Psychology of Eating Podcast: Episode #227 – Making Peace with the Past

Dorothee, 29, is learning to navigate her own body wisdom, and step into her present and future in a healthy way. This means she will need to make peace with the past, and let go of the opinion of others. As she shares her story with Marc David, founder of the Institute for the Psychology of Eating, we learn she has challenges with inflammation, digestion, allergies and anxiety. Marc invites her to move forward by trusting herself, and being unattached to others, especially her family, about whether or not they buy into her holistic health practices. Dorothee comes away with new insights on how to navigate her nervousness, and trust her own path and align with others who share her values when it comes to searching for answers about health.

Below is a transcript of this podcast episode:

Marc: Welcome, everybody. I’m Marc David, founder of the Institute for the Psychology of Eating. And we are back in the Psychology of Eating podcast. And I’m with Doro today. Welcome, Doro.

Dorothee: Hi, Marc. I’m happy to be here.

Marc: Me too. And let me just say a couple of quick words to viewers and listeners before you and I get going. So if you’re a returnee to this podcast, thank you so much for coming back. I really appreciate it, and I’m glad you’re on this journey with us. If you’re new to the podcast, here’s how it works. Doro and I are just meeting for the first time, officially, and we’re going to spend 45 minutes to an hour together and see if we can push the fast-forward button on a little bit of change and transformation.
So if you could wave your magic wand, Doro, and if you can get whatever you wanted from this session together, what would that look like for you?

Dorothee: Okay. Yeah, I was suffering from an inflammatory condition for all of my life, and I have figured out my own way of dealing with it and my own diet and lifestyle. Yeah, but it’s sometimes not so easy to maintain it, and I find myself sabotaging myself a little bit.

And I’m binging on stuff that I don’t tolerate so well, like too many carbs or chocolate or nuts. Or I will just go to bed too late, and I’m sabotaging myself a little bit. And, yeah, what is also very difficult is to stand for it in front of other people, to say, like, “No, no. I cannot eat this and this food. I’m sorry.” Or to really claim that I know what I’m doing and that I have a reason to be on this diet, this specialized diet.

Even though I don’t have a diagnosis like celiac disease where it’s officially recommended that you, for example, have to stay gluten free, it’s hard to make people understand it. I think this leads to another problem that I’m a really insecure person, and I also tend to be an extremely stressed person and a really nervous person. At the moment, I’m a bit insecure how to go on with my professional life. I’ve just finished my master’s thesis in biology, and now I would like to work in health business. But I think I’m very insecure about—to put myself out there and to really see my own strengths.

And I feel like my insecurity, my anxiety about it is really standing between me in general and leading a happy life and getting professional success. Yeah. If you could give me some advice here, I would be happy.

Marc: Yes. Okay. Understood. That’s a nice, big wish. I love it. You’re going for it. How long would you say that you’ve been a nervous person? Do you remember being like that as a child?

Dorothee: Yeah, definitely. I’ve been like this always for all of my life.

Marc: Do you think that’s just who you are? Do you think that that’s kind of part of how you were raised or brought up? Like, what do you say to yourself about that? Where do you think it comes from?

Dorothee: I would say that it’s—part of it is like I was brought up. I think it’s rooted in my childhood. As far as I know, my mom was in a depression when she was pregnant with me. I have four siblings, and I would say with me it’s the worst. So my little sister is really, at least on the outside she seems to be tougher than I am.

Marc: So there’s four children?

Dorothee: Yes, I’m in the middle.

Marc: So you’re number two or three?

Dorothee: Three.

Marc: You’re number three.

Dorothee: Three.

Marc: Okay. And what’s it like for the oldest? How would you describe the oldest?

Dorothee: He was always like the rock in the waves. He was always very strong for us all. He’s extremely cool. He’s really very solid.

Marc: So your mom was probably depressed when she was pregnant with you, and tell me about your relationship with your dad.

Dorothee: Yeah, it’s difficult. Yeah.

Marc: Yeah. How so?

