Sorting Through the Chaos of Feeding Yourself and Your Family with Ann Kent

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Feel like food and nutrition has just gotten so complicated? 

Tired and overwhelmed feeding yourself and your family? 

Between diet culture, conflicting nutrition advice, and the daily chaos of feeing a family, it makes sense why we can feel so overwhelmed by mealtime. 

In this honest and refreshing convo, Becca sits down with registered dietitian and intuitive eating counselor Ann Kent to untangle the mess and make it simple and easy. You'll learn how to start rebuilding trust and healing the relationship to food for both yourself and your kids. 

We talk about: 

1. Why hunger isn't a problem - it's a signal 
2. How diet culture still deeply impacts our relationship to our bodies and food 
3. What intuitive eating really looks like in a busy household 
4. A simple framework for family meals (picky toddlers included) 
5. How to raise kids with a healthy, shame-free relationship to foods
6. Help ending the battles of meal time for toddlers 

Ann really breaks things down in a simple and clear way for moms who need this area to feel easier in this season while still prioritizing health and nutrition for yourself and your family. 

Ann has offered listeners a FREE one month trial of her meal planning app: 

Your coupon code is MOTHERHOOD for 1 month free (or $14.99 off an annual plan). 

Click here for one month free of the meal planning app! 

Ann Kent is a Registered Dietitian and the owner of Peas and Hoppiness. She is helping thousands of busy families get more variety and nutrition on the table every week with her meal planning app, called the Peas and Hoppy Meal Guides. Members save tons of time with a weekly menu planned for you. Customize the menu with over 800 healthy recipes including gluten-free, dairy-free, and plant-based options. Make your life easier with an auto-made grocery list that integrates with Instacart. Subscriptions start at just $14.99/month. Tired of doing it all yourself? Let us meal plan so you don’t have to!

About Ann:

Ann’s love of food started early when she grew up on a farm, then continued into her professional life. In addition to being a registered dietitian, she earned her master’s of science in nutrition, worked as a Certified Diabetes Care and Education Specialist for over a decade, and most recently earned the title of Certified Intuitive Eating Counselor. Ann is passionate about integrating delicious flavors with optimal nutrition and sustainable agriculture.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the Motherhood Mentor Podcast.
I'm Becca, a somatic healingpractitioner and a holistic life
coach for moms, and thispodcast is for you.
You can expect honestconversations and incredible
guests that speak to health,healing and growth in every area
of our lives.
This isn't just strategy forwhat we do.
It's support for who we are.
I believe we can be wildlyambitious while still holding

(00:25):
all of our soft and hardhumanity as holy.
I love combining deep innerhealing with strategic systems
and no-nonsense talk about whatthis season is really like.
So grab whatever weird healthbeverage you're currently into
and let's get into it.
Welcome to today's episode ofthe Motherhood Mentor Podcast.

(00:46):
Today I'm so excited to have mynew friend, anne, with me.
We had coffee the other day andwe're talking all things, just
diet and nutrition and dietculture and making it work, and
health and food morality, and itwas just such a great
conversation I was like, hey,would you come and do a podcast,
cause I would love to have thiscombo where other people can

(01:09):
hear your perspective, yourprofessional expertise.
Can you just introduce yourselfand what you do?

Speaker 2 (01:16):
Absolutely.
Thanks for having me.
Yeah, so my name is Ann Kent.
I am a registered dietitian andI have a master's degree in
nutrition and dietetics.
I worked in the field ofdiabetes and endocrinology for
about 10 years.
I'm also a certified diabetescare and education specialist,
so I can talk about blood sugarall day long Also one of my
passions and most recently Ibecame certified as a certified

(01:41):
intuitive eating counselor.
So I really love to take mypassion for nutrition or blood
sugar management and combinethat with my deep love of food
and help people find thatintersection of how do I nourish
my body in a way that feelsgood, both mentally, physically
and emotionally.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
Yeah, because there's there's the whole like knowing
what to eat, right, there's likethe hard biology of like what
food does biologically to ourbodies, with blood sugar, with
you did a reel the other day onlike protein that I love so much
, just like you know thenutrients of it.
But also there's like there'sthis side that I think we have
to talk about, both aspects offood, of there's this, there's

(02:24):
this biology aspect and thenthere's this like emotional,
relational, cultural aspect offood.
So talk to me a little bitabout like helping women when
they're coming out of dietculture.
When there's all of this, likeI'm emotional eating.
It's like I know what to eatbut like I keep using food as a

(02:44):
coping tool.
What, what is that?
Tell me more about that.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
Food is such a common coping mechanism and I maybe I
wonder if we should even likeback up and just talk about,
like, what diet culture is,because I think when, when you
start to go down the intuitiveeating path, which I love so
much, we start talking a lotabout diet culture.
but like what even does thatmean?
And to me, diet culture isreally this idea that you should

(03:10):
be following like a specificXYZ pattern of eating, and a lot
of times, diet culture has todo with following this diet in
order to change your body insome way, either to change your
shape or change your weight.
Sometimes it's related tohealth, but I'm going to call
out that a lot of times I see,especially today, there's this

(03:32):
new diet culture that useshealth as kind of a code word
for losing weight, and those twothings are not always
synonymous.
I think it's very important tounderstand that losing weight
does not always mean beinghealthier, and so we really need
to separate those things.
It becomes even morecomplicated when you bring in
the emotion and the coping pieceof this, because for a lot of

(03:56):
us, this introduction to usingfood as a way to gain control or
to change our body for manywomen, that idea first started
very early in life.
I work with so many clients whostarted their first diet as a
teenager, sometimes even earlier.
If they didn't start a diet.
They were watching their momdiet or seeing you know pictures

(04:18):
and magazines of women who werevery undernourished, the whole.
You know nineties heroin chiclook, um.
That should be a red flag thatwe're using a drug in our um, in
the language that we talk about, how we want to look about our
bodies, um.
But because of that, because ofthis like intersection of you
know, food as nourishment.

(04:39):
Food is this like biologicallyimportant thing and food as a
coping mechanism?
Food is this like biologicallyimportant thing and food as a
coping mechanism?
It's really confusing how thesetwo intersect.
One of the things that I hear alot of people struggle with when
they talk about like, oh, Ireally struggle with eating food
, I struggle with feelingaddicted to sugar, or sometimes
I'll use language like that, butI can't stop eating food.

