The Self Led Woman Podcast: emotional eating and nervous system healing for self-leadership

Episoder

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  Episode 42: Why Internal Family Systems Therapy Works for Healing Emotional Eating 14.09.2026 15min

  This isn't a surface level overview of IFS. This is the actual clinical and human reality of why this model reaches what other approaches miss. In this episode I'm breaking down why I believe Internal Family Systems therapy is one of the most effective frameworks available for healing a disordered relationship with food. Not because it's the latest trend in the wellness space, but because it goes underneath. Because it's body based. Because it works with the parts driving the pattern, not jus...
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  Episode 41: Food Is Not the Problem. It's the Message - Somatic Eating, Trauma and Nervous System Healing with Stephanie Mara Fox 07.09.2026 57min

  What if your food behaviors were never the problem — but the most intelligent thing your body could do in a moment that felt unsafe? In this episode Megan sits down with Stephanie Mara Fox, somatic nutritional counsellor, creator of Somatic Eating, and PhD candidate in somatic psychology. Stephanie has spent nearly two decades supporting women in healing from emotional eating, binge eating, chronic dieting, and body image concerns — and her approach will completely reframe the way you see you...
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  Episode 40: Comparison, Belonging and Coming Home to Yourself | Part 2 31.08.2026 15min

  If you haven't listened to episode 39 yet, start there. This one picks up where that one left off. Last week I talked about comparison as a nervous system response and belonging as a biological need. This week I want to talk about what's actually on the other side of all of that. What it looks like when you stop trying to become someone else and start coming home to yourself. And I'm going to get into some things that might surprise you. Like why getting dressed in the morning is a nervous sy...
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  Episode 39: Comparison, Belonging and Coming Home to Yourself | Part 1 24.08.2026 18min

  Comparison isn't about vanity. It never was. It's about belonging. It's about safety. It's about what your nervous system learned was acceptable, what got praised, what got rejected, and what got mirrored back to you when you were too young to question any of it. In part one of this two part episode, I'm talking about why the drive to fit in, to measure yourself against other women, to shrink or perform or become someone you were never meant to be, is not a character flaw. It's biology. And i...
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  Episode 38: Why Ignoring Your Cravings Makes Emotional Eating Worse, Not Better 17.08.2026 18min

  You wanted the chocolate. You chose the rice cake instead. And an hour later you were still thinking about the chocolate and probably ate more than you would have if you'd just had it in the first place. This episode is about why that keeps happening. Not because you lack discipline, but because of how your brain's seeking system actually works, and what it means when a woman learns, early in life, that her desires aren't something she's allowed to trust. Megan breaks down the neuroscience of...
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  Episode 37: Tired of Being Good | Fawning, the Nervous System and Reclaiming Your Body With Kallie Klug 10.08.2026 47min

  What if the thing keeping you stuck in your relationship with food, your body, and other people isn't a lack of willpower, but a nervous system response that's been running since childhood? In this episode I sit down with Kallie Klug, certified somatic practitioner, yoga teacher, and author of Tired of Being Good, a nervous system map for reclaiming your body after a lifetime of fawning. Kallie's work sits at the intersection of somatic trauma therapy, the fawn response, and the deeply intell...
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  Episode 36: Your Cravings Might Be Older Than You Think - Epigenetics, Ancestral Trauma and Emotional Eating 03.08.2026 17min

  What if the urge to reach for food when you're not physically hungry isn't just about today? What if it's older than that — much older? In this episode Megan explores one of the most fascinating and undertalked pieces of the emotional eating conversation. The intelligence your body is carrying that has nothing to do with willpower and everything to do with thousands of years of human survival. She talks about epigenetics — the science of how trauma and experience actually alter the way our ge...
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  Episode 35: Why Emotional Eating Isn't a Willpower Problem - An Open Letter to Women Who Are Ready to Hear the Truth 27.07.2026 14min

  This episode is for every woman who has been trying harder than anyone around her knows — and still can't make it stick. Who has reset more times than she can count, spent years on the merry-go-round of starting over, and quietly wondered what is actually wrong with her. Nothing is wrong with you. In this episode Megan shares her own 30-year story — what kept her on the merry-go-round, what she tried, and what nobody ever asked her until she finally asked it herself. She breaks down why emoti...
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  Episode 34: What Ozempic Is Actually Doing to Your Brain | GLP-1s, Food Noise and Nervous System Healing 20.07.2026 30min

  There's a conversation happening right now about weight loss medications. And almost everyone is either for them or against them. But that's not the conversation I'm interested in. What I'm curious about is what's actually happening in the brain and the nervous system when people take these medications. Because when you start looking at the research, what you find isn't just about appetite. It's about regulation. It's about what it feels like when a system that has been running on threat and ...
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  Episode 33: Your Body Never Meant You Any Harm | Somatic Healing, Body Image and Eating Disorder Recovery With Dr. Ann Saffi Biasetti 13.07.2026 50min

  What if the body you've been at war with has actually been trying to protect you this whole time? In this episode, I'm joined by Dr. Ann Saffi Biasetti, transpersonal psychologist, somatic psychotherapist, and author of Your Body Never Meant You Any Harm, releasing July 21st 2026. Ann has been working in the space of eating disorders and trauma recovery for over 35 years, and this conversation is one I've genuinely been looking forward to. We talk about why so many women feel like their bodie...
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  Episode 32: Emotional Eating, Bingeing & the Search for Something Food Could Never Fix 06.07.2026 19min