Dorothee: Yeah, my mom I would say she’s the emotional part of my family, and my father is the rational part, extremely rational. He’s a civil servant, public official, and he’s really like the role model for that. And he’s very correct, and discipline is extremely important to him. And he has his own childhood trauma, and I don’t really have a relationship to him. He was more like providing for us and organizing everything. And he could be really—he was even beating us and having sessions with us where he was I would say applying psychological violence to us. My relationship now is like that he was providing me with money while I was studying. And actually, December is the first month that I am now standing on my own feet, so this is also a big leap for me. Yeah.

Marc: Congratulations. Good for you.

Dorothee: I hope so.

Marc: So are you close with your mom these days?

Dorothee: Yes, I’m very close to her. Yeah. Both of us, we are extremely similar and I even look very alike, like her. I would say she’s like my best friend. She’s really like an angel.

Marc: Aw, that’s so sweet. So are you in a relationship now?

Dorothee: Yes, I’m married for two years now, and I’ve been with my husband for 10 years.

Marc: So what does he think about your nervousness and the anxiety? How does he deal with it?

Dorothee: He’s also very cool. Okay, sometimes he can also be like choleric. He will shout, but he just lets it out and then it’s fine. And then it’s okay. He says, “Don’t overreact. And what should happen? And everything will be fine.” And he always—he’s patient, but sometimes I think it’s hard for him to just understand.

Marc: Sure. That makes sense. How old are you, Doro?

Dorothee: I’m 29.

Marc: 29. Okay. When did you first get diagnosed or when did you realize you had an inflammatory condition and started changing your diet for that?

Dorothee: I have been sick for all of my life. I was born with eczema, and later in a normal way I developed asthma and irritable bowel syndrome. Yeah, later depressions and severe brain fog and everything. Like when I was I think 23, I was even diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome. After my graduation, I even had one year of burnout. I had everything like hay fever and food intolerances. At some point, I was just trying out different diets. I was vegan for almost two years. But it made it worse, and I was trying out everything. Finally, I was trying out a GAPS diet. But it nearly killed me.

Then I realized that I was severely histamine intolerant, and at that point, I just started to set it up like my own little study and doing it with a system and really just not following any diet anymore and just doing what was working for myself. And now, I have really found out my safe foods and some supplements that are helping me. If I keep to that, my gut is happy and I don’t have brain fog anymore. Oh yeah, I had terrible problems with fatigue also and insomnia. And I had severe eczema all over my body and acne. And my bowel was terrible, and yeah.

Marc: So when did the eczema and the acne clear up?

Dorothee: It was like two years ago that I was on the GAPS diet, and then in the beginning of 2015 I found out about the histamine. And then it started clearing up in the spring of 2015. But if I slip on my diet, it can come back. Yeah, I had lots of stress during my master’s thesis. Now I have a little bit of inflammation in the corners of my mouth, but it’s nothing compared to former times. But I want to have it perfect.

Marc: I understand. When did the asthma stop for you?

Dorothee: This was earlier I think. I think it somehow changed into hay fever. If I would eat too much histamine now or if I’m too stressed, then the sneezing would start again. But if I’m maintaining my healthy lifestyle, I don’t even have hay fever anymore. But yeah, in the beginning of last year, I still had some problems with it.

Marc: You’ve been on a very big journey with your health from really it sounds from birth.

Dorothee: Yeah, I was born sick. Yeah. Your story reminded me of my own story, I must say.

Marc: Yeah, well. If you knew the details of my story, we would almost be telling a very similar story. So, yes, I was born with asthma, eczema, allergies, a collapsed immune system, and poor digestion. And that was with me till—and I was a stutterer. I couldn’t talk. And most of that resolved when I was 15 or 16, but I had been changing my diet from a young age and experimenting. So I know what it’s like. The asthma and the allergies still lingered a little bit. But the good news is the body gets healthier as you’ve seen.

Dorothee: Yeah.

Marc: The body can get healthier. That’s the good news. So you see yourself in the future as being a health coach in Germany.

Dorothee: Yeah, I would really love that. Yeah. So many people, I am in forums and there’s many people who have the same problems that I have been struggling for. And there are so many false claims and diets which say that they are good for everyone. And I just want to help people find their way.