(05:01):
And therein lies the problemthat food is necessary.
We have to eat every single day.
Food is as important as water,as oxygen, as sleep, and yet
it's oftentimes used forpurposes outside of nourishment.
Some of those are reallyhealthy.
Sometimes it's really healthyactually to go out to happy hour

(05:22):
with your friends or eatbirthday cake with your kid.
Really healthy actually to goout to happy hour with your
friends or eat birthday cakewith your kid, and sometimes
it's a less healthy copingmechanism that maybe we are
covering up another need ortrying to meet a need with food
when otherwise we actuallyreally need to ask ourselves
what is that need and how do wemeet that?
A little bit better.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
Yeah, I love that you wanted to start with defining
diet culture, Cause I do thinkit's one of those phrases that I
use a lot, but I don't think alot of women understand how
deeply rooted this diet cultureis, and when I use that phrase,
I'm thinking of like it's thewater we swam in in relationship
to how we eat, what we do eatwhat we don't eat, our hunger

(06:03):
cues.
And you know, I work with a lotof women who are very, very
healthy.
They're very intelligent,they're very smart, they're very
, I would say, like, healthconscious and minded right
they're.
They're really paying attentionto what am I feeding my body
and what does that do for me?
How does that fuel my energy ortank my energy, how is it
helping my kids and their immunesystems and all of these things

(06:23):
.
But it's so hard becausethere's this sneaky, unconscious
relationship that's going onthat was never really talked
about.
It was just you're right Likethose behaviors of here's an
exact plan where someone outsideof you is going to tell you
here's what to eat, here's whatnot to eat.

(06:43):
But it wasn't even about here'swhat nourishes and fuels your
body.
It was how small are you?
How desirable are you?
I mean, even to the like,nothing tastes better than
skinny feels right.
That's not even.
That's not even talking aboutlike how you feel in your body.
It's actually talking aboutlike this moral and even like

(07:03):
social, like you will belongbetter when you're in a thin
body.
And it's wild to me that, likediet culture didn't just impact
women in bigger bodies, but I'veworked with women of all sizes
of bodies who have deeply rootedshame about their weight, about
their size, about what they doand don't eat.
This either, hyper control, butlike I think underlying in the

(07:25):
diet culture is this you don'ttrust yourself to make decisions
around food.
You don't trust yourself tomake decisions around hunger or
when I'm full and when I'meating something out of a want
versus a need.
There isn't any deep awarenessaround what's going on in your
body at all.
It's you as an object versus asubject.

Speaker 2 (07:49):
That's such a good way to put that I'm sitting here
like nodding along because Ithink you hit it.
It's this distrust with yourbody and that's what I work with
when I work as one-on-one withclients is like is, first of all
, even identifying needs.
We have become so good at beingdisconnected from our body's
internal cues that many of usdon't even realize what hunger

(08:10):
feels like and, on the flip side, what fullness feels like or
what satisfaction feels likeversus feeling over full and
diet culture.
If you've ever dieted, that'softentimes a specific objective
in diet culture.
You're actually, it's like,supposed to feel hungry and
you're supposed to ignore hungerwhen you're on certain diets

(08:30):
and instead of listening to yourhunger cues, you're supposed to
follow points or follow macrosor follow calories.
You're supposed to like, likeyou just said, really it moves
the locus of control totallyoutside of you, and so not only
does it disconnect you, but it'sintentionally disconnecting you
from what hunger feels like.
And then, after you get off thatdiet, the feeling of hunger

(08:52):
becomes so scary we have to likework through a ton of fear
around like, oh my gosh, I feelhungry, and sometimes that fear
leads to overeating, becausehunger is as important a
biological signal, as if I askedyou to hold your breath for
three minutes and then take anormal breath after that, and

(09:16):
your body would be screaming foroxygen after those three
minutes, just like when you'vebeen in a calorie deficit,
especially a severe caloriedeficit.
Your body is screaming for notsalad, it's screaming for
calories, and so that's why thatpendulum swing happens a lot of
times extreme hunger to extremefullness, but it's also it's

(09:39):
another thing that I foundfascinating is that, being on
repeated diets, it teachespeople that you're not allowed
to eat until you're at extremehunger, when in reality, once
you get to extreme hunger, it'sreally hard to respond to that
extreme hunger with a moderateamount of food.
Really, we should be respondingto hunger when we're a little

(09:59):
bit hungry, happy hungry, whenit's like, ooh, I feel
pleasantly hungry.
That's what intuitive eatingdescribes I feel pleasantly
hungry and I'm ready to sit downand have this delicious meal.
That is the idea that when youare as in tune with your body as
you as you can be in thatscenario, you are going to be
able to eat to a place ofsatisfaction, rather than

(10:20):
feeling this out of controlfeeling of of overeating.

Speaker 1 (10:24):
Yeah, it's, you know, and I've experienced this in my
own body so I can really speakto I really was under eating,
but I would have never told youthat, like I would have said,
yeah, I eat when I'm hungry.
But I was working with thisnutritionist who was fabulous,
who I was eating more and I waseating more regularly.
And I remember, like when Ioriginally told her I said, no,
I eat when I'm hungry.

(10:44):
And then all of a sudden I waslike, no, no, I eat when I am
starving.
But I would have neverunderstood that because I've
never had someone teach me andtrust my body to say, okay, eat
this certain at this, certaintime, which, like for me, was
actually very helpful because itgave me this like rebuilding
trust framework of I'm eatingmore often and regularly and

(11:06):
just it.
It allowed me to realize, oh,I've been like starving, like
starving, like my body has beenhaving to send bigger and bigger
and bigger cues, because I havelearned to disassociate from
what I need.
I've learned to disassociatefrom that hunger because for so
long that was a bad thing, thatI shouldn't have, that I don't

(11:27):
need that.
Like there was this weird shameand playing small and I think
it's so much deeper, excuse me,it's so much deeper than diet
culture, too, and I think dietculture keeps us at this high
level.
Here's what you need to do,here's what you don't do, here's
what you don't do that keeps usfrom like, actually treating

(11:48):
the individual.
Right I think of like, yourindividual relationship to food
might be completely differentfrom mine, right, like I, my
relationship to food now is soeasy and so simple, but it
didn't always used to be so.
I'm, I'm curious, like for you,when you're working with a
woman who, like, fundamentallydoesn't trust her body you know

(12:10):
she's going through this like Iknow I'm using food as a coping
mechanism how do you help herapproach that and shift that
behavior when she's like okay,this isn't working for me.

Speaker 2 (12:22):
Right, yeah, um, it takes time to rebuild the trust,
and that's the first thing wedo.
I mean, we were just talkingabout hunger, and usually I
start with biology before we canstart with emotion, because if
you're biologically walkingaround starving all day, we
can't reach any sort of likehigher level brain functions.
There's no capacity, exactly,yeah.
So my first goal is to get youfed and get you nourished so

(12:43):
that then we can, like, work up.
I think of, like Maslow'shierarchy of needs on the face
of the triangle are are do youfeel safe?
Do you have adequate food,water, shelter, like all of
those things?
Social connections and those.

