August 12, 2024 • 50 mins
There is a lot of fear swirling around sharing injectable-related weight loss, which leads to secrecy within our relationships. So, where does the judgement come from and is it possible to break free from the negativity? Even if it's coming from your Mother?
With knowledgeable guest, Maureen, Abbey explores the disconnection from our food sources. Our relationship with food has spiraled out of control in just a generation and a half. And the Evil Trifecta keeps us eating junk that is neither nutritious or satisfying. (And is probably making us sick.)
Tune in for some actionable tips on how to reclaim your power, act local, educate yourself, and cook meals that make you feel better!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Music.
(00:06):
The thing about food in this country and body and beauty standards?
I'd like to begin with a fact. We eat like crap.
And in one and a half generations, we forgot how to cook and what food was.
This is the Abbey Normal podcast, here to tell you that you're weird and that's normal.
(00:29):
I'd like to begin with a fact. Whether in a small town like McAllen and the.
Music.
Rio Grande or in Chicago, New York, or Los Angeles.
It is business. Big business.
Hello and welcome back. As a reminder, Maureen was on the injectable Monjaro
for a year and a half to address her metabolic disorder.
(00:49):
She put me on an injectable, and I have lost 55 pounds.
Go back to the last episode, Skinny Minnie, to hear more about her health rollercoaster.
Now, we all know that body judgments are inescapable, And that,
of course, extends to the use of medications and injectables that lead to weight loss.
So, today we're going to discuss those judgments, which lead to fear and secrecy
(01:13):
within our relationships.
And we're also going to explore the evil trifecta that impacts how we all eat
and what we can, maybe, do about it.
That's taken on multiple industries.
Music.
Buckle the F up.
(01:34):
There does seem to be some judgment about using this medicine.
Right. Which I don't actually think should exist.
You shouldn't feel bad that somebody has lost weight because they got medical support.
Yeah. And you did it all on your own and were able to work out and stuff.
People are having very strong reactions to this drug being a cheat.
(01:56):
And I think it's really important for people to understand that there are so
many different body types.
And the foods and stuffs we're putting into those body types in America and
in the West does nothing but exploit the need for us to eat more and put on
weight. And it's a really unhealthy diet.
And if this is part of the solution, then that's great. You shouldn't be judged
(02:19):
for that. It is just dealing with another.
Music.
I mean, I do feel like there's so much of the hurt people, hurt people concept occurring here, right?
So if for our whole lives, we've been told just that willpower,
(02:39):
you need the willpower. Exactly. If you want it, you can do it.
You just have to, you know, put the pedal to the metal. So fucking American, right?
So that is bullshit, but that's ingrained in us, right?
It is. So it's a little bit like, well, this isn't fair that these people now
get to just take a drug and have
what I've been trying and wanting for my entire life. That's not fair.
(03:02):
And then also just the cognitive dissonance of realizing that that message is
bullshit. And like, now what do we do with that?
So, yeah, I do think that folks that have been able to leverage this as a medical
solution, like, are stuck in the crosshairs of kind of this new understanding
that people are having. Yeah. Unfortunately.
(03:23):
Unfortunately. And there's the whole other thing of like,
and I don't know how much this was happening, but for a while there were like
shortages and sometimes I'd have to wait a while to get the drug because everybody
was so desperate to get their hands on it, including celebrities to lose weight,
to get ready for a photo, a movie.
Like that's how great the need is. Like,
Does the person who's the movie star really need to lose the weight? No. Right.
(03:48):
But they think they need to. Absolutely. Because they're just as brainwashed as the rest of us.
And so like this need is real, but for so many different reasons. Right.
The need is real. And yet it feels kind of strange, honestly,
to see so many folks around you shrinking all at the same time.
(04:09):
And as you heard last episode, we don't know what's going on with people on the inside.
But bringing up the celebrity thing led us into talking about the judgments
that they face too, including one of my favorite English actresses and activists.
Do you follow Jamila Jamil from The Good Place?
(04:29):
Anyway, she's great. She's this, you know, beautiful Indian actress.
Oh, I know who she is. Yeah, and the media has just, like, torn her apart.
In so many different ways and she's been
a victim of like you know when she's thin she gets the she's beautiful
even though she's sick and depressed you know in that
photo then she gains weight and she's happy and the media
(04:50):
blows her up on on that i don't think i had really a point aside from the way
that these poor i feel bad even defending them but these poor models and actresses
that have to be a size two and are made to feel fat when they can't fit into
the two when The mirror size four. Or the zero. Yeah.
Yeah. So like. It's insidious. There are reasons for potentially using a drug
(05:13):
like this are the same ones that we would have. Exactly. So anyway.
I'm going to find a way for us to travel into the past because I just read a story. Uh-huh.
Mama Cass's daughter is publishing a biography. I don't know if you saw that ever.
And one of the things she's tackling is this notion that Mama Cass died from
choking on a hand sandwich. Yeah.
(05:33):
Which is total bullshit, but it's something we were all told,
right? This is Mama Cass from the Mamas and the Pampas. Yep,
yep. She had a heart attack.
But all of these years, this really unkind, cruel story is that she died choking
eating because she was heavy. Right.
And why is that the thing that we remember and not the beautiful singing?
(05:55):
Yeah. And the beautiful songs? Yeah.
And that really tells us a lot about where we are in
the West especially in this country and i really think america
has a special way of dealing with it because we were founded by
puritans so you have you have to do it yourself if you don't do it right you're
wrong at some level it's because god is displeased and like like you know like
(06:19):
that is what this country was founded on right and immense controlling of the body for everybody
especially women yeah it was founded by men and puritans and puritanical men,
and slavery and all of that shit and just informs all the things we're talking
about every day all the time yeah and so this is a very american way of i think
(06:43):
the west has this in spades but america in particular has its own flavor of
dysfunction when it comes to all of these things.
Her point is that American history informs what we're dealing with today.
Puritanical attitudes about hard work and self-control, the roots of slavery
and racism that value a thin and white body over others, and toxic patriarchy
(07:07):
that paints one picture of the value of women and is constantly inclined toward
controlling those bodies.
These seem like big, old concepts, yet they show up in all facets of life.
For example, simple healthcare.
I didn't go to the doctor for a long time because the doctor that I had had
between college and getting my adrenal gland diagnosis was mean.
(07:33):
And I finally had to go to the doctor. Of course, I had moved up here by then.
And so I was like, well, I need to find somebody up here.
So I had found a GP that I loved. I followed her to every practice.
Amazing. Dr. Logan, she's wonderful.
Avis Logan, if you're listening to this, I love you.
(07:53):
So supportive, so kind, opposite of what I experienced in Southern California. Yeah.
But I ran into an endocrinologist up here before I found Dr.
Bohannon, who told me that, well, you know, my wife and I both lost 10 pounds
by just switching to salads at lunch and had me in tears in the parking lot
because I was like, why am I even talking to this guy? I actually just walked out.
(08:16):
Yeah. He wasn't listening to the struggle I'd been through. I don't want to
hear one word, honestly, from a man, doctor. No.
When I finally found my current endocrinologist, she's just like, look, there's science.
There's figuring out what's going on with you. And then we'll come up with a plan. Don't worry.
(08:38):
Like, we'll figure this out. And she's told me stories about other people she's worked with.
And she's like, look, I just want you to be healthy. You know,
in your case, I felt strongly you needed to lose some weight because your numbers were changing.
But if you're technically 50 pounds overweight and your numbers are fine and
you're taking care of yourself, I'm not worried about it. Yeah.
(09:01):
Do you know how it's so refreshing?
So refreshing and should not be controversial.
No, it should not be controversial. No. Treatment should be based on your health.
The things that are used by health insurance, of course, right?
That's the fourth thing. They make money off of us too. We can add that to your list.
Yeah, There's no holistic approach to health in this country. Right.
(09:23):
There's just money making. Yeah. And so, of course, people are having trouble.
And most doctors are just trained in the basics.
The doctors have to please, you know, have to bill the health insurance.
So they have to like make up. Okay, they've got these things for you to even get covered.
The doctors then use the tools that are provided for them out there.
(09:44):
And like one of them is BMI, which is your body mass index. Okay.
You know, it turns out that's just one indicator of health. Doesn't necessarily mean a thing.
And it's like just invented based on like some European man.
Yeah, I was going to say it's based on a dude. It's not based on age.
It's not based on gender. They've changed it so that there's minimum.
(10:05):
But it's like they don't take any of your other stuff into account.
And, you know, an insurance company might not approve something because of that.
There's nothing holistic about it, which is enraging.
Also just societally we're going
to our doctors who are doing the best they can in this
(10:26):
impossible situation where they have to like bill the health insurance that
may not cover it but trying really hard to give you care yeah and not having
enough resources right so i know how lucky i am to have dr bohannon she spends
an hour with me she doesn't take health insurance for that reason. Oh, wow. Oh, my gosh.
But I don't really pay her any more than I would for a good massage of the same
(10:48):
time period. That's awesome. But it goes straight to her.
And I want to go back to that. Yeah. But she's also mostly retired from seeing patients at this point.
There's only about 20 of us. But even when she wasn't, she would spend an hour with us.
She was always running late. And while I would curse her waiting in the waiting
room, I'd be like, oh no, but this is why. Who else is gonna do this? Yeah.
(11:17):
Maureen was able to find good care, basically outside of the health insurance
system, from a doctor who listens first and doesn't make assumptions based on body size alone.
Doctors are humans. Weight bias affects them too. So let's go back to that.
For many of us, it originates from our mothers.
My mom has her own food stuff, and we've never really talked about it,
(11:40):
but you see it in how she eats.
She doesn't eat much during the day, and then she'll eat desserts.
But I know in her head, she's counting all the calories. That's right.
That's right. 100%. She also has a really negative attitude towards people who are fat.
Really? And that I haven't actually told her that I've taken the Manjaro because
I am not comfortable with the way she sees fat people.
(12:02):
And I know so much of that is internalized, but she'll make fun of people on
television when we're sitting there watching. Oh, wow.