Marc: So what do you think—when I asked you at the beginning if you could wave your magic wand, what would you get from this session, and you mentioned to stop self-sabotaging with food. And you mentioned about just the anxiety and the nervousness: “I wish that wasn’t stopping me.” What do you think, when you notice what stops you from being who you want to be in the world, could you maybe be more specific? What do you think holds you back? Is it a certain thought that comes up? Is it a belief? Or it just might be just anxiety that just comes up? So I’m just wondering if there’s more to say about that for you.

Dorothee: Yeah, I feel like I still have to prove myself in a way that I’m not really doing this just for myself, just to be happy, but also to prove it to some of my relatives, like my father, for example. They totally believe into the medical system, and I somehow want to prove to them that there are other ways. But they don’t believe me, and so then I start thinking, “Oh, it doesn’t matter. It’s all in vain.” I only do it for myself.

When I was getting better, I was going to my father and telling him, “Look, I have found an alternative. I have found a way to heal myself.” And he was just saying, “This is not possible. You’ve been with so many doctors, and they all said it’s not possible. And your last doctor, Dr. This-and-This said you just have to live with it.” It really hurt, and it’s really… Yeah.

Marc: I could totally see why that would hurt and how much that would hurt because here you are finally seeing results from all your hard work and all your good efforts. And it’s clearly working. And here’s your own father saying, “No, impossible. It’s not working.” So he’s not just saying what you’re doing isn’t right. He’s saying all your efforts and your life and your discoveries are not right and your future is not right. That’s kind of what you’re hearing when he says that.

Dorothee: Yeah, it feels like part of me would be stopping to exist. It’s like it would be denying me, like denying me as a person just not seeing me. This is my biggest achievement I think. But it was like when I made this achievement it was feeling like I had found my biggest treasure, like the philosopher’s stone, and I was thinking like, “I should throw a party.” But, yeah, people were reacting very strangely. They were not understanding or some were jealous or so.

Marc: Okay. So let’s start handling this. Let’s start taking care of this. This is a good place for us to dive in here a little bit. I want to say a few things to you. First thing I want to say is let’s have a little, small, mini party right now and celebrate your success. Okay? Because you were born with some very debilitating conditions. No human wants to come into this life not able to breathe, covered with eczema, not able to digest, not having energy, being allergic, and growing up with all kinds of health challenges like that that no doctor can fix.

And the doctors say you have to live with, and here you are, you’re not even a doctor or a professional in that way. And through your efforts and your exploration, you figured it out for yourself. You came to some amazing conclusions that, quite frankly, they don’t teach in medical school. The mainstream does not accept because that’s the setup of the world. That is how the world works. There is always the mainstream, and then there’s the growing tip of evolution.

Evolution always has a growing tip. There is always the leading edge of a field. Pick any field. In the field of physics, you have everybody who teaches the same things, and then you will have a few leaders of the physics generation who are just so far advanced that they help evolve the field. But usually the ones who are at the front, leading the charge, discovering new things, they’re loved and they’re hated. They’re absolutely loved, and they’re absolutely hated because they’re breaking the status quo because they’re advancing beyond the normal knowledge. And some people respect that and some people get intimidated by that.

Some people go, “No, that’s impossible. No, that’s impossible, because this is what we’re taught in medical school. And we’re the doctors and we’re the professionals and we’re the experts.” And the truth is, oftentimes, innovation comes from outside of a field, not within the field. So when it comes to health and when it comes to nutrition, I’ve been observing these fields for years, and all the innovation comes from the outside. It comes from the crazy people. It comes from the renegade doctors, the renegade nutritionists, the renegade experts. It comes from people who are out on a limb, experimenting, exploring, practicing, actually being real scientists.

Real scientists experiment. You try new things; you go, “Huh.” A real scientist gathers data. Okay, let me gather data. Here’s all my symptoms. Here’s all the treatments that I’ve had and nothing works. Huh. Logic says these things don’t work. Let me try something else. That’s smart science. That’s a good researcher. This doesn’t work; let’s try something else.

What the mainstream often says is, “Oh, your problem doesn’t fit into our paradigm. We don’t know how to fix you; therefore, you can’t be fixed. If our system doesn’t have answers, then there are no answers.” Now, that is foolish nonsense. It is intellectual immaturity.