(13:04):
Those are incredibly important.
I do not mean to, you know,minimize those at all, but I
think, especially with dieting,it really, um, dieting really
teaches us that wehypothetically could disconnect
from our biology and not haveany consequences from that,
which is absolutely ridiculous.
There's, you know, no othersituation in which there's no
diet that says, like, don'tdrink water for a week and see

(13:25):
what happens, like, but again,like we, we do some of these
things with eating and we expecta different result.
So that's the first thing I doto regain trust in your body is
to teach your body that yourbody is safe by listening to
hunger, by practicing whathunger and fullness feel like.
Those are very helpful hungerfullness scale that I use and it

(13:49):
teaches you from one to 10 torate your hunger and fullness
before and after a meal.
And so, instead of doing foodtracking a lot of times, I'll do
hunger fullness tracking withmy clients and that just gives
them a little bit of pause toask themselves and like, notice,
how am I feeling now?
That's so hard at first and alot of people are like I.
I have no idea where I am onthat scale and it's okay If it's

(14:12):
too hard to rate a number.
Sometimes you can just say, like, does this hunger feel good or
does it feel scary, or does itfeel overwhelming?
How does this fullness feel?
Does it feel happy andsatisfying, or do I feel like
miserable and like I don't wantto move?
So you can just do some morequalitative at first.
But the more you practice this,the more that muscle comes back
.
And that's what I always reallywant to reassure people is that

(14:33):
even we're all built with theseinnate cues of being able to
feel our hunger and fullness,and a lot of us lose them along
the way.
Even if you haven't been on adiet, it's very common to lose
those hunger and fullness, maybeeven because of your work
schedule Like I would say, likenurses are one of the prime
example.
If you're on a 12 hour shift,nurses don't feel when they have
to go to the bathroom, letalone feel hunger, and so it's

(14:56):
not just hunger that we can like, lose these signals with, but
you can also relearn them.
So, yeah, first step is isstarting with biology, making
sure those biological needs aremet, and then we can work up on
that, on that scale.

Speaker 1 (15:12):
Yeah Well, and I mean you're starting at the baseline
of any relationship, which isawareness of self, really, like
I think of.
If you know, if you're in adating relationship, you can't
trust someone if you can't evennotice them, if you can't see or
feel or hear them, and soalmost you're repositioning your

(15:33):
relationship to your body, nolonger just from this okay, what
is this?
Am I going to get this endresult of skinny versus okay?
In this moment, what is my bodyneeding?
What am I feeling?
What is, what is the sensationgoing on, and just kind of
coming back to where you noticeyourself and what you're feeling

(15:54):
.

Speaker 2 (15:54):
I'm glad you said that and specifically um called
out weight loss, because I havebeen seeing this more and more
um, the conflating intuitiveeating with some sort of like
mindful calorie deficit, andthose two things actually cannot
coexist.
If you are practicing intuitiveeating, you have to put changing

(16:15):
your body size on the backburner and, um, it's not that we
can't, it's not that your body,your body might change with
intuitive eating, because yourbody's going to do whatever it
wants to do when you are eatingin a way that feels good to it.
For some people that meanstheir body might get smaller.
For some people that meanstheir body might get bigger, I
don't know.
But when you are relearningthis intuitive eating, it's

(16:38):
really, really important to, atleast for the moment, put this
goal, whatever it is size wise,on the back burner, because
otherwise you will always havethis little devil on your
shoulder saying hey, but like,really do you need that?
Hey, but like it's going to bedisconnecting you, even from a
subconscious level.
So that is one red flag that Iwould have women watch out for

(17:01):
If you see someone talking aboutintuitive weight loss,
intuitive calorie deficit, thosetwo things.
A lot of times there is likethis co-opting of intuitive
eating when it's really justdiet culture.

Speaker 1 (17:14):
I'm glad you mentioned the little devil on
your shoulder because I thinkthat's what diet culture feels
like.
It's this, it's a constantobsession.
And I think of you know, when Iwas steeped in it, not even
knowing, and I would have saidlike quote unquote I'm trying to
be healthy, I'm trying to takecare of myself it's self-care,
right but like there is aconstant thinking and feeling

(17:34):
all of the time about eating,about what I was eating, what I
wasn't eating, how much I wasworking out.
It was like this obsession andthat was taking so much mental
and emotional capacity and Ithought that it's like okay,
once I lose the weight, once Ilose the weight, I'll feel
better, I'll look better,everything will be fine.
And you know, I haven't justseen this pattern in myself, but

(17:56):
I've seen it in the women thatI work with of size doesn't ever
fix that size.
Size never makes that littledevil on your shoulder go away,
because that little devil isjust obsessed with this one
little thing.
And I think what?
And that obsession word isimportant because it's like it's
one thing to be aware of andand I'm a very I care about

(18:17):
these things, I want to beintentional with them, but it
doesn't take so much mental andemotional brain space as it used
to, and I think intuitiveeating had a lot to do with that
of like wait, this is verysimple.
Actually, when you, when youare in tune with your body's
needs and cues, it becomes sosimple and so easy.

(18:38):
Like right before this call,like I just ate breakfast a
couple hours ago but I had thatlike I'm kind of hungry and I
was like well, I could just waittill lunch.
And then I was like lunch is inlike three hours and I have two
podcasts and I need some energy.
Like grab a little snack.
This is not dramatic, this isnot hard, it's very easy.
But that little devil sometimesjust like it's hard to trust

(19:01):
yourself when you're used to Ineed to listen to this external
person about what I should do.

Speaker 2 (19:07):
Well, and then talking about trust, I think
that when you're in dietingculture, that feeling of
distrust gets confirmed when,okay, you've been on this diet,
you've been really controlled,you've quote unquote had success
and like lost weight or gonedown in size, but then you stop
this diet, you stop this controland all of a sudden you gain

(19:27):
weight back and so that'ssending you this message that,
uh, you are not to be trusted.
But in reality, what's happeningis that diet was not good for
you.
Sometimes, you know, I thinkthis question of size and like,
oh, if I just get to the sizeand it'll be better, but if you
have to think about food all thetime, to be at this size, that

(19:48):
size is probably not good foryou.
There has not been any gooddata about, like what, how to
truly decide what is someone'sideal weight.
There are calculations you cando and they're all
mathematically based and they'rethere's, but there's not a good
, medically based, medicallysound, researched way of
deciding what your ideal sizeshould be, and that's why I

(20:10):
think it's really dangerous totry and reach a number for
health reasons quote unquotebecause, uh, that actually has
not been determined the only wayto really truly figure out.
What your healthiest weight isis to listen to your body, eat a
balance of nutrients that weknow you need, and move your

(20:30):
body in healthy ways.
Address your stress and thensee what happens and let your
body fall where it is, and thatis really your, your healthiest
ideal weight.
That's how I would would getyou there.

