ABOUT
Rachael
Hi, I’m Rachael
I’m Rachael, a therapist, loneliness researcher and creator of The Loop Model™, helping you clear your mind of that one person you can't stop thinking about and finally create secure relationships where you are chosen.
For the past 5+ years, I’ve worked across child protection, psychiatric wards, community mental health, domestic violence and sexual assault, alongside academic work in loneliness research with La Trobe University and Ending Loneliness Together, where I was recognised as an expert in the field. I’m also a certified eating disorder clinician and currently completing further clinical training in OCD.
But The Loop wasn't something I only learned professionally. I started seeing the pattern in my clients, my friends, and eventually in myself. When I found myself caught in a two-year situationship, I knew I wanted the relationship, but I didn't want to keep feeling consumed by it. I wanted to understand why uncertainty could have such a hold on me, and what I could actually do about it.
So, I created The Loop Model™.
My Journey:
From Living The Loop To Escaping The Loop
How I went from growing up fast and learning to navigate life on my own, to becoming a therapist, living The Loop myself, and creating the framework that became Escape The Dating Loop.
EARLY YEARS
Growing Up Fast
I grew up with an emotionally unavailable dad and a mum who struggled to regulate her own emotions. I learned early to stay on high alert, read the room and handle things myself. Because when I was upset, I knew no one was coming to help me make sense of it.
Then my dad died. I was a child. My mum skedaddled, and my siblings and I were left to fend for ourselves.
So, I looked after my siblings while going to school, growing up far faster than I should have had to.
Should a social worker have been involved? Absolutely. Did I know what a social worker was as a child? Nope.
I just knew I had to keep going.
2010
Putting My Life On Hold
At the end of high school, I was offered a place in the double degree of my dreams. But my family needed me.
I put my plans on hold. I was working, I was the only one bringing in money, and I was leaving money behind for my siblings while figuring out how to keep everything going.
I went to university, but looking after people never really stopped.
I became everyone's unpaid therapist, supporting those closest to me through addiction, suicide attempts, relationship breakdowns and everything else life threw at them, all while completing my undergrad.
Somehow, I was always the person people came to when they didn't know what to do next.
I just didn't realise that this would become my career.
2016-2021
Relationships Raised Questions
I was in long-term relationships of my own, while friends and family increasingly came to me for relationship advice, support and perspective. I loved helping people make sense of what was happening, especially when they couldn't make sense of the pattern themselves.
Meanwhile, I was smashing out a PhD in marine mammal bioacoustics, or at least I was supposed to be. What was meant to take around three years stretched towards “maybe seven?” as COVID stopped my fieldwork. A crap co-supervisor also made finishing feel impossible.
So, I made a decision: I needed a more stable career.
I didn't know it yet, but I was getting closer to the work I was meant to do.
2021
Finding My Work
I completed my Master of Social Work and moved into clinical work across child protection, psychiatric wards, community mental health, domestic violence and sexual assault.
I finally had a career where the thing I'd been doing for years: listening, supporting people and helping them make sense of what was happening, was actually my job.
But I remained a nerdy researcher at heart. I was an academic with La Trobe University completing loneliness research with Ending Loneliness Together, and somehow kept getting asked, “So… when are you doing your next PhD?” 😂
I didn't know it yet, but I had finally found the work I wanted to spend my life doing.
THE TURNING POINT
Then I Lived The Loop
I had only ever been in long-term relationships. Then came my first situationship.
For two years, I experienced a level of uncertainty and anxiety I’d never known before. I couldn’t sleep, I had panic attacks, I couldn’t focus on anything else, and I talked about it so much that I lost friendships along the way.
I saw psychologists. I was told to leave. But leaving didn’t explain why I felt so consumed by the uncertainty, or what I could actually do about it.
After years of supporting people through relationships and seeing how deeply uncertainty can affect us, I knew there had to be more to the story than simply walking away.
I wanted to understand what was happening inside me, and how to change it.
PRESENT DAY
ESCAPING THE DATING LOOP
I started mapping what was happening: the uncertainty, the alarm, the way my attention would lock onto him, the thoughts and stories that followed, and the behaviours I used to try to feel okay again.
I called it The Loop.
I brought what I was discovering into my research and clinical work, refined the model, and finally had a framework for what I’d been experiencing, and what I had seen play out in so many other people.
I realised the answer wasn't becoming indifferent, forcing myself to stop caring, or learning to tolerate a relationship that didn't feel good.
It was understanding The Loop, and learning how to respond differently when it began.
And that became the foundation of the work I now do.