  In this episode, I share a deeply personal story about emotional eating, bingeing, loneliness, shame, and the nervous system patterns underneath it all. I take you back to my late 20s, living alone in Melbourne during a cold winter while working in a high stress banking environment that left me emotionally exhausted and completely dysregulated by the end of the day. What looked like “food issues” on the surface was never really about the food. It was the supermarket trips. The chocolate...
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  Episode 31: The Desire to Be Smaller Didn't Start With You 29.06.2026 15min

  There's a question I come back to again and again in sessions with clients. Is this actually your belief, or is it something you inherited? So much of what women carry around food, their bodies, visibility, and taking up space was never consciously chosen. It was absorbed. Passed down through generations of women adapting to environments where being smaller, quieter, more agreeable, and less visible was genuinely safer. In this episode, I explore the generational, historical, and nervous syst...
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  Episode 30: Emotional Eating & the Hidden Cost of “I’ll Deal With It One Day” 22.06.2026 12min

  How long have you known that your relationship with food or your body is something you want to change? Not how long you’ve been trying.How long you’ve known. In this episode, I’m talking about the hidden cost of tolerating emotional eating, body obsession, self criticism, and the constant mental noise around food. Because for many women, the issue isn’t a lack of awareness.It’s that the pattern has become manageable. You can still function.Still work.Still show up.Still look like you have it ...
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  Episode 29: Emotional Eating, Control & Parts Work with Ivana Legnerova | IFS Therapy for Healing Your Relationship with Food 15.06.2026 41min

  In this episode, I’m joined by Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapist Ivana Legnerova for a deeply compassionate conversation about emotional eating, control, and healing your relationship with food. Ivana specialises in working with eating disorders, including emotional eating, under-eating, perfectionism, and self-sabotage. Together, we explore how these patterns are not failures, but protective parts of your system trying to help you cope. We talk about what’s actually happening underneat...
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  Episode 28: Why Knowing Your Emotional Eating Patterns Still Doesn’t Change Them 08.06.2026 14min

  A woman said something to me recently that I hear all the time. “I already know where this comes from. I know it’s my childhood. I know it’s because of trauma.” And then she paused and said something incredibly honest. “But I’m still doing it.” She still finds herself standing in the kitchen late at night, opening the cupboard and eating something even though part of her is thinking: Why am I doing this again? I know better. If you’ve ever understood your patterns but still found yourself rep...
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  Episode 27: All the Things I Tried to Stop Emotional Eating (And Why None of Them Worked) 01.06.2026 20min

  For years I believed my emotional eating was a discipline problem. So I tried everything to fix it. I tried hypnotherapy. Acupuncture. Kinesiology. Past life regression. Affirmations on my walls. Personal trainers. High protein diets. Low carb diets. Intuitive eating. Juice cleanses. The lemon detox diet. Running a marathon. Blood sugar supplements from a naturopath. Even taping my mouth shut at night so I wouldn’t ...
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  Episode 26: The Hidden Link Between Emotional Eating, People Pleasing and Boundaries 25.05.2026 19min

  When people talk about emotional eating, the conversation usually focuses on food. Cravings. Discipline. Willpower. But when I work with women around emotional eating, the pattern rarely begins with food at all. It often begins in a moment where something didn’t sit right. A comment that hurt. A boundary that was crossed. A moment where you felt dismissed, unseen, or taken for granted. And instead of expressing what you felt, you swallowed it. In this episode, I explore the connection between...
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  Episode 25: Emotional Eating Isn’t About Food | Dr Anita Johnston on Body Image, Cravings & What Your Body Is Really Saying 18.05.2026 43min

  In this episode, I’m joined by depth psychologist and eating disorder specialist Dr Anita Johnston, author of Eating in the Light of the Moon, for a powerful conversation that will completely shift the way you understand emotional eating and your relationship with food. We explore why struggles with food and body image are rarely about food itself, and what these patterns are actually trying to communicate beneath the surface. Dr Johnston shares her unique approach using metaphor and storytel...
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  Episode 24: Why Weight Loss Is Not the Goal of Healing Emotional Eating 11.05.2026 22min

  In this episode, I talk about something that might surprise people who are new to my work. Even though I work with women who struggle with emotional eating, food, and their bodies, weight loss is never the goal of this work. And there are important reasons for that. We already live in a culture that constantly tells women their bodies need to be smaller, better, or fixed in some way. Diet culture, wellness marketing, and the fitness industry all reinforce the same message over and over again....
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  Episode 23: My Bipolar Diagnosis and the Gut Brain Connection: How Nutrition Changed My Mood Stability 04.05.2026 19min

  In this episode, I share something deeply personal about my own journey with mental health. At 35, I was diagnosed with bipolar type 2. At the time, it felt like a life sentence. I was told I would likely need medication for the rest of my life and that mood instability would always be something I had to manage. For years before that diagnosis, I had experienced cycles of depression alongside periods of elevated energy, creativity and productivity that I later learned were hypomania. I believ...