Speaker 1 (20:42):
And I love.
I love that we're able to talkabout size and weight, because I
think one of the things thatdiet, there was that season
where I was in diet culture andthen there was a season where it
was like both middle fingers up, fuck diet culture, Like, and I
almost went to the polaropposite end where it was just
like I'm just going to love mybody.
Well, that also led to me notthinking about what my body

(21:03):
actually needed.
It was like I was eating fordopamine.
I was constantly emotionaleating and it was constantly
this like quote unquoteself-care, Like I'm taking care
of me, and it's like no, you'renot.
Like you're using that's notlove.
Like that's also not love and Ican see it easily with my kids
of like loving them is notmaking them feel guilty for

(21:23):
eating candy.
It's also not being like here,eat candy all day, every day,
and then when you're sick, I'mgoing to be like wait, what is
what do you mean?
Your tummy hurts.
That's weird.
I had, but I was doing that withmyself.
And then I I had to come tothis place where it's like I had
to redefine what does healthlook like?
What does it feel like in mybody.
Because there was this I kindof had to recalibrate my whole

(21:47):
relationship to food and to mybody of just like, okay, my body
still has things that it needs,and just like there's that
little devil on the shoulder,there's also this like mom on my
shoulder who's like, hey, Becca, we need more vegetables, or
you're not going to go to thebathroom regularly, or if you're
eating tons of sugar, you'regoing to feel like shit and your

(22:09):
ADHD is going to beuncontrollable.
There's actual biological needsand I love in this conversation
where you're able to talk aboutthe biology of food how does
this food impact you?
Of food Like, how does thisfood impact you, how does it
impact your biology and how youfeel mentally and emotionally

(22:29):
and just energetically.
And then also the like thatside of it, that's like more
mental and emotional and theguilt and the shame, versus like
, okay, trusting yourself,trusting food, not being afraid
of it, but also not just okay,whatever, whatever, whenever,
and it'll be fine.

Speaker 2 (22:47):
Yes, I think that that is one of the biggest myths
.
Second biggest myth maybe thatI see around intuitive eating.
Maybe the first is thatintuitive eating is going to
lead to weight loss.
And myth number two is thatit's just eating whatever you
want, whenever you want, andthat is actually principle
number one.
Principle number one ofintuitive eating is to reject
the diet mentality.
So, congratulations, you didthat very successfully and that

(23:08):
is an important piece of yourintuitive journey.
But there are 10 principles tointuitive eating.
It has so much more than justrejecting diet culture and if
you get stuck there, then that'snot really intuitive eating.
That is, I call it the pendulumswing.
Okay, so, like, you've been inrestriction, naturally, when you
remove restriction many times,you sort of have this pendulum

(23:31):
swing and you're like I wannaeat all of this stuff that I
could never have before andthat's like Like a teenage
rebellion, right, absolutelylike you, do you?
Okay, like, have that, feelwhat that feels like and then
start to notice how you'rereally feeling.
Feel what that feels like andthen start to notice how you're
really feeling.
And the other thing that Iheard you say that I love and
that I work with a lot of withon my, with my clients, after
once we meet those biologicalneeds, is that inner child?

(23:52):
If you were reparentingyourself, how would you do this?
Because when you're just likeyou were talking about with your
kids, you have healthyboundaries around food and it's
not out of shame or out of guilt, it's actually because you love
them and care for them.
And your fully formed adultprefrontal lobe can say I know
that you just want onlychocolate right now, but that's

(24:14):
not going to sustain you for thenext four hours in school.
I need to help you get a littlebit more balanced around this
meal.
And so that is a much differentway of approaching this than
from restriction, than tellingyour child chocolate is bad for
you and it's going to, you know,make you gain weight and it's
going to do all these bad thingsfor you.
No, you're actually coming atthis from a place of love and

(24:35):
adding in the nutrients theyneed.
And when you focus on addition,when you focus on adding in the
nutrition that you need, younaturally rebalance.
When you're doing this, whenyou're adding in the nutrients
you need and you are respondingto your hunger because you
understand it, you end upshifting this balance so you end
up eating less chocolate in thelong run.
Anyway, you just don't hateyourself for it, you don't feel

(24:58):
restricted and you don't feellike someone is, you know,
top-down approach, like smackingyour hand because you've been
bad.
So I think those, yeah thosetwo balances are so important.
One meet your biological needs.
Two start reparenting thisinner child from this place of
love instead of shame.

Speaker 1 (25:26):
Yeah, well, and it.
I think what's wild is so manywomen have learned that hyper
controlling way and I thinkthey're terrified to take away
all of the rules.
They're terrified to take awayall of the restriction because
they're worried that likethey'll go into this other end
of no control.
And I think what's interestingis it's like, if you think of
power dynamics, but withyourself, this is where it's so
powerful of okay, yeah, you cancontrol yourself in hyper

(25:47):
rigidity, but like that'sactually really exhausting and
it there is a part of you thatyou're controlling that is not
getting its needs met.
And so when you can move intothis place of giving yourself
what you need and payingattention to the hunger, you
begin to be in a relationshipwhere there is self-control,
without this like icky powerdynamic.

(26:10):
It's a very different.
It's a choosing.
You're back in touch with youragency, which is you feel free
to do what you want and need andyou feel capable to make that
choice without fear.
I mean, none of us like to becontrolled by someone who isn't
doing that out of love and careand respect.

(26:31):
That is a very different thingthan punishment or this
restriction that we were talkingabout.

Speaker 2 (26:40):
Autonomy is like the number one most important thing
I would argue in in someone'slife, and you know, I think we
can see that in other areas too,like when you experience a
traumatic event.
It's when your autonomy isbeing taken away, and and that's
what dieting does it takes awayyour autonomy.
Intuitive eating actually has amodel they identify different
characters in in intuitiveeating.

(27:00):
So there's the food police,it's the, it's the part of you
or even the other people in yourlife who are judging what
you're eating.
And then there is the dietrebel who is doing what you just
described of oh I hate theserules, I'm not going to do them.
It's like screw you, I'm goingto swing to the other end.
Some of these characters canactually become really helpful,

(27:23):
powerful allies through theintuitive eating process.
So intuitive eating can guideyour diet rebel to become your
rebel ally, and your rebel allyis the one that's going to say
wait a second.
This person is trying to get meto eat past fullness.
I don't want to do that.
You can't tell me what to do.
I trust myself, or the opposite.
This person is trying to judgeme for eating a, a Snickers, and

(27:45):
that's what I want and needright now, like you can't do
that, so that, um, thatrebellious part of you can
actually be very helpful andgood in the right circumstance.
It's sort of like that teenageexample that you that you gave.
I think that's really accuratethat the teenager who is just
being controlled from the topdown approach is likely to do

(28:07):
these rebellious, self-harmingthings.
But a, a, a rebellious teenagerwho is in a healthy
relationship, who has like ahealthier boundaries, might use
that rebellion to maybe dosocial justice things that
they're really passionate about,and they're using that
rebellion for good instead offor self-destruction.

Speaker 1 (28:27):
I'm smiling so big right now because are you
familiar with internal familysystem or parts work?

Speaker 2 (28:32):
I am and I'm not a therapist, so I don't
technically use it.

Speaker 1 (28:35):
Obviously, yeah, yeah .

Speaker 2 (28:36):
No.

Speaker 1 (28:37):
I love this because I didn't know and I you know I'm
familiar with intuitive eatingin my own like practice, but
like as far as like the studyand like their specific language
and protocols and stuff.
I'm not super familiar with it,but I think parts work is one
of the most powerful things everand I think it's so.
It's kind of hard to explainunless you've experienced it,

(29:00):
but you just explained partswork so well.
I do somatic parts work withpeople, but it's like when you
start noticing all of thesedifferent parts and pieces that
are happening in all of you, youstart noticing like kind of
what are the voices at the tablethat are making these decisions
?
And I think what's powerful isit brings you back into
realizing what part of me ismaking a decision.

