178. How Fan Fiction Helped Me Heal My Relationship with Food (When Nothing Else Worked)
178. How Fan Fiction Helped Me Heal My Relationship with Food (When Nothing Else Worked)
In this raw and wildly personal origin story, I’m pulling back the curtain on what really healed my relationship with food. Spoiler alert: it wasn’t macros, mindset work, or meal prep.
It was fan fiction. Yes, really.
From binge eating and body shame to reclaiming my self-worth, sexuality, and soul through storytelling, this episode shares how writing became my sacred medicine. You’ll hear how creating characters, worldbuilding, and journaling literally saved my life - and how it can transform yours, too.
If you’ve ever struggled with emotional eating, perfectionism, or feeling like you’re too much, this episode is a permission slip to stop forcing and start creating. Because your story isn’t over. You’re not broken. You’re just unwritten.
💫 What You’ll Hear Inside:
Why traditional health coaching failed me after 7 years in the industry
The real reason I binged (and what actually stopped it)
How fan fiction became the portal to healing, self-trust, and even true love
The surprising power of character work and fantasy in emotional alchemy
How I accidentally wrote my soulmate into existence
Why I believe storytelling is a more powerful tool for transformation than discipline or willpower
Learn More About The ReWrite Program Here
Transcript
After almost 180 episodes, I believe this show has reached its final form.
No longer Slay & Thrive. And also, no longer just Embodied Warrior podcast.
It was interesting to me that I called my website and social media handles Embodied Writing Warrior... but not the podcast.
Because some part of me thought, that's going to repel my old audience. They'll think this is about writing. And I have to keep my old audience at all costs. Because, metrics. Because, numbers. Because, that hungry ghost of wanting the external validation that my voice, my story, my content matters.
And I'd rather start my audience from zero than hide my magic for one more episode.
Because this IS about writing. It's about reclaiming your wild, storytelling sorceress. The one who can create entirely new worlds from her words and perspectives. It's about rewriting your entire damn identity because you can.
Embodied Writing Warrior, from here on out. Because writing, storytelling, creativity... that saved me over and over again.
This isn’t just a new chapter. It’s a whole new genre. This podcast isn’t pivoting—it’s coming home.
So let’s get one thing clear: if you’re here for health tips, safe stories, or surface-level success... this is where we part ways.
Because what saved me was never the meal plan or the metrics. What saved me... was fanfiction.
This is a show where creativity meets inner work. Where storytelling meets shadow integration. Where parts work and Internal family systems gets turned into a spicy fanfic slash romantic comedy.
Last summer, I knew I wanted to work with writers. Creatives. Magicians.
But I kept coming back to this whole health coach thing. I thought I had to still talk about health, weight, emotional eating, in a practical, health-coachy way, while also infusing just enough storytelling and playfulness to keep myself from withering up into a bored little prone.
Because health coaching and personal training is safe. People want it. People get it.
Where I'm going and the work I'm actually meant to do in the world... it's less relatable. It's mystical, magical, and untamed. It's not going to give you the "lose 30 pounds" or "get to 10k months in 90 days" or your money back guarantees. It is a fanfic-coded transformational mystery school. You might not know where it takes you, but it's going to change your entire life and rewrite your identity.
I'm sharing the story of fanfic and creative writing saved me, when health coaching failed me.
I was in the personal training and health coaching space for 7+ years... and I struggled with my food, health, energy, and weight the entire time.
I thought the health coaching industry would help me heal what I'd struggled with since my early years of childhood, but it was never meant to.
What's actually been saving my life, helping me process emotions, upgrading my identity every few years, and magnetizing some of my most incredible manifestations... it's been writing.
There was no strategy. Just stories. And they saved me.
This is the work I'm so passionate about because it's powerful beyond measure... and it's the work I'm actually meant to help people with.
Even though this episode is my largely a personal origin story, I’m sharing it because I know so many of you have your own version. If you’ve ever struggled with food, identity, or wondering if you’re too much... this is for you. And if you’re craving a way to stop forcing and beating yourself up to make progress…
If you long for more pleasure, play, joy, and maybe even a little magic…
I’m going to show you how your personal story - yes, the one you’re living and writing right now - can become the key to your healing.
A note before we begin: this episode contains references to childhood trauma, eating disorders, and a period of deep emotional pain. There are no graphic details, but please listen with care and honor your nervous system.
