May 6, 2025 • 52 mins
Are you tired of swinging between "restrict and binge"? Ever found yourself standing in the pantry late at night, binging on snacks with a mouth full of shame and a heart full of questions?
This episode is for the woman who’s done the therapy, the inner work, the self-help books—but still feels stuck in a loop with food.
In this raw and revolutionary deep-dive, Lauren Michelle Jewel breaks down:
- Why binge eating isn’t a willpower issue—it’s a nervous system survival response
- How restriction is just freeze mode in a $98 pair of leggings
- The biochemistry of cravings and why your gut-brain axis is secretly calling the shots
- How your mother wound, attachment style, and nervous system wiring shape your relationship with food
- The cultural conditioning that moralizes hunger and monetizes your shame
- Why food isn’t just fuel—it’s a portal to your pleasure, your power, and your truth
You’ll meet Melissa and Sarah—two clients whose food struggles looked wildly different but stemmed from the same root: dysregulation, disconnection, and inherited survival patterns.
Lauren introduces The Binge-Busting Blueprint™, a 3-step process to:
- Replenish your brain and body chemistry with functional nutrition and amino acids
- Regulate your nervous system through somatic practice and trauma-informed embodiment
- Reclaim your hunger as a sacred signal—not a flaw to fix
⚡ This episode isn’t about discipline. It’s about safety.
⚡ It’s not about fixing food—it’s about feeding the woman you were never taught to nourish.
🗓️ Join the Revolution
If this episode lit something up in your body, Lauren’s live workshop "Pleasure, Power & The Plate: Fuck-the-Patriarchy, Burn-the-Diet-Bible" is happening May 28th @ 7 PM EST.
This isn’t just another food freedom seminar—it’s a nervous system and soul-level reset for the woman who’s ready to stop performing and start receiving.
🎟️ Reserve your spot: https://l.bttr.to/hCHRc
💌 If this episode resonated, leave a review, share it with your ride-or-die, or DM Lauren @lauren_michelle_jewel on IG.
Because food was never the enemy—it was the messenger.
Now it’s time to listen.
🔗 CONNECT WITH LAUREN MICHELLE JEWEL
✨ Instagram → @laurenmichellejewel & Lauren's Facebook
💌 Join the Embody This Collective → Join Here
🌐 Website + Work With Me → https://msha.ke/laurenjewel
🎁 Free Resources → Grab All My Freebies
🎙️ Podcast Hashtag → #EmbodyThisPodcast
💬 DM me on Instagram and tell me what resonated most with you from this episode.
📣 Share the show and tag me so more women can reclaim their body, identity, and f*cking life.
⚠️ Disclaimer:
This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended to diagnose, treat, or replace professional medical advice or mental health care. Always consult with a qualified healthcare provider before making any changes to your health practices.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Do you ever find yourselfstanding in the kitchen at,
let's say 10:47 PM with thepantry door half open, and your
fingers are deep in something,maybe sweet, salty, or crunchy,
telling yourself just this oncewhile also whispering, what the
hell is wrong with me?
(00:22):
This episode, it's for thatmoment, that moment where your
mouth is full, but your heartfeels empty, where your gut is
bloated, but your soul isstarving.
Or you've done the therapy, thejournaling, the breath work, and
still you're stuck in this goddamn loop.
You don't need more willpower.
(00:43):
You don't need another reset.
You need the fucking truth.
Because you're not just bingingbecause you're lazy, or broken
or out of control.
You're binging because yournervous system is brilliant and
it's begging for safety, forsoftness, for something to hold
onto when life feels like it'stoo damn much.
(01:03):
And here's what no one tellsyou.
Food is the final frontier.
It's not the symptom, it's theactual portal.
And if you're listening to this,you're being invited in.
This episode isn't about fixingyour relationship with food.
It's about reclaiming yourrelationship with pleasure and
power because food isn't theproblem.
(01:24):
Your nervous system's,brilliance is the reason you
reach for it in the first place,and until your body feels safe
to receive your healing willalways be something you talk
about instead of something youactually embody.
So today we're cracking open thebinge restrict loop and we're
burning the rule book.
We're calling bullshit on thewellness industry that moralize
(01:45):
hunger while monetizing yourshame.
And we're getting radicallyhonest with what your cravings
are really trying to tell you.
'cause you don't need anotherplan.
You need a homecoming.
Welcome to Embody this, the NOBS Healing podcast for women who
are done playing small.
(02:06):
I'm Lauren Michelle Jewel, asingle sober business owning
badass who has been humbled ashell by healing.
But I'm not just someone who'slived it.
I've studied it, coached it, andhelped women walk through it for
over seven years in mind, bodyhealth, gut brain science, and
nervous system healing.
I've worked with women who havetried everything, therapy,
(02:27):
diets, supplements, self-helpwork, but still feel
disconnected from their bodies,their health, and their truth.
Because here's the thing,healing isn't a trend.
It's not aesthetic.
It's not an identity.
Healing is embodied, and let mebe real with you, it's hard as
fuck and it's also rewarding asfuck.
(02:50):
I know because I've lived it.
And along the way I realizedsomething.
Modern healing methods arefailing us.
Everything is compartmentalized.
Go to therapy.
They say, take the supplements,do the inner work, but no one
teaches you how to actuallyintegrate it.
All this show is for you ifyou're ready to rethink healing.
(03:13):
It's not about being perfect,being a wellness influencer or
having a PhD in biohacking.
It's about undoing, unlearning,and finally coming home to
yourself.
Quick disclaimer, this podcastis for educational purposes
only.
It's here to expand your mind,challenge old narratives, and
empower you with knowledge.
(03:33):
It's not a replacement formedical advice.
Always consult a professionalwhen making health decisions.
If this episode hits home,follow the share, rate it,
review it, share it with someonewho needs to hear it, because
you never know whose life youmight change.
Now let's fucking go.
(03:54):
Let's just call it what it is.
Binge eating isn't about food.
Neither is restriction ortracking or those clean grill
meal plans.
You ghost by day three.
It's not about macros, and it'snot about being the best at
eating.
(04:14):
It's about trying to findcontrol in a body that's never
felt safe without it.
Because here's the thing.
You can't quit food.
You have to live with it, whichmeans you are in a relationship
with it, whether you want to beor not.
And that relationship, itreflects everything.
(04:37):
How safe you feel, how you cope,and how much permission you have
to receive, soften or slow thefuck down.
And that's why it hits so hardbecause if you're the kind of
woman who's done the work, thetherapy, the shadow work, the
identity rewiring, and foodstill feels like a battlefield.
(04:58):
It's not because you missed amodule, it's because your
nervous system is still stuck insurvival.
Your body doesn't speak mindset.
It speaks safety.
And if that safety never getsbuilt into your biology, the
deepest parts of you will keepreaching for relief.
Anywhere they can find it.
(05:19):
That moment where you spiralinto fuck it mode, that's not
failure.
It's a chemical.
SOS, your gut's inflamed, yourserotonin's tanked, your blood
sugar's crashing, and your bodyis just trying to feel okay.
Even if that, okay.
Lives at the bottom of a Ben andJerry's.
So, no, you're not broken,you're adaptive, you're
(05:40):
brilliant, you're surviving thebest way, you know how, but
here's the cost.
The more you try to controlfood, the more it controls you.
And eventually you realize thiswas never about food.
It was about power, aboutreceiving and what you've never
felt safe having.
(06:02):
Because for women who've spenttheir whole life bracing,
binging feels safer thansoftness.
Restricting feels safer thanbeing fed, and tracking feels
safer than trust.
Real nourishment, emotional,physical, spiritual requires
something.
Most of us we're never given aregulated foundation, and if
(06:24):
you've never learned how to bewith food without being in a
power struggle with it.
Of course it becomes a placewhere your deepest work unravels
because food isn't abstract,it's daily, it's in your fucking
face, and it's the part of yourhealing.
You can't compartmentalize,intellectualize, or bypass.
(06:44):
And yet so many women postponeit.
They heal the trauma, they fixthe relationship, they build the
business.
But food.
That gets shoved into thesomeday when I'm strong enough
corner until one day theyrealize food isn't the final
boss.
It's the fucking foundationbecause everything else you
(07:05):
built sits on top of yourbiology, and if that biology is
inflamed, dysregulated, runningon caffeine and cortisol, no
amount of journaling is going tocarry you into your next
evolution.
This is where the realinitiation begins.
Where healing stops beingsomething you talk about and it
starts being something you live.
(07:27):
When you can meet your hungerwithout panic, fullness without
shame, cravings, withoutcollapse, that's when your
nervous system exhales.
That's when the work finallylands, and that's when you stop
coping and start actuallyliving.
So let's say it for the women inthe back, food was never the
(07:49):
villain.
It was the voice, the portal,the messenger.
In this episode, this is wherewe stop punishing the messenger
and we start listening to whatit's been trying to say all
along.
So let's just go a little deeperhere.
'cause you know me, ya girlloves to get into the science.
(08:10):
You are not just reaching forfood because you lack willpower.
That's such a tired, overusednarrative.
And honestly, it's one thatkeeps women stuck in shame
instead of healing.
What's actually happening is farmore intelligent when you're
standing in the pantry cravingsomething salty or sweet, not
because you're hungry, butbecause you're anxious or
(08:31):
overstimulated or numb.
Your body isn't failing you.
It's actually trying to regulateyou because here's what most
people don't know, your gut andyour brain are in constant
communication.
Not sometimes, not occasionally,but all the time.
And this isn't a metaphor, it'sliteral, biology, the gut sends
(08:52):
messages to the brain, and thebrain sends messages back.
That's what we mean by thegut-brain access.
It's a two-way street.
So if your gut's inflamed oryour microbiome is set a
balance, which happens all thetime when you're chronically
stressed, inflamed, orundernourished, or running on
survival mode, thatcommunication gets hijacked.
And when that happens, yourbrain doesn't get what it needs.
(09:15):
It doesn't get serotonin, whichhelps you feel calm, safe, and
content.
It doesn't get dopamine in theright rhythm, which helps you
focus, feel motivated orenergized, and your inner
chemistry is dysregulated.
And guess what?
Your survival brain, when itsenses that, it gets real
fucking loud and it goes huntingfor the fastest fix it can find,
(09:36):
which usually is sugar, carbs,or anything that can spike your
blood sugar and get you out ofthe emotional free fall you
didn't even realize you were in.
And sometimes it's not even youdoing the talking.
I know that sounds wild, butyour gut bacteria, especially if
you've got things like candida,parasites or osis, they can
literally influence yourcravings.
(09:57):
They can send signals to yourbrain asking for sugar because
they feed off of it.
But let me say this loud andclear.
Parasites and candida are notthe core issue.
They're symptoms of a deepervulnerability in your terrain,
physically, emotionally, andenergetically.