Things like that. And that is coming from her. That is coming from her own attitude
towards people being heavy.
So I've not been real keen to share a lot of this stuff over the years because
I don't know how she's is going to react.
And if I play her this podcast, this is probably going to be news to her.
(12:25):
Bad on me for not saying it, but it's just been easier not to deal with it.
Wow. So it's hard. Yeah. There was actually a woman on the Oprah thing today
who's a doctor and was sharing the same thing as you, that she hadn't told her
mom yet because she didn't want her mom's judgment.
And she went on the Oprah thing and talked about it. So she had to tell her
(12:47):
mom. But yeah, I think there's... There's real judgment. Yeah,
there's no judgment, but I know I know Logically that's coming from her and it's her shit.
Yeah, but it certainly doesn't feel good coming from your mom. I,
And your mom, who's a dietician and has made that her life's work.
(13:09):
Yeah. So this, you can understand why this is something I didn't necessarily
want to talk about. Yeah, a little more loaded than maybe for someone else. Yeah. Yeah.
And maybe you don't need to tell her. I might not. I mean, do you feel like,
is there a tug where you're like, I really want to tell her or? No.
Yeah, maybe you don't need to. you no it's my shit i've actually gotten to the
(13:32):
point where it's like you know what i don't want.
The only thing sometimes i think i should
do is tell her that her attitude towards
weight is messed up yeah yeah i mean i don't know how much self-inspection your
mother is willing or able to do she's gonna be 79 at this point i don't it's
(13:56):
possible though it's possible and so that To me,
that is the benefit of calling someone on that.
Yes, she may respond angrily initially.
Yeah. But maybe it's a thing that she can reflect on that's actually going to
help her feel better about herself.
That's the hope more than anything. I don't think I need it anymore because
(14:18):
this is something that I've been struggling with for so long that I'm at a pretty
good place with it right now.
You know, with all the things we talked about, I don't need my mom to approve
or disapprove that I took a drug to help me stave off type two diabetes because
I have a metabolic disorder.
I don't need that. I'm fine with that 100%.
(14:39):
Do I wish I didn't need it? Sure, but that is not what my body does.
Yeah, but if we can get through some of this negativity that I have been living
with my whole life, that would help both of us.
The negativity, meaning the little thoughts in our heads about others,
(15:00):
and how we talk to ourselves, and what we say to our children.
And it shows up in all the little pieces of media we consume throughout the day.
And all of this is passed on generation to generation, often from mother to daughter.
Don't you think we get a lot of our own stuff from our moms specifically?
(15:23):
Specifically, I don't really feel like I inherited any of this stuff from my dad.
I was always just his daughter and he loved me. And yeah, we played.
He was my soccer coach and it was great.
And yeah, Oprah shared data around that, too, that so much of this is shaped
by our relationship with our mothers.
And they got it from somewhere, too. Right. Of course, they didn't make this up.
(15:45):
Oh, this is back to point A, internalized patriarchy fueled by capitalism.
Right. And their mothers were wearing the corsets and the pointy bras to fit
into their tiny dresses while they were frantically making dinner for their husbands.
I mean, it hasn't been that long in our society that we've gotten to say no.
(16:05):
It has not been that long. And as we know by what's happening in Washington, D.C.
And other states, there's a number of people aren't happy that we say no.
That we're our own women we don't have to subscribe to this shit but it hasn't
been very long and working through this stuff is generational,
(16:26):
because we do pass it down we live a long time and we generally have one or
two kids some of us have none.
Music.
It hasn't been that long that we've been able to say no,
In the introduction to Sonia Renee Taylor's book, The Body is Not an Apology,
(16:51):
Ijeoma Oluo paraphrased says, The concern that my mother had for the size and
shape of my body was the same concern that her mother had for her when she was a girl.
It was born from the fear that the world would be cruel to me.
She could not imagine a world that would love any woman in a larger body,
and she wanted me to be loved.
Her concern came from love, and that love felt like a knife to the heart.
(17:15):
Music.
Now, the way we learn to eat also comes from our families, originally.
Maureen shared that her parents did cook when she was young.
Yet, back in the 1980s, there were a lot of weird thoughts on what healthy food is.
(17:39):
My mom and dad, they cooked all the time, but it was that, you know,
busy, both working parents, simple foods, that kind of thing.
But there's still plenty and they still are because like they go to Costco and
they buy all the canned everything, plenty of cans that you just put together to cook, right?
And that might be better than like buying the frozen stuff at the grocery store,
but it's still processed food.
(18:00):
Do you think that canned is better than frozen? Like the frozen meal.
Oh, okay. Okay. Yes. No, like frozen peas. Fine. Yeah. Great.
She taught me the basics about good eating, even if some of that stuff has changed.
Like we always had margarine and nonfat milk, but because that was at the time,
the thing that they thought was healthy, turns out that, you know,
(18:21):
fat is actually good fats are actually good for you for a reason.
That was a big learning for me. My kid was like kind of underweight their first year or so.
So we went and saw a nutritionist, pretty straightforward.
Nothing was wrong. The the doctor was like, full fat yogurt,
full fat milk, all the avocados, full fat cheese, all these things that would help.
(18:44):
And to me, it was like, oh, yeah, those things are good for us.
I was just raised that they are bad for us and I would not feed them to a baby.
We were raised during the low fat craze, which, I mean, it was like from a few
studies about heart disease.
But then again, like the corporate food chain latched on that.
It's like, oh, Oh, this is the way to make money. That's right.
(19:06):
Sorry, margarine's so bad for you. Really, go back to butter now.
I mean. It's like, what even was margarine?
Poly, mono. Just oil, some kind of oil.
And what I think we talked about at your house when we were talking about the
pandemic lockdowns, just this idea that we're so far away from our food source.
(19:28):
So far. Like, we have no idea how food grows, what food we should grow,
how to harvest said food and turn it into food that we want to eat.
Nobody knows how to do that. No, it's really hard. That is something that we
all grew up eating fast food.
We grew up eating very mechanized and increasingly more mechanized food.
(19:49):
And nobody cooks anymore.
What does mechanized food mean? Food that is basically like the 50s,
right? This was the future. It's the power.
Women will no longer have to cook all of these meals. They can take these and
put them in the oven and then you'll have food, right?
We love that as people because it saves time. That's right. And in one and a
half generations, we forgot how to cook and what food was.
(20:11):
That's how fast that happened. That's how fast that happened. Right.
And so having to relearn has definitely been part of my journey.
It's one of the reasons I do not miss the farmer's market every Saturday coming out of high water.
That I have known these farmers for over 20 years that I have learned how to,
and I'm lucky enough to have space to do it, that I have learned and have to
grow my own tomatoes and have my lovely backyard hens.
(20:35):
And it comes from being horrified at the foods I was putting in my body when
I realized what they were and not understanding how bad they were before that.
Like actually how much damage they can do to you as a person.
I have been on a journey of trying to make sure I eat good foods.
(20:57):
Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma was a huge book for me.
I'd already sort of started down this path of understanding how bad the American
diet was when I was trying to figure out what was wrong with me.
But reading that book made me realize how important it was to actually buy whole
foods from farmers, grow your
own stuff, avoid processed food and ultra-processed food and all of that.
(21:20):
Maureen has been on a journey of learning how to eat. And the system does not make this easy.
There are powerful players working against us, feeling good emotionally and physically.
We eat like crap.
We have an industrialized food complex that is getting more creative and insidious
every year in what they put in the food and label it as food.
(21:45):
Humans are lazy. They're going to get the easy thing, but they're also going
to get the thing that tastes amazing because as they've gotten more insidious
and very good at making these highly processed foods delicious,
they see their profits go up, right? It's all about profits.
Even the same with our whole foods, right? Like so much is run by agribusiness.
(22:07):
Agribusiness is going to use chemicals to treat the food.
It's going to use chemicals to grow the food, whether it's an animal or a plant,
right? So all of these things go into our foodways.
And so all of this stuff is going into us.
It's the stuff we see at the store. Most people don't even think about it.
They just pick it up. It's the food at the grocery store.
(22:27):
You actually have to really educate yourself about what you're looking at when
you read the back of a box right so in
that sense it's nobody's fault this is like this is
capitalism causing obesity yes yes
and i that's why like i think it's important to say like yes there's some laziness
but also the laziness is not causing everything the system the systemic issues
(22:50):
that you're describing right now right now i'm saying that i should i should
rephrase that human beings will take the easy way yes so if there's like an
easy thing at the store that's That's what they're going to buy.
Not lazy in the sense of not exercising, not eating well.
Right, right. It's just that that's the way we're programmed to do less work
if we can do something else.
Right. And industrialized food knows this about human nature. Yes.
(23:13):
So that is its own moneymaker. Los Angeles. It is business. Big business.
Yes, of course we're going to do less work. We're going to go to the freaking
grocery store and assume that we're buying actual food there.
So I need Maureen to educate me a little bit more about mechanized and industrialized food.
(23:34):
Most of America's food is mechanized in that it is produced by agribusinesses
using fossil fuels as fertilizer and also producing monoculture.
That is the same crop over large swaths. This is really bad for the environment
because it doesn't support pollinators and it's putting poison in the ground and on our food.
(24:00):
Okay, point one, bad for our environment. Then we have the processing.
That's where the cheap food comes from, which goes to factories,
which break down those foodstuffs into component parts that are remixed together
to create highly processed foods that also include things like flavors.
(24:21):
You know, natural flavors are some, if you read that New York Times article,
like natural flavors can are sort of ultra
processed and mechanized but then there's
also these fake flavors that go into things and all of
these things that are broken down i mean the impossible burger is a perfect
example of highly processed mechanized food that is delicious and we love these
(24:44):
things because they taste delicious because they are so good at putting all
the flavor back in. So we eat a lot of it.
But there are more and more studies. And if you look at the New York Times and
the BBC and a bunch of other places, there is increasing studies that it's terrible
for us. So no doubt it is part of the problem.
