beginning, you, or like maybe not the beginning phase, but you’re still in the phase of refeeding and recovery.

The mental is just as important as the physical, so actually proving to, because they’re connected, they are not two separate entities. They speak to each other. They, that the mental effects, the physical effects, the mental. So if there’s a part of us, if there’s a subconscious part of us, that’s I’m going to let myself eat food, but But I’m still gonna XYZ.

I’m still gonna follow these kinds of like subtle rules or, if this doesn’t work in six months, I’m going to go back to a diet. Your body knows that you’re thinking that, and your body knows that this is conditional and temporary. And so it’s going to act accordingly. It’s not going to actually allow your self to heal.

It’s going to keep you in this kind of nervous state that you’re going to put it on another famine, which is how the body is reacting. Especially if you’ve been on a lot of diets in the past, it’s oh shit, we’re in this kind of unsafe not abundant time. Like we better, we better wire this human that we’re protecting.

We better wire the body to be obsessed with food and to eat and pack on weight. So we don’t starve the next time the famine comes. So we’re trying to get out of that state. But the mental part is just as important. You have to build trust. You have to prove to your body. I’m really willing to.

Listen to you, I’m really willing to feed you. I’m really willing to challenge all of the, the fears that I have. And, I could maybe tell myself that eating dessert when I’m not hungry every single day for the rest of my life might not be the best thing for me to eat when I’m not hungry, but that’s not what you’re saying.

You’re saying, look, I’m proving to my fucking body that it’s not that precious. And it’s okay if I got really full sometimes or often, and there will come a time when you’re like, I’m allowed to eat that dessert, but I really don’t feel like it right now. Like it would make me feel better if I just waited a couple hours, maybe even yeah.

A hundred. And it will be easy as opposed to oh shit, is this, like you have to work through all of the old stuff. So it doesn’t feel like it. Triggering, literally triggering that diet trauma. And I really do believe that’s what we’re storing in our body is this diet trauma that has to be worked through.

Yeah. And not only diet trauma, but just like the inherent trauma that comes whenever you don’t trust your body and you’re not listening to your body. I think a lot of people really do underestimate the traumatic impact that their own thoughts, which they are reacting to and living from on a minute by minute basis is actually just as traumatizing in that it’s creating that constrictive fear state in your body, the same as if you were about to cross the street and a car almost hit you, like it’s, that’s like an instant, right?

That’s a moment. But every single one of these thoughts I shouldn’t do this though. This is going to make me so fat. Oh, this is so unhealthy. Like all of that, it’s all, it’s like little minute by minute. Trauma that’s still being stored on your body too. And it’s disconnecting you from yourself because somehow you have to live in this body and take care of it.

And at the same time, you have a mind that you can’t control, thinks up all kinds of crazy shit. And it’s almost it’s almost like you have to split yourself into two separate identities in order to make it work because the two don’t fit together and it divorces us from ourselves. Am I making sense?

Oh yeah, for sure. And then the other thing too, the other traumatic piece of this is truly like how cool people can be about weight gain. And that’s one of the things that we’re, that’s a trauma that actually can inspire this. Dysfunctional relationship with food that only further traumatizes us, especially when we can’t do it.

And we have these horrible, traumatic experiences of failing and, weight cycling and people commenting and, feeling super out of control, all of that’s traumatic, but it often starts with even just, if it’s not about us hearing someone say something cruel about someone else and you’re like I never want them to say that about me.

I better, that’s a huge piece and understanding all of that and what maybe we may be holding there and how we may need to work most likely need to work through that as well. It’s a lot to work. It’s no small thing, it’s not easy, but it is worth it. Yeah.

Yeah. So let’s go all the way into talking about your new book tiredness. Yes. I’ll tell you my kind of like mini story that ties together the fuck it diet and how it led to what became tired as fuck, but started with what I called two years of rest. So 10 years ago is when I started the fuck a diet and it was apifany that I had that I was never going to get out of the cycle.

I was going to keep bingeing. I was going to keep putting myself on diets. I was going to keep feeling this way. I’d already been doing it for 10 years, which, isn’t even that long compared to how so many other, how long, so many other people diet for decades and decades. But I was like hardcore.

This is my focus in life is healing myself from on a cellular level with perfect diets from when I was 14 to when I was 24 and I was 24. I had what I call an epiphany because it really was, it was like this deep understanding that my obsession with weight was actually the reason that I couldn’t heal my relationship with food because I’d tried, I tried intuitive eating, which I bastardized really quickly.

I thought it was still going to make me super skinny. And that was a big, that was a big barrier to truly healing. So I had this awareness, it was all intuitive. I had no science to back it up. I just had this weird feeling that if I could feed my body. I could get out of this crisis state that I was in and I could get to what I considered the other side that was a lot more trusting and calm and where my body trusted me.

And I trusted my body and my appetite was relatively stabilized compared to how it felt at the time. But I also started researching and I actually started by reading these fat activists books because though I am not fat and I never have been. Yes I’ve fluctuated extremely in my weight. I knew that if I was going to heal my relationship with food, I had to heal my relationship with weight and what better way to surrender to what my body wanted to look like then to read from people who had to do that in a way more extreme, experience than me.

So I started reading, I read these two books, almost called lessons from the Fatosphere one was called fat. So have not read them since I can tell you that they changed my life, but I couldn’t tell you like what’s in them at this point, except that it led me to what people refer to as health at every size.

And there’s a book called health at every size. And it’s written by a weight researcher named Lindo bacon. They They vowed when they they went to school to study weight science, to try and find a way to my God, this is going to be such a long story. I better see the south to try and find a way to lose weight and keep it off forever.

And what they found in the process was that. That just didn’t work, no matter what you did over time, your body would change your metabolism. It would fix it. You on food would do. It would have you binge would do all of these things that assure that you would gain the weight back. And, we always blame it on ourselves, but it’s actually this biological protective mechanism okay.