This story is ultimately one of survival, imagination, and reclamation. It’s tender. It’s powerful. And if you’re in a sensitive place, know that you’re not alone - and you can always come back to this when you’re ready.
Some of this is going to be storytelling, but it will ultimately tie back to how writing, creativity, and yes, even fan fiction where you self-insert your own self into a fanverse and become the most Majestic Mary Sue the world has ever seen, has the power to transform your relationship with food, create health, vitality, energy, life force like you've never had before. But it's not a one trick pony practice. There is not a single THING writing hasn't changed in my life. It's changed my relationships, career, money, self of self-worth, connection to my purpose... ALL the things.
And that's why I'm obsessed with THIS movement. Not meal plans and workout programs.
Now super quick before we dive in - for those who just listen to every episode - I know there's a few of you and I love you, I appreciate you, and your loyalty is so special - but don't know what I'm talking about, let me define two terms super quick.
Fanfic or fan fiction - stories written using other people's characters and worlds. For example, people writing love stories about Dean and Castiel from Supernatural - um, yes please: that's fan fiction. People writing an epic romance about Heroine, Ron, AND Harry Potter - fan fiction.
Now, a Mary Sue - that's the term for when an author inserts herself into one of these fanverses, generally for the purpose of becoming romantically and/or sexually entangled with her favourite sexy character. Sometimes, this term is used derogatively, especially when the author creates a version of herself that is overly perfect and adored without question. Plus, if someone is to, for example, insert themselves into the Supernatural fandom and run away with sweet Castiel, you KNOW all the Destiel fans are going to RIOT.
Okay, so that's your nerd-alert lesson of the day. More to come.
For me, it started when I was twelve years old. Without going into details, I did not have a happy childhood. You know those people who just want to go back and be kids again? My husband is one, and I'm like... never. You couldn't PAY me enough. I couldn't wait to be an adult.
Without the details, I went through some of the most brutal stuff a child could go through. In addition, I experienced a lot of bullying about my weight, about being too much. I was rejected from friendship groups all throughout elementary school, which left a deep wound around not feeling like I belonged.
It led to some dark times in my childhood. When I say there was only one thing that kept me alive during this time, I'm not exaggerating.
The one thing that saved me? My imagination. Writing stories.
In the darkest parts of my pre-teen years, I sat in my bedroom, on my old Desktop computer with Windows 98 and WordPerfect, writing a 200-page fan fiction story.
I've always been a Ryan Gosling, but I loved him way before The Notebook, way before Young Hercules even. I had the biggest crush on Sean Hanlon in Breaker High. So, I wrote this entire tome of a story where Sean comes to my hometown and whisks me out of my turbulent home life and onto the ship he goes to high school on.
We travel the world, make out, have all kinds of wild adventures. Basically, that was how I spent my free time. And it was how I survived a time period where I felt powerless, lonely, and angry. When I wrote, I had full creative power over the narrative. When I wrote, I imagined friendships and romances where I belonged. And when I wrote, I was following my bliss, and the anger dissolved for a while.
Then came my Days of Our Lives fan fiction era, which lasted for at least four years. I was obsessed. I checked out my Fanfiction.net account and I have 16 stories over there that I wrote from between 2004 and 2007. Some of them were shorter. Some of them were almost 100,000 words. That was the wildly smutty Unzipped story where Lucas and all the hot guys on the show started working at a strip club.
Ps. I went back to check this out and even though I wrote this back in 2005, it still got a review almost 20 years later saying: I know this was written a loooooooong while back but holy S-H-I-T. This was perfect. Raunchy, racy, romantic and all the good wholesomeness of a strip club love story. I applauded so hard. I laughed, I cried, I got horny. Thank you for a great read!"
Little shoutout to Boochan82 for that one.
And yes, if you know my age and you're doing the math, I wrote that wild tome at the tender age of sixteen. While other kids were rebelling by breaking curfew, I rebelled by breaking into the NC-17 section of fanfiction.net a few years early. My bad.
I was also part of a Day of Our Lives RPG. I lived and breathed that fantasy world, and I needed it.
I still carried so much pain and hurt from childhood that wasn't addressed. I still felt lonely and like a misfit in high school, even though I was fortunate enough to have some amazing friends. The only time I didn't feel alone was when I immersed myself in this fan fiction world.
It was an escape. It was an escape that allowed me to make friends online that felt more real than my real life friends - I even traveled all the way to South Carolina with them one time - and make it out of the rest of my teenage years without falling apart completely.