(25:05):
I think one of the more recent case studies about how badly this affects us
is maybe something like high fructose corn syrup.
Not corn Corn syrup like you use for baking, but high fructose corn syrup came
out of the need to sell and grow more corn because of the way American farming subsidies are set up.
(25:26):
And a lot of obesity can be tracked to farmers, basically these giant farms
selling high fructose corn syrup, which is broken down and put into tons of food.
And that definitely coincides with the increase in obesity and diabetes,
for example, that is one way that it is very bad for us.
(25:50):
So it is...
Just this whole notion that we grow stuff using pesticides and fossil fuels
and then turn that stuff into delicious but terrible foods for us because we're
not actually eating whole foods.
We're eating all these things that basically have been broken down into inedible
(26:13):
chemicals or parts of the plant or meat or whatever that is not actually whole
enough to be nutritious anymore more and is also not satisfying.
Okay, so basically the majority of our food is processed, and the ultra-processed
category is the one with the biggest red flag.
Essentially, it's not whole enough to be nutritious, and it's not satisfying,
(26:38):
so we're inclined to eat more of it.
This is just the attempt to master nature and feed us a bunch of crap and make
a lot of money doing that.
And research is showing a link between these foods and a higher risk of illness
cancer and heart disease,
(26:59):
there's a simple solution to how we should eat going back to michael pollan
who wrote the dilemma his follow-up little tome very succinctly described what
i think we should try and do with with food,
eat food, mostly plants, not too much. Right.
Right. It's pretty simple. Yes. But very hard for us to do.
(27:23):
Music.
Okay, I lied. It's not simple. Because as you now know, two parts of the evil
trifecta, agribusiness and capitalism, make it hard.
And, you know, the agribusinesses know this.
Like, as people have become more aware and are doing things like buying food
(27:46):
from markets, making sure they get fresh things, growing their own foods,
companies like Monsanto are buying seeds so that you can't save seeds and grow
food yourself the next year.
They will control that part of the chain too. They know all of this.
It's hard to fight. It's horrible. It's horrible. It's really horrible.
And it makes me afraid for the future. Yeah.
(28:07):
I mean, you know, when the climate is so bad that it's going to be hard to grow
food, they'll probably save us by being able to grow the mechanized food, but it won't be great.
Well, that's a positive spin on it. Yeah, well, they'll have the technology and the money. Mm-hmm.
But in the meantime, it's better to like save the seeds that actually do well
(28:28):
in the climate that is changing or buy from the farmer that's doing the same thing.
And don't forget that government subsidies are also at play.
The government subsidizes the agribusiness.
They do not subsidize the small family farm or the medium family farm or the organic producers.
So like, why is it that when you go to the store, organic food is twice as much as regular food?
(28:51):
It's crazy especially the produce and the
government should be subsidizing them not the agribusinesses right
and they do not so it is from
the top down who gets the money who gets the tax breaks who don't so that's
angering too and I don't know what there is to do about it yeah I don't see
(29:11):
like a clear path either yeah none of the companies that give all all the money
to the folks that are in the farm belt are gonna take away their subsidies.
They're not going to. No, that's not because they're getting them elected.
Desirable, yeah. Exactly, there's no political will to support the small organic farm.
(29:31):
And it's like to make any impact via individual action, like that also feels
not like a thing we could do.
Like there's not enough people that would care.
And if they care, have time and have energy and have resources to like shift.
I think the one place it works is here. It works here at least until recently
(29:53):
because there were enough of a critical amount.
I mean, we live in a ridiculous place in terms of abundant organic fresh food
sources, different than everywhere else in the world. Really?
And I've been all over the world. Yeah.
We have it so good here.
California. California. The bread basket. What is it? The fruit basket?
I don't know. Yeah. But Northern California in particular is ridiculous.
(30:18):
There are so many small organic farms and small meat producers.
And you can actually go out and you can buy the good foods.
The foods that have been raised well if it's an
animal or the tomato that has
been raised without pesticides and is an open pollinated
seed that no agribusiness owns
you pay a lot more for it and until recently it wasn't that much more i think
(30:43):
it's actually still not that much more if you go to the grocery store these
days especially if you do know your farmer and you go and your support that's
one direct action that makes a difference you giving a farmer 20 bucks is going
to keep them in business.
So it may not change it on a policy level, but that is one of the ways of acting
local where you actually keep the money with the farmer and get the food directly.
(31:05):
With little interference and can feed yourself in a healthy way.
Music.
Learn how to cook and eat. She eats from an informed place, one that is aligned with her values.
She recommends acting local if you can. And the good news is that it still tastes great.
(31:29):
Thank you. You're welcome. And we always eat so good at your house. Well, you know.
So good. That's been a journey though. That like what you're eating has been
a 25 year journey to get to that point. Right. Like, yeah.
I mean, I think that's part of the the point is like it does take time
and effort and education and all of it
right but it's to me it's one of the most important
(31:51):
things i mean that's what's kind of so nuts
about it is that our life used
to be feeding ourselves yeah that was like your entire life yeah for you know
50 years or whatever was like shelter and feeding yourself warmth yeah right
warmth you know and And now we can't even dedicate the time it would take to
(32:14):
figure out how to feed ourselves well.
Like we just don't, we don't even have that time. We spend no time.
But we do, but we don't know it. We've been tricked into believing we don't. I feel like we don't.
All right, tune in for some actionable tips. Maureen is going to explain how
we have the time and share what she picks up at the farmer's market and how
(32:36):
it transforms into a meal.
We do. How do we find the time? I have my meals that I make Monday through Thursday.
And then I have my meals that I will do on the weekend that require more time. Okay.
And so I feel like everybody can find five to eight things that they can make
during the week that are very healthy for you that don't take time.
(32:57):
You plan them or do you do the same thing every single week?
No. So Saturday when I'm at the farmer's market, I see what's in season.
And there's usually two things that happen. One, if I know that I'm going to
be cooking for friends, I will buy for that.
But then if it's just us, I almost always on the weekend, Cody and I will cook
a bigger, more complicated meal because we like it. We've gotten to that point. Yeah.
(33:20):
And we'll usually make enough as if we were having people over and then we can
eat a little bit of that in the coming days.
Together we do cook together but then at the
same farmer's market i'm like okay here's what's
in season this is what i know i'm going to eat because we're trying we've been
trying really hard not to go out except basically once a week right i mean it's
(33:40):
gotten expensive out there but also there's no reason we shouldn't be cooking
it's important and so that's part of the equation and then what i don't get
at the farmer's market and because we don't eat meat that's a little bit bit easier.
We have occasional fish, but mostly vegetarian.
I'll get the rest at Berkeley Bowl or Whole Foods though.
(34:00):
That's Amazon these days and it's getting a little more complicated to shop there.
Or run down to Farmer Joe's, which is the local excellent little grocery store to fill it out.
And so I do think about it every week. I think about what I want.
Right. And you go to two locations.
Yeah. And I get it. And then I plan on cooking it. And I used to be not as good
at this and and I wasted a lot of food, I've gotten a lot better at actually
(34:22):
buying what we're gonna eat.
So I'll think, oh, wow, look, there's those mushrooms. I'm going to make us
a pasta and a salad with fresh mushrooms and fresh herbs.
And you have that much, for those of you who can't see me out there in audio
land, I'm making a small amount of pasta and a giant salad on the plate, right?
Rather than the other way around, because it's a lot easier to eat a ton of
(34:43):
pasta and a little bit of salad.
Or, you know, like it's asparagus season right now and we've got hens.
So I always have eggs. So a wonderful meal is grilled asparagus with a couple
of eggs over the top, whether poached or medium or over easy over the top.
And one other vegetable or one, you know, like that is super easy.
(35:07):
A lot of times this is where the canned stuff comes in, right?
You can always make yourself a fresh sandwich with good bread.
You don't have to buy the processed bread. we've got a ridiculous number of
bakers, including Firebrand, who's making sandwich bread now that is delicious.
If you're out of time, you can make yourself a tuna salad sandwich without tons
of mayonnaise, but you can do that within all the vegetables.
(35:29):
And you get that all in one, right? Or sometimes when I make a pasta,
I'll make sure that it's just chock full of vegetables, right?
So it's not just the processed pasta, or you do a whole wheat pasta and you
put tons of vegetables in it. Like what vegetables would you put?
So I just made one last week, I put a ton of mint, a ton
of asparagus a ton of fresh shelling peas lemon
zest lemon juice and then olive oil salt and pepper and just a tiny bit of parmesan
(35:54):
over the top that sounds really good but there was as many vegetables if not
more than the pasta in that pot cooked it all together wow you just have to
teach yourself how to do it.
There's other things that we make all the time that I'm not thinking about. Oh, like rice bowls.
That's another really. I freaking love a rice bowl. But you get the whole grain
(36:14):
rice. You don't get the white rice. I want the white rice, though. But you know what?
Brown, nutty California rice is delicious.
Is it? It really is. Okay. And that one, this is another trick, right?
You stick it in your rice cooker or your Instant Pot, and then it's ready when
you're ready to make the other things.
And then you can put anything on it that you have that's in season.
Oh, yeah. Yeah, grain bowls. Can I do like the mayo red, the yum yum sauce?
(36:40):
Do you know what the yum yum sauce is? You can put some yum yum sauce.
Okay, thank you. Just not too much. Not too much. Just a little.
Just like a tablespoon. Yeah, yeah.
So it's like, again, it's not being puritanical. It's finding the thing that
is healthy and good for you.
You can still use like your condiments and stuff and make it taste good.
You want it to be easy in that sense.
(37:03):
All right, here's the numbers. Maureen's Saturday food shopping trip takes an
hour and a half, and her Monday through Thursday cooking takes about 30 minutes of prep.
So it seems pretty manageable, right?
You just, you have to find the time, and you do have the time.
I mean, there is infinite television, or there's taking some of that infinite
(37:24):
television time and going to the farmer's market once a week,
and then bringing everybody with you, right?