Your terrain becomes fertile fordysfunction when you're living
(10:17):
in disconnection.
When your nervous system isstuck in fight, flight, freeze,
or fa, when your body doesn'tfeel like a safe place to be,
that's when things start to takeroot that don't belong there,
whether it's emotional patterns,intrusive thoughts, gut
imbalances, or food compulsions.
And then on top of all of that,you add guilt, you add shame,
(10:39):
you add the, I should knowbetter by now.
Spiral.
Which doesn't just feel bademotionally, it disregulates you
further.
That emotional load spikescortisol, which tanks your blood
sugar, which ramps up yourcravings, which sends you right
back into the pantry.
Hating yourself for somethingthat's actually been
biochemically wired.
(11:01):
Can you see the loop now?
It's not about discipline, it'sabout resources.
It's not about willpower, it'sabout nourishment.
Your body is not working againstyou.
It's working for you.
And every craving is a cue.
A cue that something deeperneeds tending to when you've
(11:23):
spent your whole lifedisconnected from your body.
Living in hyper independence,performing, producing,
perfecting, how do you even knowwhat that deeper thing is?
That's where we go next.
Before we dive into how thisshows up in real life, I want
you to hear a story, one thatmight feel eerily familiar.
(11:46):
Because, listen, I've workedwith hundreds of women on this
problem, whether they call itbinge eating, emotional eating,
cheat days, cravings, or justlosing control.
It's all the same root, and oneclient in particular really
stands out.
Let's call her Melissa.
(12:07):
See, Melissa had it together onpaper.
She was a powerhouse in hercareer.
She had her therapist, herpersonal trainer, her meal plan.
She checked all the quote,unquote, I'm doing the work
boxes, except she couldn'tspiraling around one thing.
Cheese.
Yep, cheese.
(12:28):
Her cheat food, her shame food,the thing that kept swearing.
She'd quit on Monday, but alwaysended up knee deep in by
Saturday night.
She'd beat herself up over it.
Why can't I stop?
I'm sabotaging myself.
I should know better by now.
She'd say, but she hadn't workedwith me yet.
(12:49):
Because here's the thing.
She didn't have a cheeseproblem.
She had a nervous systemimprint.
And yeah, neuro moment here,cheese does hit the same opiate
receptors in your brain asliteral opiates.
It's chemically comforting.
It gives you that little ah,when your nervous system is
screaming.
But the real question that Iasked her wasn't how do we stop
(13:10):
the cheese?
It was, what is the cheesegiving you that you're not
getting anywhere else?
So I had her bring it to ournext session and she was like,
wait, you want me to eat it?
And I did, but this time withintention, so we slowed it way
down.
She looked at it, smelled it,touched it, and let it melt in
(13:34):
her mouth instead of shoving itdown with shame.
And then I dropped her into herbody.
I said, close your eyes.
Where do you feel that?
What memory comes up?
And boom, just like that.
She was back in her childhoodliving room.
Her mom, wine, cheese,charcuterie, TV on laughter,
(13:56):
warmth, peace, that moment ofcheese, it was her nervous
system's portal to home becauseher body didn't just want food,
it wanted safety, it wantedconnection.
It wanted her mother.
But here's the deeper layer.
She also had some unresolvedpain with her mom, some unspoken
(14:16):
grief, some unmet needs.
So her body, it was trying torecreate connection with the
very person she feltdisconnected from.
That's not sabotage, that issurvival.
And once we named it, once wegave her full permission to eat
the cheese with presents insteadof punishment, everything
(14:37):
changed.
She went on vacation with herhusband and shared a charcuterie
board, savored every bite, andthen she forgot about it.
Literally didn't think about itagain, because when the
emotional imprint is met, thecompulsion doesn't need to stay,
and that's not even the wildestpart.
A few weeks later, she reachedout and told me.
(14:57):
Lauren, I finally had theconversation.
I finally spoke to my mom, notfrom bitterness, not from blame,
but from capacity, and it wasmessy.
Sure there were tears, some oldtension in the room, but there
was something else too,connection.
And in that conversation, hermom casually mentioned some
(15:17):
symptoms that she'd beenignoring.
Melissa listened differently.
This time.
Something clicked.
She pushed her mom to get themchecked out, obviously, because
wouldn't that worry you?
Well, turns out it was actuallylife-threatening and because
Melissa had the capacity to showup in that moment because she
had the regulation to hear whather body and her mother were
(15:39):
actually saying, she seemed toher mom's fucking life.
This is the ripple.
This is why this work mattersbecause when you stop fighting
your cravings and startlistening to them, like really,
really listening to them, you'renot just healing your
relationship with food, you'rehealing your capacity to
connect, to lead, to speak, andto live.
(16:01):
So if you've been tellingyourself, this is just about
food.
It's not.
It never was.
This is about relationship.
This is about intimacy.
This is about safety.
This is about truth.
And when you reclaim thosethings, everything else, food,
health, body, purpose starts toshift on its own.
(16:24):
Now, I know Melissa's storyprobably hit something in you
because so many of us know thatspiral, the craving, the shame,
the food as comfort, as mother,as medicine.
But I want to be really clearhere, that's just one side of
the coin.
If Melissa showed us what itlooks like to binge from unmet
connection, Sarah's story showsus what it looks like to
(16:46):
restrict from unprocessedemotional chaos.
Because for every woman kneedeep in snacks trying to soothe
the nervous system in overdrive,there's another woman who's
healed her binging only to swingstraight into the arms of
restriction.
And I'm not talking aboutmedical dietary choices or
intuitive eating.
I'm talking about control, hypervigilance, the kind of wellness
(17:08):
that looks clean on the outsideand gets praised, but is
actually chaos on the inside.
So let me tell you about anotherclient of mine.
We'll call her Sarah.
Sarah had done the bingingthing.
She lived in that loop.
She felt out of control withfood for years.
So when she cleaned it up, shethought she was finally doing
better.
(17:29):
No more sugar, no more carbs.
Everything measured, everything.
Tracked smoothie supplements,discipline, health.
On paper, she looked like thedream client, but under the
surface, she was fuckingexhausted.
Her nervous system was runningon fumes work.
Stress was sky high.
Her relationships were shaky andher emotions were on mute.
(17:52):
And because her life felt sochaotic, food became the one
place she could control.
She wasn't binging anymore, butshe also wasn't eating, not
really.
She was surviving on adrenalineand cortisol.
And if you know the biology, youknow that stress hormones
literally shut down your hungercues.
Your body's not prioritizingdigestion when it thinks you're
(18:12):
under threat.
It's bracing, preparing to fightor flee or in her case, freeze.
So the skipping meals, the lackof appetite, the obsession with
food purity that wasn't healing,that was a body, again, in
survival mode, and it started tocatch up with her.
She lost her period.
She couldn't sleep.
(18:33):
Her skin broke out, her gutflared, she couldn't focus at
work.
She felt like she was floatingthrough life, numb, tired, and
disconnected.
And all the energy she shouldhave been able to use to create,
to live, to expand was goinginto micromanaging food because
that felt like the only safething left.
(18:53):
But here's the hard truth.
No one talks about restrictiondoesn't make you strong.
It makes you a trauma survivorin$98 leggings.
It's a nervous system that'sbracing in freeze mode wearing a
wellness badge, and it's just asdysregulating and just as
exhausting as binging becausewhether you're overeating,
undereating, or obsessivelycontrolling every single bite,
(19:17):
it's the same root.
A body that doesn't feel safe, Anervous system that's stuck in
hypervigilance, and a mindtrying to protect you, the only
way it knows how.
And here's what I want you totake away from all this before
we shift into the next part.
This is not about food.
It never was.
Food is the entry point, themirror, the messenger, the place
(19:41):
where your trauma, your unmetneeds, your hyper independence,
your perfectionism all show upwith receipts.
So as we start to talk about thereal healing work, how to build
safety, how to come back intoyour body, how to actually
regulate your system in a waythat allows you to eat, live,
and expand without fear offixation.
Just know this, whether you'resoothing through food or
(20:04):
surviving by controlling it,you're not wrong.
You're not weak and you're notbroken.
You're just trying to feel safein a world, in a body, in a
nervous system that hasn't knownwhat that actually means.
And now we get to rebuild thatsafety from the inside out.
So let's go there.
(20:24):
So take a breath with me, onedeep breath in through your
nose, and if you haven'talready, just breathe everything
out and then breathe in.
Because after hearing all that.
After seeing how binging andrestriction are just the two
sides of the same trauma coin,it can be easy to slip into that
(20:46):
old story again.
So what the hell do I do now?
I guess I'll always be this way.
Wow.
Great.
So I'm actually the problem.
But before we try to fix it,before we reach for a new food
rule or a spiritual to-do list,I want you to pause.
I want you to meet the part ofyou that has been taught to be
(21:06):
afraid of her own hunger.
Because if there's one thingthis culture has conditioned you
to believe, it's that yourhunger is a threat.
That if you want too much, toomuch food, too much rest, too
much love, too much life, you'rejust selfish, you're greedy or
too much.
So we learned to starve not justphysically, but emotionally.
(21:29):
We starve ourselves of pleasure,of truth, of softness, of
connection, of being held.
We cut ourselves off from thethings we actually need, and
then we shame ourselves when thecravings come back roaring.
But let me say something, and noone else taught you, your hunger
is not a flaw.
It's a prayer.
It's the most honest fuckingpart about you.
(21:51):
It's the compass inside yourbody that's trying to lead you
home to nourishment, to truth,to presence, to power.
You don't binge because you'reundisciplined.
You binge because you've beentrained to ignore the signals
until they scream.
You restrict because you'velearned that control feels safer
than connection and you obsessbecause obsession gives you the
(22:12):
illusion of order.
When everything inside feelslike chaos, but the hunger
underneath it all, that's notwrong.
It's fucking wisdom.
It's the part of you thatremembers what wholeness feels
like.
And if you slow down enough toactually listen to it, not
moralize it, not override it andnot fix it, but to witness it,
(22:35):
you start to realize somethingradical.
You were never too much.
You were just never fully fed.
Let that land not just fed withfood, but with presence, safety
and soul.
(22:55):
And now.
Now you get to change that.
Now you get to stop treatingyour hunger like a problem and
start seeing it as sacred.
You get to stop asking, how do Icontrol this?
And start asking, what is thistrying to tell me?
Because your cravings are justcravings, their communication,
and when you can meet them withcuriosity instead of shame,
(23:18):
that's when the body stopsbracing.
That's when the nervous system.
Exhales.
That's when eating becomesintuitive, not reactive, and
that's when food stops being abattleground and starts becoming
belonging.
Which brings us to the nextlayer.
The part you've been told isabout willpower, but is actually
about wiring because of hungeris holy.
(23:40):
Then biology is the blueprint.
So let's talk about how torestore your chemistry, rebuild
your capacity, and reclaim yourrelationship to food from the
inside out.