Speaker 2 (29:22):
Right, and are they helping or are they hurting?

Speaker 1 (29:25):
Yes, and how old is that part and what is it trying
to do?
Because a teenage part of memight be making a decision that
really helped me and made sensewhen I was 16, but now, as a
34-year old, doesn't actuallywork, doesn't actually make
sense.
But when you can understandthat there's other parts of you
and not over-identify with thatone specific part, like

(29:49):
understanding all of thedifferent facets of you, all of
your values and beliefs and theway that you approach things, it
brings you back to thatholistic agency of what am I
choosing, what access do I haveand how do I support myself?
In showing up to this, I wouldlove to go in the direction of

(30:11):
when women come to this placeand they're starting to feel
their hunger, they're startingto take care of their things,
they're taking care of theirbodies, they're listening to
their hunger cues, and then werun into real life and then, we
run into real life, right, thesoccer and the picky kids and

(30:32):
the like my kids don't want toeat what I'm eating.
Or like you know, how do I haveto make three meals a day, every
single day, for the rest of mylife?
Like I really underestimatedthis part of adulting, right,
how do you help women fithealthy eating into our lives?

(30:52):
That like, truly I think of.
Like, oh, how nice would it beif all I did, all I had to do
every day, is like figure outfood in the household, right,
that would be life changing, butthat's not the reality for
anyone, including stay at homemoms.
By the way, like you're not,absolutely.
You're doing a lot more so, ohmy God, yeah, even more so, for
sure.

Speaker 2 (31:12):
Yeah, I mean, that's actually one of the things that
I talked about first with myclients is, like I need to help
you with intuitive eatingBecause, like, do you really
want to be counting calories asyour full-time job?
Like I don't think you haveenough time to count all of your
macros.
And like, drink all of theproteins.
Like do all these things?
Fix four different dinners foryour family?
Because you're eating one thing?

(31:33):
And yeah, and so I think theword that came to mind when you
were just, you know, talkingabout this is to simplify.
I want to bring it back tosomething you said earlier too
is that you know the individualis different than the whole, and
I think, especially on socialmedia, we have all of these
different people telling us thatthere's this like one best way

(31:53):
to eat, or like you have to getthis X number grams of protein,
or you have to follow this likepercentage macro in order to get
this, and from a veryevidence-based nutrition
approach, that's not true.
There are general guidelinesthat are true.
Things like we know that morefiber is better for you.

(32:15):
It's going to lower your riskof heart disease, cancer.
You know all these things.
Eating a lower processed dietis good.
Eating enough protein is good,eating a balance of healthy fat
is good, but there are so manydifferent ways that you can go
about this sort of healthyeating pattern.
There is just not one right waythat everybody needs to
subscribe to, which I think ispart of the reason there's so

(32:38):
much confusion out there,because your neighbor can come
to you and say, hey, I just likewent fully plant-based and I
feel awesome, and you're like,oh my gosh, do I need to go
fully plant-based?
That seems really overwhelming.
And then your other neighbor islike, hey, I just did paleo and
I feel awesome, and you're like, wait now, do I need to do
paleo?
That includes me.
I'm so confused.
It's because both of thoseactually can be the right thing,
and the real question is whatis right for as an individual?

(33:00):
So for you as an individual,when I think through this,
helping the person in front ofme, I first start with okay,
what does the science tell usabout what your base, what your
needs are nutritionally?
But then let's talk about thetime you have, what your food
preferences are, what yourculture is, what your cooking
ability is and how much time youwant to spend in the kitchen,

(33:21):
where you're starting.
Yes, like you just said, youcannot just spend your entire
life micromanaging your food.
That's just not going to be asustainable way to live.
So when I say simplify, the mostsimple way that I like to think
about it is to think about thehealthy plate method.

(33:41):
That's the model that replacedthe old food pyramid that we,
like, grew up with on the sideof the bread painters.
That's, you know, been doneaway with for 10 years and now
we have a plate, because we eaton a plate, not on a pyramid.
So that makes sense.
So, basically, when you'rethinking about all the food that
you eat in a day, about afourth of it should come from
some sort of protein, about afourth should come from some
sort of starch and about a halfshould come from fruits and

(34:04):
veggies.
You can plug and play thatmethod in so many different ways
, and it could be a cooked mealthat you actually sit down to
the table with, or it could besnacks that you bring along to
the soccer game.
It could be some turkeypepperoni and string cheese for
your protein, and it could be anapple and snap peas for your

(34:24):
veggie, and it could be some ofyour favorite chips for your
starch.
It could be a brownie for yourstarch.
You know you can actuallyinclude some of the things that
you love.
Again, going back to thatindividual approach, include
what you love within that modeland then focus on the hunger and
fullness to know how much youneed.

Speaker 1 (34:43):
I love how simple that is.
The first thing that I think ofis when people are listening to
this, they're going to go.
Okay, but what about when Igive my toddler that plate and
they don't eat it?
And they're like panicked aboutthat?
Because I think that it's trulysimple, like that's so simple
and easy.
And I'm constantly remindingmyself like it doesn't need to
be fancy, fancy, like acharcuterie board is the perfect

(35:04):
reminder of like this is sosimple and easy and tasty and
takes no time.
And people joke about girldinner.
But also I remind myself likeit's okay if my dinner nourishes
me, fills me up, but it doesn'tlook fancy.
Because I'm someone who, like I,cook most of our meals from
scratch.
So sometimes for dinner I justneed it to be simple.

(35:28):
I just I remember it wasliterally a couple of months ago
when I was like a sandwich Idid not realize that diet
culture stole sandwiches from methat, like this is such a
delicious, easy, full meal thatgives me everything I need.
But what about for our kids?
How do we help our kids getthose simple plates when they're

(35:50):
picky or they don't want to eatsomething?

Speaker 2 (35:53):
It's a great question that I can fully empathize with
, because I am not only adietitian but I also have a 16
year old stepson and a threeyear old toddler.
So we are both like running inmultiple directions and we are
deep in the picky phase.
And there is a natural, normalpicky phase that kids go through

(36:13):
from like ages of one throughfive, and our my goal as a
parent is to help my kiddo movethrough that phase.
If we get stuck in this, in thesame foods over and over, and I
don't expose him to new foods,then that picky phase never goes
away, which is why we havepicky adults.
There's other reasons too whichwe could get into, like neuro

(36:34):
spiciness, but I'm going to keepthis simple for now and talk
about the 90% Um.
So what I do with my toddlerthe thing about picky eating is
uh, exposures are important, butyou don't have to actually
taste the food for it to countas an exposure.
So exposures might be touchingthe food, watching you eat and
enjoy the food, preparing thefood, shopping for the food,

(36:56):
playing with the food on theirplate.
Doing any number of thesethings actually counts as an
exposure and helps them be morelikely to eat it in the future.
The second thing to remember isthat autonomy is so important,
so what you don't want to dowith your toddler is to get into
any sort of power struggle inwhich you are accidentally
taking away their autonomy.
For example, you have to take abite of this food or you can't