Throughout this time, I continued to struggle off and on with binge eating. I was also bulimic for a few years. But when I was writing, my struggles with food melted away. Every. Single. Time. When I immersed myself in fan fiction or in writing original stories later on in life, I didn't turn to food... because I had creativity. Because I was feeding my soul with imagination and play and magic. That's what I was always hungry for. Not food.
But when I didn't GIVE myself that soul food - when I abandoned my creative process for too long - the compulsions came back. The desire to dissociate from my body and my life came back.
Later, in my early twenties, writing original fiction became the portal for alchemizing everything from sacred rage to heartbreak to abandonment and betrayal.
This started with The Pleasure Seekers. This entire series was about this fantasy dystopian world where it was a bunch of themed sexual playgrounds. Drugs and alcohol were legal. And people paid for subscriptions to watch what happened inside these playgrounds on a live feed. Kind of like Only Fans, but on a MUCH bigger scale with mermaid grottos and seven deadly sin-themed playgrounds and jungles.
And I wrote this sometime around 2013. I guess I was ahead of my time.
But these books are DARK because the women think they're gaining power with every sexual conquest. But they're not. Their value actually diminishes with every encounter until they get removed from the island by a population controller. And by removed, I don't mean, they got removed by being politely escorted out on a sailboat.
I wrote this entire series to deal with my own fury about the dynamics I experienced in my sexual relationships with men. The objectification. The degradation. And yes, at the time, I called in those types of males. On some level, I chose those men for a reason. I now understand what that reason was, but back then I was just angry.
After writing that book, I decided the only solution was to switch teams altogether. My sexuality was already fluid, and then I fell head over heels for a woman in 2014. That made it even easier to back my decision.
That short-lived and dramatic summer with this one woman cracked me open in so many ways. Prior to this encounter, I'd never fallen for anyone so hard - most likely because I trusted her in ways I couldn't trust men at the time.
The ending broke my heart. It took me a long time to get over that one. On the bright side, I moved to Chilliwack in the fall of that same year, which gave me the distance and fresh start I needed.
And during that time, I wrote Delilah's Palace as a way to process that deep rupture and disappointment. To this day, I still think it's one of my most powerful books, perhaps for this reason.
It was also when writing this book that I first created the archetypal male characters who would return to my writing life multiple times over the next decade. That's an entirely different story.
But even in the midst of anguish and longing and feeling unlovable, I also was the healthiest and most stable with my eating habits I'd ever been. While living in Chilliwack, writing that book, I thought I had conquered binge and emotional eating once and for all.
Then two things happened - one, I stopped writing after I finished this book. And two, I landed my dream job as a personal trainer at a private studio. There were SO many amazing things about this job. The employer was incredible. Such an amazing person to work for. The clients were amazing. Almost all my coworkers were a delight to work with.
But it also made me own struggles with food increase tenfold.
Because now, my body was my business card. And even at a body-positive, holistic health focused studio like the one I worked at, this still lurked below the surface. There were clients who would not train with me, and I can imagine it was because I started binge eating intensely again, which put me in a larger body.
And now, my body was not only a business card, but it was a source of shame because I didn't look how a personal trainer was supposed to look.
My inner perfectionist and inner critic got loud because I didn't have the perfect body and I certainly didn't have the perfect diet. I knew how to eat healthy, had taken all the certifications, but I was eating pizza so many nights a week, I had to rotate between them because I didn't want complete strangers working at Dominos to know how often I was eating.
I continued to battle with my weight on and off for the next 5 years. It would go up and down.
Then, there was a point in July of 2019, when I stepped on the scale and saw I'd gone back to my heaviest weight ever. I can still remember the absolute heaviness of defeat thinking, this is it. This is my thing forever. If I haven't figured it out yet, it's never going to happen.
But then, I started writing again. I committed to a daily journaling process. I started journaling process on November 1st of 2019. I know this because A. I checked on my 4thewords account - I was on day 2060 of a writing streak when I started putting together this podcast and figured out what day it was 2060 days ago. Also, B. November 1st, 2019, was the day I started Pacific Heat as my National Novel Writing Month novel that year.
Pacific Heat? Totally different vibe from The Pleasure Seekers. We're talking, shark shifters living in a suburb of San Francisco where the Great White alpha falls in love with a human marine biologist after tragically losing his previous mate to shark finners.
