Megan Gldberger shared that eating was a way for her to feel safe, and it became a form of control after she had gone through tough times at home when she was young.
Megan Goldberger, 26, from Cardiff saved thousands to pay for a gastric sleeve before she was diagnosed with a binge eating disorder. She has now gone on a healing journey and wants others to know surgery isn’t always the answer.(Instagram)
Megan Goldberger, a TikToker from Wales, had saved thousands to get surgery in Turkey. She struggled with her weight and thought it was her only hope.
The Welsh TikTok star @meggoldberger had put away the £2,500 needed for a trip to Turkey to have a gastric sleeve fitted. But then therapy helped her realise that surgery wasn’t her solution. After this revelation, Megan began a “healing journey” which led to her being diagnosed with a binge eating disorder. This, she realised, was triggered by past traumas that caused her to comfort eat.
Megan shared that eating was a way for her to feel safe and it became a form of control after she had gone through tough times at home when she was young. Her doctor officially diagnosed her with a binge eating disorder.
Opening up about her past, she said: “My McDonald’s order would be something silly like two cheeseburgers, 20 chicken nuggets, large fries, a large drink, I would have apple pies and McFlurry and I would sit and eat it all.”
These days, Megan can’t imagine eating so much. “Now I can’t imagine eating anywhere near that,” she said. “One of the reasons I ate so much all the time was because I didn’t feel safe in my environment. Food became a comfort.”
“I didn’t realise how much of an impact that had on my weight. I could not understand why I could just not eat less and move more.” Megan, who has a big following on TikTok, said she gets mean comments about her size.
“Someone commented ‘How does somebody get that build’,” and she answered by saying that tough times in her life made her use food as something she could control. “I have done every single diet you can imagine, none of them worked as I was not healed on the inside.
“Last year I was in therapy and worked with spiritual coaches to start healing. I came to learn that my inner child was worried, she was scared, she didn’t know what was going on. Now I am parenting that inner child, I have to tell her ‘you are safe now, you are in control, you have food in the fridge’. There were times in my life where we didn’t have much and sometimes dinner was just a boiled egg and a piece of bread, I now have to remind myself that I have food, and I’m safe.”
Megan thinks this way of thinking helps her not to eat too much. She’s sure that if she had the surgery, it wouldn’t have fixed how she feels about food, and she’d still be upset.
“I have had conversations with people who have had the surgery and they have said how they can’t keep anything down and still want to binge. I will never tell someone not to get it but I just want to urge people to do your research, it isn’t just surgery, you are on vitamins for life. And some people have come back and need corrective surgery on the NHS, and that is if they do come back at all.”
Megan explained how she managed her weight loss of two stone and five pounds by dealing with the real reasons for her overeating. She wants to show folks that alternatives to surgery exist. Megan stated: “You can heal your relationship with food, spiritually or non-spiritually, without having to go down that route. It is not easy, it is so hard, but you can do it.”
In addition to a new approach to food, Megan uses the Muscle Food Plan, where all her weekly meals arrive prepped and ready to eat. Also, she got into hula-hooping as a fun way to stay fit, even sharing her fitness journey through TikTok videos.
The UK Government has warned that over 25 Brits have died in Turkey since January 2019 after having medical procedures. It advised that medical standards can be different around the world, and anyone thinking about going abroad for treatment should do their own research and talk to their UK doctor first.