You ready?
You didn't binge because youlacked discipline.
You didn't restrict because youwere addicted to control, and
(24:01):
you're not stuck in foodobsession because you skipped a
journaling prompt.
You're stuck because yourbiology is, you're still bracing
because your brain is under fed.
You're still swinging betweenkale and chaos because your
nervous system never got thememo that it's safe to receive.
And that thing you keep callingself sabotage.
(24:21):
It's not sabotage, it'ssurvival, it's protection.
It's your neurotransmittersthrowing a full blown tantrum
because you're trying to heal atrauma response with oat milk
and affirmations.
And here's what every womanwho's cried in Whole Foods
parking lot needs to hear.
Your cravings aren't a flaw.
(24:42):
They're a flashlight.
Not a failure.
A fucking SOS cravings.
Equal depletion, not defiance.
So let's decode this.
That chocolate obsession, not asweet tooth, that carb attack at
4:00 PM not a lack of planning,and that late night pantry raid,
(25:03):
it's not even a lack ofwillpower.
It's chemistry, not character.
Cravings happen when your brainis under fed and your gut is
inflamed and your nervous systemis still living in a war zone,
it calls normal.
And here's where traumadysregulation and spiritual
bypassing collide.
You're trying to think your wayout of what your body never felt
(25:25):
safe enough to heal yourmeditating over a malnourished
microbiome, and you're bypassingbiological needs in the name of
being aligned.
When what you really are isdepleted, your cravings have a
personality, AKA.
These are the five appetitetypes according to Julia Ross,
(25:48):
the author of The Diet Cure, theMood Cure and the Craving Cure.
Your cravings aren't justrandom.
They're specific, predictable,and biologically explainable.
I call them your biochemicallove languages.
Number one is low serotonin.
This is like the moody carboholic.
You cry when someone breatheswrong.
(26:09):
You crave bread like it'soxygen, and you don't need
mindset.
You need tryptophan and aregulated gut to produce
serotonin in the first place.
If you have a low dopamine, thisis like the unmotivated muncher,
so you wake up exhausted and by2:00 PM you sell a kidney for
sugar or caffeine.
This isn't a productivity issue,it's a dopamine drought.
(26:32):
You need protein, sunlight, andmaybe some tyrosine, not another
macho fueled to-do list.
If you have lo gaba, this isknown as attention snacker, so
you're eating with your jawclenched and your chest is
tight.
This isn't boredom, it's panicwith a side of gluten.
You need GABA support, ting andnervous system repair, not
(26:56):
another rule book if you havelow endorphins.
This is known as the comfortseeker.
Food equals love.
Food equals safety.
Food equals the only hug you letyourself receive.
You're not a lost cause.
You're touch starved.
Undersupported and DPA couldhelp move more than any
(27:17):
affirmation ever will.
And if you have blood sugardysregulation, this is known as
the hangry hopper.
So you're irritable, foggy,grazing all day and still
unsatisfied.
This is a biological crash, nota personal failing.
You need L-glutamine, proteinand rhythm, not almond crackers
and guilt.
(27:37):
So here's how we rewire.
First we feed, and then we feel.
So you cannot rewire a survivalbased behavior in a malnourished
brain, right?
You can't trauma process on anempty tank, and you can't vagus
nerve your way through aserotonin shortage.
So what's the fix?
Well, step one is we mustreplenish.
(27:57):
We have to rebuild the systembefore you try to regulate it.
So here's your binge bustingbiochemistry blueprint.
This is where we build biologythat can hold your healing.
So before the mindset, beforethe somatic work and before the
food tracking therapy on backingor emotional integration you
eat, but not just anything.
(28:18):
Here's the lineup.
Every three to four hours, Iwant you to eat protein to
stabilize blood sugar and giveyour brain the amino acids it
needs to make serotonin,dopamine, gaba, endorphins.
These are the real OGs ofappetite regulation, and because
your nervous system runs on saltand minerals, not just green
(28:39):
juice and gilt, we needelectrolytes.
And then I also want you toreally focus in on amino acids.
Like tryptophan for serotonin,DPA for endorphins, L-glutamine
for blood, sugar and calm,tyrosine for dopamine and gaba
for well gaba, they're notbiohacks, they're brain food to
(29:00):
reset your circadian rhythm, soyour cortisol stops spiking at
midnight and crashing by 2:00 PMI want you to focus on getting
morning sun, so 20 minutes ofsunlight in your eyes, or get a
sun lamp during the winter.
And this is also important toknow that you do not wanna wear
sunglasses and you don't wannawear your regular glasses.
You want straight sunlight inthe eyes.
(29:21):
Remember, we're not staring intothe sun, obviously.
Come on, common sun guys, thereis a thing called reflection.
We're just going outside andwe're getting sun on our skin.
Then I also want you to focus onsome real fucking sleep.
Yeah, I said it not doomscrolling in bed with a weighted
blanket and a trauma podcast.
I want you to get some actualrest.
(29:41):
Then we want movement thatsupports not punishes.
So somatic shaking, walking,lifting, dancing in your
underwear, whatever gets you inyour body instead of escaping it
and focusing on meals thatground you like food that tastes
good.
You know what I'm saying?
Food that's warm.
Food that makes you feel human,not food you eat because an
(30:04):
influencer told you to.
Because nourishment isn't areward.
It is a biological requirement.
So your cravings aren't bad.
They're brilliant.
They aren't disobedience theirdata.
They're saying, please feed me.
Please stop punishing me forbeing hungry.
Please stop trying to mindsetyour way through malnutrition.
(30:27):
You don't restrict your waythrough safety.
You replenish your way toregulation and you feed your way
to freedom.
So if you're stuck swingingbetween discipline and disaster,
kale and chaos, starvation andstuffing know this.
The problem was never the food.
It was a body that never learnedit was safe to receive.
(30:47):
And when that body finallybelieves, I am fed, I am safe.
I don't have to fight anymore.
That's the moment the healingactually begins.
So let's stop punishing thecravings.
Let's stop moralizing hunger andlet's stop ghosting the body
that keeps us alive.
And for the love of the nervoussystem, let's start feeding the
woman underneath it all.
(31:10):
Step two is we wanna regulatethrough the body.
So now that we've fed the brainstabilized biology, now we get
into the body because let me sayit loud for the perfectionist
achievers in the back.
You can't journal your waythrough a binge.
You can't positive affirmationyour way out of a panic fueled
pantry spiral, you can't mindsetyour way out of a nervous system
(31:32):
that still thinks rest equalsdanger and pleasure equals
exposure.
This is the part where we pause,not to suppress, not to analyze,
but to actually feel.
bravely Ask, what is this reallytrying to show me?
What am I using food to say thatI haven't felt safe enough to
speak?
(31:53):
This is what I call a nervoussystem.
Widening the practice ofexpanding your internal window
so that you can be with thediscomfort instead of abandoning
yourself in it.
Sometimes that looks likeplacing a hand on your chest
before you eat and whispering.
I'm here breathing through theurge instead of numbing it,
(32:14):
shaking your limbs after a hardmoment, instead of reaching for
sugar, letting a sound movethrough you instead of
swallowing your truth withchips.
These micro moments ofregulation, they're not small,
they're radical because when youbuild the capacity to feel a
craving without collapsing intoit, you finally give your body a
new option.
(32:35):
An option besides fight, anoption besides flight, an option
besides food.
As a fire extinguisher, you showyour nervous system, we can
stay, we can feel, and we don'thave to die when we do.
Now, here's where we burn therule book.
This is step three where we unsshame your hunger.
(32:58):
Now, this is where we burn therule book because you can eat
all the protein, you can takeevery supplement, you can track
your cycle, sleep with mouth,tape, and walk your 10,000
trauma informed steps a day.
But if you still believe thathunger makes you unworthy, that
wanting more makes youdangerous, that being full makes
you too much.
(33:19):
You'll stay in the loop.
So we unha it.
We take hunger off the moralityscale, and we put it back where
it belongs on the altar.
Because hunger isn't the enemy.
It's not a flaw, it's not anemergency.
It's a sacred signal, a signthat your body remembers what
wholeness feels like and iscalling you back towards it.
(33:42):
So next time the craving hits,pause gets curious, ask, what
part of me is asking to be fedright now?
What has been so neglected thatit had to scream through snacks,
and then you meet her not withrules, not with shame, not with
kale and Marty Dom, but withpresence, with reverence, with
(34:05):
enoughness.
Because the moment you stopmoralizing hunger is the moment
that you stop dividing yourselfinto good and bad based on what
you ate for lunch.
And that's what I call foodfreedom.
And if you've been halflistening, come back now because
this next part, this is the partthat no one talks about in
intuitive eating books ornervous system trainings.
(34:28):
This is where we name the truthyou've always felt, but never
had language for you, didn'tcome outta the womb restricting
you learned it.
You didn't hate your hunger.
You inherited that shame.
So now that we've fed thebiology, regulated the somatics
and stopped punishing thesymptoms, it's time to go to the
source.
The first nervous system youever sink to.
(34:50):
The first body you borrowed asyour blueprint, the first mirror
that showed you what it meant toeat, to feel, to be a woman in a
body.
Let's talk about the motherwound.
Let's talk about the firstimprint.
Let's talk about where it allbegan, because if we're really
(35:10):
gonna heal your relationshipwith food, we have to start with
the woman you learned it from.
We're going there gently,bravely, truthfully, and girl is
gonna set you free.
Let's talk about your mother.
And no, I don't mean this as ablame game.
This isn't about finger pointingor rewriting the past to
(35:32):
resentment.
This is about biology, about theway your nervous system got
wired before you ever hadlanguage about the emotional
tone you inhaled before you evenhad thoughts.
Because your mom, she was yourfirst wifi signal, her breath,
her stress, her softness or herbracing became the frequency
your body calibrated to.
(35:54):
And if your mom was at war withfood, if she counted calories,
skipped meals, called herselfbad for eating cake, or
moralized her body in front ofthe mirror, you learn that not
as a belief but as truth,because when you're little, you
don't separate her relationshipwith food from reality.
You absorb her patterns as theblueprint for survival.
(36:16):
If she withheld food asdiscipline, or gave food as
love, you learn.
That love has conditions, and ifshe starved herself to be
accepted, you learn that hungermakes you more lovable.
And if she was constantly on anew diet, chasing a smaller
body, smiling throughself-criticism while raising you
(36:36):
to be confident, you inheritedthat contradiction.
And let me say this again, so itlands the way your mother
treated her body, became theenergetic template.
For how you learn to treatyours.
That's not physiological, that'sepigenetic, that's nervous
system imprinting in real time.
(36:59):
This is what I call inheritedloyalty.
Not because you wanted it, notbecause you chose it, but
because it was coded in yournervous system as a way to
belong.