(37:19):
get up from the table.
You don't want to bribe themwith other foods, like you have
to eat your broccoli in order toget the brownie, because what
that accidentally does is itputs food on a moral hierarchy
and what you accidentally justdid was to tell them that the
brownie is better than thebroccoli, when, in actuality,
what is the wildest thing?
We just experienced this lastnight, we had like vegetables

(37:41):
and some rice and protein.
And, anyway, my toddler is veryinto chocolate.
He loves chocolate, of course.
So we have these chocolatecovered blueberries.
We had them on his plate.
He's like I want the chocolatecovered blueberries.
I'm like fine, the other foodis just sitting on his plate.
I am not hopeful that he'sgoing to eat it.
He's like eating the chocolatecovered blueberries.
And then he's like I want somebroccoli and I'm like cool, no

(38:03):
reaction.
Give him broccoli.
And he's like eating broccoliand chocolate covered
blueberries.
This like wild thing happenswhen you allow kids to be
exposed without any pressure isthat they actually do try more
foods than you think they might,and it's the I mean I could I
tell you this every day.
Like I have reels about this,because I am like incredulous

(38:23):
watching my kid, like I cannotbelieve that there's both of
these foods on his plate andhe's choosing the vegetables.
Sometimes it's not perfect,it's not all the time, but if
you want a script or if you wantlike a like, okay.
Actually, how do I do this athome?
The way that I approach this isI plan for my family, I plan
for me, I plan our meals aroundour whole family.
I don't plan around my toddler'spicky eating.

(38:46):
What I do, though, is I havesafe foods available for him in
each of the categories and eachof the carb, protein, vegetable,
so last night I served thedinner.
I'm like not hopeful that he'sgoing to eat any of it, because
he is pretty picky, but I alsooffer him string cheese and um,
like a piece of fruit, usuallyinstead of vegetable, because

(39:07):
fruit and veggies have reallysimilar nutrition, and kids
oftentimes are going to eatfruit.
So I have that to offer him.
And then, um, I have somecrackers, and then, of course,
um, chocolate is my starter food.
A lot of times, a lot of times,he just needs like a little
appetizer to like get to thetable and once he takes a little
bit of edge off, he's morewilling to eat other foods.
So that's what I would doinstead of cooking two separate

(39:29):
meals, plan your meal and thenhave these sort of like snack
dinner is what we call it athome have these other like
really easy grab and go optionsin each of the categories so
that you know that they haveanother alternative without
cooking two meals.

Speaker 1 (39:43):
Yeah, I'm.
I'm curious too for teenagers,because there's the I'm entering
this whole new phase ofparenting where it's not the
toddler thing, where they'relike refusing to eat what I cook
and all of that it's.
It's the like you have accessto your own money and agency and
like a way, bigger way of likebuying soda or coffee all of the

(40:04):
time, or these things were likeI'm I'm doing my diligence to
teach what food does to ourbodies, helping them understand
how things make us feel, whatthey do biologically right.
So like, if you're having acaramel macchiato from Starbucks
, like, is that fun and tasty?
Absolutely yes.
It's also going to like dumpsugar and caffeine into your
system and it might make youfeel a certain way.

(40:27):
So I'm curious if there's anyapproaches for like teenagers.
That like is teaching them toapproach food without diet
culture and also not going tothe opposite end, where it's
just like a free for all withhere, eat whatever you want,
when I still feel somewhat I'mstill fully responsible for your
nutrition, and then also likeyou start not being, though,

(40:50):
right.

Speaker 2 (40:51):
Oh my gosh, I think you're doing a great job,
Honestly, Like that is.
What I would recommend is totalk about the function of food
and totally separate it from thebody.
Um, I think once body imagecomes into play, it can bring in
all this other emotion, stuffor whatever.
Um.
So, instead of talking aboutbody, I love talking about
function and um, something bothfor adults and for teens because

(41:15):
they are getting older is to isto link it to their values.
So, like are you playing sportsand you want to like be
stronger.
Like you've got to have enoughprotein and like having a coffee
for breakfast that's not goingto give you much.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
Like you're not going to have the building block that
one for sure works in ourhousehold of hey, do you want to
play like an athlete, you haveto eat like an athlete.
Like you need more food, youneed more protein than you used
to get.
Like, if you're building muscleand working out two hours a day
, essentially you need more ofthese essential nutrients, or
you're not going to feel good oryou're going to have that dizzy

(41:48):
blood sugar.
Like teaching them the function.
Do you feel like that alsoworks for toddlers?
I know in my household that wasmy main approach when they were
younger and I really didn't knowwhat I was doing.
But for me it's like I justwanted to teach them that like
food was just food.
I didn't want to have all ofthis like bad, good, can't have
it, can't have it.
I didn't want that diet culture, but I also didn't want to like

(42:10):
hey, just eat whatever you wantand there's no consequences,
not in the like you're beingpunished, but like food creates
things in our bodies and howdoes that make you feel?
And I think what's cool.
I will say this if you havelittle kids teaching my children
oh, like, when they mentionthat tummy ache, when they
mention that thing, it's like,oh, yeah, that donut tasted so

(42:31):
good.
Sometimes, when we eat too muchsugar, we get a tummy ache
because our bodies can't like,and I would teach them the
function of it and what's crazy.
I've watched my kids make thosechoices on their own without so
much drama, and it's actuallybeen very healing for me,
because I watch how I teach themabout food and half the time I
have way more drama about myselfand so I have to be like okay,

(42:55):
what would I tell my daughter,what would I tell my son?
And it has made it so mucheasier on me and for them to
focus on the function of food.
I love that.

Speaker 2 (43:04):
Yeah, you're, you're, totally you're doing an amazing
job.
Yeah, like, and I think thatyou're experiencing it, which is
so cool and, um, I agree,actually, like, teach function
all the way from your littlestto your biggest.
Uh, the it's what changes isthe complexity and, like, the
way we talk about it.
So, you know, for my toddler,um, like I am right now, we're

(43:26):
struggling with, like, waking upin the middle of the night,
hungry, a lot of times, and sowe talk a lot about, like at
dinnertime, like, hey, like,this protein and this fat is
going to keep you full.
So, like, let's make sure wehave some protein so that you
can sleep all night long.
Um, sometimes we go I'm going togive the example of blueberries
, because blueberries aretraditionally considered very
healthy but, holy cow, he can gothrough some blueberries.

(43:47):
And so eventually I'm like,buddy, your tummy is, is there's
too much fiber in this?
Like you're, actually, yourtummy is going to hurt if we, if
we overeat this really quote,unquote healthy food.
So anything, you know, whenit's not balanced, cannot be
good.
Um, and so I think that thereneeds to be a differentiation
between diet rules and dietboundaries, because I, for sure,

(44:07):
have boundaries around certainthings, and it's not like we
just have a free for all, butit's just like you have healthy
boundaries in any other healthyrelationship.
Any relationship is not good ifyou don't have any rules about
how someone is going to treatyou.
But you also don't have to berigid and you can also
understand that sometimes thoseboundaries are going to flex.
If my friend is having anextremely bad day and doesn't

(44:29):
ask how I'm doing and theconversation is all about her,
it doesn't mean that that's anunhealthy conversation to have
once in a while.
But if that's all ourrelationship ever is, then
that's not very healthy either.
So in any I think you can usethese, this analogy, in a lot of
different ways.
That, um, it's not so much onemeal, one food, one thing, it's

(44:50):
what are your, what are patterns?
Um, what are?
And then linking these to yourvalues, which is kind of what we
were just doing with likefunction.
So when you eat this food, howis it affecting the rest of your
life?
And like, is it supporting youin in your values or is it
pulling you farther away fromlike what you want to do?