Because then that's how you actually start teaching the next generation where
their food actually comes from and what to do with it. Yeah.
And I think making it a family partnership like you and Kogi have done is also critical.
It really is. It makes it fun. You're both, everybody's bought into it.
(37:46):
Yeah. And it's delicious. And it's freaking delicious.
As I said, eating at Maureen and Cody's is a real treat.
But when I was cooking more thoughtfully on the reg, nothing tasted that great.
My partner, Erin, will still make cracks about those Weight Watchers recipes
that contained zero spices.
So on this journey, you do have to be open to failure and eating some things
(38:08):
that do not tickle your taste buds.
I bet when you started on this, not everything tasted good. No, I fucked up last night.
So I'm like, oh, I have those potatoes that I didn't end up using.
Thing. So I'm really on not wasting.
And I have half of the peas that I shucked for that pasta I described.
I'm like, I'm going to make some aloo matar, which is peas and potatoes, Indian style.
(38:29):
And I had saved this recipe that I was going to try because I don't necessarily
know the basis for that by heart.
But I'm never afraid to try it. And we've got all those great spices from Oaktown
Spice. And I'm like, I've got everything I need here.
It just tasted wrong. and I put it I
was so excited I put it I cooked my rice I made it looked
(38:50):
so good so disappointing and something about the
spice I think it was a bad yeah I think it was a bad recipe I think
the spice mix was off yeah and I followed it exactly and Cody was like and Cody
was he came home because he was at band practice last night and he's like oh
good you cooked I'm like yeah but that took me about a half an hour it didn't
take very long but it did not come out and that's okay I'm like I'm I'm not
(39:13):
deterred. I'm just like, okay, I have to find a better recipe.
So that's Maureen's vision for direct action. Buy from your local farmer and
eat non-mechanized food as much as you can.
There's often pre-made food at the farmer's market, and that counts too.
Also, if you need help, phone a friend.
(39:34):
And then ask a lot of questions. You know, it's funny. Jeremy calls me all the
time because he's the one who cooks.
Yeah. And he's like, hey, Mo, if I do this, how long should I put it on?
And so I'll tell him. And so like, call me. I love helping people cook.
My neighbor, Punkage, is like, I really want to learn bread.
I'm like, OK, it's really hard to learn bread together because most of bread
is just waiting for things to rise.
(39:57):
I said, but let's start. Do a focaccia. Nobody can fail at a focaccia.
And he didn't. And now he's so confident. So like, you know,
you start with the stuff that you're comfortable with or you know, or you ask questions.
Music.
Even though we're fighting against two parts of the evil trifecta,
(40:17):
it seems doable, right? Even kind of enticing.
But I'm going to add the final component of that trifecta. And this one you've heard about already.
The diet industry is its own moneymaker, including, you know,
and the thing is, like, I don't know if you just saw this article.
There was an article about the ADA, which is the American Diabetes Association,
(40:39):
about who they're actually working for.
And it's interesting because my mom stayed with us before she retired to attend
ADA conference, and they were having it at the Marriott in Oakland.
And she came back with all of
her swag as you get at conferences you know your swag bag and it was like McDonald's
I was like McDonald's is sponsoring the American Dietetic Association she's
(41:02):
like yeah I'm like don't you think that's weird she's like oh I didn't really
think about it and it was I don't remember I don't remember every single other
but the McDonald's really stuck in my.
Craw but the there everything that was
there was basically some form of processed or
industrialized product weird it wasn't like
there was you know fresh fresh fruits and vegetables from california
(41:24):
sponsoring right right ada conference somebody actually
sued them for actually siding with the industrialized food over people and they
ended up settling out of court but there was just an article in the new york
times about this they sued the ada sued the ada because they were like who are
you working for it turns out it might be for the agribusinesses right so the folks that should
(41:47):
be like setting what we're eating are in cahoots with
the ag business yep quote nutrition
professional organizations like the american diabetes
association or american dietetic association or
american society for nutrition often partner with
or advocate for the mechanized food industry i mean this is just a continuation
(42:07):
of the margarine nonsense the suit maureen mentioned was related to splenda
being an elite sponsor of the ada their ex-director claimed she was was pressured
to endorse Splenda recipes with no nutrition-based reasons.
Hint, it's about the money.
Back to diet culture.
And then, of course, people aren't happy when they don't feel good. Right.
(42:30):
Because when it comes down to it, like, nobody feels good when they're too heavy.
Right. Everybody knows that, like, oh, I'm not moving. I'm not exercising.
I'm feeling weighed down.
When they're too heavy for themselves. For themselves. Correct. Right.
But then what do you do? Well, look, there's this whole other series of things you can buy into.
(42:53):
Your Jenny Craig's. Yes. Your Weight Watchers, all of these things,
SlimFast, that whole industry has actually been turned on its head because of these injectables.
They're suddenly not going to be making a lot of money because this shot can solve the problem.
Right. Or we just have like two tiers now, right? Because people that can afford
(43:13):
$1,200 a month are going to get it.
People that can't are still going to be doing Jenny Craig. Exactly.
And losing and gaining and losing and gaining. and
where really I feel like the education is
about what kinds of things to put into your body and how
much is right for you but I don't feel like that is actually going to be something
(43:34):
that's easily accessed or supported by the government and in your real way plus
the people making these injectables are making a gazillion dollars Eli Lilly's
sock is through the roof so you also Also have shareholders, please. Right.
So it's an insidious trifecta. Both of those, all of those solutions,
(43:54):
except maybe even the eating well, but to a lesser degree,
feed off of us all just feeling shitty both emotionally and physically.
Absolutely. They want us to feel shitty regardless of our size.
Yeah. Regardless even of our health.
Exactly. They want us to feel like crap and think that we look like crap and
(44:15):
want to pay money to feel better. Exactly.
Ultimately, here's what Maureen hopes in relation to medical weight loss and food.
I hope that they find a way to make this affordable for people because it is a real game changer.
I do think the education, this is the part that's not going to happen,
(44:38):
right? Right. For all the reasons we talked to, like education for people about
actually how to eat healthy foods needs to happen. Yeah.
It's taken on multiple industries.
But I will say that this is something that will help people not be sick. Yeah.
I told Maureen that Weight Watchers is now offering Weight Watchers Clinic.
(45:02):
That seems to be a combination of the things that we discussed.
They're going to be like, they are going to have like doctors on staff and be.
Oh, so they're okay. So this is a thing that's been happening.
Like people are trying to capitalize.
I've noticed this. Even health insurance have these things now where it's basically
like these weight loss centers.
And they have the doctors on site and they're making it easy for people.
(45:23):
And I feel like it is more cost effective that
way at least for the short term I'll be
interested to see because all this stuff is new be interested
to see long term if they keep the prices down because I remember when
we first started this process and that
first the coupon through Eli Lily worked where it was only
25 a month which is a much more reasonable price I'd be
(45:44):
happy to pay that you know I was prescribed it
off label and they weren't checking for that
in the beginning okay so i was prescribed it
because i'm on the spectrum of diabetes
with the metabolic disorder okay uh-huh sure but after
so many people are like oh my god get me the shot the drug companies are like
(46:06):
whoa we can't keep doing all these coupons and so then they started checking
and so then they you had to answer if you had a prescription because you had
type 2 diabetes and you had to show the prescription got it got it okay and
at that point they stopped covering it.
Also, we don't know what the long-term side effects are.
There is some evidence that there might be a potential to have thyroid cancer,
(46:28):
like they showed that in lab rats.
So it's not something I'm real keen to stay on if I don't have to.
Sure, you don't wanna be one of those lab rats. No, and it didn't seem like,
I mean, they've done some trials,
it didn't seem like it was gonna be that way in humans, but it's new.
We don't know. All these old drugs she had me on had been in,
in like 50-year-old drugs. Like they already know what's going to happen. Nothing.
(46:54):
I filled out the online questionnaire and Weight Watchers told me,
congratulations, I'm qualified for their prescription weight loss program.
And I can expect to lose 26 pounds with my membership.
It would be 800 to $1,200 a month for the medication and another $85 for the benefits.
But this is about my health. I mean, nothing is currently wrong with me health-wise,
(47:17):
but I will reduce my risk of possibly getting diabetes by 5-10%.
Back to these type of centers and the combination of injectables and education.
I read an article about this concept of feeling sated.
Satiety? It's a hard word to say. Do you say it like satiety or satiety?
(47:42):
Right? There's like an I in there.
So I don't know. But so feeling sated is that one of the things about these
industrialized foods I'm talking about, these highly processed foods,
you have to eat a lot more to actually feel full and not just feel full, but feel satisfied.
And so these drugs help you feel satisfied.
(48:03):
And that they think is actually, in addition to making you feel full,
the fact that you feel satisfied is changing behavior for folks who are not
eating the things they should be eating.
And maybe have gained weight because they're eating all these highly processed
foods and haven't learned how to actually cook for themselves in a healthy way.
And so that's a game changer because basically it's like, okay,
(48:28):
you're throwing all this industrialized food at us, but now you're going to feel full.
So even if you're still eating that crappy food, you're not going to eat enough
of it to gain weight. You're going to lose weight.
And feel satisfied while you're on it go off it
you're back to not feeling right and not knowing how to
eat still right and so that's the component that i hope
these centers will be addressing is teaching people actually
(48:48):
how to cook and eat and recognize foods that are good for them i mean i think
that that would be the power of an entity such as weight watchers if they're
offering all that together right like a shot plus a community plus education
yeah properly right Right.
So we'll see. We'll see. Or they'll just continue to be the devil.
(49:15):
Maureen went off Monjaro a few months ago, and she's feeling good and hoping
that her numbers stay where they're supposed to be.
She has no regrets about her decision. And if she has to, she'll do it again.
I think I can do this. I hope I can. I really hope I don't have to go back on
it, but I will if I have to.
Because if my body rebels, my body rebels. Right. Exactly. And you have very
(49:37):
little control over that.
I'd like to begin with a fact. I have none. You have no control over that.