Dorothee: Yeah.

Marc: It is a form of intellectual laziness. Just because I don’t know the answer doesn’t mean it’s not out there. So what you’re coming against, I just want to say to you, Dorothee, is not personal against you. It feels personal. “Wait a second, Dad. This is the opus of my life. I’ve found the philosopher’s stone, and you’re not even seeing it. You’re not getting it. You’re not recognizing it.” What I’m saying to you is the voice that he’s speaking I’ve heard 1000 times in my life. I’m professionally accomplished. I still hear people say, “No, that can’t possibly work.” And I’m saying, “Don’t tell me it can’t possibly work. It works!”

And there’s plenty of people it works for. It might not work for you. That’s fine. Not everything works for everyone. So that goes on in every university. In every university, there are professors and scientists who are disliked because they’re more advanced. They have more knowledge. They’re more at the leading edge. So all I’m saying to you is that is the world, and it’s not personal.

In your country, the field of holistic health and nutrition, in certain ways Germany is more advanced than United States in certain things. And in other ways, it’s more behind. In a more popular way, health coaching is much more accepted in my country than it is yours. But that doesn’t mean it’s not useful and necessary and extremely needed. But if you’re going to be at the leading edge, then you have to start getting comfortable understanding that you will be unpopular.

Dorothee: Yeah.

Marc: With certain people. And you know something? With certain people, you will be their hero; you will be their god. They will love you because you’re helping. You’re helping them or you’re helping them by saying, “You know something? Medical science maybe hasn’t been able to give you an answer. Let’s explore possibilities. No guarantees. But let’s explore possibilities. Here’s what works for me. Here’s what worked for other people who have similar challenges to you. Let’s try this. Let’s try that.” That’s a true doctor. That’s a true scientist. That’s a true explorer. “Let’s try this and see what happens.” That’s what a real healer does.

You try the smart strategy based on the information and the data that you have. If it works, great. If it doesn’t, you try the next thing. That’s just intelligence. That’s just smart. But you’re bumping against resistance that, even though it’s coming from your family and maybe from some of the people around you, it’s a voice that’s universal. So I’m trying to tell you that everyone that I know who is in the holistic health field has a similar story.

I know some of the most famous holistic health doctors in the world, and they get attacked. They get horrible things said about them, and that’s part of the job in a way. Now, I’m not saying that that should be part of the job. I’m not saying I like that, but eventually what happens is you develop a strength to not hear that and not listen to it and not pay attention to it. Because instead, what we do is we focus on the good. You have to learn how to focus on, “Wait a second, I wish all the people around me would see that what I’m doing is good.”

So I understand why you want that. I understand you want positive feedback from your own father, and you’re probably never going to get it, I would assume. If one day he comes to you and says, “Doro, I’m sorry. I apologize. You’ve been so amazing. You’ve been so brave. You’ve been so smart. Congratulations. What you’ve done is incredible.” If he says that someday, I’m going to think about that as a nice big birthday surprise. But I want you to assume and live life as if that’s not going to happen because then you’re free to be who you are without waiting for anyone else to give you permission.

This is you becoming your own woman. And you’re afraid to do that, understandably so, because you want people to love you and you want people to recognize you. And the people that are closest to you aren’t always loving you and recognizing this aspect of you.

Dorothee: I think that people should listen to me, and I would like that my family would really see my accomplishments because we have so many really severe health problems in my own family. The most important part of my journey started because my mother got breast cancer, and this was my main motivation to start it. With everything like depression, different health problems, and lots of cancer in the family, I think I would just like to help everyone.

Marc: Yes. So what I’m asking you to do, believe it or not, is to let that go.

Dorothee: You have talked about this in one of the last tele-classes and it’s to not try to help the people who are closest to us. And I think I really should work on letting that go. It’s hard, but I think there’s no other way.

Marc: Yes, love them in a different way. It doesn’t mean you don’t love them. See, you want to love them in this way because you know how important it is, and you know how profound it could be. And you know how amazing it could be. So you’re very smart in that way, and you’re very caring in that way. But they literally don’t understand.

