Author Q&A With Megan Margherio

Megan Margherio is a writer, speaker, and trauma-informed embodiment coach whose work explores trauma recovery, estrangement, joy, and the long road back to self-trust. She is the author of Everwoven: A Memoir. A Reckoning. Meet Megan:

Did you always want to be an author? When I was little, I used to write my dreams on slips of paper and tuck them into the walls of my Barbie house because I was afraid of being ridiculed. One of the things I put on those slips of paper was that I wanted to write books, but even then, I didn’t know I was allowed to become an author. 

Writing was always how I made sense of the world. Even before I had the language to write about trauma, embodiment, healing, or survival, I was drawn to words as the place where truth lives. When we read or hear the truth, we feel it in our bodies, and it rearranges something within us. That’s why writing my book was not just about making my story public; it was about claiming the parts of me that had been there all along. It was about letting those parts finally speak and letting myself rearrange around a truth that was no longer hidden. 

I was inspired to write this book because it was the book I needed but couldn’t find. I’ve noticed that many trauma memoirs recount details graphically, which can be retraumatizing for the author and some readers. Additionally, almost all memoirs dealing with trauma, grief, or loss speak from a distance, after the worst has passed and life feels easier. I wanted to write for the people who are in the messy middle of it all. The ones whose scars have healed, whose bruises have faded, but whose internal battle is still raging. 

But it was tricky. I have many gaps in my memories, which is not uncommon for trauma survivors, so I had to build a structure that would allow me to share the truth, even when I didn’t have access to every single detail. That’s why the story is told through vignettes and internal conversations. The story became less about what happened to me and more about how I was still picking up the pieces. Everwoven became a way to gather those pieces and recognize that none of them were wasted, even if they were unspeakable for decades. Each of these pieces, no matter how brutal or cruel, was woven into the person I am today, and for that, I am grateful.

How do you hope your book will uplift readers? I hope Everwoven uplifts readers by helping them feel less alone in their stories and in the messy middle of healing. This is not a book that pretends healing is simple or linear. It makes room for all of the complexity of being a human who experienced harm. My hope is that readers see themselves in the pages and feel a little more compassion for their younger versions, whom they may have judged, hidden, or misunderstood. 

So many of us carry survival strategies and mistake them for parts of our identity or personality flaws. I used to think I was too sensitive, too guarded, too much, and not enough – often feeling all of this at the same time. But then I started to ask myself, “What if this part of me is trying to protect me?” When I looked at it that way, I saw that most of these feelings and strategies came from Little Me and Teen Me. That made it easier to show compassion to those parts because they came from children who were forced to grow up too quickly. 

My hope is that readers will pause and look at their own strategies and see the child or younger adult underneath that was just trying to stay safe in a challenging situation. 

What are you most excited about with this book? What excites me most about Everwoven is the way it is helping people name things they never had the words for. I’ve had numerous readers message me to share their personal stories or that the book inspired them to sit down with their teen self to acknowledge their hidden pain. These messages mean everything to me. I screenshot each one and hold on to them for hard days. 

I’m also excited about the conversations this book opens: conversations about estrangement, trauma, survival, shame, self-loathing, embodiment, and the courage it takes to heal. Too often many of these conversations become judgemental or focus on the visible aspects of trauma. Now, more of the invisible pain is being discussed and I love listening to these conversations come to life.

I’m probably equally excited that I wrote something that doesn’t neatly fit into one box. From a creative standpoint, that makes me really proud. Everwoven is a memoir, but it’s also a conversation with myself. It’s about pain, but it’s also about self-compassion. It holds the grief I carried silently, but also makes room for wonder, love, joy, and peace. I think that complexity mirrors real healing. We are not only what hurts us, we are also what comes after.