Other than exercising and eating well.
But that's not going to cause weight loss for me. Or it might cause weight gain.
Music.
(50:02):
I did a lot of easy cheats without going fully processed or just giving into
the burrito as much as I love a burrito oh that just made me want a burrito why did you say that?
Music.
Music.
(00:06):
The thing about food in this country and body and beauty standards?
I'd like to begin with a fact. We eat like crap.
And in one and a half generations, we forgot how to cook and what food was.
This is the Abbey Normal podcast, here to tell you that you're weird and that's normal.
(00:29):
I'd like to begin with a fact. Whether in a small town like McAllen and the.
Music.
Rio Grande or in Chicago, New York, or Los Angeles.
It is business. Big business.
Hello and welcome back. As a reminder, Maureen was on the injectable Monjaro
for a year and a half to address her metabolic disorder.
(00:49):
She put me on an injectable, and I have lost 55 pounds.
Go back to the last episode, Skinny Minnie, to hear more about her health rollercoaster.
Now, we all know that body judgments are inescapable, And that,
of course, extends to the use of medications and injectables that lead to weight loss.
So, today we're going to discuss those judgments, which lead to fear and secrecy
(01:13):
within our relationships.
And we're also going to explore the evil trifecta that impacts how we all eat
and what we can, maybe, do about it.
That's taken on multiple industries.
Music.
Buckle the F up.
(01:34):
There does seem to be some judgment about using this medicine.
Right. Which I don't actually think should exist.
You shouldn't feel bad that somebody has lost weight because they got medical support.
Yeah. And you did it all on your own and were able to work out and stuff.
People are having very strong reactions to this drug being a cheat.
(01:56):
And I think it's really important for people to understand that there are so
many different body types.
And the foods and stuffs we're putting into those body types in America and
in the West does nothing but exploit the need for us to eat more and put on
weight. And it's a really unhealthy diet.
And if this is part of the solution, then that's great. You shouldn't be judged
(02:19):
for that. It is just dealing with another.
Music.
I mean, I do feel like there's so much of the hurt people, hurt people concept occurring here, right?
So if for our whole lives, we've been told just that willpower,
(02:39):
you need the willpower. Exactly. If you want it, you can do it.
You just have to, you know, put the pedal to the metal. So fucking American, right?
So that is bullshit, but that's ingrained in us, right?
It is. So it's a little bit like, well, this isn't fair that these people now
get to just take a drug and have
what I've been trying and wanting for my entire life. That's not fair.
(03:02):
And then also just the cognitive dissonance of realizing that that message is
bullshit. And like, now what do we do with that?
So, yeah, I do think that folks that have been able to leverage this as a medical
solution, like, are stuck in the crosshairs of kind of this new understanding
that people are having. Yeah. Unfortunately.
(03:23):
Unfortunately. And there's the whole other thing of like,
and I don't know how much this was happening, but for a while there were like
shortages and sometimes I'd have to wait a while to get the drug because everybody
was so desperate to get their hands on it, including celebrities to lose weight,
to get ready for a photo, a movie.
Like that's how great the need is. Like,
Does the person who's the movie star really need to lose the weight? No. Right.
(03:48):
But they think they need to. Absolutely. Because they're just as brainwashed as the rest of us.
And so like this need is real, but for so many different reasons. Right.
The need is real. And yet it feels kind of strange, honestly,
to see so many folks around you shrinking all at the same time.
(04:09):
And as you heard last episode, we don't know what's going on with people on the inside.
But bringing up the celebrity thing led us into talking about the judgments
that they face too, including one of my favorite English actresses and activists.
Do you follow Jamila Jamil from The Good Place?
(04:29):
Anyway, she's great. She's this, you know, beautiful Indian actress.
Oh, I know who she is. Yeah, and the media has just, like, torn her apart.
In so many different ways and she's been
a victim of like you know when she's thin she gets the she's beautiful
even though she's sick and depressed you know in that
photo then she gains weight and she's happy and the media
(04:50):
blows her up on on that i don't think i had really a point aside from the way
that these poor i feel bad even defending them but these poor models and actresses
that have to be a size two and are made to feel fat when they can't fit into
the two when The mirror size four. Or the zero. Yeah.
Yeah. So like. It's insidious. There are reasons for potentially using a drug
(05:13):
like this are the same ones that we would have. Exactly. So anyway.
I'm going to find a way for us to travel into the past because I just read a story. Uh-huh.
Mama Cass's daughter is publishing a biography. I don't know if you saw that ever.
And one of the things she's tackling is this notion that Mama Cass died from
choking on a hand sandwich. Yeah.
(05:33):
Which is total bullshit, but it's something we were all told,
right? This is Mama Cass from the Mamas and the Pampas. Yep,
yep. She had a heart attack.
But all of these years, this really unkind, cruel story is that she died choking
eating because she was heavy. Right.
And why is that the thing that we remember and not the beautiful singing?
(05:55):
Yeah. And the beautiful songs? Yeah.
And that really tells us a lot about where we are in
the West especially in this country and i really think america
has a special way of dealing with it because we were founded by
puritans so you have you have to do it yourself if you don't do it right you're
wrong at some level it's because god is displeased and like like you know like
(06:19):
that is what this country was founded on right and immense controlling of the body for everybody
especially women yeah it was founded by men and puritans and puritanical men,
and slavery and all of that shit and just informs all the things we're talking
about every day all the time yeah and so this is a very american way of i think
(06:43):
the west has this in spades but america in particular has its own flavor of
dysfunction when it comes to all of these things.
Her point is that American history informs what we're dealing with today.
Puritanical attitudes about hard work and self-control, the roots of slavery
and racism that value a thin and white body over others, and toxic patriarchy
(07:07):
that paints one picture of the value of women and is constantly inclined toward
controlling those bodies.
These seem like big, old concepts, yet they show up in all facets of life.
For example, simple healthcare.
I didn't go to the doctor for a long time because the doctor that I had had
between college and getting my adrenal gland diagnosis was mean.
(07:33):
And I finally had to go to the doctor. Of course, I had moved up here by then.
And so I was like, well, I need to find somebody up here.
So I had found a GP that I loved. I followed her to every practice.
Amazing. Dr. Logan, she's wonderful.
Avis Logan, if you're listening to this, I love you.
(07:53):
So supportive, so kind, opposite of what I experienced in Southern California. Yeah.
But I ran into an endocrinologist up here before I found Dr.
Bohannon, who told me that, well, you know, my wife and I both lost 10 pounds
by just switching to salads at lunch and had me in tears in the parking lot
because I was like, why am I even talking to this guy? I actually just walked out.
(08:16):
Yeah. He wasn't listening to the struggle I'd been through. I don't want to
hear one word, honestly, from a man, doctor. No.
When I finally found my current endocrinologist, she's just like, look, there's science.
There's figuring out what's going on with you. And then we'll come up with a plan. Don't worry.
(08:38):
Like, we'll figure this out. And she's told me stories about other people she's worked with.
And she's like, look, I just want you to be healthy. You know,
in your case, I felt strongly you needed to lose some weight because your numbers were changing.
But if you're technically 50 pounds overweight and your numbers are fine and
you're taking care of yourself, I'm not worried about it. Yeah.
(09:01):
Do you know how it's so refreshing?
So refreshing and should not be controversial.
No, it should not be controversial. No. Treatment should be based on your health.
The things that are used by health insurance, of course, right?
That's the fourth thing. They make money off of us too. We can add that to your list.
Yeah, There's no holistic approach to health in this country. Right.
(09:23):
There's just money making. Yeah. And so, of course, people are having trouble.
And most doctors are just trained in the basics.
The doctors have to please, you know, have to bill the health insurance.
So they have to like make up. Okay, they've got these things for you to even get covered.
The doctors then use the tools that are provided for them out there.
(09:44):
And like one of them is BMI, which is your body mass index. Okay.
You know, it turns out that's just one indicator of health. Doesn't necessarily mean a thing.
And it's like just invented based on like some European man.
Yeah, I was going to say it's based on a dude. It's not based on age.
It's not based on gender. They've changed it so that there's minimum.
(10:05):
But it's like they don't take any of your other stuff into account.
And, you know, an insurance company might not approve something because of that.
There's nothing holistic about it, which is enraging.
Also just societally we're going
to our doctors who are doing the best they can in this
(10:26):
impossible situation where they have to like bill the health insurance that
may not cover it but trying really hard to give you care yeah and not having
enough resources right so i know how lucky i am to have dr bohannon she spends
an hour with me she doesn't take health insurance for that reason. Oh, wow. Oh, my gosh.
But I don't really pay her any more than I would for a good massage of the same
(10:48):
time period. That's awesome. But it goes straight to her.
And I want to go back to that. Yeah. But she's also mostly retired from seeing patients at this point.
There's only about 20 of us. But even when she wasn't, she would spend an hour with us.
She was always running late. And while I would curse her waiting in the waiting
room, I'd be like, oh no, but this is why. Who else is gonna do this? Yeah.
(11:17):
Maureen was able to find good care, basically outside of the health insurance
system, from a doctor who listens first and doesn't make assumptions based on body size alone.
Doctors are humans. Weight bias affects them too. So let's go back to that.
For many of us, it originates from our mothers.
My mom has her own food stuff, and we've never really talked about it,
(11:40):
but you see it in how she eats.
She doesn't eat much during the day, and then she'll eat desserts.
But I know in her head, she's counting all the calories. That's right.
That's right. 100%. She also has a really negative attitude towards people who are fat.
Really? And that I haven't actually told her that I've taken the Manjaro because
I am not comfortable with the way she sees fat people.
(12:02):
And I know so much of that is internalized, but she'll make fun of people on
television when we're sitting there watching. Oh, wow.
Things like that. And that is coming from her. That is coming from her own attitude
towards people being heavy.
So I've not been real keen to share a lot of this stuff over the years because
I don't know how she's is going to react.
And if I play her this podcast, this is probably going to be news to her.
