Microdosing for Eating Disorders
After a ceremony of jaguars, holding onto another female participant for motherly support (I didn’t know about transference then), lots of tears, even more laughter, and heart-opening sensations, I had a sense that after my first hero’s dose of psilocybin in 2017, a lot of work was needed. After that journey, I started microdosing with psilocybin. The intention behind it was wanting to continue working with the medicine in a slow, steady, sustainable way after the huge opening I experienced in the ceremony, specifically to continue integrating and nurturing these new, wide-open spaces within my heart, body and mind in the name of my eating disorder recovery.
Over many journeys with plant medicine, and with the most profound teacher - time - I have come to understand an eating disorder as process one goes through in order to understand oneself in the world. An eating disorder is the body’s smart survival adaptation to regulate one’s nervous system. It is a solution for the now-moment, and is an attempt at restoring balance by relying on something external (i.e., food or exercise) rather than turning inside. Of course when we look inside, there is often a lot of pain and discomfort, and so it makes sense that we look away.
As psychologist, eating disorder specialist, and psychedelic researcher, Adele Lafrance says about eating disorder behaviours, “Starving can numb distress, binge eating can soothe, and purging can provide relief.” People with eating disorder (or eating adaptations as I like to refer them to) often struggle with low self-esteem, self-judgement, guilt, shame, disconnection, and disembodiment, which often stem from trauma to the attachment or defense system.
Trauma is somatic contraction resulting from anything that overwhelms a person, usually where there is inadequate or no support, causing fixed reactive sate in the mind and body. It becomes like an inflexible wound with a lot of scar tissue and is sensitive to touch, meaning that the past is constantly tainting and influencing, informing the present moment from that wounded place.
Trauma impacts us as a whole, including our minds, bodies, behaviour, self-identity (who we think we are), spirits, relationships and communities. Because trauma impacts us holistically, we must heal holistically. We are living a traumatized society – and diet culture reflects that. Trauma is not an individual experience; it impacts and is reflective of the greater society in which we live. Collective survival strategies “shape” communities and are passed down through generations.
When I think about eating disorder recovery and think about the many forces that are in opposition to healing, it can feel overwhelming. But the plants remind that it just needs to start with me. One person can and does make a difference. Microdosing with the generous, benevolent, kind mushrooms over the years have assisted me returning back to myself. To be present with my body, its sensations, its rhythms. To look within and observe what wants to be seen, heard and brought to the surface. To open up my heart and clear my mind so that I can see and feel more clearly, with perspective, and with grace. Raising the vibration within my own temple. This is where it starts.
It has taken some time for me to find my groove with my microdosing practice. It started out with little understanding - I would pop it like a pill, very much still stuck in the Western medicine mentality, that is, taking something and putting all my trust in it, thus disempowering myself, separating myself from my body’s wisdom and not taking responsibility for my health. Nonetheless, it was a start. And my microdosing practice had to start somewhere.
Over time (and I have huge thanks to give to Laura Dawn, my microdosing mentor), I have a flow that took me beyond the medicine. I realised like everything, it is not about the medicine. It is about intention, and presence. The medicine are tools in helping us sit, pray, set intentions, cultivate presence, become clear on values, and the person we want to become. Important to sitting down with the mushrooms is asking them how I can be of service to them - these ancient elders of the land - and represent them in ways that serve this Earth. And seeking how to be in right relationship with the medicine and the Earth, I realised I am serving myself. This has been the biggest insight (as simple as it sounds) through my microdosing practice: the interconnected web of service, and the more that I show up for myself, I give permission for others to do the same.
My microdosing practice is a daily practice of presence, setting intentions, and working with the nervous system. Through somatic process, I am train myself to hold bigger or challenging sensations and develop capacity and tolerance to be with them rather than starving, binging or purging them away. In this way, I am building resilience and practicing holding awareness. These are inherent within each other us and we can cultivate it.
Microdosing amplifies whatever is going on inside the body, and so for me working with mushrooms on a regular basis is essentially just the practice of learning how to be in my body. It’s an opportunity to return back home to the body, to be embodied.
Just to switch gears, I would like to talk about this question that comes up in the microdosing communities…
Can microdosing help me with weight loss?
Mushrooms are literally decomposers and so when we ingest psilocybin, we end up decomposing limiting thought patterns that tell us that in order to feel happy, in control, valued, appreciated, successful we need to lose weight to be validated and loved. Again, this is another act of looking outside of ourselves to feel worthy. The mushrooms however are here to support us in our expansion of consciousness, liberating us from external crutches and attachments that we hold onto so tightly. And in my journeys one thing has been clear: in that high vibration state where the plants are helping me see and feel clearer, that there is no space for shrinking and controlling our bodies to feel safe. So rather than trying to suppress the food, try find out what is the suppressing belief. How is it suppressing you? Where does it come from? Does this belief serve you in your growth and purpose in this lifetime, and how do you want to live your life?
When we try suppress our food, we fall into the restrict-binge-purge pendulum. Not only are we suppressing our food but also thoughts and emotions. When we lean too far to one side, the body has to rebound back to balance. This is where binging comes in.
Binging is the body’s smart and adaptive way of quickly getting nutrients in after a period of restriction. This is the body just doing its thing. It’s survival-based. When the body starts to notice a pattern of restriction, it will do whatever it can to get food in. The “overeating” comes in because the body doesn’t know when it will get its next meal. So when you are in a binge period, recongise that what your body is doing is extremely adaptive and smart.
To get off this pendulum is to start listening to the body and become aware of what your hunger cues are. For me, recovery is an additive process, so it’s not about stopping a behaviour and rather adding to what is already here. And what we are adding in is simply more awareness.
The mushrooms take us into our own bodies, and it becomes harder to ignore the moments where we betray ourselves and attempt to override the body by ignoring signs of hunger. Through this process of working with the mushrooms, and becoming more aware, we actually start to notice WHY we are trying to suppress our food in the first place. What are we trying to run away from, numb, suppress, soothe, get relief from, or cover up?
I have some relief through the plants offering insight, reflections, shining light on the shadows and encouraging me to let go of the controlling, dense, heavy layers that kept me small, inauthentic, suppressed, oppressed by the many limiting thoughts – which have been absorbed through my family network, generations, our culture, historical forces, and social norms, institutions, and media. Indeed, the kind of change we are after is cellular as well as institutional, is personal and intimate, is collective as well as cultural.
This work is multi-layered – it’s individual and collective and transcends time. As with the nature of healing, it is not linear and so through all of these layers, we move in circles of continuum. As we reach a level of natural maturation, there is a letting go which can be painful, and so this cycle goes on and on.
This is what I have been learning from the mushrooms – really see what is here, train up the nervous system to hold the challenging, contrasting waves that come with this work, and then hold the big vision: a world that is embodied, where all bodies are valued and loved and welcomed, where people are connected to their bodies and thus with the land, where food and our bodies no longer dictate our lives, a world we can be our full expression.
And let us remember that we are living in a diet culture world where there are very real pressures of looking a certain way and eating a certain way. It is a courageous radical act to go against these hefty systems.
The more we are able to step out of diet culture, tune in ourselves, our heart and see what is needing to be looked at – what is the pain about and how is it trying to make itself know, and can we tend to it, see it, hold it – that is the way we find calm, joy and peace with food and our bodies. And the mushrooms are supporting us in our awakening, and in our paths to reclaiming our inherent freedom and liberation.
Image by by Hailey E Herrera