It’s like all of a sudden if you started talking a foreign language to them. They don’t understand. You must learn. You must learn—and I mean this—to not take it so personally. You must learn that. And I know it feels personal because it’s your loved ones and it’s your family. And you’re offering them this tremendous gift, and they’re saying, “No.” And not only that, they’re not recognizing it and they’re saying, “No. This is not even a gift. This is silly. It’s nonsense. I don’t want to hear it.”

So you have to understand that it’s not them speaking. It’s this bigger voice that exists in the world, that resists change, that resists information that’s different than what we’ve been taught.

Dorothee: Yeah.

Marc: It takes humanity a long time to embrace new discoveries, new truths about life, about health, about medicine, about the world. It takes time. So, I don’t want you to waste another minute holding yourself back. Love them in other ways. It’s not like you’re not loving them. Love them in other ways. You’ll figure that out. You might just have to just love them and watch them go through physical hardships and watch them go through disease.

My two parents died before the age of 60 of cancer. I’ve had aunts and uncles die in their early 60s of cancer. I’ve had aunts and uncles die of heart attacks in their 40s. They weren’t eating good food, and I couldn’t save them. But I still loved them. And everybody has a different journey. So you have to let them have their journey. And you have to know and remember that the work you’re doing is good. And you have to learn how to feel that for yourself. You have to learn how to feel that value inside you.

I want to tell you that when I first started understanding that there was a different way to see nutrition, this was in the 1970s when there weren’t many nutrition books you could buy in a bookstore even. It was mostly textbooks. And the information about nutrition was very old and antiquated. And I started learning things and studying with healers and nutritionists and gathering so much information. And I got no support from teachers, professors. Everybody thought I was crazy talking about what I was talking about. And now, the things I was talking about in the 1970s, it’s commonplace.

But I had to know inside myself—my point is I had to just say to me, “I believe in the truth of what I’m doing. I know the truth of what I’m doing because it worked for me personally.” And now I’m helping other people, and it’s working for them. So that’s all I need to help move me forward. And it’s all about empowering ourselves. It’s you believing what you know to be true, despite anybody else’s opinion. So that’s a lesson in life. That’s a personal lesson. You can call that a soul lesson. You can call that just a deeper lesson that you’re here to learn is to believe in yourself.

Dorothee: Yes, that’s true.

Marc: Very simple. It’s very simple to believe in yourself. And the way you believe in yourself is to gather evidence and data. And your story is perfect evidence and perfect data that what you do works and that what you do helps. It certainly helps you. The strategies that you do and that you’ve mentioned can help others. They are useful tools. They are powerful tools. And you learn how to mix and match. “Wait. Let me try this with this person, that with that person. Okay. That worked. Now what else? Oh, this worked for them, but that didn’t work for them.” That’s a true scientist. That’s an artist because scientists are both scientists, but they’re artists at the same time. They’re creative.

So that’s what you’ve done. You’ve used your creative mind, and so over here I’m telling you I’m considered somebody who’s big in my field. I’m saying congratulations. You’ve discovered some amazing things on your own, and you’ve helped yourself. That’s huge. It’s tremendous. It’s an awesome accomplishment, absolutely awesome accomplishment.

Dorothee: Thank you.

Marc: And I know how hard it is because I’ve been down that road personally. And it was driven for you by your own need. So because of your own personal need, you discovered a way to fix yourself even when the doctors couldn’t. Think of how amazing that is. Think of how amazing that is. You discovered ways to help yourself heal even when the doctors could not. That’s phenomenal. That’s a huge statement. And you can imagine why that would be intimidating for some people.

Dorothee: Yeah, that’s right.

Marc: Because they go to all these years of professional school, and they can’t do anything. No, you just have to live with this. And you go, “Guess what. I found alternatives. Look, I’m better. This cleared up. That cleared up. I’ve found a way to do things.” And people don’t want to hear. So you have to understand that that’s the way of the world. And it’s important for you to feel success in you, for you to be able to celebrate that for you.

And that’s why I was just trying to acknowledge you and let you know you’ve done a tremendous job, you really have. You’ve done a tremendous job.

Dorothee: Thank you.