How did writing a book help your career take off? Writing Everwoven helped shape my career by giving me a body of work to stand behind. Before writing this book, I had many pieces of what I wanted to offer: years of teaching experience; training in trauma-sensitive yoga; certifications in meditation, breathwork, and somatics; a deep interest in healing and embodiment work; and my own lived experience of surviving and rebuilding a life I’m proud of. Everwoven helped me bring those threads together into something tangible. It helped me clarify my voice and the kind of work I feel called to do in the world. 

This book has opened doors to conversations, workshops, podcast interviews, and deeper connections with readers, but more than that, it has helped me take myself seriously. Everwoven is the foundation for me to talk about trauma recovery, self-abandonment, embodiment, estrangement, joy, wonder, and building an honest life with more conviction and steadiness. It became the reason I stopped sitting on the sidelines of my own life waiting for permission to join the game, and started running out on the field.

How do you handle setbacks and criticism? For a long time, criticism felt less like feedback and more like confirmation of my worst fears about myself. A setback would quickly become an internal story about failure, about my worth, or about whether I was allowed to keep going. I think many people who have lived through trauma will understand that response because it’s not uncommon for the nervous system to interpret disappointment or silence as danger.

Now, I try to pause before turning a setback or criticism into an indictment. I ask myself what is true, what I can learn, and what part of me is afraid or needs reassurance before making a decision about how to move forward. Knowing when criticism is useful feedback and when it is projection is also helpful. Not everything everyone says about my work is for me to carry. It’s ok to just let it exist. It’s ok to just let them misunderstand me.

How do you hold yourself accountable and achieve the goals that you set forth? I hold myself accountable by staying connected to the deeper reason behind my goals. I am not someone who thrives when using accountability as punishment. For me, accountability needs to be rooted in what I’m building, who I hope it will serve, and why I believe my work matters. When I’m connected to that, I can keep showing up, even when progress feels slow.

Practically speaking, I try to break my dreams down into small repeatable actions. I’m not looking for how to bring the full picture into view, I just need to know the next step. Maybe that’s finally writing the essay I started on my Notes app, or sending the email, or teaching the next workshop, or letting myself enjoy a slow morning. I don’t need to have a perfect plan or a certain number of followers to begin. I just need to be consistent and know that sometimes things will be quiet and my job is to keep showing up. That is how I measure success – by integrity, not just the outcome.

What do you find most fulfilling in the career that you’ve chosen? The most fulfilling part of my work is witnessing people come back into a relationship with themselves in some way. It doesn’t have to be big to be meaningful. Whether I’m writing, teaching yoga, facilitating a workshop, or having a conversation with a reader, I am always interested in the same thing: what happens when a person feels safe enough to tell the truth? I’ve witnessed so many people heal something inside themselves when they aren’t forced to be “better” but instead get to be honest, compassionate, and present with themselves. Knowing my work can help someone feel less alone or more able to trust their own inner experience is such an honor. There is something incredibly meaningful about offering language, movement, space, or reflection for others, especially when it helps them recognize themselves more clearly. 

What book uplifts you?  A book that uplifts me is The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows by John Koenig. I’ve read it at least half a dozen times and always sit in awe of how it gives language to complex, layered emotions we don’t always know how to name. There is something deeply comforting about discovering that an experience you thought was private, strange, or even impossible to explain can be held in words. That kind of writing always speaks to my soul. It makes me feel more human, more awake, and less alone in my own inner life. It reminds me that language can be a bridge to ourselves and to others.

Anything else you’d like to share with your readers? I hope my readers know that healing doesn’t require you to become a brand new person. So much of my healing has been less about becoming someone new and more about returning to myself. I have returned to the parts people said were too loud, too sensitive, too excited, too joyful, and I’ve tried to listen and integrate those parts back into my life. It has not always been easy, but it has always been worth it. 

If you recognize yourself in any part of Everwoven, I hope you remember that you are not disqualified from joy because you’ve felt pain. There is still life waiting for you. There is still good to be had. There are still more favorite meals, people, experiences, and memories to be discovered. There is still a self within that is worth all of it and then some.

Learn more about Megan and her book through her website.