(12:25):
Bad on me for not saying it, but it's just been easier not to deal with it.
Wow. So it's hard. Yeah. There was actually a woman on the Oprah thing today
who's a doctor and was sharing the same thing as you, that she hadn't told her
mom yet because she didn't want her mom's judgment.
And she went on the Oprah thing and talked about it. So she had to tell her
(12:47):
mom. But yeah, I think there's... There's real judgment. Yeah,
there's no judgment, but I know I know Logically that's coming from her and it's her shit.
Yeah, but it certainly doesn't feel good coming from your mom. I,
And your mom, who's a dietician and has made that her life's work.
(13:09):
Yeah. So this, you can understand why this is something I didn't necessarily
want to talk about. Yeah, a little more loaded than maybe for someone else. Yeah. Yeah.
And maybe you don't need to tell her. I might not. I mean, do you feel like,
is there a tug where you're like, I really want to tell her or? No.
Yeah, maybe you don't need to. you no it's my shit i've actually gotten to the
(13:32):
point where it's like you know what i don't want.
The only thing sometimes i think i should
do is tell her that her attitude towards
weight is messed up yeah yeah i mean i don't know how much self-inspection your
mother is willing or able to do she's gonna be 79 at this point i don't it's
(13:56):
possible though it's possible and so that To me,
that is the benefit of calling someone on that.
Yes, she may respond angrily initially.
Yeah. But maybe it's a thing that she can reflect on that's actually going to
help her feel better about herself.
That's the hope more than anything. I don't think I need it anymore because
(14:18):
this is something that I've been struggling with for so long that I'm at a pretty
good place with it right now.
You know, with all the things we talked about, I don't need my mom to approve
or disapprove that I took a drug to help me stave off type two diabetes because
I have a metabolic disorder.
I don't need that. I'm fine with that 100%.
(14:39):
Do I wish I didn't need it? Sure, but that is not what my body does.
Yeah, but if we can get through some of this negativity that I have been living
with my whole life, that would help both of us.
The negativity, meaning the little thoughts in our heads about others,
(15:00):
and how we talk to ourselves, and what we say to our children.
And it shows up in all the little pieces of media we consume throughout the day.
And all of this is passed on generation to generation, often from mother to daughter.
Don't you think we get a lot of our own stuff from our moms specifically?
(15:23):
Specifically, I don't really feel like I inherited any of this stuff from my dad.
I was always just his daughter and he loved me. And yeah, we played.
He was my soccer coach and it was great.
And yeah, Oprah shared data around that, too, that so much of this is shaped
by our relationship with our mothers.
And they got it from somewhere, too. Right. Of course, they didn't make this up.
(15:45):
Oh, this is back to point A, internalized patriarchy fueled by capitalism.
Right. And their mothers were wearing the corsets and the pointy bras to fit
into their tiny dresses while they were frantically making dinner for their husbands.
I mean, it hasn't been that long in our society that we've gotten to say no.
(16:05):
It has not been that long. And as we know by what's happening in Washington, D.C.
And other states, there's a number of people aren't happy that we say no.
That we're our own women we don't have to subscribe to this shit but it hasn't
been very long and working through this stuff is generational,
(16:26):
because we do pass it down we live a long time and we generally have one or
two kids some of us have none.
Music.
It hasn't been that long that we've been able to say no,
In the introduction to Sonia Renee Taylor's book, The Body is Not an Apology,
(16:51):
Ijeoma Oluo paraphrased says, The concern that my mother had for the size and
shape of my body was the same concern that her mother had for her when she was a girl.
It was born from the fear that the world would be cruel to me.
She could not imagine a world that would love any woman in a larger body,
and she wanted me to be loved.
Her concern came from love, and that love felt like a knife to the heart.
(17:15):
Music.
Now, the way we learn to eat also comes from our families, originally.
Maureen shared that her parents did cook when she was young.
Yet, back in the 1980s, there were a lot of weird thoughts on what healthy food is.
(17:39):
My mom and dad, they cooked all the time, but it was that, you know,
busy, both working parents, simple foods, that kind of thing.
But there's still plenty and they still are because like they go to Costco and
they buy all the canned everything, plenty of cans that you just put together to cook, right?
And that might be better than like buying the frozen stuff at the grocery store,
but it's still processed food.
(18:00):
Do you think that canned is better than frozen? Like the frozen meal.
Oh, okay. Okay. Yes. No, like frozen peas. Fine. Yeah. Great.
She taught me the basics about good eating, even if some of that stuff has changed.
Like we always had margarine and nonfat milk, but because that was at the time,
the thing that they thought was healthy, turns out that, you know,
(18:21):
fat is actually good fats are actually good for you for a reason.
That was a big learning for me. My kid was like kind of underweight their first year or so.
So we went and saw a nutritionist, pretty straightforward.
Nothing was wrong. The the doctor was like, full fat yogurt,
full fat milk, all the avocados, full fat cheese, all these things that would help.
(18:44):
And to me, it was like, oh, yeah, those things are good for us.
I was just raised that they are bad for us and I would not feed them to a baby.
We were raised during the low fat craze, which, I mean, it was like from a few
studies about heart disease.
But then again, like the corporate food chain latched on that.
It's like, oh, Oh, this is the way to make money. That's right.
(19:06):
Sorry, margarine's so bad for you. Really, go back to butter now.
I mean. It's like, what even was margarine?
Poly, mono. Just oil, some kind of oil.
And what I think we talked about at your house when we were talking about the
pandemic lockdowns, just this idea that we're so far away from our food source.
(19:28):
So far. Like, we have no idea how food grows, what food we should grow,
how to harvest said food and turn it into food that we want to eat.
Nobody knows how to do that. No, it's really hard. That is something that we
all grew up eating fast food.
We grew up eating very mechanized and increasingly more mechanized food.
(19:49):
And nobody cooks anymore.
What does mechanized food mean? Food that is basically like the 50s,
right? This was the future. It's the power.
Women will no longer have to cook all of these meals. They can take these and
put them in the oven and then you'll have food, right?
We love that as people because it saves time. That's right. And in one and a
half generations, we forgot how to cook and what food was.
(20:11):
That's how fast that happened. That's how fast that happened. Right.
And so having to relearn has definitely been part of my journey.
It's one of the reasons I do not miss the farmer's market every Saturday coming out of high water.
That I have known these farmers for over 20 years that I have learned how to,
and I'm lucky enough to have space to do it, that I have learned and have to
grow my own tomatoes and have my lovely backyard hens.
(20:35):
And it comes from being horrified at the foods I was putting in my body when
I realized what they were and not understanding how bad they were before that.
Like actually how much damage they can do to you as a person.
I have been on a journey of trying to make sure I eat good foods.
(20:57):
Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma was a huge book for me.
I'd already sort of started down this path of understanding how bad the American
diet was when I was trying to figure out what was wrong with me.
But reading that book made me realize how important it was to actually buy whole
foods from farmers, grow your
own stuff, avoid processed food and ultra-processed food and all of that.
(21:20):
Maureen has been on a journey of learning how to eat. And the system does not make this easy.
There are powerful players working against us, feeling good emotionally and physically.
We eat like crap.
We have an industrialized food complex that is getting more creative and insidious
every year in what they put in the food and label it as food.
(21:45):
Humans are lazy. They're going to get the easy thing, but they're also going
to get the thing that tastes amazing because as they've gotten more insidious
and very good at making these highly processed foods delicious,
they see their profits go up, right? It's all about profits.
Even the same with our whole foods, right? Like so much is run by agribusiness.
(22:07):
Agribusiness is going to use chemicals to treat the food.
It's going to use chemicals to grow the food, whether it's an animal or a plant,
right? So all of these things go into our foodways.
And so all of this stuff is going into us.
It's the stuff we see at the store. Most people don't even think about it.
They just pick it up. It's the food at the grocery store.
(22:27):
You actually have to really educate yourself about what you're looking at when
you read the back of a box right so in
that sense it's nobody's fault this is like this is
capitalism causing obesity yes yes
and i that's why like i think it's important to say like yes there's some laziness
but also the laziness is not causing everything the system the systemic issues
(22:50):
that you're describing right now right now i'm saying that i should i should
rephrase that human beings will take the easy way yes so if there's like an
easy thing at the store that's That's what they're going to buy.
Not lazy in the sense of not exercising, not eating well.
Right, right. It's just that that's the way we're programmed to do less work
if we can do something else.
Right. And industrialized food knows this about human nature. Yes.
(23:13):
So that is its own moneymaker. Los Angeles. It is business. Big business.
Yes, of course we're going to do less work. We're going to go to the freaking
grocery store and assume that we're buying actual food there.
So I need Maureen to educate me a little bit more about mechanized and industrialized food.
(23:34):
Most of America's food is mechanized in that it is produced by agribusinesses
using fossil fuels as fertilizer and also producing monoculture.
That is the same crop over large swaths. This is really bad for the environment
because it doesn't support pollinators and it's putting poison in the ground and on our food.
(24:00):
Okay, point one, bad for our environment. Then we have the processing.
That's where the cheap food comes from, which goes to factories,
which break down those foodstuffs into component parts that are remixed together
to create highly processed foods that also include things like flavors.
(24:21):
You know, natural flavors are some, if you read that New York Times article,
like natural flavors can are sort of ultra
processed and mechanized but then there's
also these fake flavors that go into things and all of
these things that are broken down i mean the impossible burger is a perfect
example of highly processed mechanized food that is delicious and we love these
(24:44):
things because they taste delicious because they are so good at putting all
the flavor back in. So we eat a lot of it.
But there are more and more studies. And if you look at the New York Times and
the BBC and a bunch of other places, there is increasing studies that it's terrible
for us. So no doubt it is part of the problem.
(25:05):
I think one of the more recent case studies about how badly this affects us
is maybe something like high fructose corn syrup.
Not corn Corn syrup like you use for baking, but high fructose corn syrup came
out of the need to sell and grow more corn because of the way American farming subsidies are set up.
