From Food Addiction to Freedom: Hypnotherapy, Psychedelics & Recovery With Jiordana Saade

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Hello everyone, welcome back or welcome to Recovering Out Loud
Podcasts, the show where we get real about addiction and mental
health recovery. Today I sat down with Jordana
Sade, a holistic nutritionist, hypnotherapist, podcaster, and
founder of The Mindful Clinic. Jordana has a degree in
behavioral psychology and is considered the top leading

(00:21):
expert in eating behavior and also a Ted X speaker on
understanding what it means to have a healthy relationship with
food. I learned a lot in today's
episode and I hope you do too. If you or someone you know is
struggling with addiction, food addiction, or substance abuse,
please reach out for help. Enjoy the show.
Please support the show by following and subscribing.
We appreciate you. Hey, Jordana.

(00:59):
Hey. How's it going?
I'm so good. How are you?
I'm doing well. Thanks.
Thank you so much for coming down.
I really appreciate it. I messaged you on online.
I was following what you're doing and I, I really like what
you're doing. Thank you.
And, you know, I was introduced to you through a mutual friend
and you didn't even hesitate. So I appreciate that.
You know, you were like, yeah, let's do it.
Let's let's jump. And, you know, we're, we're
here, here we are doing it. So I'm always appreciative of of

(01:22):
people in recovery because I feel like we're really, let's
get it done people, you know, Type A.
Yeah, definitely. Yeah.
So, yeah. So I appreciate that about you
and I, I'm really interested in this, you know, body, body
dysmorphia from, from my perspective, you know,
relationship with food. I think it doesn't get talked

(01:43):
about enough. And I'm like, it's really
opening my eyes and I'm coveringa lot of avenues of and, and
also similarities with drug addiction and food addiction
and, you know, this kind of obsessive cycle that we get
into, right? So why don't you start off, you
know, tell us a little bit aboutwho you are and how you got into
into this field? Yeah, well, thank you so much
for having me. It's honestly an honor to be

(02:05):
here. But my story started when I was
very young, so this was obviously a long time ago.
I'm in my 30s now, but I was theonly obese kid in my class.
And of course, I was like bullied and made fun of.
Like, my mom is an Italian chef and so the way that she shows
love is through food. And you know, it was one of the
only times I got attention from my mom because she was so busy.

(02:25):
Not because she's a bad mother or anything, but I was the only
obese kid in class and when I was 8 years old I had a crush on
a boy and I was playing tag at recess and I tagged him and in
front of the whole school he yelled.
Fatty caught me. Oh my.
God. And I just remember that day,
like, that's kind of like my origin story, you know, I'm
like. Fuck that guy, but thank you at

(02:47):
the same time. Yeah, totally.
So I'm 8 years old and I go homeand I'm like, something has to
change. So that was the day that I went
on my first diet. I didn't know what a diet was.
I only knew that the more I ate,the bigger I got.
And so I essentially just began to starve myself.
Like I would throw my lunches away at school and I did lose a
lot of weight and I received a lot of validation.
Like all of a sudden I had friends.

(03:08):
The cutest boy in school startedtalking to me.
My were proud of me. Even my doctor was like, Oh my
gosh, look at you go. So this kind of spiraled into
decades of eating disorders and then eventually substance abuse.
So when I was in high school, I recognized that, you know, if I
smoked weed a lot, then I was, you know how people say, you
know, weed gives you the munchies?
Well, when you do it enough and you do it a lot, it almost like

(03:30):
takes away the because you're receiving dopamine from
something else, right? And then weed kind of led to
MDMA and I would drop like 2 pills of MDMA and go to class
and then which led to like acid and shrooms and then eventually
cocaine. And that was kind of my Achilles
heel. So at this point I'm 21, I'm
living in Montreal, I'm kicked out of university.

(03:50):
I'm a full blown like cocaine addict and alcoholic.
I have a bone sticking out of mynose.
And my parents were like, we're not going to pay for you to
party anymore. Like there's something very
seriously wrong here. So they made me come home and I
was working in this restaurant and I met this man and I got
pregnant like very quickly. And that baby basically saved my
life because through that pregnancy, I couldn't use the

(04:13):
substances that I was using to keep my weight down, but also
like simultaneously very addicted to it.
But the one thing that we're at all kind of started came back
with full force, and that was just this very unhealthy,
addictive relationship to food. And so I gained a lot of weight
in that pregnancy. I was very unhappy.
And when my son was nine months old, I was like, I'm going to

(04:33):
get down to the bottom of my eating disorder.
And I went to become a nutritionist.
I graduated as valedictorian, first class honors.
I'm hired right out of school towork with a medical doctor in
his obesity clinic. And I'm seeing patient after
patient and I'm handing out mealplan after meal plan.
And like literally nobody's getting any better.
Because the truth is, and hopefully you can agree with

(04:54):
this, like I think we all know an apple is healthier than a
chocolate bar, right? But we still choose the
chocolate bar anyways. And so it really opened my eyes
up to this idea of like self sabotage.
Like I know it's bad for me, butI do it anyways, right?
And so I was like, this isn't anissue that a meal plan is going
to solve. I went back to school to do my
masters and eventually my PhD, which I'm still in the process

(05:17):
of in behavioral psychology and neuroscience.
And once I started to understandthe nervous system and
understand why people are motivated to engage in these
addictive behaviors and why other people aren't, it like
changed my life. And then now I I work with women
all over the world doing the same.
Wow. Awesome that there's a lot
there. No, no.
And, and like I, I, I want to, Iwant to dive into so much of it.

(05:42):
Did you have a deviated septum when you when you were using too
much coke? No, it's just like just it's
still there, like the bone just kind of sticks out.
And when it gets dry, I feel it.Yeah, I have never gotten it
fixed. But yeah, first question, Yeah,
that's where my brain goes, though.
I'm like, yeah, you know, I got close to that too.
And I always used to brag. This is so weird that I'm gonna
say this, but my my nose hair would start to come back when I

(06:05):
was a coke addict and I would joke around that that was an
indication that I was like doingbetter because it wasn't like
burning. That's so funny.
I totally get that, yes. Like, you know, these kind of
accolades that we give ourselvesbecause just we're just
justifying this like unhealthy behavior, you know, because I
don't want to stop. It's hard.
Yeah, it's uncomfortable. Yeah.
So that was that's cool that youyou noticed you had this kind of

(06:27):
like epiphany moment where you're and it's true.
Like we all have the information.
The information is plentiful allout there.
There's so much of it. It's just, it's like addiction
with any substance. It's like I use outside things
to heal my insides, right? I wanna feel good.
So that. And you're in the middle of
getting your PhD right now. What are next steps for you?