So she kept researching that. And when she graduated and began her like more intense research, she made the spout to not take any money from pharmaceutical companies, which allowed her to actually do research that no one else was doing and that no one else could it wasn’t making money. Most people are doing research with an agenda, there’s a product that they’re researching.

And so there’s bias and all of that, but. So she, so anyway, when I found that I was like, oh my God, because what it really shows is if you want to improve health, focusing on weight is like the last thing that you should do, you can improve health. Weight will do what it does. That’s really hard from a cultural lens.

But if we really want to take care of ourselves health habits and understanding that weight is not health is one of the most important things you can do. There’s so much, you can research this, you can read the book. There are so many people who research this further, but this for me was like, oh my God, I can’t believe this.

This is unbelievable. I need to write about this. I need to share this. No, one’s going to read it, but I just need to write about it for myself. I bought the fuck it diet handle. I started a blog. I started writing about my own journey and what I was researching. All of that became the fuck. A diet change.

My life unlearned so much shit worked through so much. I was a different person a couple of years after that way. Happier, better health, better. It didn’t spontaneously miraculously heal me from the inside out, but it did improve. Some of the things that I was trying to heal with extreme dieting that extreme dieting did not heal.

And five years into that, which was five years ago at this point, I found myself extremely burnt out. So it was this weird thing where like I had improved different parts of my health. I was sleeping better. I had a better menstrual cycle because my issue was PCOS and like super whacked out hormones that who knows whether I thought that it was coming from The way I was eating and my quote, unquote, food addiction.

And says, everyone says, PCO S if you do a low carb diet and like all these things that you’re going to heal, PCLs like, I know so many people with PCOS that are like going the diet route. Yeah. Because that’s what you’re told to do. And they link it to insulin resistance. So you’re like, okay, so you like need to go treat yourself like a diabetic and blah, blah, blah.

Meanwhile, there’s research that first of all, dieting almost always leads to weight cycling. Cause your body’s trying to bring yourself back up and then you try to lose weight again. And it goes up and down and up and down, and you have a horrible relationship with food. You’re gaining weight, losing weight, gaining weight, losing weight, which has been shown to be one of the worst things you can do for insulin resistance.

That is, that can cause insulin resistance. So you’re keeping yourself in this crisis state where your body’s ah, I don’t know if I’m going to ever get food or carbs again, and it’s gonna just you’re whacked out even more. Did my end. I wasn’t getting my period for almost 10 years. But I thought it was PCLs, which it may have been partially, but also could have been caused by be constantly trying to eat the smallest amount of calories and carbs possible.

And I never would have said that I was eating too much or, sorry, I never would’ve said that I was eating not enough. So that was what made it so difficult for me to except that my problem was restriction. Cause I thought my problem was bingeing, but not understanding that constantly putting herself back on a diet to make up for the binge is just still keeping herself in this crisis state.

So anyway, I’m backtracking and talking about the fucking diet, but it improved my health. And then I just started and it was a combination of burnout from my emotional and mental life that I had. Address. I ha I had unlearned all of the stuff about food and weight, but there was so much that I was still putting on myself and then I’d still take it on.

And still hadn’t even realized about everything else about and most, specifically about career stuff, because I was still living in New York city trying to be an actor and personal life stuff. I was feeling con every night that I w and I was so burnt out, but I felt so much guilt for wanting to stay home because I was single and I had to be going out.

And if I wasn’t, then it was all my fault and I was going to die alone. And. Very normal. I think a lot of people who are single feel that way and a lot of people have career pressure, but for whatever reason, it became really clear to me that I had been operating with this low grade anxiety and this guilt for at least 15 years since I was in high school, at least.

And that, that had been enough to. Burn me out. It was like, either you pop the tire really quickly and all the air comes out immediately, or you have a slow leak. And eventually you’re like, what the fuck is wrong with me? I can’t find any holes on my tire, but it’s been leaking out the whole time.

Or I compare it to a computer program, all of these, this guilt that I had for years, it was like this computer program that you don’t even realize is on. You’re not using it. You don’t even realize that it’s like taking up all of your fucking battery and ran, but it is, and it’s depleting you and you don’t even really understand why until.

Until you really get honest with yourself till one day, you try to turn on your computer and you have the light. Exactly. And so I was finding myself, feeling dread. I would look at my schedule and be like, I fucking hate everything that I have to do in the next two weeks. Like it mustard.

So it required me to muster more strength than I had and energy than I had. And I didn’t understand. I was like, what’s this doesn’t logically make any sense. If I compare myself to that woman who I know who’s a mother of two and a lawyer and, whatever, like she seems fine.

Like what the fuck is wrong with me? Why can’t I, why can’t I deal? Why can’t I, why am I so tired?

It hit me again. I had this epiphany and I also, it was the time. It was like the era of Marie Kondo of the life-changing magic of tidying up. And I was so obsessed with it. I loved it. I was like, all right, I’m going to, and I was doing a lot of energy work at the time and like trying to get rid of, and that’s what helped me identify oh, okay.

I have a lot of beliefs and a lot of fear and a lot of stuff to work through about all of these other areas of my life and expectations, and specifically and everyone’s going to have their own version of this, right? No one’s story is going to be exactly like mine, but people may be able to identify the ways that they have done this to themselves and the things that they have taken on.

But I I had always been. It pretty talented singer and actor ever since I was a child and everybody told me you were going to be on Broadway, you are going to do all these things. You’re amazing. You’re this fit. And I weirdly took it on and I was like, I have to live up to their expectations.

I have to live up to my potential and my, my my destiny and this is what I have to do. And at the same time I found it excruciating really anxiety inducing to constantly be going on auditions. And I really it was almost like that expectation made me the worst auditioner in the world because it was his perfectionism and there was no way to enjoy it.