(25:26):
And a lot of obesity can be tracked to farmers, basically these giant farms
selling high fructose corn syrup, which is broken down and put into tons of food.
And that definitely coincides with the increase in obesity and diabetes,
for example, that is one way that it is very bad for us.
(25:50):
So it is...
Just this whole notion that we grow stuff using pesticides and fossil fuels
and then turn that stuff into delicious but terrible foods for us because we're
not actually eating whole foods.
We're eating all these things that basically have been broken down into inedible
(26:13):
chemicals or parts of the plant or meat or whatever that is not actually whole
enough to be nutritious anymore more and is also not satisfying.
Okay, so basically the majority of our food is processed, and the ultra-processed
category is the one with the biggest red flag.
Essentially, it's not whole enough to be nutritious, and it's not satisfying,
(26:38):
so we're inclined to eat more of it.
This is just the attempt to master nature and feed us a bunch of crap and make
a lot of money doing that.
And research is showing a link between these foods and a higher risk of illness
cancer and heart disease,
(26:59):
there's a simple solution to how we should eat going back to michael pollan
who wrote the dilemma his follow-up little tome very succinctly described what
i think we should try and do with with food,
eat food, mostly plants, not too much. Right.
Right. It's pretty simple. Yes. But very hard for us to do.
(27:23):
Music.
Okay, I lied. It's not simple. Because as you now know, two parts of the evil
trifecta, agribusiness and capitalism, make it hard.
And, you know, the agribusinesses know this.
Like, as people have become more aware and are doing things like buying food
(27:46):
from markets, making sure they get fresh things, growing their own foods,
companies like Monsanto are buying seeds so that you can't save seeds and grow
food yourself the next year.
They will control that part of the chain too. They know all of this.
It's hard to fight. It's horrible. It's horrible. It's really horrible.
And it makes me afraid for the future. Yeah.
(28:07):
I mean, you know, when the climate is so bad that it's going to be hard to grow
food, they'll probably save us by being able to grow the mechanized food, but it won't be great.
Well, that's a positive spin on it. Yeah, well, they'll have the technology and the money. Mm-hmm.
But in the meantime, it's better to like save the seeds that actually do well
(28:28):
in the climate that is changing or buy from the farmer that's doing the same thing.
And don't forget that government subsidies are also at play.
The government subsidizes the agribusiness.
They do not subsidize the small family farm or the medium family farm or the organic producers.
So like, why is it that when you go to the store, organic food is twice as much as regular food?
(28:51):
It's crazy especially the produce and the
government should be subsidizing them not the agribusinesses right
and they do not so it is from
the top down who gets the money who gets the tax breaks who don't so that's
angering too and I don't know what there is to do about it yeah I don't see
(29:11):
like a clear path either yeah none of the companies that give all all the money
to the folks that are in the farm belt are gonna take away their subsidies.
They're not going to. No, that's not because they're getting them elected.
Desirable, yeah. Exactly, there's no political will to support the small organic farm.
(29:31):
And it's like to make any impact via individual action, like that also feels
not like a thing we could do.
Like there's not enough people that would care.
And if they care, have time and have energy and have resources to like shift.
I think the one place it works is here. It works here at least until recently
(29:53):
because there were enough of a critical amount.
I mean, we live in a ridiculous place in terms of abundant organic fresh food
sources, different than everywhere else in the world. Really?
And I've been all over the world. Yeah.
We have it so good here.
California. California. The bread basket. What is it? The fruit basket?
I don't know. Yeah. But Northern California in particular is ridiculous.
(30:18):
There are so many small organic farms and small meat producers.
And you can actually go out and you can buy the good foods.
The foods that have been raised well if it's an
animal or the tomato that has
been raised without pesticides and is an open pollinated
seed that no agribusiness owns
you pay a lot more for it and until recently it wasn't that much more i think
(30:43):
it's actually still not that much more if you go to the grocery store these
days especially if you do know your farmer and you go and your support that's
one direct action that makes a difference you giving a farmer 20 bucks is going
to keep them in business.
So it may not change it on a policy level, but that is one of the ways of acting
local where you actually keep the money with the farmer and get the food directly.
(31:05):
With little interference and can feed yourself in a healthy way.
Music.
Learn how to cook and eat. She eats from an informed place, one that is aligned with her values.
She recommends acting local if you can. And the good news is that it still tastes great.
(31:29):
Thank you. You're welcome. And we always eat so good at your house. Well, you know.
So good. That's been a journey though. That like what you're eating has been
a 25 year journey to get to that point. Right. Like, yeah.
I mean, I think that's part of the the point is like it does take time
and effort and education and all of it
right but it's to me it's one of the most important
(31:51):
things i mean that's what's kind of so nuts
about it is that our life used
to be feeding ourselves yeah that was like your entire life yeah for you know
50 years or whatever was like shelter and feeding yourself warmth yeah right
warmth you know and And now we can't even dedicate the time it would take to
(32:14):
figure out how to feed ourselves well.
Like we just don't, we don't even have that time. We spend no time.
But we do, but we don't know it. We've been tricked into believing we don't. I feel like we don't.
All right, tune in for some actionable tips. Maureen is going to explain how
we have the time and share what she picks up at the farmer's market and how
(32:36):
it transforms into a meal.
We do. How do we find the time? I have my meals that I make Monday through Thursday.
And then I have my meals that I will do on the weekend that require more time. Okay.
And so I feel like everybody can find five to eight things that they can make
during the week that are very healthy for you that don't take time.
(32:57):
You plan them or do you do the same thing every single week?
No. So Saturday when I'm at the farmer's market, I see what's in season.
And there's usually two things that happen. One, if I know that I'm going to
be cooking for friends, I will buy for that.
But then if it's just us, I almost always on the weekend, Cody and I will cook
a bigger, more complicated meal because we like it. We've gotten to that point. Yeah.
(33:20):
And we'll usually make enough as if we were having people over and then we can
eat a little bit of that in the coming days.
Together we do cook together but then at the
same farmer's market i'm like okay here's what's
in season this is what i know i'm going to eat because we're trying we've been
trying really hard not to go out except basically once a week right i mean it's
(33:40):
gotten expensive out there but also there's no reason we shouldn't be cooking
it's important and so that's part of the equation and then what i don't get
at the farmer's market and because we don't eat meat that's a little bit bit easier.
We have occasional fish, but mostly vegetarian.
I'll get the rest at Berkeley Bowl or Whole Foods though.
(34:00):
That's Amazon these days and it's getting a little more complicated to shop there.
Or run down to Farmer Joe's, which is the local excellent little grocery store to fill it out.
And so I do think about it every week. I think about what I want.
Right. And you go to two locations.
Yeah. And I get it. And then I plan on cooking it. And I used to be not as good
at this and and I wasted a lot of food, I've gotten a lot better at actually
(34:22):
buying what we're gonna eat.
So I'll think, oh, wow, look, there's those mushrooms. I'm going to make us
a pasta and a salad with fresh mushrooms and fresh herbs.
And you have that much, for those of you who can't see me out there in audio
land, I'm making a small amount of pasta and a giant salad on the plate, right?
Rather than the other way around, because it's a lot easier to eat a ton of
(34:43):
pasta and a little bit of salad.
Or, you know, like it's asparagus season right now and we've got hens.
So I always have eggs. So a wonderful meal is grilled asparagus with a couple
of eggs over the top, whether poached or medium or over easy over the top.
And one other vegetable or one, you know, like that is super easy.
(35:07):
A lot of times this is where the canned stuff comes in, right?
You can always make yourself a fresh sandwich with good bread.
You don't have to buy the processed bread. we've got a ridiculous number of
bakers, including Firebrand, who's making sandwich bread now that is delicious.
If you're out of time, you can make yourself a tuna salad sandwich without tons
of mayonnaise, but you can do that within all the vegetables.
(35:29):
And you get that all in one, right? Or sometimes when I make a pasta,
I'll make sure that it's just chock full of vegetables, right?
So it's not just the processed pasta, or you do a whole wheat pasta and you
put tons of vegetables in it. Like what vegetables would you put?
So I just made one last week, I put a ton of mint, a ton
of asparagus a ton of fresh shelling peas lemon
zest lemon juice and then olive oil salt and pepper and just a tiny bit of parmesan
(35:54):
over the top that sounds really good but there was as many vegetables if not
more than the pasta in that pot cooked it all together wow you just have to
teach yourself how to do it.
There's other things that we make all the time that I'm not thinking about. Oh, like rice bowls.
That's another really. I freaking love a rice bowl. But you get the whole grain
(36:14):
rice. You don't get the white rice. I want the white rice, though. But you know what?
Brown, nutty California rice is delicious.
Is it? It really is. Okay. And that one, this is another trick, right?
You stick it in your rice cooker or your Instant Pot, and then it's ready when
you're ready to make the other things.
And then you can put anything on it that you have that's in season.
Oh, yeah. Yeah, grain bowls. Can I do like the mayo red, the yum yum sauce?
(36:40):
Do you know what the yum yum sauce is? You can put some yum yum sauce.
Okay, thank you. Just not too much. Not too much. Just a little.
Just like a tablespoon. Yeah, yeah.
So it's like, again, it's not being puritanical. It's finding the thing that
is healthy and good for you.
You can still use like your condiments and stuff and make it taste good.
You want it to be easy in that sense.
(37:03):
All right, here's the numbers. Maureen's Saturday food shopping trip takes an
hour and a half, and her Monday through Thursday cooking takes about 30 minutes of prep.
So it seems pretty manageable, right?
You just, you have to find the time, and you do have the time.
I mean, there is infinite television, or there's taking some of that infinite
(37:24):
television time and going to the farmer's market once a week,
and then bringing everybody with you, right?
Because then that's how you actually start teaching the next generation where
their food actually comes from and what to do with it. Yeah.
And I think making it a family partnership like you and Kogi have done is also critical.
It really is. It makes it fun. You're both, everybody's bought into it.
(37:46):
Yeah. And it's delicious. And it's freaking delicious.
