Why I became a psychologist

I wanted to be an actor- since the age of 14. I studied Drama at school and at University. Being part of the acting industry was very hard, especially during the late 1980s, where our Australian acting industry became obsessed with the likes of Kylie Minogue, a small -bodied blonde actor, who became very popular.  Then into the 1990s and the Supermodels were everywhere. The bodies we were exposed to were very thin. I was not naturally thin, I was a chubby child. The only way I could be thin was by having an eating disorder. And I did, and I was depressed..

My Values, since I was a child, was making people happy, helping others feel good. So when I would put on a show as a young child and made others laugh or smile, I would love that feeling. I thought continuing in the acting field, I could keep making people happy- and I did, for many years but on a small local- theatre scale. It bought me joy, but it also bought me a cost- a cost to my health. And I knew, that I could not sustain being this way in this industry. For years, I searched for happiness, read numerous books and eventually had to leave the acting industry, as I recognised it was no longer in line with my Values. So I focused on being a Drama teacher.

It is the year 1998, I was a High school teacher, and I was at an independent school teaching Year 9s.  I had been a Drama teacher for 5 years  prior and coming out of a period of disordered eating, I was learning to accept my changing body. One thing that helped me, was studying and learning about Health and Fitness (which I did every school holiday). I wanted to share my knowledge and passion and help these 14- 15 year olds, to work on good mental and physical health. So I created a subject called “Mind, Body & Soul”.  This subject included the topic of Body image issues and eating disorders. It was teaching this subject with 30 students in my class, when I first realised the extent of body image issues and eating disorders affecting this age group. It was sad. And it was when I ended up visiting one of my students in an eating disorder hospital unit, that I decided I needed to help more people. I knew then I wanted to become a Psychologist. I knew that as a teacher, it was hard to help a large cohort of young people change how they felt about their body, but I tried and I thought at least I could educate them. And so I did. For the next 5 years, I was able to educate 150 students every year about the topic of eating disorders and body image issues- they also learnt about the myths of nutrition (and dieting), the benefits and enjoyment of different exercise, and what is Depression and Anxiety and what can help. But the impact was small, and I was not qualified to counsel them whenever they would confide in me about their struggles.

So, throughout those years, whilst teaching part time, I decided to study Psychology at University, completing my Grad Dip in Psychological Studies followed by my Bachelor of Psychology (Honors) by 2005. It was a privilege and an honour to teach those students, and I am grateful to have had many of them as part of my Honors research thesis (I had 261 participants). My Honor’s thesis was on what made adolescents resilient to body image dissatisfaction and dysfunctional eating behaviours.  Reflecting back on my Honor’s research thesis it makes me think about the current research on eating disorders in adults and how my clinical experience shows a similar outcome (to my research in 2004). What can make people prone to body image dissatisfaction, is a tendency to have unrelenting standards or unrealistic expectations they place on themselves, they have incredibly critical and demanding thoughts of themselves and a feeling that they cannot express their emotions freely.

I left my teaching career when I had my first child in 2005- and my pursuit to become a fully qualified psychologist continued. I knew I had two years to go, I had to complete a Masters of Psychology. It was tough, I had a one year old child, but also a very supportive husband, so that I could continue this path towards contributing to this world, especially in the area of eating disorders and body image dissatisfaction.

My eating disorder history and experience with body image dissatisfaction made me want to study hard, to complete the 6 years of training in Psychology, to provide and be there for my children, in a way, whereby they are not so impacted by body image dissatisfaction. And this has also been my wish for others- to be able to overcome body image dissatisfaction, and together we work as a society to overcome the myth and drive for the thin ideal, accepting all bodies as equal, as beautiful, as ideal.

My job as a psychologist is to help people work through this- and now in my role as a psychologist, I can do this.

And I will not stop doing this. I will continue to support people going through body image dissatisfaction and (of course) other mental health conditions. And I want to thank all my clients over the years who I have had the priviledge to be able to do this as their chosen psychologist.

For now,  I will continue to live by my Values- making others happy, making others feel good- but now I also have these Values for myself.

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