And we as humans, we'll doanything to belong, even if it
means turning our hunger intothe enemy.
Even if it means rejecting ourbody so we don't have to reject
(37:19):
our mothers, even if it meansholding onto disordered eating
patterns as a subconscious wayto stay connected to the woman
who never learned how to feedherself love.
This is the thread I see runningthrough so many of my clients
and myself.
They're not just binging orrestricting, they're trying to
metabolize a mother wound theynever had words for and until
(37:44):
that gets named.
Until the grief is felt, thepattern is witnessed and the
voice in the mirror isquestioned.
They'll keep outsourcing theirworth to food.
They'll keep bracing aroundnourishment, and they'll keep
trying to heal their motherwound through their own
restriction.
But here's the most powerfulthing I can tell you.
(38:05):
You don't have to keep her waralive.
You get to choose a differentpath.
You get to update the wifi.
And you get to feed yourselffrom a place of truth, not
trauma.
You get to regulate from within,and when you do, you're not
betraying her, you're breakingthe cycle.
(38:25):
She was too hurt to breakherself, and that's the most
sacred kind of healing there is.
And here's something else I wantyou to start noticing.
The way you show up with food,it often mirrors the way you
attach in relationships.
So if you're anxiously attached,you might obsess over food.
Feel out of control withcravings, binge for closeness,
(38:48):
and then shame yourself when itfeels like too much.
If you lean avoidant, you mightrestrict over control or
emotionally detach from foodaltogether until the chaos
sneaks in through the back door.
And if you're disorganizedattachment, that unpredictable
swing between binging andstarving, that I don't trust
food or myself vibe.
(39:08):
Yeah.
That's not just about willpower.
That's your nervous system.
Remembering love as chaos andtrying to survive it all over
again, but on your plate.
So your attachment style doesn'tjust shape how you love people.
It shapes how you feed yourself,how you receive, and how you
nourish.
And the wildest part, most of usare trying to fix our food
(39:30):
habits without even realizingthe emotional blueprint that's
been running the whole show.
So if you've been stuck inloops, you can't explain if
you've hated your hunger,micromanage your plate, or felt
like your body is always workingagainst you.
Maybe it's not just about thefood.
Maybe it's about the frequencyyou were raised in.
Maybe it's about the nervoussystem you synced to before you
(39:52):
even had language.
Maybe it's about the energy youabsorbed from the woman who fed
you, whether she was absent,anxious, or restricted, or just
surviving.
And maybe now it's your turn tobreak the cycle because once you
do, you stop trying to earn yourright to be fed.
You stop proving your worththrough self-denial, and you
stop shrinking your hunger tofeel safe being loved, and
(40:15):
instead you start doing whatyour mother couldn't.
You feed yourself from loveinstead of lack from trust
instead of trauma, from presenceinstead of performance.
But here's the thing that no onetells you.
Even when you rewrite yourpersonal story, even when you
reclaim your body, your biologyand your boundaries, you're
still living inside of a systemthat profits off your
(40:38):
disconnection and that system,it's trained you to perform your
hunger like it's a fuckingtalent show.
So let's zoom out.
We've talked about biology,we've talked about the nervous
system, we've talked about yourmother.
Now we talk about this wholedamn culture that conditioned
you to believe that food is acurrency for approval.
(41:01):
That nourishment is somethingyou earn.
That appetite is something youapologize for, and that
celebration and self-destructionare somehow served on the same
damn plate.
Because let's be honest, ifyou're having a good day, it's
time for a little treat.
If you're having a bad day, it'salso time for a little treat.
You win the game well, icecream, of course, and if you
(41:23):
lose the game, of course we'regoing to get ice cream.
If you graduate, it's pizza Ifyou break up pizza, birthday,
wedding, funeral, Tuesdayafternoon, meltdown in the car.
Food.
Again, this isn't about foodbeing wrong, food is sacred,
food is celebration, food isancestral, food is connection.
(41:46):
But when every emotional momentis followed by a dopamine balm,
when nourishment becomes rewardand punishment becomes
restriction, we lose the damnplot.
We don't even eat to feelanymore.
We eat to numb.
We eat to cope.
We eat to delay the collapsebecause food, it's one of the
(42:08):
most silently leveraged drugs inthe world, especially food like
substances that biochemicallyare known to be addictive.
So much so that many of us don'teven touch Whole Foods on a
daily basis, and it's all in thename of convenience.
And yet convenience comes at aprice.
And what makes it worse is thatwe've outsourced the entire
(42:29):
experience.
We instacart our groceries.
We Uber eats our meals.
We reheat, repackage, refeedourselves, scrolling through
TikTok while we microwavedinner, and we wonder why we
feel disconnected from ourbodies.
We don't touch our food.
We don't smell it.
We don't honor it.
We don't chew it like itdeserves to be part of our
(42:49):
bodies.
We treat food like a transactioninstead of a transmission.
But I wanna show you something.
Go ahead and close your eyesunless you're driving,
obviously, and I want you topicture your favorite food, not
the one that you should love,the one you crave, the one that
makes your eyes roll back.
Just thinking about it.
(43:10):
Maybe it's warm, maybe it'scrispy, maybe it's sweet and
creamy or salty, and it melts inyour mouth.
Perfect.
Picture it right in front ofyou.
Smell it.
See the texture.
Watch it Steam.
And now imagine taking a bite.
Let it linger.
(43:31):
Let it coat your tongue.
Do you feel your mouthsalivating?
Well, that's not imagination.
That's chemistry.
That's your nervous system.
Your brain, your gut, allresponding to a single thought.
Because food isn't just fuel.
Food is energy.
Food is frequency.
(43:51):
Food is information, and itdoesn't just fill you.
It literally becomes you.
That bite, it gets broken downinto amino acids, vitamins,
minerals, glucose, and thosebecome your hormones, your
neurotransmitters, your skin,your cells, your cycle, your
mood, and your metabolism.
You are literally made of whatyou eat.
(44:14):
Food is the raw material yourbody uses to build your brain,
stabilize your emotions, repairyour tissues, regulate your
immune system, and power everysingle thought that you have.
That's not fucking woo, that'scellular biology.
Every bite you take is amessage, every flavor, a
(44:34):
frequency, every meal, anopportunity to come back home to
yourself.
So when you take in food thatwas grown in trauma, prepared in
a rush, consumed withoutpresence, while your nervous
system is already in fight orflight, your body doesn't just
digest the meal, it digests themoment.
And for the most of us, we arespiritually starving.
(44:58):
We are overfed on content andcortisol, but we're
undernourished in the ways thatmatter.
Like slowness, stillness,sensation, ritual, intimacy.
We don't bless our food.
We barely taste it.
We eat like we live.
Rush, distracted, braced, andapologizing for the hunger that
(45:18):
never goes away.
That's why I always say ourrelationship to food is a mirror
to our life because it fuckingis so true.
But food was never meant to be ascoreboard or a sin or even a
coping mechanism.
Food was meant to be communionwith your body, with Earth, with
the ancestors who knew how togrow it, cook it, and honor it
(45:42):
before capitalism, turned itinto a calorie count, and then
sold it back to us.
This isn't about organic versusnon-organic.
This isn't.
About any of that.
This is about presence versusperformance because the real
nourishment we're craving.
It's not just nutrients, it'smeaning.
It's the slow bite that says,I'm here.
(46:04):
It's the inhale before the mealthat says thank you.
It's the pause that reminds yourbody.
You're not at war anymore.
You're allowed to receive.
And when you start eating likethat, you stop shaming your
hunger.
You stop apologizing forneeding, and you stop using food
to perform and you start usingit to belong.
(46:24):
This isn't about more control.
This is about more connection,more reverence.
More remembrance and moreritual.
You were never meant to eat likea machine.
My girl.
You were meant to experiencepure fucking bliss and gratitude
at each meal, and that's whatwe're reclaiming.
(46:46):
So can we just take a moment?
You made it all the way here.
You stayed with me through theshame spirals, the gut science,
the mother wounds, and thenervous system truth bombs.
And you didn't flinch.
You felt it.
You heard it.
You're still here.
So now I have one final questionfor you.
It's simple, but it's fuckingeffective.
Are you ready?
(47:08):
What are you really hungry for?
Not just the Ben and Jerry's,not just the takeout order, not
just the dopamine drip at theend of the long ass day.
I mean, real hunger, the oneyour body's been whispering
about for years.
Are you hungry for peace, forpower, for pleasure that doesn't
(47:28):
come with guilt and selfnegotiation.
Are you hungry to be the kind ofwoman who feeds herself because
she knows she's fucking deservesto be fed?
Not because she's earned it, notbecause she tracked it, not
because it fits in her macros,but because her body is home and
she's done treating it like abattleground.
Then my lady, this is yourmoment.
(47:50):
This is the invitation.
Your soul has been side eyeingwhile your brain tried to stay
in control.
This is the fork in the roadwhere you burn the diet rule
book and choose somethingsacred.
My live workshop is happeningMay 28th.
at 7:00 PM Eastern Standardtime.
(48:11):
and it's not just a workshop,it's a fuck you to the
patriarchy.
It's a reclamation of yourhunger.
It's a nervous system and soullevel reset for the woman who's
tired of living on crumbs in hermeals, in her relationships, in
her damn life inside.
We're not counting calories,we're not playing small.
(48:31):
We're not asking for permissionto eat the damn cheese.
We're gonna be learning how tobreak free from control based
eating in the mind, fuck ofwellness.
That's really just aestheticperfectionism.
And Lulu Lemon.
We're gonna understand how yourattachment style shapes your
food patterns, your hunger, yoursense of safety, how to stop
numbing with food or controllingit, and finally, feel free and
(48:54):
safe enough to listen.
We are gonna anchor into thepleasure principle, not as
indulgence, but as yourbirthright and your biology.
We're gonna step into the grownass identity of the woman who
eats, like she respects herselfwith no longer negotiates this
with shame because this is thework.
This is the portal, this is therevolution.
(49:16):
And this isn't just a workshop.
It's the moment you stop waitingto be fed and you feed yourself
like you fucking mean it.
And if your body is buzzing, ifyour soul is screaming, yes, if
you've been secretly praying forsomething like this but you
didn't know what to name it,it's called the pleasure, power,
and the plate and your seat iswaiting.
(49:40):
Link is in the bio.
Go fucking grab it'cause this isyour moment to stop performing
and start receiving.
To stop shrinking and startnourishing to come home to your
body like a grown ass fed,untamed woman you weren't born
to be.
Whew, that is a wrap.
(50:00):
So if you're still here, ifyou're still breathing through
this with me, if somethinginside you is stirring right
now, I want you to know thatthis is not just resonance, it
is remembrance.
You didn't just stumble on thisepisode by accident.
You didn't sit through 40 plusminutes of gut brainin,
breakdowns, food, trauma,revelations, and truth bombs
about your mother because you'rebored.