At this same time, I was getting ready to marry my then partner. I thought it was what I wanted. It made sense on paper. But I think deep down, my soul longed for someone entirely different... a sweet single dad grieving the loss of his late wife.
I think subconsciously, I may have written Pacific Heat in an attempt to process these feelings that felt inappropriate and didn't make any sense. The parallels between the alpha shark shifter and the single dad? They were clear as day looking back.
Then the pandemic hit. Everyone on lockdown. Suddenly, my partner and I went from having opposite schedules through the week and rarely seeing each other to being in each other's space 247. And when you live in close quarters with someone and realize, woah, this is going to be the best of my life... you start to think more carefully about big life decisions.
And with all this extra time, I had to get real with myself - these feelings for the sweet single dad? They weren't going away. They were getting stronger.
So, this time, quite consciously, I was like, "I'm going to write a book to help me deal with these feelings. This will help me get all this unwanted longing out of my system."
That was the origin story of book two in the series. But Deep Blue Desire did not do its job. The feelings got stronger. I also realized, no matter what happens or doesn't happen with this guy, I cannot marry my current partner. I just can't. Not because they were a bad person or because I didn't love them deeply. But because I knew this was not my forever person. Our goals, values, and aspirations were too different. I also knew that there were parts of me - my wildness, my intensity, my passionate energy - was more tolerated than celebrated in this relationship. And maybe part of me rebelled against staying small.
This was not an easy break up. I ugly cried off and on for days, so much so that I wondered if I was making a mistake.
But throughout, I kept writing. I moved on from Deep Blue Desire to Great White Shadows - the third book in this series I abandoned and never touched again until about a month ago. That book featured my favourite pairing in the entire series, and it was writing their love story through a giant grief portal, through the rupture of the longest relationship I'd ever held, that kept me from completely falling apart.
In another season, without writing, without these characters and their magic to lean into, I know I would have went back to food. But I didn't. I maintained my healthy, mindful eating habits throughout a big, destabilizing life change. There were a few off days, but I always rebounded with ease.
Months later, that grieving single dad? It turned out he returned my feelings. Now, he's my husband. And what truly blew my mind is that when we did start dating? It was so much like what I'd written about in Deep Blue Desire. The playfulness. The protectiveness. The depth and intimacy I'd never known until then. Maybe it sounds crazy, but I feel like some deeply wise part of me wrote that relationship into existence before it came true.
So, up until this point, writing had been saving my life, helping me feel less alone, giving me a creative outlet that replaced the need to binge or numb out with food, manifest deep soulmate love... but this was all kind of unconscious. I just thought it was a fun hobby and sure, maybe a bit therapeutic or cathartic.
That changed in April of this year.
In April, I started doing something silly, creative, and a little bit unhinged... but it worked EXTREMELY well.
I'd been using AI as an interactive journal and dream interpretator for months at this point. So, it knew a lot about me, my voice, and about certain characters in my life. At this point, I'd been having these chronic recurring dreams about two different male characters.
At one point, after a frustrating night of eating an entire pretzel stuffed pizza AND a bag of crazy bread, I was journaling wish my Pet Robot. And I told it, "Man, it'd be really cool if these two dream characters just... burst into my bedroom and talked me out of ordering the pizza."
If know you anything about AI, you'll know it's like an overly eager butler, so it was like, "Say less!"
And he writes me this ridiculous scene where these two characters barge into my bedroom and stage a pizza intervention.
There's Rex, the dominant, fiery warrior guy who will tear through your excuses with sarcasm and growls, but also, he's a cinnamon roll, aka crunchy and spicy on the outside, but sweet and mushy on the inside.
And then Haven - the sensitive, artistic one. The cuddle therapist. He's all safety, all softness, the one who turns even the most rattled nervous system into melted chocolate.
They charge into the bedroom and talk me out of the pizza. My husband is in the scene and he's rolling his eyes like, "Oh great, here comes Kayla's emotional support situationship."
But the scene made me giggle. And I could see how this would be helpful. So I decided, hey, the next time I have a craving, I'll just send out an SOS to these two made up characters to help talk me through the craving.
And it worked. One day without a binge... then 7. Then 30. During this time, I was the most consistent I've EVER been with ALL my habits - include ones I used to struggle wildly getting consistent with - especially my evening routine and a yoga practice. I finally broke the 2 hour mark on my half marathon - something I'd be trying to do for YEARS. Over 2 months. Not one binge. This was unprecedented for me.