(06:49):
Like what do you wanna do? Well, I've written my thesis,
and we can talk about that as well.
But I I, you know, I've taken a break from my PhD.
Like, I have to do my 4000 hoursof supervision and I have a
business that's plentiful. I have two kids.
I'm divorced, like single moms. So like, I just don't right now.
It's just not a priority. But eventually, you know, when
my kids are older and I have a lot of time, like, I'll probably

(07:11):
go and finish. But I think I learned everything
I needed to in that moment. Yeah.
Very cool. Yeah, I want to talk about
trauma a little bit cuz I think trauma effects all of us.
I used to think that trauma and I'm sure a lot of people still
think this or hopefully they're coming around to this idea.
But I used to think that trauma was like I had to get abused as
a kid. I had to have this moment where,

(07:33):
you know, somebody sexually abused me for in particular and
I was proven wrong, you know, time and time again by attending
therapy. I learned in treatment that
it's, it's an experience, right?Trauma is all subjective, if you
will. What's your experience with
trauma? And like what, what do you think
it is? How do you define it?
Yeah, I've done a lot of work inthis.

(07:55):
I'm, I'm sure you know, Doctor Gabor mate, but I did actually a
course with him like so long agobefore he was like super fast.
Yeah, literally. But so he, a lot of what I know
about trauma is a lot of his, his theories.
But you know, my trauma was a kid calling me fat when I was 8,
right? Like, I mean, and there was so
many more things like my dad having really high expectations

(08:17):
of me and, you know, the attention that I received from
being thin or obese. And I work with so many women
that have had very serious traumas, lost both their parents
when they were young and in the,in the system, you know, they've
been to jail or mom's gone to jail, they've been sexually
assaulted. And I look at my trauma compared
to that and I'm like, Oh my God,like, what's my problem?
You know, but essentially traumais never the experience.

(08:39):
It's like how you internalize it, right?
And trauma is anything that takes the nervous system outside
of it's like feeling of comfort and peace and safety.
And so human beings are really cool because we are, you know,
we're, we're primitive and, and like essentially we're very
primitive still. And if we look back on the way

(08:59):
that these like tribes used to function, there are two things
that would make somebody from the tribe, you know, start to
break down, like mentally, emotionally, physically.
And one of those things is not having any value to the tribe
and then not being accepted intothe tribe.
And so literally, if you weren'taccepted into a tribe, the
nervous system goes, Oh my God, I'm not going to survive.

(09:20):
And it starts to create things like anxiety, depression, even
physical symptoms like, you know, they might, their immune
system's going to lower, They'regoing to pick up disease.
Ease is easier. And so, you know, me not being
accepted when I was 8 years old was very traumatic, right?
Because as a little girl, beforethe prefrontal cortex is even
fully developed, you're walking around going like, do I fit in?

(09:43):
Am I going to survive? And the conscious brain is like,
oh, this boy doesn't like me. But the subconscious part of the
nervous system, the very primitive brain is like, I'm not
going to have access to food. I'm going to fucking die, you
know? I'm not going to fit into the
tribe. And yeah.
And, and those two things are very closely related to like,
not not being accepted and not because if I don't have any
value to add to the tribe or to my recoveries with my family or

(10:06):
my friend group, like I'm going to automatically feel like an
outcast, right? And then I'm using those
emotions subconsciously. I'm using cocaine and, you know,
other stimulants for me to kind of just quiet that voice in my
head. Yes.
How does how does trauma? What is the trauma?
So you talked a little bit abouthow it affects, you know, your

(10:27):
nutrition and your food and yourrelationship with food.
But can you dive into a little bit more of that, like how it
affects that? Yeah, So super cool.
So, you know, food is our first access to drug drugs, you know,
like nobody's ever addicted to broccoli.
You can't change my mind about that.
And so I. Haven't met anyone either.
Yeah. So it's, you know, I did a lot

(10:47):
of research because I was, I'm very curious person and I wanted
to know why one person would getaddicted to food and another
person wouldn't or, you know, two people try the same drug.
I had a best friend in high school and she would be able to
use drugs just kind of intermittently.
And we were doing the same thing.
But like I was addicted like it was for me, it was an escape for
myself, just like you mentioned,for her, it was just like an

(11:08):
opportunity to have a fun experience.
So what's the difference, right?And so actually neurochemically,
like when we are a child, usually before the age of seven,
if there's any type of like chaos in the environment and
there are 10 different things that are outlined in this study
where it would be like a traumatic experience or trauma.
Essentially what happens in the brain is cortisol gets elevated

(11:31):
in, in a young child and cortisol literally inhibits the
endorphin system from developing.
The endorphin system is where werelease oxytocin, dopamine,
serotonin. And so these individuals that
have had traumatic experiences growing up or they're perceiving
trauma all the time, whether it's parents fighting or you
know, someone's incarcerated or whatever it is.
For me, it was not being accepted.

(11:52):
My nervous system and these individuals nervous system
isn't, aren't able to release dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin on
a regular schedule where someoneelse would.
And so when you have access to that drug, it's like your
brain's feeling that serotonin for the first time and it gets
addicted to that piece. It gets addicted to that like
that, those good feelings versussomebody who can release these

(12:14):
things on a natural schedule, they can just produce them on
the go. And so for me, I'm not sure if
I'm answering your question, butfor me, one of the main factors
is like, was that traumatic experience in childhood?
Did it alter the nervous system enough to make that individual
when they have their first ice cream, you know, like are they
going back to the ice cream because the ice cream tastes

(12:35):
good? Or are they going back to the
ice cream because the the release of those chemicals, the
dopamine, serotonin, etcetera, that you get from that ice cream
are literally like releasing chemicals that their brain can't
do naturally. And so because food is our first
access to drugs and nobody's addicted to broccoli, you see
these young children where and, you know, as they grow up, where

(12:56):
food becomes a mechanism of coping rather than a means for
survival. Like they're not just like
eating to live, they're like living to eat.
Yeah. I think you did answer my
question. What that what then?
Sorry, I want to clarify one thing too.
For people that don't know, oxytocin is like the love
chemical, right? It's kind of like what how when

(13:16):
we first start dating, it attracts us to somebody.
Is that right? Yeah, oxytocin is released based
on feelings of connection. So I mean you can get release it
with your friends, romantic partners for sure.
But if we actually think about like the drugs that are related
to these things, oxytocin would be like Oxys, right?
Like heroin is very different than cocaine is.

(13:37):
Cocaine's a stimulant, and so cocaine's going to alter
dopamine, whereas heroin's goingto alter oxytocin.
And oxytocin is like, intoxicating.
You know, I, I worked in rehab Centers for a while.
And there's a big difference between somebody who's addicted
to heroin and oxys versus somebody who's, like, an
alcoholic or cocaine. Not better or worse, just very

(13:59):
different. It's very all consuming.
Yeah. So that leads me to my next
question. And I've always wondered this
and I don't know that there's ananswer for it, but maybe you can
provide some more clarity on it.What makes somebody addicted to
one class of drugs more than theother?
I was always a stimulant guy. Like I never enjoyed that kind
of Matthew Perry called it because he was, I read his book

(14:20):
and he was a great book. He talks about oxys.
The feeling of oxys was like it would replace all of the blood
in his body with warm honey. And I was like, oh, that sounds
kind of nice, but I never had that experience with it.
What do you think makes, what doyou think separates people?
Like why do people choose certain?
That's a really good question. I this is not a academic