Marc: And you’ll keep getting better and better and better as you explore more and learn more. Part of the self-sabotaging, part of it comes… Here’s what I want to say. What you’re doing, when you’re eating something that you really don’t want to eat, I wouldn’t necessarily call it self-sabotage for you. I would probably use a different term, and I don’t quite know what the term is.

But let me try to explain what I’m saying. You’re under a lot of stress and a lot of strain. And you’re in school, and you just finished your thesis. And you have health challenges, and your family is not always supportive. And they don’t see your accomplishment, and that’s stressful. And there are certain times that we will use food to de-stress us.

Dorothee: Yeah.

Marc: Just to help de-stress because sometimes it’s hard for us to feel good and to feel better. But if you eat a little bit of the foods that you know you shouldn’t, there’s a temporary relief. It just happens like that sometimes. There’s a temporary relief. So there’s times when it gets so challenging for you that you need some temporary relief. And a lot of times when you’re reaching for foods that you know are not good for you, I really wouldn’t call it self-sabotage. Self-sabotage implies you’re attacking yourself and that’s really not what’s happening for you.

Now, some people do self-sabotage. Many people do. It’s really less that for you. And it’s really more that you’re not naturally nervous, but you came into this world that way. I’m going to cycle back to that in a moment. Part of your nervousness is what you’ve learned. Part of your nervousness is how your nervous system was trained when you were in your mama’s womb and how it was trained when you came out.
So, oftentimes, what happens is there are certain experiences, traumas, or even chemicals that get into the system of the body that literally create a trauma. And that trauma impacts the nervous system, and the nervous system becomes weak. The immune system becomes weak. So part of what you’ve been doing in your life is learning how to strengthen your nervous system and your immune system and your digestive system which all got a very difficult start.

So you should’ve been coming out of the womb with a stronger baseline, but you came out with a weaker baseline. So you’ve had to do a lot of work to get to a place that a lot of other people already have when they… Do you follow me?

Dorothee: Yeah. It always felt like I had to struggle hard and, yeah, have to double effort than everybody else.

Marc: It’s true. So that’s true. So what I want to suggest that you start to do is I think there’s a place—I think—and tell me if this is true for you. There’s a place where you haven’t fully sort of accepted that this has been your journey because you have had to work harder. You’ve had health conditions that are not fun at all, and nobody likes that. You don’t like that. Give me a different life. This is not easy.

So what I’m saying to you is there’s a place where you can get to where you bless that journey. Where you say, “This hasn’t been easy. I wish it was different to begin with, but it wasn’t. And the good part of my journey is that it’s taught me how to strengthen myself. It’s taught me to explore a whole new way to help myself heal and to help others heal. It showed me new territory that most other people don’t even know about in the helping and the healing and the medical and the nutrition professions. So I was given a rough start, but that rough start has helped me strengthen myself and help me develop a knowledge that is valuable.”

Dorothee: Yeah. Definitely. During my life, I had to refrain from so many things because of my illness. For example, I really so, so wanted to be a veterinarian, but I couldn’t because I was allergic to all the animals. But now, when I’m looking back, I think I wouldn’t have made a good veterinarian. It would have been dealing with too many people. Most of all, I have gained so much knowledge I wouldn’t trade this for anything in the world. I have grown personally and spiritually so much. And there were days when I was really in much pain and I was like, “This is all shit. I want to give it up.” And then, the next day I was reading something and thought, “Wow, this is so amazing, and this is so cool.”

Yeah, I am grateful for it, but also it’s very isolating. Somehow in some way I was doing all of this to better fit in, to become a normal person, to have normal energy, and to have healthy skin and to feel beautiful and be able to engage in sports activities and to work. And I was feeling like an alien, and now I am somehow feeling like an alien even more. I’ve looked behind a secret door, and now nobody understands me anymore. I have met new people who do understand me. I think I will have to leave some people behind because they are holding me down.

Marc: That’s true. I think that’s very true. And there’s a world of people out there that understand exactly what you’ve been through and that believe in the same things you believe in. There’s tons of them. That’s who I associate with because that’s my profession as well, and I’ve learned to seek out those people. They’re my allies. They’re my colleagues. They are my friends. And that gives me the energy I need to feel good about myself and what I do. We need the support of our community. And you’re feeling isolated because your family doesn’t get it, and a lot of the professionals around you don’t get it.