(50:22):
You're here because your soul isdone playing small.
You're here because the goodgirl inside of you is tired of
eating air and pretending she'sfull.
And you're here because there'sa grown ass no longer available
for the bullshit woman inside ofyou who is starving, not for
calories, but for connection.
In this episode, this was justthe appetizer.
(50:45):
This was the body rememberingwhat it feels like to taste
truth again.
So take a breath.
If your chest is heavy, if yourgut is tight, if your mouth just
went dry while listening, thatis not resistance.
That is your body saying this isthe work.
Feel the hunger not as somethingto fear, but as something to
(51:07):
honor because this isn't the endof the episode.
This is the beginning of yourreturn to your body, to your
power, to your plate, and ifyou're ready to stop tracking
your macros and start trustingyour body again.
If you're ready to tradedopamine hits for oxytocin
self-trust, then get your ass tothe fucking workshop.
(51:27):
My girl pleasure.
Power in the plate goes live May28th.
at 7:00 PM Eastern Standardtime.
You already know the link is inthe bio.
Bring your cravings, bring yourcontradictions.
Bring your grown ass energy.
Because we're not just rewritingthe rules, we're refeeding the
revolution.
(51:49):
I'll see you there, and untilnext time, this is Lauren,
Michelle Jewel, reminding youthat your hunger isn't a flaw.
It's a fucking compass, trusted.
Do you ever find yourselfstanding in the kitchen at,
let's say 10:47 PM with thepantry door half open, and your
fingers are deep in something,maybe sweet, salty, or crunchy,
telling yourself just this oncewhile also whispering, what the
hell is wrong with me?
(00:22):
This episode, it's for thatmoment, that moment where your
mouth is full, but your heartfeels empty, where your gut is
bloated, but your soul isstarving.
Or you've done the therapy, thejournaling, the breath work, and
still you're stuck in this goddamn loop.
You don't need more willpower.
(00:43):
You don't need another reset.
You need the fucking truth.
Because you're not just bingingbecause you're lazy, or broken
or out of control.
You're binging because yournervous system is brilliant and
it's begging for safety, forsoftness, for something to hold
onto when life feels like it'stoo damn much.
(01:03):
And here's what no one tellsyou.
Food is the final frontier.
It's not the symptom, it's theactual portal.
And if you're listening to this,you're being invited in.
This episode isn't about fixingyour relationship with food.
It's about reclaiming yourrelationship with pleasure and
power because food isn't theproblem.
(01:24):
Your nervous system's,brilliance is the reason you
reach for it in the first place,and until your body feels safe
to receive your healing willalways be something you talk
about instead of something youactually embody.
So today we're cracking open thebinge restrict loop and we're
burning the rule book.
We're calling bullshit on thewellness industry that moralize
(01:45):
hunger while monetizing yourshame.
And we're getting radicallyhonest with what your cravings
are really trying to tell you.
'cause you don't need anotherplan.
You need a homecoming.
Welcome to Embody this, the NOBS Healing podcast for women who
are done playing small.
(02:06):
I'm Lauren Michelle Jewel, asingle sober business owning
badass who has been humbled ashell by healing.
But I'm not just someone who'slived it.
I've studied it, coached it, andhelped women walk through it for
over seven years in mind, bodyhealth, gut brain science, and
nervous system healing.
I've worked with women who havetried everything, therapy,
(02:27):
diets, supplements, self-helpwork, but still feel
disconnected from their bodies,their health, and their truth.
Because here's the thing,healing isn't a trend.
It's not aesthetic.
It's not an identity.
Healing is embodied, and let mebe real with you, it's hard as
fuck and it's also rewarding asfuck.
(02:50):
I know because I've lived it.
And along the way I realizedsomething.
Modern healing methods arefailing us.
Everything is compartmentalized.
Go to therapy.
They say, take the supplements,do the inner work, but no one
teaches you how to actuallyintegrate it.
All this show is for you ifyou're ready to rethink healing.
(03:13):
It's not about being perfect,being a wellness influencer or
having a PhD in biohacking.
It's about undoing, unlearning,and finally coming home to
yourself.
Quick disclaimer, this podcastis for educational purposes
only.
It's here to expand your mind,challenge old narratives, and
empower you with knowledge.
(03:33):
It's not a replacement formedical advice.
Always consult a professionalwhen making health decisions.
If this episode hits home,follow the share, rate it,
review it, share it with someonewho needs to hear it, because
you never know whose life youmight change.
Now let's fucking go.
(03:54):
Let's just call it what it is.
Binge eating isn't about food.
Neither is restriction ortracking or those clean grill
meal plans.
You ghost by day three.
It's not about macros, and it'snot about being the best at
eating.
(04:14):
It's about trying to findcontrol in a body that's never
felt safe without it.
Because here's the thing.
You can't quit food.
You have to live with it, whichmeans you are in a relationship
with it, whether you want to beor not.
And that relationship, itreflects everything.
(04:37):
How safe you feel, how you cope,and how much permission you have
to receive, soften or slow thefuck down.
And that's why it hits so hardbecause if you're the kind of
woman who's done the work, thetherapy, the shadow work, the
identity rewiring, and foodstill feels like a battlefield.
(04:58):
It's not because you missed amodule, it's because your
nervous system is still stuck insurvival.
Your body doesn't speak mindset.
It speaks safety.
And if that safety never getsbuilt into your biology, the
deepest parts of you will keepreaching for relief.
Anywhere they can find it.
(05:19):
That moment where you spiralinto fuck it mode, that's not
failure.
It's a chemical.
SOS, your gut's inflamed, yourserotonin's tanked, your blood
sugar's crashing, and your bodyis just trying to feel okay.
Even if that, okay.
Lives at the bottom of a Ben andJerry's.
So, no, you're not broken,you're adaptive, you're
(05:40):
brilliant, you're surviving thebest way, you know how, but
here's the cost.
The more you try to controlfood, the more it controls you.
And eventually you realize thiswas never about food.
It was about power, aboutreceiving and what you've never
felt safe having.
(06:02):
Because for women who've spenttheir whole life bracing,
binging feels safer thansoftness.
Restricting feels safer thanbeing fed, and tracking feels
safer than trust.
Real nourishment, emotional,physical, spiritual requires
something.
Most of us we're never given aregulated foundation, and if
(06:24):
you've never learned how to bewith food without being in a
power struggle with it.
Of course it becomes a placewhere your deepest work unravels
because food isn't abstract,it's daily, it's in your fucking
face, and it's the part of yourhealing.
You can't compartmentalize,intellectualize, or bypass.
(06:44):
And yet so many women postponeit.
They heal the trauma, they fixthe relationship, they build the
business.
But food.
That gets shoved into thesomeday when I'm strong enough
corner until one day theyrealize food isn't the final
boss.
It's the fucking foundationbecause everything else you
(07:05):
built sits on top of yourbiology, and if that biology is
inflamed, dysregulated, runningon caffeine and cortisol, no
amount of journaling is going tocarry you into your next
evolution.
This is where the realinitiation begins.
Where healing stops beingsomething you talk about and it
starts being something you live.
(07:27):
When you can meet your hungerwithout panic, fullness without
shame, cravings, withoutcollapse, that's when your
nervous system exhales.
That's when the work finallylands, and that's when you stop
coping and start actuallyliving.
So let's say it for the women inthe back, food was never the
(07:49):
villain.
It was the voice, the portal,the messenger.
In this episode, this is wherewe stop punishing the messenger
and we start listening to whatit's been trying to say all
along.
So let's just go a little deeperhere.
'cause you know me, ya girlloves to get into the science.
(08:10):
You are not just reaching forfood because you lack willpower.
That's such a tired, overusednarrative.
And honestly, it's one thatkeeps women stuck in shame
instead of healing.
What's actually happening is farmore intelligent when you're
standing in the pantry cravingsomething salty or sweet, not
because you're hungry, butbecause you're anxious or
(08:31):
overstimulated or numb.
Your body isn't failing you.
It's actually trying to regulateyou because here's what most
people don't know, your gut andyour brain are in constant
communication.
Not sometimes, not occasionally,but all the time.
And this isn't a metaphor, it'sliteral, biology, the gut sends
(08:52):
messages to the brain, and thebrain sends messages back.
That's what we mean by thegut-brain access.
It's a two-way street.
So if your gut's inflamed oryour microbiome is set a
balance, which happens all thetime when you're chronically
stressed, inflamed, orundernourished, or running on
survival mode, thatcommunication gets hijacked.
And when that happens, yourbrain doesn't get what it needs.
(09:15):
It doesn't get serotonin, whichhelps you feel calm, safe, and
content.
It doesn't get dopamine in theright rhythm, which helps you
focus, feel motivated orenergized, and your inner
chemistry is dysregulated.
And guess what?
Your survival brain, when itsenses that, it gets real
fucking loud and it goes huntingfor the fastest fix it can find,
(09:36):
which usually is sugar, carbs,or anything that can spike your
blood sugar and get you out ofthe emotional free fall you
didn't even realize you were in.
And sometimes it's not even youdoing the talking.
I know that sounds wild, butyour gut bacteria, especially if
you've got things like candida,parasites or osis, they can
literally influence yourcravings.
(09:57):
They can send signals to yourbrain asking for sugar because
they feed off of it.
But let me say this loud andclear.
Parasites and candida are notthe core issue.
They're symptoms of a deepervulnerability in your terrain,
physically, emotionally, andenergetically.
Your terrain becomes fertile fordysfunction when you're living
(10:17):
in disconnection.
When your nervous system isstuck in fight, flight, freeze,
or fa, when your body doesn'tfeel like a safe place to be,
that's when things start to takeroot that don't belong there,
whether it's emotional patterns,intrusive thoughts, gut
imbalances, or food compulsions.
And then on top of all of that,you add guilt, you add shame,
(10:39):
you add the, I should knowbetter by now.
Spiral.
Which doesn't just feel bademotionally, it disregulates you
further.
That emotional load spikescortisol, which tanks your blood
sugar, which ramps up yourcravings, which sends you right
back into the pantry.
Hating yourself for somethingthat's actually been
biochemically wired.
(11:01):
Can you see the loop now?
It's not about discipline, it'sabout resources.
It's not about willpower, it'sabout nourishment.
Your body is not working againstyou.
It's working for you.
And every craving is a cue.
A cue that something deeperneeds tending to when you've
(11:23):
spent your whole lifedisconnected from your body.
Living in hyper independence,performing, producing,
perfecting, how do you even knowwhat that deeper thing is?
That's where we go next.
Before we dive into how thisshows up in real life, I want
you to hear a story, one thatmight feel eerily familiar.
(11:46):
Because, listen, I've workedwith hundreds of women on this
problem, whether they call itbinge eating, emotional eating,
cheat days, cravings, or justlosing control.