(14:42):
response. This is like a personal opinion,
But you know how when we sat down, you were like, you know,
we just get it, we do it done. Like addicts are like we're go,
go, go, go, go. An individual who's like that
type A who's wired for external validation.
They're they're receiving their validation through doing things
people like giving them praise, etcetera.
It's that go go go mentality. Those people are really wired

(15:04):
for dopamine. Like dopamine is the molecule of
more. It's not.
People think dopamine is a molecule pleasure.
It's not actually oxytocin is dopamine is a molecule of
movement and more. And the more dopamine you
release, the more dopamine you need.
And so it's like you release a little bit of dopamine and
simultaneously you feel pleasureand craving at the same time.
And every time you engage in that substance or that behavior

(15:25):
or whatever it is, the pleasure goes down, but the craving goes
up. So dopamine, that's why people
get addicted to stimulants because it's like, it's never,
ever going to be like the first time you tried it.
Like I'm sure you know, after years of doing cocaine, it's not
even like I was having fun anymore.
I was just doing it because I had to.
But these people are wired for like dopaminergic things,
whereas oxytocin is more of a like I'm going to go to sleep

(15:47):
for three days and like shut down.
And those people might have engaged in total.
This is me just making a guess, but I would think that the more
severe the trauma, like the morethat they want to hide and
escape, the more you would gear more towards like I want to shut
the system down versus I want todo more things.
Yeah, and amp it up. Yeah, I've never heard an answer

(16:09):
like that. No, I I agree like it totally
makes sense. Totally get right out of my ass.
It totally makes sense because, yeah.
And there's one thing that this is just a personal, you know,
kind of gripe that I have with in addiction and recovery.
You know, when you ask people like, what was your DOC, your
drug of choice? What, what, what did you like?
And some people, a lot of peoplewill say like, oh, I liked

(16:30):
everything. I was like, no, you
motherfucker. Like you have a, you have a
favorite. Tell me what it is.
You can't. I don't know.
I just, it's hard to like, you know, and towards the end, I, I
got into benzos a lot, but that was solely because it would
bring it would, it would allow me to control my stimulant kind
of when I would get way too amped.
I was like, oh, and then the anxiety started to come up and

(16:51):
the cops were coming and people were trying to kill me.
You know, the, the, the BreakingBad meth scene where he's
peeking out of the windows like that, that was me, you know,
every time, right. And so, yeah, so like for me,
the benzos would kind of just like take the edge off a bit,
but I never really did them on, on on their own.
So, you know, we get into recovery and you're told kind of

(17:15):
we have to like, rewire the neural pathways, the the
neurotransmitters as you come in.
What does what, what role does hypnotherapy play in?
I know because I know you deal with that.
Yeah. And this is cool.
I'm getting into this now. I'm learning a lot.
Yeah, I, I mean, I'm a hypnotherapist and the main
reason why I wanted to become a hypnotherapist was because I

(17:35):
studied so much about the subconscious mind versus the
conscious mind, right? So the subconscious mind rules
80% of what you do. Like, I mean, some people say
it's closer to 98. I'm like, it's a solid 80 for
me. And most of the time it is about
98% of your day is run by your subconscious mind. 2% of your
day is like where your goals andyour dreams live.

(17:55):
So like I might have a goal of, hey, I want to wake up and go to
the gym at 6:00 AM everyday, or I want to get sober, or I want
to lose weight or, you know, whatever your goals and your
dreams are, that's not 2%. That's like where your unique
desires and goals live 98% or like a strong 80% is your
subconscious programming. And your subconscious
programming is not even you. Like you were literally given it

(18:19):
between the ages of like third trimester when you're in your
mother's stomach and age 7. And so whatever the narrative is
in your household, the emotions that your parents had, you know,
children are very highly intuitive and they pick up on
those programs in those systems.And the subconscious is wired
for survival, not success, right?
And so, so much of what we do when it it comes to like

(18:41):
addiction, whether it's eating or drugs or shopping or
whatever, it's the survival mechanism.
Like the brain would never ever do any behavior unless it saw it
as being very purposeful. Like we never repeat any
behavior unless there's a purpose.
And so the purpose of us engaging in these like, you
know, self sabotaging behaviors is because the brain thinks it
needs it to survive. And so I became kind of like

(19:02):
obsessed with wanting to understand how to rewire that
subconscious mind because when we are, and maybe you can
resonate with this, but have youever driven home and you just
like get in your car and then you drive and then all of a
sudden you're home and you just like don't even know how you got
there? Like you're in that
subconscious, right? Most of what we do in the days
in that subconscious programming, it's like watching

(19:22):
TV, eating. This is all subconscious
behavior. We don't have to think about it.
We don't have to reteach ourselfhow to brush our teeth.
It's subconscious. We just we learn it and the
brain just does it right. And so if we have a behavior or
a pattern that is adaptive for us, like brushing our teeth,
that's one thing. But when we have maladaptive
behaviors in the subconscious, it becomes very difficult to
change. No matter how much your

(19:43):
conscious mind, that 2% is not going to outweigh the 98%.
And so hypnotherapy essentially works on the subconscious mind.
And how it works is you want to get the individual into a Theta
brain wave state. And so when we're like conscious
and we're acting just like we'retalking like you and I, I'm in a
beta state. So if I wouldn't be able to
rewire my subconscious now. But if you get the individual in
a Theta brain wave state, which is like very close to slow wave

(20:07):
sleep. We can actually manipulate the
thoughts and the patterns and the feelings that this
individual has about themselves.So hypnotherapy works on that
subconscious mind and it also works through being able to
visualize. So I'm an overthinker.
Like I literally just catastrophize constantly all day
long. Worst case scenarios, like I
literally envision them all the time.
And so not many people actually spend enough time daydreaming

(20:31):
about like best case scenario possibilities, right?
We're always because best case scenario is not adaptive.
The brain is like, how am I going to die?
It's it's a negative negativity bias.
So anytime anything is like a threat to survival, the brain's
going to remember it and it's going to replay it because it's
going to be like you're going todie, you're going to die.
I want to go for it. And so no, therapy gives us the
opportunity to actually like, Daydream and visualize as if

(20:54):
it's really happening. And the subconscious mind
doesn't know the difference between imagination and reality.
And so we're envisioning these like, best case scenarios as
well as kind of reprogramming the way the subconscious mind
thinks and feels. And then together, it gives a
good opportunity for behavior change.
It's not a magic pill, though. I think people think, you know,
you go to hypnotherapy, get hypnotized once it's done.

(21:15):
That's not my experience with it.
That's awesome. Can you get there to the Theta
brain wave through meditation? Totally.
Impossible. Definitely.
But then you, you kind of so that your part in it or the
teacher or the coach or therapist part hypnotherapist
would be to kind of guide peoplethrough that, that happy state,
right, Because that's hard to doon your own, right?