Speaker 1 (45:11):
Something, something that just occurred to me when
you're talking is, you know, I'mespecially thinking of those
moms with kids in the toddlerera, cause I do think it gets
easier.
But one thing that you'resharing, I think, when you stick
with that simple, like what youwere just describing for women,
of making sure that your kidshave available those foods, that
you're creating these likehealthy rituals of eating

(45:34):
regularly and remindingourselves when we need a snack
and like are we hangry, do weneed some food?
And having that available toyour kids, and noting that, like
it doesn't have to be perfect,every meal that you're looking
at like is the sum ofrelationship healthy?
Like do they feel safe to eat?
Am I creating an environmentwhere there are healthy options

(45:58):
that they enjoy?
Am I making it simple and easyfor them and for me?
And just knowing that like itdoes get easier too.
But what you were justdescribing feels so much
different than like this intensepressure to get all of it
perfect as a mom, or even foryour kid to get like the perfect
nutrition.
It's like I think sometimesthat keeps us, that like

(46:22):
intensity keeps us from doingreally well because we're trying
to make it perfect.

Speaker 2 (46:28):
I can resonate with that too and, like a personal
level, like it is hard sometimeswhen I'm watching my toddler
choose to not eat what I thinkthat he needs to eat and my
mantra to myself is to rememberthat I'm playing the long game.
I don't have to make this mealperfect.
I want him to have a goodrelationship with food.
I want him to be able to trusthis body, and there's always a
next time, like we're going tohave a snack in like two to

(46:51):
three hours.
So if he doesn't eat perfect atthis meal, it's not that big of
a deal.
I just have to, like remindmyself this meal is not that big
of a deal.
I need to focus on the longgame and the bigger picture.

Speaker 1 (47:07):
Yeah Well, and even just the urgency and the
intensity that I think moms have.
I really do think we havecreated a mom culture where moms
feel personally, they holdthemselves personally
responsible for every littlemicro moment, and it's like
that's just not realistic.
You are raising a real humanbeing who you actually have way
less control than we'd like tothink about.
Like you have so and I thinkmoms and moms with toddlers are,

(47:30):
for sure, relearning thislesson Like you have so little
control, but you do have a lotof influence and impact and you
can control the environment.
And that's what I alwaysreminded myself when it came to
food with kids is like I do getto control, like what foods we
have on hand, and so for me thatlooked like okay, most of our
food is going to be like realwhole, nutrient dense foods and

(47:51):
if they're hungry they willfigure out how to eat something.
And then also we had fun foodsthat like weren't super
restricted but they also weren'tjust like free for all.
So it gave this it.
It it helped me to understand Ican't control those micro
moments, but I can influence andimpact the environment and what
I'm buying and what I'm cookingand the relationship that I was

(48:15):
the way that I talked aboutfood.

Speaker 2 (48:18):
And honestly I mean it's a, it's like a bigger
parenting lesson.
But kids do what we do.
They don't do what we say.
And so your relationship, yourown relationship with food, even
if it's not always been good,like showing your children how
to heal from diet culture,showing them how to relearn some
of these things, I think can beone of the most powerful tools

(48:41):
that you can give your kid,because you're going to send
them out into the real world andthey're going to experience
diet culture, whether or not itexists at home.
They are going to encounter itin their practices, in their
dorms at college, like in youknow, wherever they go.
But you are can be such aprotective, safe place If you

(49:01):
have a solid relationship withfood yourself and if you can
heal that again.
You don't have to be perfect,but it's just like when you mess
up and yell at your kid andthen you go back and say sorry,
that repair is just as powerfulas you doing it right the first
time.
So remember that you do nothave to get it right the first

(49:21):
time.
If you've, if you're listeningto this and you're like, oh my
gosh, I've been like making mykid eat broccoli and before they
can get dessert.
You can change that today.
You can say at the next meal,you can say you know what?
I just learned that this isreally unhelpful and actually
brownies have their place too.
Broccoli has its place andbrownies have their place.
And I trust your body and we'regoing to do this differently

(49:42):
starting today.
So you don't have to do perfect.
You can teach them that doingbetter is an option, and I think
that's going to be reallyhelpful and healing, because
they are not going to be perfectand they are going to need to
learn how to say wow, I havebeen doing this, not great, and
I just learned something new,new and now I'm going to do

(50:03):
different.

Speaker 1 (50:04):
Yeah, I'm thinking when you share that there was a
time in my motherhood believe itor not for people who know me
now where I was very type A andcontrolling as a mom.
I had hyper, hyper anxiety andperfectionism going on.
I can think of like melistening to this podcast and
you telling me to like put abrownie and broccoli on the

(50:26):
plate and I'm I can like feelthe fear in my body just
thinking about it, and so I justwant to share, on the other
side of that, what has been sopowerful when I worked through
one, not not needing tohyper-perfectionistic control
myself or my kids.
This powerful thing happenswhen you teach kids their agency

(50:48):
and their choice and how thingsfeel and you're teaching them
the function of food.
I watched both myself and mykids choose the things without
needing to be punished.
I learned, I watched them learnfrom their own lessons and be
able to have this likedecision-making skill on their

(51:11):
own, which I don't think peopletalk about enough in parenting
of like, when you're raisingkids to make really good choices
, you have to give them space tohave a choice, to have agency
and be able to choose thosethings.
But I think that's so hard formost parents, because I think

(51:31):
most people haven't experiencedthat for themselves.
I mean, it's interesting so manyof the people I'm surrounded by
closely they're not steeped indiet culture and it's wild to me
interesting so many of thepeople I'm surrounded by closely
they're not steeped in dietculture and it's wild to me.
Sometimes I'll have aconversation with someone where
I'm like whoa, like it's stillso deeply ingrained in us to not

(51:54):
trust our bodies, to not trustour decision-making, to need
this black and white, good andbad, moral conversation around
food versus like you're a grownass adult, like how does this
food make you feel?
Does it make you feel good ornot?
And like you actually do havethe agency to choose whether or
not you eat that or how much youeat that.
But I think when we'redissociated from that, we forget

(52:16):
that we have agency and choice.
So I don't know, as you weretalking, that just really I
remember it being so scary togive my kids those options when
I still didn't trust myself withthem, if that made sense.

Speaker 2 (52:30):
It absolutely does, and I think that that's one of
the most important reasons whyyou need to first heal your own
relationship with food beforeyou're able to do this with the
next generation.
So it's okay that it doesn'tfeel, okay Like you're not alone
in that and you can heal fromit.
Yeah, many people heal from usand you can too.