It was just this it was like a, it was like like the biggest burden ever. And it’s tragic because it. Under different circumstances, it could have been a totally different experience, but it wasn’t. And it was this stressful thing I went to school for. I went to NYU for it. I got all this praise, but yet I couldn’t actually do it.

I couldn’t audition successfully. And your entire life, when you’re an actor is auditioning, I would be thrilled when I got a role and I could actually do the job, but really your life is going to four auditions a day, every day of your life. That’s what the job is. I hated it. And I just couldn’t admit to myself for such a long time that I was not living a life that was actually supportive to my peace and my happiness.

And that was one of, that was one of the factors that had depleted me for 15 years, the personal stuff too. And it just became so clear. I am forcing myself to live a life that is making me miserable. That is making me absolutely fucking exhausted on a level that is impossible to even explain to people because it’s this like subconscious existential thing, it’s this slow leak that no one could see.

I couldn’t even see it, but it was happening. And I was like, really? Like I had trouble keeping my eyes open, like talking to people, like I was exhausted and I was filled with fucking dread and it was like, I hit a wall where I was like, I can’t, I cannot keep living like this. And because I’d been doing all this decluttering of my stuff, which was awesome.

It was so I loved it. I loved decluttering so much. I love it so much. And to me it immediately, I, it was symbolic, right? There’s all this energetic stuff that she talks about in the book. If you’ve read it, the life changing magic of tidying up. But to me immediately, I was like, oh, I’m holding on to expectations, jobs pressure that I’ve put on myself or taken on that is going to energetically deplete me and weigh me down until I let go of those things.

And it was this it was so odd at the time. And I was doing all this energy work that was like, meant to process out limiting beliefs and like PR. And so I was like, I have to get rid of what I’m doing. Like I have to declutter the way I’m living. Not just my stuff, not just my closet. I have to do.

I have to get rid of the things that I’m forcing myself to do that I do not have to do that. I’ve told myself I had to do that. Don’t spark fucking joy and. And I said, I’m going to go on two years of rest. And I know that sounds like a crazy thing. And everyone always says, how could I possibly not work for two years?

I did work. I worked during my two years of rest, but I turned my life on its head. I moved cities. I moved out of New York. I moved to Philadelphia, which is a significantly cheaper city. I was doing a lot of freelancing at the time. And I was doing a lot of forcing myself to be an actor. At the time I decluttered all of the stuff that I hated.

And I was like, this, these couple things are the things that I’m going to keep doing to make money because those things I actually enjoy. Those things are fun for me. Those things feel like they’re leading to what I want to do now. It was me decluttering, all acting stuff and being like, I’m going to really focus on the, fuck it diet.

I’m already making money running these workshops. And I’m writing the book now and I’m gonna, I had all this creativity. All this stuff that I was excited to do, but in order to even have the time to do it and the energy to do it, cause I was so fucking burnt out. I had to get rid of so much and I had to, for me, and I talk about, when people are like, how can I do this?

How, do I have a, do I have to do what you did? No, nobody should do what I did. They should check in with where they are, what they need, what they’re forcing themselves to do the kind of rest that they need. Some people only need rest from work. Some people only need rest from crazy social life that maybe they need a little bit of a break from.

Some people need more social lives. Some people need that people need all different sorts of rest. And of course the rest that I’m talking about is not only physical, like actually doing less, but that mental fuckery that like mental exhaustion of the guilt that I felt when I let myself rest, I didn’t even realize that I never ever.

Actually let myself rest. If I, if ever I stayed home from going out or stayed home from going to an audition, it was like, oh my God, what’s wrong with me? Like the guilt, like this, like squeeze of oh, I hope that this doesn’t ruin my life. It was constant. And I had no idea that it was in, it was like happening totally unconsciously, but it took for me to recognize that was happening and then say, okay, I need a very significant amount of time.

I chose two years. I knew it didn’t have to be two years. It could be longer. It could be shorter, but I just needed to give myself that, like that space, that time that container, if you will, to allow myself radically to say no to do less. And to not feel guilty for doing less, because just the, fuck it diet where you need this very significant period of recovery.

And refeeding where on a physical and mental and emotional level, you need to like overhaul and let yourself like the pendulum swings, right? You’ve super restrictive for a long time. The pendulum is gonna swing to the other side before it ever looks, something like balance. And it was super clear that that’s what I have to do with my exhaustion.

I have to radically do as little as I possibly can. No, I can’t just go to a resort and lie on a float in a pool for two years. And I don’t even think that would have been, yeah, that might be like nice for a little while, like for the physical part. But what I needed to learn was all the shit that I was doing in my brain.

I needed to learn how to have a more restful life and a kinder way of relating to myself in the real world. Like where I had to navigate. Am I going to say yes to this job opportunity or to this social thing? Cause I needed social Russ too. I needed to say no to everything that felt a pleading to me, cause so much felt to pleading to me in the beginning.

And so I had this time and a shit ton happened that first year I bought a house. I accidentally got three acting jobs because I had all these contacts in Philadelphia. And then I was like, oh what I really wanted a break from was auditioning. But I do like doing shows. So maybe I should do these.

So it was doing so much that first year of rest. But every moment that I had the opportunity to say no to something that I would have unconsciously just said yes to, or said no to, but felt guilty about, which was a lot of what I did. I was very dedicated to prioritizing rest. Not only physically rest, actually doing less.

Being very aware of when I felt that guilt, I felt that anxiety asking myself the next question. Okay. So what’s the belief that’s under this? What is the subconscious expectation or belief or should that is causing me to feel guilt? For instance, it was a lot of like scarcity stuff, right? Oh, if I say no to this thing, no one’s ever going to ask me to do anything ever again, or it means that I’m, a re a stupid lazy recluse who’s never going to have anything hot.

Like I had all of these beliefs about what it meant that I was tired and what it meant that I was taking this time. But luckily I, just like the, fuck it diet. I had this very strong, intuitive sense that this was something that I really needed and happy to report like the fucking diet. It was a healing phase.