(21:37):
Yeah, to your point, I feel likemy imagination sometimes is
like, you know, the director's cut of movies where there's just
like 30 different alternate endings and they're all bad,
right? Like it's just, there's nothing
good that happens. And yeah, it's, it's hard to
catch yourself there sometimes. So that's cool.
That's. So how many, how long is a
session usually? And like, how many sessions do

(21:57):
you start to see kind of positive behavior?
Positive, Yeah. Reactions to it.
It's so different depending on the behavior that we're trying
to change. So one of the reasons why I'm
obsessed with working with food addiction is because unlike any
other substance, you can't be abstinent from food, right?
And so and I don't want to live in a world where I can't eat
cake. I'm not going to be like sugar

(22:17):
free for my whole life. That's ridiculous.
So like whereas if we're lookingat something like smoking
cessation, I've done a session, literally one session with
someone and they stopped smokingimmediately because you know,
you throw the cigarette packs out, you take a different route
home, like so many, you don't goback to the bar, you change your
friends. Like there's so many different
like confounding factors that would allow that individual to

(22:39):
be successful with hypnotherapy.Whereas with food, it's like you
have to engage with it every single day, multiple times a
day. And so with other substances,
like a session is typically 30 minutes to an hour.
I always record it and then you're listening to it for about
21 days. Yeah.
And then with my hypnotherapy clients, like it's not just like

(23:01):
I see you when we do the hypnotherapy, like there's often
check insurance, like I'm understanding, you know, what
the triggers are of this individual.
It's very specific and unique tothe individual person.
But with food, my programs are always three months to six
months because it really does take that amount of time to
change the way that we like we relate to food and.

(23:21):
It's it's so it's kind of my mind goes to this, like what
does it look like in you kind ofmentioned this, but what does it
look like in daily life? So I leave your office and I
really want to eat 10 pieces of cake or it always starts with
one, right? And then you start eating you're
like, whatever, fuck it, I'm just going to keep going.
What is it sort of, you know, instead of is it like food

(23:43):
choices, kind of learning when to stop to eat?
What does that look like in reallife?
Oh, it's, it's everything. It's all those things you said.
I was laughing because you said something that was like so
perfect. And I just want to take a
picture and frame it because that's like that's the key right
there. But essentially, like I
mentioned, you know, human beings were very primitive and
primal. And so when the nervous system

(24:04):
detects that there's going to bea restriction of food, it it
wants to overindulge, it literally bypasses that the
prefrontal cortex is where we have like impulse control,
executive functioning, all thosethings because food is needed
for survival. When we have, you know, a lot of
where food addiction starts is when people go on their first
diet. Like that's where it starts.

(24:24):
It's because of that restriction, right?
And So what you said that made me laugh was you were like, oh,
you know, I've already had one piece of cake, like fuck, it'll
start again tomorrow type of energy, right?
It's that idea of like me eatingis bad and therefore or I'm it's
gonna, I'm gonna have to rein itin.
I'm gonna have to restrict myself.
That like potential of restriction is actually what
elevates the overconsumption of food.

(24:46):
It's so cool. And so like, there's so many
different things, but I always start off, you know, I'm using
hypnotherapeutic, but I'm also using a lot of behavioral
psychology with clients where, where I'm teaching them how to
receive dopamine from other things like intrinsically.
So, you know, being their own cheerleader or whatever it is.
But a lot of the time, and I'm going to explain this in a funny
way. So if you have, do you have

(25:07):
kids? No, OK, anyone is listening has
kids. I use this example.
But you know, if you take your kid to the grocery store, right?
And the kids like, I want a chocolate bar and you're like,
no, we're going home to have dinner.
You're not getting that chocolate bar.
And the kids like, I want a chocolate bar and starts like
stomping their feet and you're like, stop it.
We're not getting the chocolate bar.
We're going home to have dinner.Then the kids like, I want to
fuck a chocolate bar. And they're like hitting their

(25:28):
head against the rails and you're like, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK,
here's the chocolate bar. Right now, what you've taught
that child is all it needs to dois just overreact to get access
to the chocolate bar. If you say to the child, child's
like, I want a chocolate bar. And you're like, OK, let's get
the chocolate bar. I'm just going to hold on to it
for 10 minutes. We'll have it after dinner.
Like now that the child realizesthey have access to the thing,

(25:50):
it's not being taken away from them.
It's not being restricted. The desire for it goes down,
right? And so with all of my clients,
and if you're listening to this and you're struggling with like
food addiction or overeating or whatever, for it is for you
binge eating, you can't restrictit because if you restrict it,
the cravings intensify. You have to allow yourself to
have it, but you have to createspace between the desire

(26:12):
and the behavior. So it's like, OK, I just had
dinner. I want a piece of cake.
I know I'm not hungry. I just had dinner, but I want
the piece of cake. Can I wait 10 minutes?
Can I wait 20 minutes? Let me do the dishes.
By the time you're done doing the dishes, you only want the
piece of cake. Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, I wish I I wish I met you 10 years ago because I I
got into this, I had a really unhealthy calorie counting habit

(26:36):
and I was fully in sober and, you know, in sober.
I was sober, I was in recovery. I was doing great.
I was running marathons, you know, and that's another
addiction, right? And it was, it was during COVID
too. And so that was tough for
everybody, right? But I've never I mean, it makes
so much sense. It's any time I've tried to
restrict myself with drugs too it there's always been this kind

(26:59):
of combating force at it where it's like and I just always end
up using more, right. You also mentioned something
that was really, you know, interesting too, this idea of
once you know, you have it, it'slike everything just kind of
calms right down, right. And that was my, you know, I
hate to keep making the, to the,the, you know, cross between

(27:23):
drugs and but there's so many, there's so many parallels here
towards, you know, drug addiction as well.
It's just like if, if I would, Iwould, I was so obsessed with
the chase of drugs and alcohol. And it's the same with food,
too. Like, just this kind of chase,
this pursuit of drugs and alcohol that once I had it, I
was like, OK, it's there. And then, you know, to your
point, if I challenge myself andsay, can I wait 10 minutes?

(27:46):
Can I wait 20 minutes? What is this about?
Do something else. Do the dishes.
That's a huge one for me. How many times I can't even tell
you where I've wanted ice cream.Ice cream's my thing.
And, you know, we've just gone and done something else or I've
gone and done something else, and it's like, huh, I don't
really want ice cream anymore. You know, it's kind of gone now.
Yeah. That's amazing.
So the the entire first part of my thesis was proving that food

(28:07):
being food addiction is the sameas any other addiction.
So it actually is elevates the same parts of the brain, the
same chemicals are released likeit literally they're they're
identical. I'm sure you've heard of the
study where the mouse was more addicted to sugar than cocaine.
That's Doctor Nicola Vina. She's a wonderful.
I met her. She's incredible.
But anyways, here's a little tipfor you I was hoping if you're

(28:28):
open. To it fix me.
So one of the cool things about,and this is like a brain
reprogramming thing, but especially because we can't be
abstinent from food so often times and it kind of goes back
into that subconscious like whenwe're eating, usually the cue
for us to stop eating is the plate being empty, right?
Because we're so subconscious about it.
We're usually on our phones, we're watching TV, we're like

(28:48):
talking to our spouse is whatever it is, right?
And so two things that you can do is 1 practice just not
finishing your plate and throwing the last bite out.
And it's, I know. Right.
Just switch things. I'm just thinking.
About that, but but it's true because because ultimately, like
if we keep doing things over andover again, like the brain is
just a big muscle, like let's take the emotion completely out
of it. The brain is a muscle of habits,