So part of your journey is to find those who understand you and support you, who are true colleagues in that way. That’s very important. And as that happens, some of the nervousness that you experience will begin to subside. What I want you to consider is that part of your journey in life is learning how to better strengthen your nervous system. You’ve been given a difficult start, so, yes, you are a nervous type. And it’s not your fault. It’s not anything you’re doing wrong. It’s just the way you’ve been launched into the world.

What I want to say—I’m going to go out on a limb here—is that the symptoms you describe that you were born with technically showed up, my guess is, chances are, after you were born and are often related to vaccine injury. It is a very common experience of vaccine injury to have digestive issues, asthma, skin conditions, because gut issue and skin conditions are closely connected. There is research out there right now showing connections between antibiotics, skin issues, and gut issues.

Dorothee: And the brain I think.

Marc: Yes, and the brain as well. And there’s plenty of research out there showing the same for vaccinations. It’s just that that information is not as easily accessed because it’s very unpopular. So what I want to say is that oftentimes because of our birthing methods, because of the drugs we give people, whether it’s the drugs your mom received when you were in the womb, whether it was the drugs you were given or the vaccinations given when you were first born into the world, these things can collapse the system. They can stress out the nervous system and create a post-traumatic stress that can take decades to unwind.

Your journey is going to be about learning how to strengthen your body, plain and simple. And that’s okay. It’s okay because you can consider everything you learn about you as a tool to help others. I was obsessed with my own health forever. Forever. Particularly for my first 30 years because I had to be. I had to figure out how to heal myself, and then when I figured that out, I started teaching about it. I started sharing about it. I started writing about it. And I wouldn’t let anybody stop me. Yes, I got attacked. I got a lot of awful opinions coming my way. I didn’t let it stop me.

The work that I do with the Institute for the Psychology of Eating it reaches millions of people now. And there were people at the beginning, 20 years ago, who told me this is all nonsense. I’m like, “Really?” So we have to learn how to follow the voice within. There’s a voice within you that knows. There is a voice within you personally that knows and that guides you. And you actually follow that voice very well. But you kind of forget that you do sometimes. You forget how strong that voice is. You forget how smart that voice is. You forget how far that voice has gotten you.

Dorothee: That’s true.

Marc: Even though it’s guided you and you follow. You actually follow that voice. You actually follow it, and you listen to it. And it’s guided you, and it’s helped you get to where you are today. And then there’s these moments where you completely forget it, and you go, “Oh, I’m not valuable. This isn’t good. What’s the use?” And you collapse. So I want you to start to catch yourself when you collapse like that. This is your job. It’s kind of like learning to stay awake in a certain place where you fall asleep.

And when you collapse like that, maybe you reach out to a friend who understands you, loves you, gets you, and appreciates you and respects what you do. I want you to have those people in your life that you can call up and go, “Hey, I’m having a bad day today. I feel like the work I do is worthless. I’m not liking myself. My father this… My mother…” Whatever. Somebody that you can talk to who can help remind you.

Dorothee: Okay. I try to figure it out all on my own.

Marc: Too hard. That’s too hard. I want you to start to create a support system for yourself. You’ve been wanting your family to be that for you, and they’re not in the way that you want them to. They have supported you in other ways. Your family has supported you financially. Your family has given birth to you and helped, raised you as best they could. They’ve done their job. Their job, at this point, they can’t do much else. They’re not designed for that. And I know you want their respect, but I need you to learn how to give yourself that respect.

One of the reasons your nervous system is still trying to find balance is because you’re still trying to find home. And home means home is you. Home is you loving you. Home is you accepting you. Home is you honoring you. Home is you being able to say, “You know something. Even though my family doesn’t get what I do, even though a lot of other people don’t understand what I do, I get it. I see it. I know the results, and I believe in myself.”

Dorothee: Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Marc.