I still think rest is important and amazing. And I have a new perspective on like why we do the things we do and why I do what I do and all of this stuff. And I’m very comfortable with downtime now in a way that I was never before, but it did what I needed it to do. And that it took a little longer than two years.

I was still tired at the end of the two years. And I knew that could be the case. It was a total random amount of time that I’d chosen. But I knew that one year wasn’t going to be enough. I just knew it. Also I was 28, turning 30 in two years, and I was trying to do like the opposite of what society would have told me to do, which is make sure you’re like engaged in two years and make sure that you’re like really impressive on paper.

By the time you hit 30. And I was like, I know that’s super toxic thing that I could easily do to myself. And I’m going to deliberately do the opposite. But at 31 ish, I really felt like a different person. I think. Way less tired and way more genuinely excited to do things. And because I had created that vacuum, I was actually going to start doing things that I genuinely enjoy doing.

And then COVID hit. Fuck COVID man. Fuck it. That’s gonna be your third book. Fuck. Seriously. I bet it’ll still fucking be going on by the time it comes out in four years. Yeah. Okay. A couple of my thoughts on that, first of all, as you were just describing all of that so beautifully, I was like, you could easily have named your book, like how to live life for human design projectors.

Oh, that’s so interesting. So interesting because I didn’t know anything about human design back then, but I don’t know when I maybe a year ago someone told me to look it up and I was like Oh, interesting. Yeah. I still don’t know a lot. I’m a projector as well. You’re a pro are you an emotional projector or are you splitting projector?

I asked me that before and I can’t, my only answer was to send you my entire chart. I think that I’m like an ego projector or something. Projector let’s sound so bad. Yeah. They could have named it differently. It sounds awful. I’m projecting my ego everywhere, but that’s not what it means, right? No, it’s not what it means.

Yeah. I feel like your book could be like, tired as fuck subtitle, how to live life. If you’re a human design projector, because everything that you’re describing is like exactly what projectors struggle with. I know a lot of people who aren’t projectors struggle with it as well, but I think we all have expectations that we’ve taken on, but some people may be able to operate in a different.

Mode, like some people, maybe some people aren’t as likely to burn out the way I was though doesn’t mean that they can’t burn out. I just really, yeah. Okay. And then the second observation is so I’m in my business or like my model of healing or whatever. I have these four pillars of holistic trauma healing and what I have found for myself and in talking with other people and in following other people is that healing is a mostly subtractive process.

It’s not about adding more things. It’s mostly subtractive. So you’re taking away everything that isn’t you, that doesn’t resonate. That isn’t true. Like you’re taking all of that away. So it’s mostly subtractive. So I have these four pillars. For my business and this is the journey that I try to guide all of my clients on.

And it’s my framework for how I structure workshops and courses that I write. And all of it, these are, this is my plan, for my business. And that is that the only thing that you increase in the healing process is your awareness and consciousness. That’s the only thing that increases everything else is a reduction.

So pillar one, Lindsay, that’s so good. So good. So pillar one is increased awareness and consciousness, but pillar two is. You got to reduce brain inflammation because trauma literally makes your brain inflamed and causes inflammation, your brain, and that trickles down into your nervous system and just helps, dysregulate your nervous system.

You also have to reduce nervous system dysregulation. So you got to fucking learn how to slow down and how to breathe and how to regulate yourself when you’re feeling dysregulated. But that requires awareness. And then the fourth one is reducing lifestyle inflammation. And what you just described sounds like you were in this two and a half year process of being like, I am fucking reducing my lifestyle implants.

Yeah. You didn’t know this about my business. Cause I, this is the first time I’ve ever shared it publicly. But yeah, the L the lifestyle inflammation is it’s like, what is in your life that you keep saying yes to that? You need to say no to is it a toxic relationship?

Is it a job that you absolutely fucking hate that you force yourself to go to every single day? Do you need to hire a house cleaner? Because you don’t have time to clean your house and your time would be better spent doing something you love do you have friendships that are not hell yes for you that you always find yourself like fawning for them and people pleasing them and never feeling like you’re adequate enough?

Like practical things. Are you drinking a lot? Are you smoking a lot? That’s lifestyle inflammation too, right? So what is in your life that needs to come out? And I often find actually that the lifestyle inflammation piece is the hardest one. Of the puzzle for everyone because everyone’s oh yeah I’ll learn how to do breath work.

And I’ll learn how to, do tapping or shaking or cold plunges or whatever I need to do to regulate my nervous system. Sure. Yeah. I’ll take some fish oil and start reducing inflammation in my brain. Easy I’ll practice awareness and consciousness. I’ll read head, heart toll. Like I’ll do all these things, but like you better not tell me that.

I got to get out of this relationship that I’m terrified of losing or that I need to quit this job that I hate, but it’s all I have to pay my bills. Don’t tell me that, because that is something I cannot do. And when I, it interesting because that is going to inherently, I I understand it’s not that I don’t get it light, lightly, brutal, but that’s going to inherently keep you in a traumatic state like it is right now.

Yeah. I’m hearing you saying, reduce your lifestyle inflammation like Marie Kondo your lifestyle. And then what’s interesting based on what you just said. Like before that point, I was super, super dedicated to becoming more embodied and processing out a lot of my trauma. That had been something that I was already doing and it was amazing, but I was still burnt out.

And so the next thing was the lifestyle. Yeah. Crazy. So cool. Yeah. It just makes me to me, it’s just really affirming. Cause it’s it can be called anything, but the principle of the same, right? The is totally the same. And it, for me, it was a radical lifestyle shifts, intentional choices where I had to be like, I cannot keep making the same choices of my life that got me to where I attempted suicide on March 7th, 2019.