It's all the same root, and oneclient in particular really
stands out.
Let's call her Melissa.
(12:07):
See, Melissa had it together onpaper.
She was a powerhouse in hercareer.
She had her therapist, herpersonal trainer, her meal plan.
She checked all the quote,unquote, I'm doing the work
boxes, except she couldn'tspiraling around one thing.
Cheese.
Yep, cheese.
(12:28):
Her cheat food, her shame food,the thing that kept swearing.
She'd quit on Monday, but alwaysended up knee deep in by
Saturday night.
She'd beat herself up over it.
Why can't I stop?
I'm sabotaging myself.
I should know better by now.
She'd say, but she hadn't workedwith me yet.
(12:49):
Because here's the thing.
She didn't have a cheeseproblem.
She had a nervous systemimprint.
And yeah, neuro moment here,cheese does hit the same opiate
receptors in your brain asliteral opiates.
It's chemically comforting.
It gives you that little ah,when your nervous system is
screaming.
But the real question that Iasked her wasn't how do we stop
(13:10):
the cheese?
It was, what is the cheesegiving you that you're not
getting anywhere else?
So I had her bring it to ournext session and she was like,
wait, you want me to eat it?
And I did, but this time withintention, so we slowed it way
down.
She looked at it, smelled it,touched it, and let it melt in
(13:34):
her mouth instead of shoving itdown with shame.
And then I dropped her into herbody.
I said, close your eyes.
Where do you feel that?
What memory comes up?
And boom, just like that.
She was back in her childhoodliving room.
Her mom, wine, cheese,charcuterie, TV on laughter,
(13:56):
warmth, peace, that moment ofcheese, it was her nervous
system's portal to home becauseher body didn't just want food,
it wanted safety, it wantedconnection.
It wanted her mother.
But here's the deeper layer.
She also had some unresolvedpain with her mom, some unspoken
(14:16):
grief, some unmet needs.
So her body, it was trying torecreate connection with the
very person she feltdisconnected from.
That's not sabotage, that issurvival.
And once we named it, once wegave her full permission to eat
the cheese with presents insteadof punishment, everything
(14:37):
changed.
She went on vacation with herhusband and shared a charcuterie
board, savored every bite, andthen she forgot about it.
Literally didn't think about itagain, because when the
emotional imprint is met, thecompulsion doesn't need to stay,
and that's not even the wildestpart.
A few weeks later, she reachedout and told me.
(14:57):
Lauren, I finally had theconversation.
I finally spoke to my mom, notfrom bitterness, not from blame,
but from capacity, and it wasmessy.
Sure there were tears, some oldtension in the room, but there
was something else too,connection.
And in that conversation, hermom casually mentioned some
(15:17):
symptoms that she'd beenignoring.
Melissa listened differently.
This time.
Something clicked.
She pushed her mom to get themchecked out, obviously, because
wouldn't that worry you?
Well, turns out it was actuallylife-threatening and because
Melissa had the capacity to showup in that moment because she
had the regulation to hear whather body and her mother were
(15:39):
actually saying, she seemed toher mom's fucking life.
This is the ripple.
This is why this work mattersbecause when you stop fighting
your cravings and startlistening to them, like really,
really listening to them, you'renot just healing your
relationship with food, you'rehealing your capacity to
connect, to lead, to speak, andto live.
(16:01):
So if you've been tellingyourself, this is just about
food.
It's not.
It never was.
This is about relationship.
This is about intimacy.
This is about safety.
This is about truth.
And when you reclaim thosethings, everything else, food,
health, body, purpose starts toshift on its own.
(16:24):
Now, I know Melissa's storyprobably hit something in you
because so many of us know thatspiral, the craving, the shame,
the food as comfort, as mother,as medicine.
But I want to be really clearhere, that's just one side of
the coin.
If Melissa showed us what itlooks like to binge from unmet
connection, Sarah's story showsus what it looks like to
(16:46):
restrict from unprocessedemotional chaos.
Because for every woman kneedeep in snacks trying to soothe
the nervous system in overdrive,there's another woman who's
healed her binging only to swingstraight into the arms of
restriction.
And I'm not talking aboutmedical dietary choices or
intuitive eating.
I'm talking about control, hypervigilance, the kind of wellness
(17:08):
that looks clean on the outsideand gets praised, but is
actually chaos on the inside.
So let me tell you about anotherclient of mine.
We'll call her Sarah.
Sarah had done the bingingthing.
She lived in that loop.
She felt out of control withfood for years.
So when she cleaned it up, shethought she was finally doing
better.
(17:29):
No more sugar, no more carbs.
Everything measured, everything.
Tracked smoothie supplements,discipline, health.
On paper, she looked like thedream client, but under the
surface, she was fuckingexhausted.
Her nervous system was runningon fumes work.
Stress was sky high.
Her relationships were shaky andher emotions were on mute.
(17:52):
And because her life felt sochaotic, food became the one
place she could control.
She wasn't binging anymore, butshe also wasn't eating, not
really.
She was surviving on adrenalineand cortisol.
And if you know the biology, youknow that stress hormones
literally shut down your hungercues.
Your body's not prioritizingdigestion when it thinks you're
(18:12):
under threat.
It's bracing, preparing to fightor flee or in her case, freeze.
So the skipping meals, the lackof appetite, the obsession with
food purity that wasn't healing,that was a body, again, in
survival mode, and it started tocatch up with her.
She lost her period.
She couldn't sleep.
(18:33):
Her skin broke out, her gutflared, she couldn't focus at
work.
She felt like she was floatingthrough life, numb, tired, and
disconnected.
And all the energy she shouldhave been able to use to create,
to live, to expand was goinginto micromanaging food because
that felt like the only safething left.
(18:53):
But here's the hard truth.
No one talks about restrictiondoesn't make you strong.
It makes you a trauma survivorin$98 leggings.
It's a nervous system that'sbracing in freeze mode wearing a
wellness badge, and it's just asdysregulating and just as
exhausting as binging becausewhether you're overeating,
undereating, or obsessivelycontrolling every single bite,
(19:17):
it's the same root.
A body that doesn't feel safe, Anervous system that's stuck in
hypervigilance, and a mindtrying to protect you, the only
way it knows how.
And here's what I want you totake away from all this before
we shift into the next part.
This is not about food.
It never was.
Food is the entry point, themirror, the messenger, the place
(19:41):
where your trauma, your unmetneeds, your hyper independence,
your perfectionism all show upwith receipts.
So as we start to talk about thereal healing work, how to build
safety, how to come back intoyour body, how to actually
regulate your system in a waythat allows you to eat, live,
and expand without fear offixation.
Just know this, whether you'resoothing through food or
(20:04):
surviving by controlling it,you're not wrong.
You're not weak and you're notbroken.
You're just trying to feel safein a world, in a body, in a
nervous system that hasn't knownwhat that actually means.
And now we get to rebuild thatsafety from the inside out.
So let's go there.
(20:24):
So take a breath with me, onedeep breath in through your
nose, and if you haven'talready, just breathe everything
out and then breathe in.
Because after hearing all that.
After seeing how binging andrestriction are just the two
sides of the same trauma coin,it can be easy to slip into that
(20:46):
old story again.
So what the hell do I do now?
I guess I'll always be this way.
Wow.
Great.
So I'm actually the problem.
But before we try to fix it,before we reach for a new food
rule or a spiritual to-do list,I want you to pause.
I want you to meet the part ofyou that has been taught to be
(21:06):
afraid of her own hunger.
Because if there's one thingthis culture has conditioned you
to believe, it's that yourhunger is a threat.
That if you want too much, toomuch food, too much rest, too
much love, too much life, you'rejust selfish, you're greedy or
too much.
So we learned to starve not justphysically, but emotionally.
(21:29):
We starve ourselves of pleasure,of truth, of softness, of
connection, of being held.
We cut ourselves off from thethings we actually need, and
then we shame ourselves when thecravings come back roaring.
But let me say something, and noone else taught you, your hunger
is not a flaw.
It's a prayer.
It's the most honest fuckingpart about you.
(21:51):
It's the compass inside yourbody that's trying to lead you
home to nourishment, to truth,to presence, to power.
You don't binge because you'reundisciplined.
You binge because you've beentrained to ignore the signals
until they scream.
You restrict because you'velearned that control feels safer
than connection and you obsessbecause obsession gives you the
(22:12):
illusion of order.
When everything inside feelslike chaos, but the hunger
underneath it all, that's notwrong.
It's fucking wisdom.
It's the part of you thatremembers what wholeness feels
like.
And if you slow down enough toactually listen to it, not
moralize it, not override it andnot fix it, but to witness it,
(22:35):
you start to realize somethingradical.
You were never too much.
You were just never fully fed.
Let that land not just fed withfood, but with presence, safety
and soul.
(22:55):
And now.
Now you get to change that.
Now you get to stop treatingyour hunger like a problem and
start seeing it as sacred.
You get to stop asking, how do Icontrol this?
And start asking, what is thistrying to tell me?
Because your cravings are justcravings, their communication,
and when you can meet them withcuriosity instead of shame,
(23:18):
that's when the body stopsbracing.
That's when the nervous system.
Exhales.
That's when eating becomesintuitive, not reactive, and
that's when food stops being abattleground and starts becoming
belonging.
Which brings us to the nextlayer.
The part you've been told isabout willpower, but is actually
about wiring because of hungeris holy.
(23:40):
Then biology is the blueprint.
So let's talk about how torestore your chemistry, rebuild
your capacity, and reclaim yourrelationship to food from the
inside out.
You ready?
You didn't binge because youlacked discipline.
You didn't restrict because youwere addicted to control, and
(24:01):
you're not stuck in foodobsession because you skipped a
journaling prompt.
You're stuck because yourbiology is, you're still bracing
because your brain is under fed.
You're still swinging betweenkale and chaos because your
nervous system never got thememo that it's safe to receive.
And that thing you keep callingself sabotage.
(24:21):
It's not sabotage, it'ssurvival, it's protection.
It's your neurotransmittersthrowing a full blown tantrum
because you're trying to heal atrauma response with oat milk
and affirmations.
And here's what every womanwho's cried in Whole Foods
parking lot needs to hear.
Your cravings aren't a flaw.
(24:42):
They're a flashlight.
Not a failure.
A fucking SOS cravings.
Equal depletion, not defiance.
So let's decode this.
That chocolate obsession, not asweet tooth, that carb attack at
4:00 PM not a lack of planning,and that late night pantry raid,
(25:03):
it's not even a lack ofwillpower.
It's chemistry, not character.
Cravings happen when your brainis under fed and your gut is
inflamed and your nervous systemis still living in a war zone,
it calls normal.
And here's where traumadysregulation and spiritual
bypassing collide.
You're trying to think your wayout of what your body never felt
(25:25):
safe enough to heal yourmeditating over a malnourished
microbiome, and you're bypassingbiological needs in the name of
being aligned.