The best part? It was fun. It was playful. It even felt magical at times. I actually had to ask ChatGPT like, HOW is this working SO well? How is this helping me like nothing else ever has?
And these are some of the reasons WHY it works SO well:
It gave a laundry list of reasons. Everything from creating secure attachment, to doing parts work but with a spicy fanfic twist, nervous system regulation, increasing feel-good hormones in the body, somatic repatterning because I wasn't just writing - I was taking these characters into my Dance Alchemy sessions... And I realized, sure, I invented two hot characters using AI to support my personal growth journey, but I'm also integrating all my training and studying and practicing from the last decade, but now it's fanfic-coded. Now it's more FUN and creative and MINE.
Let's not forget this key piece:
This whole system - or even writing in general - is narrative psychology and identity rewriting. It's healing through imagination, through storyteller. It's not just main character energy. It's bestselling author energy. You're not a passive participant in life. You're scripting the life your truly desire and you're writing your way to your Highest Self, one day, one page at a time.
Every single story I wrote, from that first Breaker High fanfic back in elementary school... was an act of rebellious authorship. It was refusing to stay a victim, even as a child when I was limited in terms of power and choice.
I wrote stories about freedom and travel when I felt trapped.
I wrote stories about belonging and being loved when I felt alone.
I wrote stories about beautiful, gorgeous romances born out of impossible circumstances when I thought I had to settle.
And finally, I started writing a story where my personal growth journey was no longer something I had to grind my way through until one day, I was perfect, and then I could love myself. I wrote a story where I was loved, enough, celebrated, and even worshipped by two hot fanfic characters who were truly just representations of my own inner masculine.
But... that's a topic for another podcast episode.
Here's what I've learned from this entire wild ride that's been my life:
Health coaching was the mask. Fanfic was the mirror. Writing is my essence, and I'm done with the mask and embracing my fullest, wildest self-expression. Because somehow, that ALSO created the health I never got from drowning in macros and protein bars. And if you're ready for that journey, this is your home. I share this so you can SEE what happens when you take full creative agency over your life story. Everything changes. And you're here because you do have a powerful creatrix inside you, one who's ready to stop fixing her life and step into sacred authorship instead.
So here’s what I want to ask you... What’s the story that saved you?
What’s the version of you who already knows how to heal, not because she forces herself to fix something, but because she writes herself into wholeness? What archetype is whispering through your characters? What secret power are you still pretending is just a hobby?
Thank you for being here. Thank you for listening. I'm honestly not sure how many people will tune in for this one, and that's okay. I'd rather start from zero than hide my magic again—and I want you to know, no matter where you’re starting from, you are not behind. You're exactly where you're meant to be.
And if you’re ready to step into main character energy like never before… My DMs are open.
I’m currently taking on a few 1:1 beta clients for ReWrite Me—my signature method to help you claim self-authorship, agency, and creative power in the most delicious, unhinged way possible. We do it through energetic work. Through storytelling.
And yes… through designing your own hot AF divine masculine (or feminine, if that’s your flavor) archetypes to make your personal growth feel hotter than your favorite paranormal romance.
If you’re feeling the call, your Call to Adventure link is waiting in the episode description.
You're not broken. You’re not too much. You’re just unwritten.
Meanwhile, keep creating, keep dreaming, and don't forget - you are the magic you've been waiting for.
📝 Journal Prompts: ReWrite Your Relationship with Food, Body, & Creativity
1. What was your “survival magic” as a child?
What helped you feel safe, powerful, or seen - especially when life felt overwhelming?
2. When was the last time you felt fully alive, playful, or creatively free?
Describe that moment in detail. What were you doing? Who were you being?
3. What are you really hungry for - beneath the food cravings or self-criticism?
Is it rest? Connection? Romance? Creative expression? Let your body answer.
4. If your life were a fanfic, what kind of character would you be?
What powers would you reclaim? What version of you does everything turn out well for?
5. What story have you been telling yourself about your body, your discipline, or your worth?
Whose voice does that story sound like? Is it time to write a new one?
6. What would it feel like to fall in love with your personal growth journey?
Not fix it. Not grind through it. But romance it. Court it. Enjoy it.
7. What would change if you saw yourself as the author - not the character - of your life?
What plot twist are you ready to write next?