Like I didn’t have a bad life, but there were some things in my life that really needed to be cleaned out. I mean like my marriage for one, like we went through a really intense period where we were like, we don’t know if we’re going to be together or not anymore. We might need to get a divorce.

In order to clear out that piece of lifestyle inflammation, like we had to hire a relationship coach and we had to go through some really intense healing because it was like, even though we love each other, the relationship that we have is creating some inflammation in our lifestyle that we can’t keep saying yes to.

Because if, even if you’re not conscious that it’s creating lifestyle inflammation, if you have that feeling or that, I call it a holy discontent. Like I think having this discontent for a job that you really hate and that doesn’t feed your soul, even if it puts food on your table it’s it’s fine to be grateful that you have that source of income and also have this holy discontent, this is not for me.

Yeah. And that’s all, that’s a huge chunk of your life to give to something that makes you miserable. Fuck really is, what’s interesting too. And I talk about this in the book. And I’m careful about it because I know it can be triggering to people who are going through their own version of the fuck it diet or people who are dealing with orthorexia.

But I was five, six years into the process. And not only was I burnt out in this like existential way, but I could tell that there was something wrong. Like I could tell that I had some sort of like chronic illness and I already had PCOS, but I could tell that this was like a different, like thing going on.

And by total synchronicity and I always I let go of my like health obsession. That was something I’ve really had to do with the beginning of the bucket diet. Like my health perfectionism was keeping me stuck in the cycle and it was clear to me in the beginning of the fuck a diet the first couple of years that like I had to let go of that perfectionism.

I had to be okay with not having this perfect health that I always saw it and find joy and understand that. There’s more nuance here when we’re looking at health. Like mental health is a huge piece of this and everything. So I let go of all the purity based stuff. And I still live in a very I trust that my body can handle.

I know that there’s shit and all this, I know that there’s shit in the environment and we’re, we live in a toxic world. I don’t like it. I’d love to do what I try to do what I can. And I’m going to talk about this in a second to actually support my body, to be better at getting that stuff out.

Because I actually think I’m super impaired. Like I have these genetic mutations, you talked about this recently. I had the MTHFR, so I’m really bad at detoxing. And a lot of anti diet people also be like, you don’t need to detox. You have a liver. And it’s yeah what am I? My fucking liver hurts.

And I can’t do it at the beginning of my rest. I could not drink a glass of wine with. Liver pain. And I was like, oh, I thought it would go away. I didn’t know if it was connected. And then I was like, okay, this isn’t, something’s not right. This is not good. And I started working with this with this amazing doctor, super integrative doctor.

And I knew that my mother had heavy metal toxicity, which is passed down in utero. And so if your parent has heavy metal toxicity, you probably do too. I think most people do. Some people are better at detoxing than others. So some people have more buildup, et cetera. So I started doing like a heavy metal detox protocol.

Cause I was like, it was like, okay, am I burnt out or do I have chronic fatigue or both? And I basically had both, so I need. And I was like being super careful about it because I’d gone down this path before of I’m going to heal, like of, they get everything on them and it, I’m going to be like this healthy person.

And I was like, I’m going into this with a totally different energy and a totally different perspective. I don’t know what kind of health I’m going to be able to achieve. I have no idea, but I know I need to slow down on a physical level. Like I know that I’m burnt out physically, and that can’t be good for my health.

And that can’t be good for my body’s ability to detox or my immune system. But if there are little things that I can do without going on a major, crazy diet I’m going to do them and I’m going to see if they help. And so I did a shit ton of stuff to try and get heavy metals out. And it was really painful and horrible.

I like basically my health got worse before it got better. And I could tell that it was like, it was a really bizarre experience. And I ha, and then basically I was diagnosed with chronic Epstein-Barr, which is like chronic fatigue and liver inflammation. And so I went to all of these, I went to a million Western medical doctors who basically were like, I have no idea what’s wrong with you?

Do you, maybe you have aids. And I was like, okay, didn’t have, they they don’t know, this is, my issue with one of my many issues with cluster medicine. It’s yeah, it’s great. If you get into a car accident, but they don’t know. Pretty much anything else. It turns out.

So it was like this journey of reducing, like that was reducing brain inflammation in a way, on a heavy metal level, and I, 1000000% did not get everything out. I essentially had to stop the process after a year and a half. Cause I was getting such horrible headaches. Cause my body was in like purge mode and I would take these like supplements, like kill.

Like I ha I had a parasite infestation too. And I was like, and that is tied in with heavy metals because parasites like almost have a symbiotic relationship with you. Cause they like, they take in heavy metals. But then they also take all your like nutrients and can make you exhausted and fuck up your sleep.

And then when you kill them, it releases all the, these like all the stuff is horrible. It was horrible. And because I write the fuck, it does. And I knew that it would be triggering for people to talk about what I was going through. I was just like saying nothing about it. It was like my own little journey.

I was figuring out how to do it and not become obsessed with it, but I also was like really fucking sick. And like I needed, I wanted to get to a place where I was a little better. Anyway. Eventually, I was like, I have to stop doing this. Like I’m like in so much pain, like it’s so hard to like, take these parasites supplements and know I’m going to feel really sick.

And I did that and I was like, in the beginning I was like, oh, and I’ll, this’ll be like a two week thing. And then it’s just went on and on forever. So I actually like two weeks to stop the spread right. A little bit. So I I stopped. I was like, I just, I need to relax th this is actually after my two years of rest, I was like, okay, I’ve had the two years of rest I’ve done.

I’ve said no to all these things. I’ve, I’ve done all this stuff on my own subconscious on my own beliefs and my own, all this stuff have decluttered so much of my life. I have a job that I like so much more nog. So many things in my life were better. And I’ve been. Fucking like killing parasites for a year and a half and like feeling horrible.

And I need to stop that because it’s just too much. So I stopped and it took a little while and I started feeling normal again. And my health was so much better. Cause it was like this burden thing. It was like, it’s like the bucket theory, right? Where like your body can handle a lot, but if you overfill it and it’s trying to handle too much or it’s too overloaded or too, there’s too, you can’t detox all this stuff.