When what you really are isdepleted, your cravings have a
personality, AKA.
These are the five appetitetypes according to Julia Ross,
(25:48):
the author of The Diet Cure, theMood Cure and the Craving Cure.
Your cravings aren't justrandom.
They're specific, predictable,and biologically explainable.
I call them your biochemicallove languages.
Number one is low serotonin.
This is like the moody carboholic.
You cry when someone breatheswrong.
(26:09):
You crave bread like it'soxygen, and you don't need
mindset.
You need tryptophan and aregulated gut to produce
serotonin in the first place.
If you have a low dopamine, thisis like the unmotivated muncher,
so you wake up exhausted and by2:00 PM you sell a kidney for
sugar or caffeine.
This isn't a productivity issue,it's a dopamine drought.
(26:32):
You need protein, sunlight, andmaybe some tyrosine, not another
macho fueled to-do list.
If you have lo gaba, this isknown as attention snacker, so
you're eating with your jawclenched and your chest is
tight.
This isn't boredom, it's panicwith a side of gluten.
You need GABA support, ting andnervous system repair, not
(26:56):
another rule book if you havelow endorphins.
This is known as the comfortseeker.
Food equals love.
Food equals safety.
Food equals the only hug you letyourself receive.
You're not a lost cause.
You're touch starved.
Undersupported and DPA couldhelp move more than any
(27:17):
affirmation ever will.
And if you have blood sugardysregulation, this is known as
the hangry hopper.
So you're irritable, foggy,grazing all day and still
unsatisfied.
This is a biological crash, nota personal failing.
You need L-glutamine, proteinand rhythm, not almond crackers
and guilt.
(27:37):
So here's how we rewire.
First we feed, and then we feel.
So you cannot rewire a survivalbased behavior in a malnourished
brain, right?
You can't trauma process on anempty tank, and you can't vagus
nerve your way through aserotonin shortage.
So what's the fix?
Well, step one is we mustreplenish.
(27:57):
We have to rebuild the systembefore you try to regulate it.
So here's your binge bustingbiochemistry blueprint.
This is where we build biologythat can hold your healing.
So before the mindset, beforethe somatic work and before the
food tracking therapy on backingor emotional integration you
eat, but not just anything.
(28:18):
Here's the lineup.
Every three to four hours, Iwant you to eat protein to
stabilize blood sugar and giveyour brain the amino acids it
needs to make serotonin,dopamine, gaba, endorphins.
These are the real OGs ofappetite regulation, and because
your nervous system runs on saltand minerals, not just green
(28:39):
juice and gilt, we needelectrolytes.
And then I also want you toreally focus in on amino acids.
Like tryptophan for serotonin,DPA for endorphins, L-glutamine
for blood, sugar and calm,tyrosine for dopamine and gaba
for well gaba, they're notbiohacks, they're brain food to
(29:00):
reset your circadian rhythm, soyour cortisol stops spiking at
midnight and crashing by 2:00 PMI want you to focus on getting
morning sun, so 20 minutes ofsunlight in your eyes, or get a
sun lamp during the winter.
And this is also important toknow that you do not wanna wear
sunglasses and you don't wannawear your regular glasses.
You want straight sunlight inthe eyes.
(29:21):
Remember, we're not staring intothe sun, obviously.
Come on, common sun guys, thereis a thing called reflection.
We're just going outside andwe're getting sun on our skin.
Then I also want you to focus onsome real fucking sleep.
Yeah, I said it not doomscrolling in bed with a weighted
blanket and a trauma podcast.
I want you to get some actualrest.
(29:41):
Then we want movement thatsupports not punishes.
So somatic shaking, walking,lifting, dancing in your
underwear, whatever gets you inyour body instead of escaping it
and focusing on meals thatground you like food that tastes
good.
You know what I'm saying?
Food that's warm.
Food that makes you feel human,not food you eat because an
(30:04):
influencer told you to.
Because nourishment isn't areward.
It is a biological requirement.
So your cravings aren't bad.
They're brilliant.
They aren't disobedience theirdata.
They're saying, please feed me.
Please stop punishing me forbeing hungry.
Please stop trying to mindsetyour way through malnutrition.
(30:27):
You don't restrict your waythrough safety.
You replenish your way toregulation and you feed your way
to freedom.
So if you're stuck swingingbetween discipline and disaster,
kale and chaos, starvation andstuffing know this.
The problem was never the food.
It was a body that never learnedit was safe to receive.
(30:47):
And when that body finallybelieves, I am fed, I am safe.
I don't have to fight anymore.
That's the moment the healingactually begins.
So let's stop punishing thecravings.
Let's stop moralizing hunger andlet's stop ghosting the body
that keeps us alive.
And for the love of the nervoussystem, let's start feeding the
woman underneath it all.
(31:10):
Step two is we wanna regulatethrough the body.
So now that we've fed the brainstabilized biology, now we get
into the body because let me sayit loud for the perfectionist
achievers in the back.
You can't journal your waythrough a binge.
You can't positive affirmationyour way out of a panic fueled
pantry spiral, you can't mindsetyour way out of a nervous system
(31:32):
that still thinks rest equalsdanger and pleasure equals
exposure.
This is the part where we pause,not to suppress, not to analyze,
but to actually feel.
bravely Ask, what is this reallytrying to show me?
What am I using food to say thatI haven't felt safe enough to
speak?
(31:53):
This is what I call a nervoussystem.
Widening the practice ofexpanding your internal window
so that you can be with thediscomfort instead of abandoning
yourself in it.
Sometimes that looks likeplacing a hand on your chest
before you eat and whispering.
I'm here breathing through theurge instead of numbing it,
(32:14):
shaking your limbs after a hardmoment, instead of reaching for
sugar, letting a sound movethrough you instead of
swallowing your truth withchips.
These micro moments ofregulation, they're not small,
they're radical because when youbuild the capacity to feel a
craving without collapsing intoit, you finally give your body a
new option.
(32:35):
An option besides fight, anoption besides flight, an option
besides food.
As a fire extinguisher, you showyour nervous system, we can
stay, we can feel, and we don'thave to die when we do.
Now, here's where we burn therule book.
This is step three where we unsshame your hunger.
(32:58):
Now, this is where we burn therule book because you can eat
all the protein, you can takeevery supplement, you can track
your cycle, sleep with mouth,tape, and walk your 10,000
trauma informed steps a day.
But if you still believe thathunger makes you unworthy, that
wanting more makes youdangerous, that being full makes
you too much.
(33:19):
You'll stay in the loop.
So we unha it.
We take hunger off the moralityscale, and we put it back where
it belongs on the altar.
Because hunger isn't the enemy.
It's not a flaw, it's not anemergency.
It's a sacred signal, a signthat your body remembers what
wholeness feels like and iscalling you back towards it.
(33:42):
So next time the craving hits,pause gets curious, ask, what
part of me is asking to be fedright now?
What has been so neglected thatit had to scream through snacks,
and then you meet her not withrules, not with shame, not with
kale and Marty Dom, but withpresence, with reverence, with
(34:05):
enoughness.
Because the moment you stopmoralizing hunger is the moment
that you stop dividing yourselfinto good and bad based on what
you ate for lunch.
And that's what I call foodfreedom.
And if you've been halflistening, come back now because
this next part, this is the partthat no one talks about in
intuitive eating books ornervous system trainings.
(34:28):
This is where we name the truthyou've always felt, but never
had language for you, didn'tcome outta the womb restricting
you learned it.
You didn't hate your hunger.
You inherited that shame.
So now that we've fed thebiology, regulated the somatics
and stopped punishing thesymptoms, it's time to go to the
source.
The first nervous system youever sink to.
(34:50):
The first body you borrowed asyour blueprint, the first mirror
that showed you what it meant toeat, to feel, to be a woman in a
body.
Let's talk about the motherwound.
Let's talk about the firstimprint.
Let's talk about where it allbegan, because if we're really
(35:10):
gonna heal your relationshipwith food, we have to start with
the woman you learned it from.
We're going there gently,bravely, truthfully, and girl is
gonna set you free.
Let's talk about your mother.
And no, I don't mean this as ablame game.
This isn't about finger pointingor rewriting the past to
(35:32):
resentment.
This is about biology, about theway your nervous system got
wired before you ever hadlanguage about the emotional
tone you inhaled before you evenhad thoughts.
Because your mom, she was yourfirst wifi signal, her breath,
her stress, her softness or herbracing became the frequency
your body calibrated to.
(35:54):
And if your mom was at war withfood, if she counted calories,
skipped meals, called herselfbad for eating cake, or
moralized her body in front ofthe mirror, you learn that not
as a belief but as truth,because when you're little, you
don't separate her relationshipwith food from reality.
You absorb her patterns as theblueprint for survival.
(36:16):
If she withheld food asdiscipline, or gave food as
love, you learn.
That love has conditions, and ifshe starved herself to be
accepted, you learn that hungermakes you more lovable.
And if she was constantly on anew diet, chasing a smaller
body, smiling throughself-criticism while raising you
(36:36):
to be confident, you inheritedthat contradiction.
And let me say this again, so itlands the way your mother
treated her body, became theenergetic template.
For how you learn to treatyours.
That's not physiological, that'sepigenetic, that's nervous
system imprinting in real time.
(36:59):
This is what I call inheritedloyalty.
Not because you wanted it, notbecause you chose it, but
because it was coded in yournervous system as a way to
belong.
And we as humans, we'll doanything to belong, even if it
means turning our hunger intothe enemy.
Even if it means rejecting ourbody so we don't have to reject
(37:19):
our mothers, even if it meansholding onto disordered eating
patterns as a subconscious wayto stay connected to the woman
who never learned how to feedherself love.
This is the thread I see runningthrough so many of my clients
and myself.
They're not just binging orrestricting, they're trying to
metabolize a mother wound theynever had words for and until
(37:44):
that gets named.
Until the grief is felt, thepattern is witnessed and the
voice in the mirror isquestioned.
They'll keep outsourcing theirworth to food.
They'll keep bracing aroundnourishment, and they'll keep
trying to heal their motherwound through their own
restriction.
But here's the most powerfulthing I can tell you.
(38:05):
You don't have to keep her waralive.
You get to choose a differentpath.
You get to update the wifi.
And you get to feed yourselffrom a place of truth, not
trauma.
You get to regulate from within,and when you do, you're not
betraying her, you're breakingthe cycle.
(38:25):
She was too hurt to breakherself, and that's the most
sacred kind of healing there is.
And here's something else I wantyou to start noticing.
The way you show up with food,it often mirrors the way you
attach in relationships.
So if you're anxiously attached,you might obsess over food.
Feel out of control withcravings, binge for closeness,
(38:48):
and then shame yourself when itfeels like too much.