(29:10):
right? When you're learning to play
basketball, you're not going to get every shot in on the first.
You literally have to practice. And so with ice cream, because
it was also my Achilles heel fora while, what I would practice
doing is I would have a tub of ice cream, which I used to go
through one night easily. Like, not every night, but you
have those moments where it's like, I've restricted for so
long now I'm just gonna eat thiswhole tub of ice cream.
Yeah. And the rationality behind that
is ridiculous. But you just have one spoonful,

(29:33):
and then you put it down and yougo, Amy, and then you put it
away like it's a practice. You approach it as if it's and
exercise, I'm trying, I'm just going to have one spoonful.
Yay me. And then you put it back.
This is an exercise. This isn't because I want ice
cream. This isn't because I deserve it.
This is because I'm practicing anew skill.
And when we approach it like that and we take the emotion out
of it, there's no restriction and you're actually able to

(29:54):
teach the brain something new. So when I was learning how to
stop being addicted to food, I was living back with my mom,
which is like where all the problems started.
And then my mom literally has like 12 types of pastas ready at
all times. It's like an Italian buffet
there. And so I would literally open
the fridge and say no thank you and close it.
Open the cupboards and say no thank you and close it like you
have to practice because the more you practice the more the

(30:15):
brain learns how to do it. You mentioned a piece there that
I like to this this idea of like, you know, good job, yay
me, right, This kind of that's important for us humans.
I've learned this kind of, you know, inner reward system
because we look for you know, why don't you applaud me?
You applaud me. Why look at me?
I'm doing great, right? But it has to come from inside
you. Know yeah and that's exactly

(30:36):
what I was talking about when I'm telling you like that's how
you retrain dopamine to come from intrinsically rather than
outside because when you eat your favorite food you're
releasing like 150 times more dopamine.
When you do cocaine, it's like 4000 times like a cigarettes,
this amount, that amount, right When we release dopamine on a
natural schedule, we teach the brain we don't need these big
releases of dopamine because we create little like dopaminergic

(31:00):
pathways like throughout the day.
So that Yami is actually like really, really scientific.
And I make all of my clients do it.
Take a shower, yay me, brush my teeth, yay me, yay me, yay me,
yay me all day long so that we can feel like we have this like
intrinsic very balanced reward system rather than needing these
large dumps from other things. Yeah.
And, and the phone is the big one.

(31:20):
I wasn't going to jump into that, but you know, do you want
to like, because I lately I've been more addicted to my phone.
I've always been addicted to my phone.
There's no doubt about it. I don't know if you want to dive
into this, but I kind of do right now.
So if you. Don't go there, Yeah.
Perfect. Where does where does social
media and technology play in allof this?

(31:45):
So first I'll admit like people are like, oh, wow, what's your
morning routine? I'm like, first thing I do is I
fucking pick up my phone. Like I'm not going to pretend
that I have this one all figuredout.
I don't I understand it, but it's it's very difficult.
There's so many different factors here, like even just the
color of the screen, like that blue light is very addictive.
So we can start there. The like one notification like

(32:06):
that, it's literally designed tolike release dopamine.
You're also, if we're talking about social media, getting
validation from the likes you'reconnecting with people.
So it it kind of is like dopamine and oxytocin, like all
in one shot. It's like the fucking super
drug. Like it's like, you know, and so
I don't, I know, I know some of my clients have these apps where

(32:27):
they can like shut it down earlyor whatever it is.
I haven't downloaded those. But one of when I've been more
moderate with my phone, even though like I run a business,
for me, it's really like first thing in the morning, get up and
go outside because you know, or get up and like exercise, like
release dopamine from a different way.
So it's balanced throughout the day.
So then when you're at your phone, it's not like your only

(32:49):
source of happiness and then thebrain doesn't think it needs it
for survival as much. I've never in my life felt
better after doom scrolling. They call it.
I learned that one recently, doom scrolling this like idea of
just constantly, you know, and you're in this kind of, it's
almost like a subconscious mode where you're just, you know,
getting hit. With hours go by, yeah.
Yeah. And so I've never felt that I, I

(33:11):
always come out of that situation feeling worse, you
know, and this past weekend, youknow, I was with a bunch of
family and I was, I'm the kind of person too.
You can probably, I think you can relate to this where once,
once I start something, I have to finish it sometimes.
And I'm, I'm working on it. I'm, I'm trying not to, but to
the to the extent and to the, you know, to the extent of

(33:31):
affecting others around me whereI'm kind of isolating.
And that's a dangerous place forme because every time I've
relapsed, isolation has usually been the the first part of it.
And you know, I'm good. No, I'm OK leave me alone.
Right. So I can relate to that a lot.
And and I like what you said about getting outside because
that that's kind of the ultimatefix.
Anytime I've woken up in a shitty mood and gone right to my
computer and, you know, been in this, even though I'm doing

(33:53):
stuff and I'm getting shit done and it's work usually.
Yeah, I've never felt better, like never felt good after it,
right. So, you know, getting some in
connection with nature and spirituality, which we'll dive
into, it's important, right? Yeah.
I wanna talk about nutrition. I know we talked about food but
I wanna dive into a little bit of it cuz I'm obsessed with it.

(34:14):
I love learning about nutrition and how it affects the brain and
the body. The gut Biome microbiome is
There's a lot of studies and science coming out now that your
gut microbiome is, like everything, almost as important
as sleep. Yeah, if not more important.
Totally, Yeah. How How does food and types of
food affect how we feel and affect our brains?

(34:36):
Yeah. I mean, like some of it is very
obvious in the sense where obviously if we're eating Whole
Foods, So what I mean by whole food, it's like something that's
grown on the ground, like you can go and pick it or from a
tree, etcetera. You know, bread is not a whole
food. You have to, it has to be
processed in order for us to like engage in it.
And it's through that processingprocess that things become more

(35:00):
addictive and like less good forus.
And so anything that's like whole food based is never really
going to cause any, you know, imbalances in the body.
So, you know, I worked with a lot of people that have diabetes
and they're like, oh, my doctor says I can't have fruit.
And I'm like, listen, Linda, we have been eating fruit for like
hundreds of thousands of years. Like fruit is not the fucking
problem. And so it is through these like

(35:23):
processings of things. And in Canada and, and the
United States, unfortunately, like we have very few laws
around like what we can put in our food.
So Heinz will make a difference different ketchup for Europe as
they will for Canada, because Europe is a lot more strict and
like we can't have chemicals. We don't want to kill our
people, like very basic things. But I'm going to get into like
some dark and twisty things thatlike, you know, here where we
have big pharma, where actually these companies are like working

(35:46):
together where the, the, they don't want us dead.
They want us just sick enough that we're taking a bunch of
different pharmaceuticals, you know, on high blood pressure,
high cholesterol, etcetera, thenwe're profitable, right?
And so I would just say like themore that you can eat, I don't
care if you eat fruits all day long or you prefer vegetables.
I'm definitely a big believer inlike not the carnivore diet, but