Speaker 1 (52:52):
I love that I am.
I loved this conversation so somuch.
I love how simple you made justthe meal planning and thinking
about all of the meals that wedo.
Tell me a little bit more aboutyour app briefly, because when
we were talking about this atcoffee, of giving people these
easy solutions, what is what isdifferent from this than like a

(53:13):
meal plan?
Like, tell me about what yourapp does.

Speaker 2 (53:17):
The main difference is that you can delete recipes
that you don't want, so it goesback to agency.
Yeah, so I created a mealplanning app.
I actually call them the peasand poppy meal guides, because
my goal is to take some of thedecision making and like the
decision fatigue off your plate,but ultimately allow you to
make the final call on whatyou're actually going to serve

(53:37):
your family.
So every week I send out a mealplan and you can sit in the
pickup line at school and makeyour meal plan for the week.
You, what I have people do isum, open your calendar app and
see what's on the on theschedule this week.
Figure out how many timesyou're going to eat at home, how
many actual cooked meals youneed, and then Don't skip that

(54:00):
part the key to reducing foodwaste.
If you don't do that, likeplease do not set yourself up
for failure.
And try to cook seven nights aweek.
Nobody does that.
I mean, I don't do that.
Maybe, if you do, that's likeyou need to come teach me.
No, just kidding, I'm not evergoing to do that.
That sounds terrible.
But figure out how many timeshow many cooked meals you need

(54:21):
and then flip over to the appand pull up this week's meal
guide.
There's five cooked meal ideasand you need to delete
everything that you don't need.
So delete, delete, delete,delete.
If you don't like it, delete it, no big deal.
If you want to substitutesomething else, you totally can.
There's over 800 recipes that Ihave in the app, so there's a
of choice, but it's all in oneplace, so you don't have to be

(54:42):
going to Pinterest and cookbooksand all these things.
Delete everything that youdon't need and then flip over to
your shopping list, which autoupdates with any changes that
you need that you just made.
So if you doubled the portionof the slow cooker meal so that
you could have two meals insteadof one, it just auto updated

(55:03):
all of those ingredients in yourshopping list.
Add the extra stuff that youneed every week I call them
staples, so we always need milkand yogurt and string cheese and
bananas.
So add that stuff to your list,cross off the stuff that you
already have at home all thespices or whatever and then
you're ready to go to the storeso you can literally make your
meal plan and like 10 minuteswhile you are waiting for one of

(55:25):
your kids events, which I knowyou were doing all the time.

Speaker 1 (55:28):
Literally that's what I'm doing all the time now
Because we now have two kids.
This is the first season everwhere my kids haven't aligned on
the same night.
I have been lucky for so solong, but we finally had a
season where one kid is onMonday, wednesday, fridays, one
kid is on Tuesday, thursdays,and I was looking at my schedule
and I was like every day, butSundays through May, cute, cool.

(55:51):
This is fine, everything isfine.
But here's the thing, what youjust shared.
I think people need to notunderestimate how much just this
one habit, this one thing,makes such a vital difference.
And even when you said the easeof not having to go find it
yourself we did one of the mealboxes one time and the amount.

(56:15):
I'm pretty good at mealplanning, pretty good at meal
prepping, I'm pretty good atcooking, like I have.
I have like a lot of skills inthis area, right, but just not
having to think about it, nothaving to plan it, not having to
think of all of the ingredients.
That one small thing, people, Ithink I, I would.

(56:36):
I really want women to hear this.
We always talk about the strawthat breaks the camel's back,
but nobody talks about thereality that when you take the
straws off, it prevents thecamel's back from breaking.
So when you do something simplelike at this app, or do a meal
plan, or have this one thingthat you don't have to spend

(56:56):
your mental, emotional andphysical energy right Like I
think of, like actual time spentdoing this, it can make such a
difference and make somethingthat usually feels so hard so
much simpler and easier, and Ilove that you can adjust it.
I love that you can deletethings.
I'm really excited to try itout.
This conversation was so good,anne.

(57:20):
Is there anything that wedidn't cover or something else
that you want to name that Like?
What do you?
What would you want women toremember?
If they could remember onething from this?

Speaker 2 (57:31):
I want you to remember that it feels hard
because it is hard, not becauseyou're doing something wrong.

Speaker 1 (57:39):
We all need that reminder on a regular basis.

Speaker 2 (57:45):
Yeah, yeah.
It's a lot to juggle all thesethings.
It's a lot to make thesedecisions.
It's a lot to heal yourrelationship with food.
It's a lot, even if you haven'texperienced that.
You're like I just have to,like, feed my child and it seems
overwhelming.
Like I hear you and I mean,like that's why I created this
tool is because I want to takesomething off your plate.
Yeah, pun intended.

Speaker 1 (58:04):
I know that was really funny.
That was good.
Thank you so much for being onthe podcast and I loved this
conversation.
There will be links for her forher app, if you're interested
in that.
If you need something to takeoff your plate, something to
make it easier and lighter, andjust I love your reels.
You guys you have to follow,and she made a reel the other

(58:25):
day of like everyone's talkingabout like how much protein we
need and like I've been so, likeI'm pretty intentional about my
protein, but I'm like wait,guys, this is a lot like this
feel.
Is anyone else worried thatthis is like too much?
Or you just your content isgreat and it's so helpful and so
it's easy and it makes thingsfeel more simple.

(58:45):
And I always think, when we canfollow and look to people who
make things easier on us insteadof always making it harder,
it's always a good place tostart.

Speaker 2 (58:56):
Yeah, well, and if it's helpful, I would love to
gift your your listeners a freemonth of the meal plans.
So that's actually would be twofree months, because I just
changed my free trial period toa full month so that you can
like experience this.
But if you use the codemotherhood at checkout, it gives
you an additional free month.

Speaker 1 (59:20):
And if there have ever been two months where I
need this in my life, and it hasbeen next two months.
So I'm very excited Becausewhen I was looking at my
calendar I was like, okay, thismeans that two nights a week I
have to have dinner ready beforeI leave the house, and then
there's two nights a week whereI need to get dinner way earlier
, Otherwise we'll be eatingdinner at eight.
So, like, just looking at thosethings, I'm really excited

(59:43):
about it.
So thank you so so much forbeing a guest and you guys, if
you love this podcast one,please leave a review.
Make sure you leave a five starreview, just a couple sentences
.
That helps the podcast so much.
And then send an or I a DM,share it on social and tag us.
We'd love to hear yourquestions, love to hear your aha

(01:00:04):
moments, what you're takingaway from this and make things
easier on yourself.
One straw off the camel's backis a win, especially for this
season.
So have an awesome day andwe'll see you next time.
Thanks for joining me on today'sepisode of the Motherhood
Mentor Podcast.
Make sure you have subscribedbelow so that you see all of the

(01:00:26):
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your life to get your hands alittle dirty, to get your skin
in the game, can bring into yourlife to get your hands a little
dirty, to get your skin in thegame.
Don't forget to take upaudacious space in your life.

(01:00:50):
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