And you’re impaired because you have this genetic mutation, like you’re going to get sick. Oh, I got, had low grade fevers all the time. That’s what made me know that was the absent bar, liver inflammation, low grade fevers, all the time, horrible headaches and chronic fatigue. That was like also going on as I went into my two years of rest.

So once I was like, I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep like doing this extreme, like detox and healing thing. I need to just stop. I stopped and I felt so much better because Had a less of a burden. So it was this really weird perspective to have to be like, okay, still anti diet. I did not diet the entire time did not die at, at all.

And I was so afraid that the doctors I saw. Put me on diets. And for whatever reason, even though they were like super holistic, they didn’t. I told one of them that I was had an eating disorder and, or I was recovered from an eating disorder. So unless they could tell me with full certainty that the change that they wanted me to make was definitely going to help me.

I didn’t want to do it. She was like, okay, totally fine. So I didn’t do anything. I did cut out gluten for six months. Cause I was like, what if I don’t want to be blinded by my own biases? What if I’m having some sort of auto-immune thing and I don’t know. And it’s, so I cut it off for six months.

Didn’t do shit added it right back in same thing with coffee, cut it off for six months. Horrible withdrawal. Like finally got to a place where I was not, I did not need coffee anymore. And I was like, nothing is literally nothing is better except that my mornings are significantly more boring.

So I patted it back in. That was the only dietary change that I made the entire time. Everything else was like herbs and stuff. But like way better health. And that was like, that was this thing where I have this very nuanced perspective on diet and healing and toxins and orthorexia, because I do fucking believe that toxins and heavy metals can make you really sick.

Not everyone, but me. It made me really sick and it was like one of the things that didn’t allow, it’s an interference it’s just like what you were saying, like you have to get productive. I had to get rid of the stuff that was like toxic in my fucking brain and tissues in order for my body to even be able to like, be normal.

Yeah. Like it was like an interference. It’s one of the things that’s one of the doctors that I worked with, they call it interferences like interferences to health. It’s like a parrot sites or interference to health. It’s like literally like taking from you. So yeah. Try and get rid of them. So it’s not interfering with your body is magical.

Your body can heal itself. But if you have trauma that you haven’t processed, for instance, you’re not going to be able to, it’s not going to be able to same thing with all this other stuff. Same thing with chronic dieting. If you’re chronically in this crisis state, your body’s not able to heal your body’s oh my God.

Okay. We’re starving. Okay. You have to get out of your own way. Anyway, that was a really long tangent. So great. I appreciate that. I appreciate the tangent. And yeah. So something that I’ve been talking a lot about lately is learning your body’s yes. And your body’s know, and listening to your body.

And if your body says no to something, then it’s, it has to be a no. And it doesn’t matter if you’ve got FOMO or if people think you’re inconveniencing them, or if people think you’re selfish or if you’re going to miss out on something really fun, or if it’s popular or if everyone else is doing it, like none of those are good reasons to override or ignore when your body is like saying no.

Do you have a super concrete? Yes and no, because I think my yes-no is so vague that it takes, we’ve talked about this before. Remember how we’ve done minus I definitely have it. I believe I’m an extremely intuitive person, but mine. Really hard to identify in the moment and way hard, way easier to identify after this.

It’s more like into the process where I’m like, Ooh, this is a node. This is another. Yeah, no, it depends on what it is. There are some things that as soon as it’s presented to me or as an option, like I can feel a very deep yes or a very deep, no, there are some, and again, I think this goes back to trauma healing.

Like when you’re in a chronically traumatized state, meaning your nervous system is dysregulated all the fucking time, then I think your nervous system is more likely to, or your thought process is more likely to be like very binary. So like it’s either yes or it’s no. So like you don’t have the nervous system capacity to even entertain the.

Maybe, or I’ll just wait I don’t know right now, but I’m comfortable with waiting and not having certainty. And I can make this yes or no decision later. So the more back in touch I’ve gotten with my body and the more that I’ve learned to listen to my body, instead of being afraid of the sensations and symptoms that my body sometimes talks to me with, the more I have been able to be comfortable with, not having the urgency to make a yes or a no.

The second. Yes. That re that resonates with me a lot. I have to do a lot of, I have no idea, but I believe that I will eventually. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s all, and that’s all that it is. And I’m an emotional projectors. So I’m still learning like the way I make decisions is I have to ride the waves.

So I’ll have a big high wave and then a big, low wave. And eventually it evens out and that’s when I’m in a better place to make a decision. But sometimes with no emotional wave at all, I can feel like, Nope, this is a hell no, for my, for me, for my body this is a hell no, or this is a hell.

Yes. So yeah, no, I know. I have to remember what and his desire base, like I almost feel like this magnetic, like I’m trying to I might be wrong. I don’t know how to put words to it, but I feel like mine is emotional. I feel like I feel a lot and I feel like that’s a way that I navigate the world a lot, but I also feel, and I even feel this with like food and this is something that I used to talk about a lot.

And I haven’t talked about. Since, and I don’t think I really talk about it in the fuck a diet, which surprises me actually, but I can, I used to do this thing in the beginning of healing, my relationship with food, when I was like, I’m allowed to eat anything, I’m allowed to eat as much as I want, but I don’t know what I want.

I was like, put a shit ton of stuff on a plate, like so much different stuff on a plate. And I would sit down and I would like to start to eat all of it. And I would try to pay attention to my, when my body was like, no, I don’t, that’s not what I want. That’s not what I want. And it was like it was this kind of thing where I do talk about how like, cravings are intuition and I was really trying to lean into.

How cause what is a craving other than intuition, it’s not concrete, and I was specifically applying it to food though. I think you could probably apply it to a lot of different things, which is why I’m saying desire based like, when I’m like, Ooh, oh, I don’t want to do that. Yeah.