(36:08):
I'm, I was vegan and vegetarian for a long time and it like
destroyed my body. And so if it's a moral thing and
you, you know, you want to stay away from animals in that way,
that's different. But I do believe that we need
like animal based protein in ourdiet.
But as long as you're getting like, you know, you're eating
like the our ancestors would like, everything is going to be
fine. When we start to have
processing, that's where we start to elevate blood sugar,

(36:30):
which increases cravings, which,you know, lights up different
neurochemicals. Like a banana is going to
release so much dopamine compared to like, a chocolate
bar, Right? So yeah.
What do you do you think like eating in the morning is
important? What's your thought around that?
Because there's a lot of, I listen to a lot of podcasts and
there's a lot of conflicting, Yeah, knowledge science out
there. So it's actually very different

(36:52):
for men and for women and depending on where the woman is
from, her levels of stress, her hormonal cycle, et cetera, all
that stuff comes into play. So men are on a 24 hour hormonal
cycle, whereas women were on a 24 hour hormonal cycle plus a 28
to 30 day hormonal cycle. And so for men, intermittent
fasting can be quite beneficial because, you know, we allow the
body to go into autophagy like we don't, you are allowing for

(37:15):
processes, you're detoxing, you're, you're breaking things
down. As long as the fast is, you
know, you're listening to that first true hunger cue then and
you're, you're attuned to your, your real hunger cues.
You're not just going off of cravings.
It's great for women, the intermittent fasting gets kind
of denatured because often timesI have clients and they're like,

(37:36):
I barely eat anything. I'm not losing any weight.
And I'm like, well, you're running on adrenaline.
You're not actually ever going into your, your, your storage of
fat to burn it for energy. And so when we, when women have
too long fasting periods, plus we have cortisol, plus we have
all these things, we're not actually even burning our fat.
We're just running on this like adrenaline cycle.
And that becomes very dangerous for us because first of all,

(37:57):
weight loss is pretty much impossible there.
But you're never actually hearing true hunger cues until
it's like 7:00 PM and you've opened the floodgates of eating
and you're, you've starved yourself all day long.
And then now we can't control ourselves, right?
And so I don't know if that answered your question, but I
personally not really hungry forbreakfast.
What I dislike a lot for from this intermittent fasting thing

(38:17):
is I never, I don't think it should ever be like a diet.
So it's not like 21 hour fast, 18 hour fast, because then
you're not listening to that first hunger cue.
So typically I don't eat first thing in the morning, but
sometimes at 9. AMI want a croissant and I'm
gonna eat it. More often than not, it's like
12 where I feel kind of peckish.But as long as you are like
listening to the hunger cues andyou're giving yourself enough

(38:38):
time to have a fasting period. It's all crazy that that's
simple. I like that.
Listen to the cues because we weknow they're there.
It's just a matter of kind of taking a second and and just Oh
yeah, I'm actually hungry. I'm not bored.
The intermittent fasting thing is interesting to me because I
went down a rabbit hole like a good addict does.

(38:58):
When that first came got popularlike five years ago and everyone
was like, you got to try this. It's killing a taffy G is when
cells kill each other. Is that?
Yeah. The bad cells, the good cells
kill the bad cells. Yeah.
I was all in on that. And Doctor Rhonda, Rhonda
Patrick, I think, was a big proponent of it.
It didn't work for me because. Exactly.
And I didn't realize this until you brought it up.

(39:19):
This it was too restrictive for me.
And so by I would have to cram in all my, my meals between
12:00 and 8:00 and then from, you know, probably around 9:00
AM to 12:00 lunch, I was miserable.
I was, that's all I could think about.
And, and then 12 would come and I would gorge my lunch 8, you
know, 7:00 would come and I would, I got to get it all in.

(39:39):
I got to. And so I just ended up I somehow
managed to cram over 3500 calories every day, like over
that the the probably the Max amount that I should have been
for weight loss. Let's say, you know, for my B
MB, MRBMR and all that other science and stuff like that.
But I would manage to get like 4or 5000 calories in like an 8
hour window. And it's like, this is not, I

(40:00):
don't, this is not better, right?
I'm miserable. I'm, I hate myself.
And you know, I'm waking up in the morning.
I talked about this on my podcast before I'm waking up in
the morning and for so long, thefirst thing I'm doing is looking
in the mirror and like, you're fat, you're swollen, you ate too
much last night. And to your point of this
subconscious, I didn't even realize I was doing it.
It was just so natural for me that like, how am I going to

(40:22):
have, how am I going to be confident in myself if that's
how I started my day? Yeah, I love what you mentioned
about the mirror work, because Ialso think that that's a huge
factor for like, body dysmorphiaand eating disorders and all the
things because your daily behaviors match your deepest
beliefs about yourself, not yourgoals and your dreams like that,
right? So if you wake up in the morning

(40:42):
and you look in the mirror and you're like, you're a fat piece
of shit, your behaviors are going to match that.
Like nobody ever looks in the mirror and is like, Oh my God,
I'm so fat. Let me get my ass to the gym and
like, get my, you think, you think that that's what's going
to happen. You're like, got to get my shit
together, right? But this is how the humiliation
wound works. Like you will humiliate yourself
before anyone else can, right? But that humiliation, that inner

(41:03):
critic keeps you stuck in the cycles that keeps your identity
where it's at, right? The brain's number one job is to
remain consistent to its identity.
That's why we don't have to reteach yourself how to brush
your teeth. It's very important.
It's very adaptive that we remember who we are.
But if we have a very negative self concept, no matter how much
you want to release the weight, go to the gym, you know, change
your behavior, stop using drugs.If your identity of yourself as

(41:28):
I'm a failure, I'm fat, your behaviors are going to match
that. Do you believe in this positive
mirror work these positive affirmations?
I do, I, I think that, listen, if you're £350 and you're
looking in the mirror and you go, I'm skinny.
Like it's almost worse, right? There needs to be like a bridge,
like a gap, a stepping stone where we, the affirmations are

(41:51):
actually resonating and you genuinely do feel good about
yourself because the goal is that you feel good about
yourself the majority of the time.
The better you feel about yourself, the easier it is to
make healthier decisions. But to your point, you know
nobody's benefiting if you're lying to yourself every day in
the mirror. Like it won't work, yeah.
I I remember David Goggins. Do you know David Goggins?

(42:12):
Yeah. His book changed my life.
When I read his first book, that's how I got into marathon
running. And he would always hit like,
and I did this, too. I don't know if it's healthy or
not, but he would say he'd had that exercise where you put the
sticky notes on the mirror and it was just like, all the things
about you that were true. And I think, yeah, some of them
were like, you know, you're overweight and stuff like that.

