Introduction - My Journey
It has been in me since I can remember; the innate desire to help people.
It was this need that led me to study for a degree in Psychology at London Southbank University. Counselling and talking therapies were my exposure to helping and supporting people during that time. As they say, psychologists are just looking to fix their own problems, and years of anxiety and cycles of bulimic episodes led to me to that degree. But something was missing.
I left university and got a job working for a chiropractor. It was here where all the thoughts I had about the world, the times I had questioned what I had been told about health, the body and healing all came to light and answers began to emerge. I suddenly had words to convey what I already knew and believed: ‘The body has the innate power to heal itself, you just have to provide it with the tools to do so’.
Let’s just say I definitely had fun in my 20s! By day, I was attempting this life of holistic wellness and by night, I was enjoying the nightlife of London. As much fun as I felt I was having, my mind and body were disconnected. I had awful anxiety and, honestly, I hated my body. I was training erratically and constantly on some kind of diet to lose weight. Fasted cardio, weight training, low carb, intermittent fasting, vegan etc. One of my ways of coping with these feelings of anxiety and discontent was to make myself sick after meals. At the time, it felt like a relief like no other, but really, I was just punishing myself.
At the age of 27, I decided something needed to change in my life and so I studied a TEFL course and moved abroad to Vietman. For my first year and a half there, I was the happiest I’d ever been. I felt invincible and had fallen back in love with life and myself. COVID hit and Vietnam was in and out of lockdowns. I then gained weight, (about 20kg) and my anxiety was at the worst it's ever been. Looking back at photos, you could see the inflammation in my face and sadness in my eyes.
It was during one of the stricter lockdowns that I can remember having the worst period of my life. The pain stopped me in my tracks and took my breath away. From that point, every period I had was painful, heavy and exhausting. It was this situation that reminded me of my innate belief - that my body could heal itself, I just needed to provide it with the tools. I was trying so hard to believe in my body’s own ability but my anxiety had a hold. I was experiencing a pulled muscle in my chest and thinking it was a heart attack, I took myself to hospital. There, I was given high-strength NSAIDS and sent home. Once again my innate voice reminded me, ‘my body can heal itself, I just need to provide it with the tools’.
It was around this time that I saw the College of Naturopathic Medicine on someone's Instagram story. Although my relationship with my body and food hadn’t always been the best, I loved cooking. I was brought up in a family of food lovers and providing a homecooked meal for people I loved brought me real joy. Seeing that I could work with food while helping the body’s natural abilities to heal itself made sense! I made the decision that it was time to go home and look after myself. I signed up to CNM and returned to London.
Through my studies at CNM I learnt more about female reproductive health, the gut and brain relationship, nutrients and their effects on mood and functionality etc. After trying to manage my heavy periods myself with no success, I went to the GP to get some answers. An ultrasound scan showed that I had several cysts in my ovaries, and they were enlarged. But my blood tests returned ‘normal’ and that was it. I never received a formal diagnosis of PCOS, but after speaking to several women and practitioners, it is likely that this is what I have; it just doesn’t fall into the diagnostic criteria of Western Medicine.
On my journey to heal, I discovered menstrual cycle awareness about a year ago, and it was this that changed everything. Measuring my temperature every day, studying the length of my cycle, charting my symptoms and honouring my energetic body at each stage helped me become one with my body. It was this coming home to my body that really helped me over my anxiety and purging behaviors.
Through my story, I hope to lead women to a sense coming home to THEIR own body, living in rhythm with it, and providing self-care, self-love and nourishment, not punishment.
Before and after I discovered how to balance my health through nutrition