And then of course you need to ask yourself like, oh, is this a, is this trauma or is this intuition? And that’s that’s the big question. But I would eat all of these things and like I would, and I would talk about like a magnetic pull towards things too. Not just food, like where, especially when I was resting and super burnt out was fascinating to notice.

The times when I just said yes, and I was super excited to do something, I was like, whoa, that’s so telling. And that’s intuition. Then I’m just saying, yes, that’s the best feeling. And then what’s opposite of that. What’s the opposite. Yeah. So I haven’t figured it out, but it’s something I’m fastened, like so fascinating.

Yeah. Yeah. And you know what happens? I post about this on Instagram too, the other day. What happens when my body’s yes or my body’s no, is quote going against science, what about then? And it’s so nuanced and it’s so complex. And the other thing that I finally remembered I was going to say is a question that I get quite a lot, whenever I’m talking about listening to your body’s.

Yes. And your body’s no. And not giving into fear when you’re making decisions and making the decision from a grounded place is what if I actually do have something medically wrong with me? What if listening to my body and there’s like really something wrong, then what?

And I’m like obviously go to the doctor, get checked out, obviously a doctor and also You can like, I think people think it’s one of the other, I think people are like if I’m listening to my body, then I’m, I can’t go to the doctor, which is a no, your body may tell you to fucking go to the doctor.

And the intuition may tell you to go to war. Your intuition may tell you something is wrong. That’s what happened to me. I was like, Hey, I’m burnt out. This is all intuition. No one told me you’re burnt out and you have something terribly wrong with you. And there are people who have liver pain. And I have to assume I was thinking this the other day, no one ever talks about having liver pain.

And I wasn’t that sick, there has to be other people who have liver pain and just, no one’s talking about it, or why was I extra aware of it? But nobody said, these symptoms mean that you’re sick and no one said this experience means you’re burnt out. It was my intuition that told me, and it was my intuition that said that something was wrong.

Something is wrong with me physically. I would like to gently see. Yeah, but that’s the end, but that’s the end. That’s what I’m saying. That’s the grounded, body-based intuitive knowing that you bring into a situation where something really might be medically wrong. Is that I feel deep within my body that I do need to get this thing checked out.

I do need to seek assistance in some way. Whereas like where I was before I knew how to listen to my body and my body was doing all kinds of weird things and it was freaking me out, like in 2018 and 2019, I went to the ER, four separate times for something that was not life threatening. But because I was so out of touch with my body, anything, my body did felt like a threat to my life, or it felt because it’s doing this, that must mean I have cancer, or that must have hyper-vigilance right.

Totally hypervigilant. But if I had been able to be with those sensations in my body and not panic and need to make this urgent decision to do something, I could have sought out medical help from a grounded place of self-love. And just I’m listening to my body and I’ve done what I can do to support it myself.

And now I’m feeling like I probably need to go get this checked out and to have gone through that process without the urgency. And without the fear, like you can still seek medical help for your body and do it from a non-urgent grounded, non fearful. Yeah. And even there’s so much that goes into, when you see a doctor feeling out whether they are actually the right doctor for you.

I went to a lot of doctors where I was like, no understand what’s going on with me. Yeah. Yeah. I’ve had that experience as well. If I get bad vibes from somebody, I don’t care how many degrees they have hanging on their wall. Nope. You’re a no, for me it doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t be a great doctor for someone else, but not for me.

So when does tire to spot come out? So simple? I don’t know. When is this coming out is going to come out. This is going to come out on January 23rd. Oh my God. February 8th. So if I could do fast math, that sounds like two weeks from when this comes out. Amazing. Crazy. If like in the interim people can pre-order yes, you can.

Pre-order and because pre-orders help authors so much. And I like to explain why, because if I don’t explain why people are like, I don’t understand, but all pre-orders count as the first week of sales. So if there’s any chance, and I don’t know that there is a chance with this book, but if there is any chance to get on one of those national bestsellers, which is a huge Uplevel, it’s like you would get it’s a huge career level and it’s free marketing and all that, everyone wants that.

That’s your best chance because it’s by rate of sale per week. So if you get a lot of pre-orders and it’s all counted as that first one, So as opposed to ordering it, like the second week it’s out, which is great. It’s all great. It’s all good. But it’s so much more helpful to order it before it comes out.

And if you do, pre-order a tired as fuck. I have these thank you bonuses to offer everyone who has pre-ordered. Cause I really am so thankful when people do pre-order and you can find all. So actually if you go to the, fuck it, diet.com/tired, you can sign up to read the first chapter of the book for free, which will give you a sense of what the book is going to be about.

You get to see the table of contents. You’ll get to see my writing style. See if you even like. And then the email that you’ll get that gives you the the excerpt, that first expert will also give you the link to get pre-order bonuses. So if you do, pre-order, you’ll click that link. You can also go to the fucking diet.com/fun.

That’s the link for the pre-order bonuses, and you just need to screenshot the proof of purchase and sign up and send the proof of purchase through the Google form. And then like within 24 ish hours, we’ll check like crosscheck and then send you the bonuses. And it’s like author commentary on the fucking diet for anyone who’s read the fuck a diet or interested like my experiences actually like writing the book and getting the book deal and the things I want it to be in the book and the things that my stupid editor said before.

I got a different editor and all this stuff I also, no one who’s listening to this will care, but I’ve been talking on my Instagram. Lindsey knows that I, one of the things I talk about in my, both of my books is how humongous my boobs were and how that was for me, your story about your boobs.

It’s so upsetting. I know. So I was all traumatized when my humongous boobs semi-skilled my relationship with my boobs. So it was a big part of my fucking diet, like just having these huge G H boobs, accepting it, buying bigger bras, buying, bigger shirts, whatever, just this past year I got a breast reduction and I’ll tell you, I did not listen to my intuition going into that.