As I said, eating at Maureen and Cody's is a real treat.
But when I was cooking more thoughtfully on the reg, nothing tasted that great.
My partner, Erin, will still make cracks about those Weight Watchers recipes
that contained zero spices.
So on this journey, you do have to be open to failure and eating some things
(38:08):
that do not tickle your taste buds.
I bet when you started on this, not everything tasted good. No, I fucked up last night.
So I'm like, oh, I have those potatoes that I didn't end up using.
Thing. So I'm really on not wasting.
And I have half of the peas that I shucked for that pasta I described.
I'm like, I'm going to make some aloo matar, which is peas and potatoes, Indian style.
(38:29):
And I had saved this recipe that I was going to try because I don't necessarily
know the basis for that by heart.
But I'm never afraid to try it. And we've got all those great spices from Oaktown
Spice. And I'm like, I've got everything I need here.
It just tasted wrong. and I put it I
was so excited I put it I cooked my rice I made it looked
(38:50):
so good so disappointing and something about the
spice I think it was a bad yeah I think it was a bad recipe I think
the spice mix was off yeah and I followed it exactly and Cody was like and Cody
was he came home because he was at band practice last night and he's like oh
good you cooked I'm like yeah but that took me about a half an hour it didn't
take very long but it did not come out and that's okay I'm like I'm I'm not
(39:13):
deterred. I'm just like, okay, I have to find a better recipe.
So that's Maureen's vision for direct action. Buy from your local farmer and
eat non-mechanized food as much as you can.
There's often pre-made food at the farmer's market, and that counts too.
Also, if you need help, phone a friend.
(39:34):
And then ask a lot of questions. You know, it's funny. Jeremy calls me all the
time because he's the one who cooks.
Yeah. And he's like, hey, Mo, if I do this, how long should I put it on?
And so I'll tell him. And so like, call me. I love helping people cook.
My neighbor, Punkage, is like, I really want to learn bread.
I'm like, OK, it's really hard to learn bread together because most of bread
is just waiting for things to rise.
(39:57):
I said, but let's start. Do a focaccia. Nobody can fail at a focaccia.
And he didn't. And now he's so confident. So like, you know,
you start with the stuff that you're comfortable with or you know, or you ask questions.
Music.
Even though we're fighting against two parts of the evil trifecta,
(40:17):
it seems doable, right? Even kind of enticing.
But I'm going to add the final component of that trifecta. And this one you've heard about already.
The diet industry is its own moneymaker, including, you know,
and the thing is, like, I don't know if you just saw this article.
There was an article about the ADA, which is the American Diabetes Association,
(40:39):
about who they're actually working for.
And it's interesting because my mom stayed with us before she retired to attend
ADA conference, and they were having it at the Marriott in Oakland.
And she came back with all of
her swag as you get at conferences you know your swag bag and it was like McDonald's
I was like McDonald's is sponsoring the American Dietetic Association she's
(41:02):
like yeah I'm like don't you think that's weird she's like oh I didn't really
think about it and it was I don't remember I don't remember every single other
but the McDonald's really stuck in my.
Craw but the there everything that was
there was basically some form of processed or
industrialized product weird it wasn't like
there was you know fresh fresh fruits and vegetables from california
(41:24):
sponsoring right right ada conference somebody actually
sued them for actually siding with the industrialized food over people and they
ended up settling out of court but there was just an article in the new york
times about this they sued the ada sued the ada because they were like who are
you working for it turns out it might be for the agribusinesses right so the folks that should
(41:47):
be like setting what we're eating are in cahoots with
the ag business yep quote nutrition
professional organizations like the american diabetes
association or american dietetic association or
american society for nutrition often partner with
or advocate for the mechanized food industry i mean this is just a continuation
(42:07):
of the margarine nonsense the suit maureen mentioned was related to splenda
being an elite sponsor of the ada their ex-director claimed she was was pressured
to endorse Splenda recipes with no nutrition-based reasons.
Hint, it's about the money.
Back to diet culture.
And then, of course, people aren't happy when they don't feel good. Right.
(42:30):
Because when it comes down to it, like, nobody feels good when they're too heavy.
Right. Everybody knows that, like, oh, I'm not moving. I'm not exercising.
I'm feeling weighed down.
When they're too heavy for themselves. For themselves. Correct. Right.
But then what do you do? Well, look, there's this whole other series of things you can buy into.
(42:53):
Your Jenny Craig's. Yes. Your Weight Watchers, all of these things,
SlimFast, that whole industry has actually been turned on its head because of these injectables.
They're suddenly not going to be making a lot of money because this shot can solve the problem.
Right. Or we just have like two tiers now, right? Because people that can afford
(43:13):
$1,200 a month are going to get it.
People that can't are still going to be doing Jenny Craig. Exactly.
And losing and gaining and losing and gaining. and
where really I feel like the education is
about what kinds of things to put into your body and how
much is right for you but I don't feel like that is actually going to be something
(43:34):
that's easily accessed or supported by the government and in your real way plus
the people making these injectables are making a gazillion dollars Eli Lilly's
sock is through the roof so you also Also have shareholders, please. Right.
So it's an insidious trifecta. Both of those, all of those solutions,
(43:54):
except maybe even the eating well, but to a lesser degree,
feed off of us all just feeling shitty both emotionally and physically.
Absolutely. They want us to feel shitty regardless of our size.
Yeah. Regardless even of our health.
Exactly. They want us to feel like crap and think that we look like crap and
(44:15):
want to pay money to feel better. Exactly.
Ultimately, here's what Maureen hopes in relation to medical weight loss and food.
I hope that they find a way to make this affordable for people because it is a real game changer.
I do think the education, this is the part that's not going to happen,
(44:38):
right? Right. For all the reasons we talked to, like education for people about
actually how to eat healthy foods needs to happen. Yeah.
It's taken on multiple industries.
But I will say that this is something that will help people not be sick. Yeah.
I told Maureen that Weight Watchers is now offering Weight Watchers Clinic.
(45:02):
That seems to be a combination of the things that we discussed.
They're going to be like, they are going to have like doctors on staff and be.
Oh, so they're okay. So this is a thing that's been happening.
Like people are trying to capitalize.
I've noticed this. Even health insurance have these things now where it's basically
like these weight loss centers.
And they have the doctors on site and they're making it easy for people.
(45:23):
And I feel like it is more cost effective that
way at least for the short term I'll be
interested to see because all this stuff is new be interested
to see long term if they keep the prices down because I remember when
we first started this process and that
first the coupon through Eli Lily worked where it was only
25 a month which is a much more reasonable price I'd be
(45:44):
happy to pay that you know I was prescribed it
off label and they weren't checking for that
in the beginning okay so i was prescribed it
because i'm on the spectrum of diabetes
with the metabolic disorder okay uh-huh sure but after
so many people are like oh my god get me the shot the drug companies are like
(46:06):
whoa we can't keep doing all these coupons and so then they started checking
and so then they you had to answer if you had a prescription because you had
type 2 diabetes and you had to show the prescription got it got it okay and
at that point they stopped covering it.
Also, we don't know what the long-term side effects are.
There is some evidence that there might be a potential to have thyroid cancer,
(46:28):
like they showed that in lab rats.
So it's not something I'm real keen to stay on if I don't have to.
Sure, you don't wanna be one of those lab rats. No, and it didn't seem like,
I mean, they've done some trials,
it didn't seem like it was gonna be that way in humans, but it's new.
We don't know. All these old drugs she had me on had been in,
in like 50-year-old drugs. Like they already know what's going to happen. Nothing.
(46:54):
I filled out the online questionnaire and Weight Watchers told me,
congratulations, I'm qualified for their prescription weight loss program.
And I can expect to lose 26 pounds with my membership.
It would be 800 to $1,200 a month for the medication and another $85 for the benefits.
But this is about my health. I mean, nothing is currently wrong with me health-wise,
(47:17):
but I will reduce my risk of possibly getting diabetes by 5-10%.
Back to these type of centers and the combination of injectables and education.
I read an article about this concept of feeling sated.
Satiety? It's a hard word to say. Do you say it like satiety or satiety?
(47:42):
Right? There's like an I in there.
So I don't know. But so feeling sated is that one of the things about these
industrialized foods I'm talking about, these highly processed foods,
you have to eat a lot more to actually feel full and not just feel full, but feel satisfied.
And so these drugs help you feel satisfied.
(48:03):
And that they think is actually, in addition to making you feel full,
the fact that you feel satisfied is changing behavior for folks who are not
eating the things they should be eating.
And maybe have gained weight because they're eating all these highly processed
foods and haven't learned how to actually cook for themselves in a healthy way.
And so that's a game changer because basically it's like, okay,
(48:28):
you're throwing all this industrialized food at us, but now you're going to feel full.
So even if you're still eating that crappy food, you're not going to eat enough
of it to gain weight. You're going to lose weight.
And feel satisfied while you're on it go off it
you're back to not feeling right and not knowing how to
eat still right and so that's the component that i hope
these centers will be addressing is teaching people actually
(48:48):
how to cook and eat and recognize foods that are good for them i mean i think
that that would be the power of an entity such as weight watchers if they're
offering all that together right like a shot plus a community plus education
yeah properly right Right.
So we'll see. We'll see. Or they'll just continue to be the devil.
(49:15):
Maureen went off Monjaro a few months ago, and she's feeling good and hoping
that her numbers stay where they're supposed to be.
She has no regrets about her decision. And if she has to, she'll do it again.
I think I can do this. I hope I can. I really hope I don't have to go back on
it, but I will if I have to.
Because if my body rebels, my body rebels. Right. Exactly. And you have very
(49:37):
little control over that.
I'd like to begin with a fact. I have none. You have no control over that.
Other than exercising and eating well.
But that's not going to cause weight loss for me. Or it might cause weight gain.
Music.
(50:02):
I did a lot of easy cheats without going fully processed or just giving into
the burrito as much as I love a burrito oh that just made me want a burrito why did you say that?
Music.
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