Marc: Yeah. I’m so abundantly clear that you’re a hero in your own life, and you haven’t figured that out yet. You’ve been on a hero’s journey, and you’ve really taught yourself so many amazing things that you’ve discovered because you’ve asked good questions. And you’ve researched, and you’ve experimented. And you’ve tried, and that is noble. And it’s honorable, and you’ve been successful at that. The world doesn’t recognize that so easily. If you graduated medical school right now and knew nothing about how to treat someone with your condition, everyone would love you. Your family would probably think, “Oh, she’s a doctor. She’s great.”

So unfortunately, the world doesn’t always reward us for the gifts that we have and the value that we bring. That’s why we have to learn how to feel that value inside of ourselves. That’s your task. To feel that inside yourself and to start to surround yourself more with people, colleagues, friends who understand and who get it and who support you.

Dorothee: Okay. Yeah. Thank you. I think this is an important advice. Finding my own family, finding a new family.

Marc: Yes.

Dorothee: Create my own.

Marc: And you still love your family, but now you’re going to love them in a different way. And you’re not going to require of them that they love you in this specific way that you need to feel loved, simply because they’re not capable. And you have to take the high road here, believe it or not. The more conscious person, the more aware person needs to stay more conscious and more aware.

So if you’re more aware and conscious and understanding than your father, let’s say, you know this information is good. You know that your knowledge is valuable. If he can’t see that, it’s your job not to be pulled down by that. It’s your job to say, “Okay, he just doesn’t get it.” He doesn’t have enough bandwidth. He doesn’t have enough flexibility to understand.

Dorothee: Yeah, it’s like he’s missing the right programs in his head. It’s like a different language to him.

Marc: It is. It really is. And he’s not the only guy that acts like that. That’s a majority of the world.

Dorothee: Yes.

Marc: So it’s not so personal really. And I just want to congratulate you on what has been, to my mind, an unbelievably successful journey that you’ve been on. And I think you’re tremendously accomplished. And the world needs you, and Germany needs you. And there are so many people that need someone who cares, who listens, who understands, and who’s willing to say, “No, you don’t have to live with this.”

Dorothee: Yes. Yeah, but still with the nervousness, I’m thinking about if I should make some kind of therapy. I’m even nervous to calling people on the phone, or I would like to give like courses or maybe some lectures or cooking class or whatever. And I’m thinking about making some kind of therapy. Really, it’s the worst phobia of mine to talk in front of other people. I always like to be just invisible, and I was thinking about—I met an NLP coach. He’s doing NLP and hypnosis. Yeah, I have a good feeling with this coach, and I was thinking about doing something in that direction.

Marc: I think that’s a great idea. For you, I would rather see you do something like NLP or something like coaching rather than traditional therapy for your nervousness. Because it’s not about you getting rid of your nervousness. It’s not about trying to find out why am I nervous, where did the nervousness come from, how do I get rid of it. It’s less about that, and it’s more about learning tools and strategies that help empower you, that help you take a step forward. So the nervousness, you’re still addressing it, but in a slightly different way. NLP is very good for that or it can be, so I highly recommend that for you for sure. I really like that idea for you. Yeah.

Dorothee: Okay. That’s good.

Marc: Doro, I am so happy that we had the chance to be in this conversation together. And I really appreciate you being—you’ve been very raw and you’ve been very real. You’ve been very honest, and I think you speak for a lot of people. I think you speak for a lot of women who are often told, “No, what you’re doing is not okay. Your voice is not okay. Your knowledge is not okay.” And we have to trust our inner knowing and trust what we have discovered to be a truth. And that’s just part of your path. That’s part of your growth, and that will strengthen you more and more as you start to realize I’ve got something to offer people. Because I know you do. I’ve got no doubt. No doubt whatsoever.

Dorothee: Thank you so much, Marc.

Marc: Yeah. I really appreciate you, and we get to follow up in another four or five months together. Someone from my team will reach out, and I really thank you.

Dorothee: I have to say thank you. Really, thank you so much for your words and for your encouragement and for your time and for all the work that you do. I really love the training, and it’s so cool.

Marc: Yeah.

Dorothee: Thank you for letting me be part of this.

Marc: You’re so welcome. Yeah. I really appreciate that. And thanks, everybody, for tuning in. I so appreciate you. Lots more to come, my friends. You take care.

The Institute for the Psychology of Eating
© Institute For The Psychology of Eating, All Rights Reserved, 2016

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