And I could’ve told you, but I was like Stockholm syndrome with the insurance company and all this stuff. And it’s so everyone who I’ve shared that with and that it’s essentially I’m really unhappy with the results. I. I write about that. That’s one of the bonuses. I don’t, again, I don’t even know why I’m sharing that with, but people will get that.

It’s one of the cause I don’t it’s I’m still like, honestly processing it. I’m like so upset about it. And so sharing everything that I think about it on Instagram is like something that I just didn’t want to do, but it was therapeutic to write about it. And so I share all of it.

It’s so long. I can’t even believe it. It’s like this entire boot socket and it’s relevant. Like it’s talking about body acceptance and intuition and all this stuff. What else? I have these email series that like, I used to have all of these like offerings, an email series and all this stuff that you can opt into as a thank you.

Bonus one on intuition, one, I’m actually on the fuck it diet. It’s like the fuck it diet self study. And I sent all the fucking diets, self study emails, all these, all this other stuff. That’s not in the book. You’ll be invited to a exclusive launch event that you can only like all this stuff. So if.

You’ll get all that. Just pre-order the book. You can cut part of that out. That wasn’t really any of it. Allie. She just gave you like 25 good reasons to, pre-order a tired as fuck. And let’s just all manifest for Caroline that she’s going to be on a bestseller list, right? Doing your parents, do your part to manifest this for me.

Awesome. I know I’m like in the M in the that’s what I want, but like now we’re getting so close to I might need to let it go. All that stuff. Oh, mean, yeah. Yeah. Practicing non-attachment and emotional reality. It never gets easier. It never is meant for me. I’m open to it. What the fuck am I supposed to write next?

Will I be, when will I be officially canceled? All that stuff. Ooh. Yeah. Yeah. I’ll probably be right behind you whenever it happens. Just to wrap up, is there anything else that you wanted to say today that you didn’t get to say? Does anything feel? I don’t think so. I think I said a lot. I’m sure I forgot to say something, but if you want to follow me on Instagram, I’m at the fuck a diet for now.

I’m always considering whether I should change it to my name though. My like plain name is taken by some middle-aged lady in Dublin and she won’t respond to my idea. She doesn’t even use the account. But if I do change it, I’m always going to have the fuck a diet account that will lead to. Wherever I am.

So you can find me at the fuck it diet. You can read the beginning of the fuck it diet. If you’re interested in that, you can read that for free by going to the fucking diet.com/book. And you can read the beginning of tired as fuck by going to the fuck it. diet.com/tired, tired. Oh, okay. I will tell everyone, go read the fuck it diet as well.

Just order the fuck it, diet it. I promise it’s fun. It’s easy. It’s like easy read. Funny. You’re funny. And it isn’t easy read. I read it in no time at all. It’s good bedtime reading or airplane reading or beach reading. Like it’s a really good and I’ve recommended it to clients and they loved it too.

And yeah, and it, just the exercises that you have throughout the book, the journaling things and the brain dumping and all of that is it’s work that I do in my work anyway. Like it’s all trauma healing work. Sometimes your trauma is food-related and sometimes it’s sexual and sometimes it’s like religious and, but the practices for healing are all the same.

I think I’ll never forget when you were sending me all those voice memos that you were sending me about your relationship with food before we’d ever talked. Like it’s funny we were following each other, but because I don’t post about the fuck it diet as much you didn’t even really know like what the fuck it diet was, understandably and that’s really shows me how terrible I’m doing with marketing, but I also didn’t I didn’t identify, I still don’t identify with. So you were telling me all these things and like talking about things. That were very intuitive and so aligned with the fucking diet and also asking these questions that were like questions that everyone I’ve ever talked to or worked with has asked and questions that I address in the book and all this stuff.

And you have this perspective on trauma and healing, trauma, and embodiment. That is, I think, unique to the book as far as anti diet books go. And I was like, Lindsay, you’re gonna you’re gonna really like this book actually up your alley. I feel like I can say that with, yeah. You’re a hundred percent.

I loved it. I loved every part of the book and the whole way through, I was like yes. Amen. Yes. And then you got to the mental chapter. And a couple of times I was like, fuck, man. She’s like reading my thoughts. Like she has opened my journal and she has actually read from it. And she is now writing about it in this book.

But like past the time-space continuum. Because you wrote it, how many years ago did you write it? Right? 2017. 18. Yeah. So yeah, you retroactively through the time-space continuum, broke into my journal, read it and then you have that chapter. Exactly. That’s exactly what I did. Okay. Love. Oh my God. Amazing. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So fun. This has been over two hours of talking to Lindsey lock desk. It’s been a good time.

All right. Y’all you know what to do next? You gotta go. Pre-order Caroline’s newest book, tired as fuck. It is linked below in the show notes. On Spotify, apple podcasts, wherever you listen to podcasts, just scroll down or tap the description and you will find the link to pre-order her book. Let’s just manifest her getting on a bestseller list of some sort.

With all these pre-orders like, I want that for her. I want this success for her. Um, and highly, highly recommended. If you have not read the fuck it diet already that you get a copy of that, that book will be linked below as well. And one more tiny little reminder to get your ticket for nervous system 1 0 1, the workshop that’s coming up on February 2nd.

At 6:00 PM. You can find the link below to get your ticket for $55. Um, it’s a two hour live workshop. If you can’t attend live, you will still receive the replay. If you can’t attend live, you will still receive the replay either way you get the replay. And I’m so excited to teach this life-changing nervous system, regulating information again, and so grateful to Caroline for having this amazing chat with me on the podcast today. And congratulations, Caroline, about your new book. So proud of you. And that is all i have for everyone thank you so much for being here and i will talk to you next week

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Holistic Trauma Healing Podcast

Episode 66: Listening to Your Body — Your Cravings, Need for Rest, Intuition, ALL OF IT with Caroline Dooner

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