If you lean avoidant, you mightrestrict over control or
emotionally detach from foodaltogether until the chaos
sneaks in through the back door.
And if you're disorganizedattachment, that unpredictable
swing between binging andstarving, that I don't trust
food or myself vibe.
(39:08):
Yeah.
That's not just about willpower.
That's your nervous system.
Remembering love as chaos andtrying to survive it all over
again, but on your plate.
So your attachment style doesn'tjust shape how you love people.
It shapes how you feed yourself,how you receive, and how you
nourish.
And the wildest part, most of usare trying to fix our food
(39:30):
habits without even realizingthe emotional blueprint that's
been running the whole show.
So if you've been stuck inloops, you can't explain if
you've hated your hunger,micromanage your plate, or felt
like your body is always workingagainst you.
Maybe it's not just about thefood.
Maybe it's about the frequencyyou were raised in.
Maybe it's about the nervoussystem you synced to before you
(39:52):
even had language.
Maybe it's about the energy youabsorbed from the woman who fed
you, whether she was absent,anxious, or restricted, or just
surviving.
And maybe now it's your turn tobreak the cycle because once you
do, you stop trying to earn yourright to be fed.
You stop proving your worththrough self-denial, and you
stop shrinking your hunger tofeel safe being loved, and
(40:15):
instead you start doing whatyour mother couldn't.
You feed yourself from loveinstead of lack from trust
instead of trauma, from presenceinstead of performance.
But here's the thing that no onetells you.
Even when you rewrite yourpersonal story, even when you
reclaim your body, your biologyand your boundaries, you're
still living inside of a systemthat profits off your
(40:38):
disconnection and that system,it's trained you to perform your
hunger like it's a fuckingtalent show.
So let's zoom out.
We've talked about biology,we've talked about the nervous
system, we've talked about yourmother.
Now we talk about this wholedamn culture that conditioned
you to believe that food is acurrency for approval.
(41:01):
That nourishment is somethingyou earn.
That appetite is something youapologize for, and that
celebration and self-destructionare somehow served on the same
damn plate.
Because let's be honest, ifyou're having a good day, it's
time for a little treat.
If you're having a bad day, it'salso time for a little treat.
You win the game well, icecream, of course, and if you
(41:23):
lose the game, of course we'regoing to get ice cream.
If you graduate, it's pizza Ifyou break up pizza, birthday,
wedding, funeral, Tuesdayafternoon, meltdown in the car.
Food.
Again, this isn't about foodbeing wrong, food is sacred,
food is celebration, food isancestral, food is connection.
(41:46):
But when every emotional momentis followed by a dopamine balm,
when nourishment becomes rewardand punishment becomes
restriction, we lose the damnplot.
We don't even eat to feelanymore.
We eat to numb.
We eat to cope.
We eat to delay the collapsebecause food, it's one of the
(42:08):
most silently leveraged drugs inthe world, especially food like
substances that biochemicallyare known to be addictive.
So much so that many of us don'teven touch Whole Foods on a
daily basis, and it's all in thename of convenience.
And yet convenience comes at aprice.
And what makes it worse is thatwe've outsourced the entire
(42:29):
experience.
We instacart our groceries.
We Uber eats our meals.
We reheat, repackage, refeedourselves, scrolling through
TikTok while we microwavedinner, and we wonder why we
feel disconnected from ourbodies.
We don't touch our food.
We don't smell it.
We don't honor it.
We don't chew it like itdeserves to be part of our
(42:49):
bodies.
We treat food like a transactioninstead of a transmission.
But I wanna show you something.
Go ahead and close your eyesunless you're driving,
obviously, and I want you topicture your favorite food, not
the one that you should love,the one you crave, the one that
makes your eyes roll back.
Just thinking about it.
(43:10):
Maybe it's warm, maybe it'scrispy, maybe it's sweet and
creamy or salty, and it melts inyour mouth.
Perfect.
Picture it right in front ofyou.
Smell it.
See the texture.
Watch it Steam.
And now imagine taking a bite.
Let it linger.
(43:31):
Let it coat your tongue.
Do you feel your mouthsalivating?
Well, that's not imagination.
That's chemistry.
That's your nervous system.
Your brain, your gut, allresponding to a single thought.
Because food isn't just fuel.
Food is energy.
Food is frequency.
(43:51):
Food is information, and itdoesn't just fill you.
It literally becomes you.
That bite, it gets broken downinto amino acids, vitamins,
minerals, glucose, and thosebecome your hormones, your
neurotransmitters, your skin,your cells, your cycle, your
mood, and your metabolism.
You are literally made of whatyou eat.
(44:14):
Food is the raw material yourbody uses to build your brain,
stabilize your emotions, repairyour tissues, regulate your
immune system, and power everysingle thought that you have.
That's not fucking woo, that'scellular biology.
Every bite you take is amessage, every flavor, a
(44:34):
frequency, every meal, anopportunity to come back home to
yourself.
So when you take in food thatwas grown in trauma, prepared in
a rush, consumed withoutpresence, while your nervous
system is already in fight orflight, your body doesn't just
digest the meal, it digests themoment.
And for the most of us, we arespiritually starving.
(44:58):
We are overfed on content andcortisol, but we're
undernourished in the ways thatmatter.
Like slowness, stillness,sensation, ritual, intimacy.
We don't bless our food.
We barely taste it.
We eat like we live.
Rush, distracted, braced, andapologizing for the hunger that
(45:18):
never goes away.
That's why I always say ourrelationship to food is a mirror
to our life because it fuckingis so true.
But food was never meant to be ascoreboard or a sin or even a
coping mechanism.
Food was meant to be communionwith your body, with Earth, with
the ancestors who knew how togrow it, cook it, and honor it
(45:42):
before capitalism, turned itinto a calorie count, and then
sold it back to us.
This isn't about organic versusnon-organic.
This isn't.
About any of that.
This is about presence versusperformance because the real
nourishment we're craving.
It's not just nutrients, it'smeaning.
It's the slow bite that says,I'm here.
(46:04):
It's the inhale before the mealthat says thank you.
It's the pause that reminds yourbody.
You're not at war anymore.
You're allowed to receive.
And when you start eating likethat, you stop shaming your
hunger.
You stop apologizing forneeding, and you stop using food
to perform and you start usingit to belong.
(46:24):
This isn't about more control.
This is about more connection,more reverence.
More remembrance and moreritual.
You were never meant to eat likea machine.
My girl.
You were meant to experiencepure fucking bliss and gratitude
at each meal, and that's whatwe're reclaiming.
(46:46):
So can we just take a moment?
You made it all the way here.
You stayed with me through theshame spirals, the gut science,
the mother wounds, and thenervous system truth bombs.
And you didn't flinch.
You felt it.
You heard it.
You're still here.
So now I have one final questionfor you.
It's simple, but it's fuckingeffective.
Are you ready?
(47:08):
What are you really hungry for?
Not just the Ben and Jerry's,not just the takeout order, not
just the dopamine drip at theend of the long ass day.
I mean, real hunger, the oneyour body's been whispering
about for years.
Are you hungry for peace, forpower, for pleasure that doesn't
(47:28):
come with guilt and selfnegotiation.
Are you hungry to be the kind ofwoman who feeds herself because
she knows she's fucking deservesto be fed?
Not because she's earned it, notbecause she tracked it, not
because it fits in her macros,but because her body is home and
she's done treating it like abattleground.
Then my lady, this is yourmoment.
(47:50):
This is the invitation.
Your soul has been side eyeingwhile your brain tried to stay
in control.
This is the fork in the roadwhere you burn the diet rule
book and choose somethingsacred.
My live workshop is happeningMay 28th.
at 7:00 PM Eastern Standardtime.
(48:11):
and it's not just a workshop,it's a fuck you to the
patriarchy.
It's a reclamation of yourhunger.
It's a nervous system and soullevel reset for the woman who's
tired of living on crumbs in hermeals, in her relationships, in
her damn life inside.
We're not counting calories,we're not playing small.
(48:31):
We're not asking for permissionto eat the damn cheese.
We're gonna be learning how tobreak free from control based
eating in the mind, fuck ofwellness.
That's really just aestheticperfectionism.
And Lulu Lemon.
We're gonna understand how yourattachment style shapes your
food patterns, your hunger, yoursense of safety, how to stop
numbing with food or controllingit, and finally, feel free and
(48:54):
safe enough to listen.
We are gonna anchor into thepleasure principle, not as
indulgence, but as yourbirthright and your biology.
We're gonna step into the grownass identity of the woman who
eats, like she respects herselfwith no longer negotiates this
with shame because this is thework.
This is the portal, this is therevolution.
(49:16):
And this isn't just a workshop.
It's the moment you stop waitingto be fed and you feed yourself
like you fucking mean it.
And if your body is buzzing, ifyour soul is screaming, yes, if
you've been secretly praying forsomething like this but you
didn't know what to name it,it's called the pleasure, power,
and the plate and your seat iswaiting.
(49:40):
Link is in the bio.
Go fucking grab it'cause this isyour moment to stop performing
and start receiving.
To stop shrinking and startnourishing to come home to your
body like a grown ass fed,untamed woman you weren't born
to be.
Whew, that is a wrap.
(50:00):
So if you're still here, ifyou're still breathing through
this with me, if somethinginside you is stirring right
now, I want you to know thatthis is not just resonance, it
is remembrance.
You didn't just stumble on thisepisode by accident.
You didn't sit through 40 plusminutes of gut brainin,
breakdowns, food, trauma,revelations, and truth bombs
about your mother because you'rebored.
(50:22):
You're here because your soul isdone playing small.
You're here because the goodgirl inside of you is tired of
eating air and pretending she'sfull.
And you're here because there'sa grown ass no longer available
for the bullshit woman inside ofyou who is starving, not for
calories, but for connection.
In this episode, this was justthe appetizer.
(50:45):
This was the body rememberingwhat it feels like to taste
truth again.
So take a breath.
If your chest is heavy, if yourgut is tight, if your mouth just
went dry while listening, thatis not resistance.
That is your body saying this isthe work.
Feel the hunger not as somethingto fear, but as something to
(51:07):
honor because this isn't the endof the episode.
This is the beginning of yourreturn to your body, to your
power, to your plate, and ifyou're ready to stop tracking
your macros and start trustingyour body again.
If you're ready to tradedopamine hits for oxytocin
self-trust, then get your ass tothe fucking workshop.
(51:27):
My girl pleasure.
Power in the plate goes live May28th.
at 7:00 PM Eastern Standardtime.
You already know the link is inthe bio.
Bring your cravings, bring yourcontradictions.
Bring your grown ass energy.
Because we're not just rewritingthe rules, we're refeeding the
revolution.
(51:49):
I'll see you there, and untilnext time, this is Lauren,
Michelle Jewel, reminding youthat your hunger isn't a flaw.
It's a fucking compass, trusted.
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