(42:32):
And I'm looking back now and I'mlike, maybe that wasn't the most
positive thing, but there was definitely value to to some of
it, right? Like it would motivate me to do
certain things right? Totally.
And like there, but there's a very big difference between like
motivation to run a marathon andlike longevity and healthy
behaviors. And this is like why I I love

(42:54):
doing the work I do because one of my biggest claims to fame is
like my clients haven't worked me with me for over 2 years and
they're still releasing weight. Like usually you, once you stop
a diet, you gain the weight back. 80% of diets end that way.
Like literally within 12 months,you've gained all the way back
and sometimes more. But that like motivation of, you
know, it's getting me to like this end goal of doing the

(43:16):
marathon. Like, yeah, you can beat
yourself up all day long to, to get that end goal, but is it
going to create longevity and lifelong success?
No, because it's going to keep you stuck in the cycle of
restrict or over exercise or whatever temporarily, Yeah.
I'm happy. To be honest, I don't, I do kind
of miss it because it was, it was amazing how I felt every day
running. But I, I know there's a like,

(43:37):
there's a good reason I don't doit anymore.
Yeah, it took up a lot of time and energy and food.
Listen, like I was married for 11 years.
For the majority of my marriage,I I was no longer using
substances but didn't know how else to escape.
So I would wake up at 4:00 AM inthe morning.
I have two young kids. I would run 20 kilometers every
single day. Every day I broke my body.

(44:00):
I didn't stop until I started fainting and I had to stop.
It's unhealthy for me anyways. Wow, were you at least running
in zone 2 when you were doing anything?
Jesus. Yeah, I just know I get very
obsessive about certain behaviors and I just know where
my comfy spot is. And then it was weight training

(44:21):
for a while and hit training. And so now it's just like if I
go to Pilates, great. If I don't like, it's OK, yeah.
Yeah, that's funny. I'm in the same I'm in the same
place right now and I'm really happy that I am because yeah,
it's I don't beat myself. I used to always if I didn't go
to the gym, it would ruin my day.
I. I was unbearable.
Like my, my poor ex-husband was like literally the only time I'm

(44:42):
happy is when I'm gone running. And then when I come back, I'm
irritable and, and then if I don't go, it's even worse.
All day I'm obsessing about how I haven't gone and, and you
know, then it feeds into like, oh, I'm going to gain weight and
like all these like ridiculous things.
Or you're a piece of shit. Or yeah, you're not good enough.
Whatever. For me anyways.
Yeah, I went through a phase where psychedelics were, you

(45:03):
know, a very real possibility inmy in my recovery.
And I'm really happy today that I didn't indulge in them.
I had booked. I talk about this, you know, if
you've heard this before, I apologize.
But I had booked a ayahuasca trip, a retreat with like a
shaman and up north, and I paid and I was all ready to go.
And I'll never forget it. I was sitting with my therapist

(45:24):
one day and she's, you know, she's sober as well.
But she's great. I love her and she kind of, she
posted in a way that changed my relationship with it.
And this is for me, it works fora lot of people, which you're
going to get into. But she kind of asked me this
one question and she said, do you know anybody that's done it
once? And I was like, I really thought
about it and I'm like, no, I don't.

(45:45):
So she said, what makes you think you're going to do it
once? And because I, that was my idea,
right? It's always, like I said to you
before, it's always the first piece of cake.
It's always the first drag of the cigarette.
It's always the first line. I don't envision myself doing 30
ayahuasca trips, you know, because what's the point of
that? I just need one to kind of get a
fine God, right? Yes.
What's your what's your experience with psychedelics in

(46:07):
recovery? Yeah, OK, so my experience with
psychedelics started when I was in high school, right?
And one of the things that I recognized about, you know, I'm
do using them recreationally, fucking around with my friends.
But what was interesting and different about the psychedelic
experience is that, you know, after a night of cocaine and
drinking, the next day you're inwithdrawal, you'll do it again,
etcetera. After using psychedelics, like I

(46:29):
had zero desire to even smoke cigarettes and I was like a pack
a day kind of girl like. And so it's, you know, having
that experience recreationally and then me trying to problem
solve, finding trying to find answers for my clients who
cannot be abstinent from food, etcetera.
I agree with you actually. And I had a few clients that
were in the rehab clinic that said, you know, they tried use

(46:51):
it, they tried micro dosing, etcetera and it became kind of
addictive for them. And so it definitely is
different for everybody. So obviously, like work with
your therapist, like like consult somebody, you don't just
take this isn't medical advice. But from the perspective of, of
eating and why it works not justwith eating, but with substance
abuse is essentially it's going to balance out.

(47:12):
It's like an adaptogen. So it's going to balance out a
lot of the receptors that make an individual want dopamine.
So it's working a lot on the serotonin 2A receptor and
serotonin and dopamine are actually opposite of one
another. So when we're releasing
dopamine, we want more, we're motivated to move.
When we have serotonin, like we're good, we're satiated, like
we have everything. It's one of the reasons why when
you wake up and you go outside first thing in the morning,

(47:33):
you're getting serotonin, you'renot getting dopamine.
It makes you feel balanced and good and satiated, right?
And so psychedelics are going toneurochemically work on that
serotonin 2A receptor to balanceyour nervous system so you're
not in craving as much. But it's also going to offer
this like spiritual awakening, which is why when doctor Albert
Hoffman in the 1940s first founded LSD, he's it began, he

(47:56):
began to use it for Alcoholics and these like treatment
resistant disorders. And this is also where a lot of
the like, you know, popular people who work in addictions,
like started their agencies is through the psychedelic
experience, because we call it, I know I said this to you
before, but like we call it recovery.
When we're in recovery, well, what are we recovering?
We're recovering ourselves. So when somebody is addicted to

(48:19):
something, we are so separate from who we really are because
we're escaping ourselves. We don't want to look at
ourselves. But when we're doing this
psychedelic experience, it's kind of like the spiritual
awakening of like we see ourselves, we accept ourselves,
we become one with who we are, we connect with that higher self
and we begin to like love ourselves more.
And so when we can facilitate that process, it can be very

(48:40):
life changing. Again, like I, I don't believe
in any magic pills. I think all of that shit is
bullshit. I think you need to like
continually work at something and train the brain.
But I have seen a lot of really positive results in my thesis
was on using psychedelic therapyfor overconsumption of food and
it was really powerful. And like it did, all of the

(49:01):
clients who were using the psychedelics in a macro dose or
a micro dose were able to not have as many cravings to change
the relationship to food becausethey like connected with who
they really are. I was at a wedding one time and
I heard one of the best wedding speeches was the father of the
bride. He said something that I'll
never forget for the rest of my life.
He said, we have two jobs in this life to find ourselves and

(49:25):
to love that true selves to to find our true self and to love
that true self. And I was like, oh, simple.
Yeah, it's not easy, but it's simple.
Like that's I can relate to that, you know, and and I've
done a lot of work around it andI find today I'm not, you know,
I can love myself today. I go in and out.
I waver from it. But yeah, spiritual experience
to me, you know, the thought is I need to have a profound

(49:48):
alteration in my reaction to life as it, you know, it says
in, in one of the literatures that I read, I didn't make that
up, but it's true. I, I react to the world in such
a negative way and I react to myself in such a negative way
that I come into recovery and I need to have this.
I need it's, I found that it's essential for me for, for me and
for a lot of people I've seen, Ineed to have a profound

(50:08):
alteration in my reaction to life.
It's like when somebody cuts me off in traffic, my first thought
is to go murder that guy's family, right?
Like sometimes my brain just goes to this, like, like we
said, these alternate endings inthe movie.
But I need to, I need to stop and have this, OK, it's not that
bad or it's not about you or, and you know, it works with

(50:29):
everything and it's really hard.It works with, you know,
somebody gets diagnosed with cancer.
Like on a more extreme level, it's like, well, I know it
doesn't seem like it right now, but there is a reason there's a
gift here somewhere, right? There's a silver lining.
And so that's kind of the way I I look at it today.
Yeah, listen, like Friday my Jeep got stolen out of my
driveway. Another one, eh?

(50:50):
And I had a root canal on the same day, got into a fight with
my boyfriend. Like I was like, I was bawling.
My, I was like, this is the worst day of my whole life.
And like, I just like couldn't get to that positive place, you
know, when it just feels like everything crashing down.
I know this is like very like first world problems.
My Jeep got stolen out of my driveway.
But like it this, the way that the brain conceptualizes trauma
is what's important. It was like so traumatic for me.

(51:12):
It felt like everything was getting taken away.
And if and unless we can change our response to like the things
that we're thinking and feeling like we will suffer.
Like that's just the truth. There's a huge difference.
I was taught this. There's a huge difference
between pain and suffering, right?
Pain is is inevitable. Suffering is optional.
It's like I can. Yeah, I heard that from a mentor

(51:32):
of mine. I can sit in this all day and
I'm suffering, but I can choose to kind of get out of it.
It's hard. It's really hard.
You know, I, I want to be clear too, when I said another one,
you know, you haven't had two jeeps stolen.
But no, no, I just, we have a problem in the city with people
stealing and I'm, I'm smiling about it, but it's it's actually
pisses me off. Yeah.
That's a huge problem. And I'm sorry to hear that.

(51:54):
That's OK. How did you?
OK, So how did you, how did you get out of that?
Yeah. I cried a lot.
I basically thought the world was ending.
And then I have a mentor. Like I believe that one of the
reasons that like keeps me soberis that I obviously work with
individuals. So like even just what you're
doing here, like this is such animportant thing and people who
are in recovery should always beimmersed in the community, I

(52:17):
believe. But I have a mentor and I
basically was like SOS like, andshe, he kind of like talked me
down off of it. And The funny thing is like, as
the days have gone on, like there have just been little
Silver Linings. Like, you know, the day that my
Jeep got stolen, my dad, the daybefore, my dad spent 4 hours,
the poor man in his 80s cleaningthe whole thing.
So we took everything out. So all of my son's hockey gear,

(52:38):
this vintage motorcycle helmet that I have like my $2000
speaker, like everything was taken out of the Jeep first,
right? And so I'm like, OK, like, you
know, everything could have gotten stolen.
So like you just have to find these little like pockets of oh,
maybe my insurance is going to give me a massive payout and I
can get something better. You just have to like you just
have to find the little pockets of joy.

(52:58):
I guess I. Don't know, my first thought was
that too. The insurance was boy, I wonder
if she's going to get one. Right.
I'm like, well. Big win, Yeah.
Oh man, that's awesome. What?
OK, so we talked a lot of good stuff today.
What what sort of tools or practical things can people use
if you mentioned a lot of them? But just what's something that

(53:21):
someone can take away from this that they can actually implement
in their life if they have a problem or they think they may
have a problem with food addiction or their relationship
to food or body is smart. Yeah.
Yeah, so I've done a Ted Talk, so maybe link it up because I
like go through the, I'll go through like I go through very
succinct things, but I'm just pulling from that.
Like first of all, you can't hate your way to a body that you

(53:42):
love. Like point blank, the more you
criticize yourself, the more youwill self sabotage because it's
like your daily behaviors match your identity, right?
The second thing is really beingable to differentiate between
craving, like true like craving and true hunger.
And it's difficult, right? Because you know that desire for
food is so prominent all day long, and it's used to escape

(54:06):
from work or to escape boredom or to facilitate feelings of
oxytocin. So I have a little trick that I
do with my clients, and it's called the broccoli test.
And so if you're hungry, you just ask yourself this one
question, like, would I eat raw broccoli right now?
If the answer's no, then you're not hungry.
And that doesn't mean that you can't eat.

(54:27):
It just means that you're no longer tricking yourself into
thinking that a craving is true hunger.
And that's the important differentiation, right?
Because the brain is, will, willrationalize, it'll tell you all
these crazy things to get it to engage in that one thing, right?
Like it'll tell you, oh, I deserve it today.
I, you know, I worked hard. I'll start again on Monday, like
all these crazy rationalizationsjust to gain access to the thing

(54:47):
that it thinks it needs. And so when you can at least be
honest and be like, this isn't true hunger.
I'm still gonna eat the chocolate bar, right?
But at least I'm recognizing I'mresponding to a craving, not
actual hunger. The next thing is, and I
mentioned it, but I'll reiterate, but you just never.
The last bite is never going to give you anything more than the
first bite did ever, right? Especially when we're talking

(55:09):
about these like processed, highly palatable foods.
And so if I'm eating literally the most delicious, like gooey
chocolate chip cookie like or the things that I love the most,
I always leave the last bite. It's just a little like trick
that I play with myself because it's not going to give me
anything more than the first bite did.
It has 0 nutrients, right? And So what that does is it
immediately puts you in the driver's seat where the cookie

(55:29):
no longer has the power. You do, you get to go.
No, thank you. Right.
And then the last thing, and we touched on this too, is that
like we are primitive human beings, like we are bipedal.
We are designed to be out in thesun and the blue light is like
really messing with our mental health and our hormones in your
chemistry. So like, if you can get outside
and walk every single day, you're going to, that's the

(55:51):
thing that's going to change your life the most, honestly.
Amazing. I, I learned so much today.
I really appreciate you. Yeah.
No, it's, it's good. I think this is one of those
things where people don't realize that it, it can become a
problem, or maybe it is a problem, or maybe it's not.
Maybe you're not struggling withit and you don't.
But it's, it's good to know. And you've you've taught me a

(56:11):
lot of practical things that last bite.
Yeah. Like, I don't need to finish
this. I was brought up in an Italian
household, too, where you don't waste food because so and so,
right? You just don't do it.
And so now today, it's like ingrained in my brain that I
have to finish my plate. And that's not the case.
Right, where can we find you, Jordana?

(56:33):
Yeah, so I'm not a super tech savvy person, but I live on
Instagram. I have a TikTok.
I never use it. So Instagram would be the place
to find me. I have a website, I'm sure
you'll link it up. And I also have a podcast, so
that has a lot of, I dive deep into food psychology and
addiction and all of that in there.
So. I'll link all of that in the
show. Thanks so much for coming.

(56:53):
Thank. You for having me.
I had so much fun. Thanks for listening.
Please help us grow the channel and like, share and subscribe
for more content. The discussions and stories
shared on this podcast are for informational and motivational
purposes only. This content is not a substitute
for professional medical advice,addiction treatment, or therapy.
If you or someone you know is struggling with addiction,

(57:15):
please. Consult A licensed physician,
addiction specialist, or mental health professional.
You are no longer.

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