I Beg Your Partum?
Whoever said the journey to motherhood was a straight path clearly never had to decipher an expired pregnancy test or navigate the labyrinth of fertility treatments. Join us, Jade and Katie, as we swap tales from the trenches of pregnancy symptoms and trying to conceive. We're here to provide dubious advice, hot and lukewarm takes, and a feminist perspective on pregnancy and parenting. Whether you're in the throes of your own pregnancy odyssey, cheering from the sidelines, or just here for a good story and a laugh, pull up a chair. We're glad to have you along for the ride!
(Please be lovingly advised that WE ARE NOT MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS and are not providing any medical or legal advice of any kind. We are just a couple of women talking about our experiences as honestly as possible.)
I Beg Your Partum?
Episode 4: Eating Disorder Horror Stories Part 2, Katie's Story
Again, this episode comes with a BIG FAT TRIGGER WARNING: Jade and Katie are sharing their experiences with body dysmorphia and eating disorders. Content is throughout the episode. Also, this one is really long so just strap in or fast forward through some parts if you want to - we won't know. :)
We start the episode with the mental torture that was media commentary on women in the public eye in the 90s and 2000s - Britney Spears and Monica Lewinsky should be entitled to millions for the bullshit they endured at the hands of Jay Leno and other "comedians." Katie describes how the toxic standards set by shows like "Friends" had lasting effects on what she thought she was supposed to look like growing up, and how long it has taken to work towards body neutrality and self-love.
Jade and Katie also talk about the flawed metrics like BMI that have long dictated health perceptions, and how being fat has changed our interactions with the healthcare system.
Katie shares her 20-plus-years of eating disorder symptoms, including some eye-opening insights from a summer in France that was the first attempt at eating disorder recovery. We're pretty candid about how our eating disorders have morphed, and how relapse is TOO easy. But we do end on an upbeat note - through this conversation, we came up with lots of insight about the process of finding peace with our bodies, facing our fears, and healing. Fuck diet culture! Eat food! Take up space!!!!! We love you!
This episode of I Beg your Pardom contains very honest recountings of journeys through recovery of eating disorders, with detail at times that may make some listeners uncomfortable. So please be advised that there is a trigger warning for eating disorders.
Speaker 3:Okay, hey, hi Jade, how's it going?
Speaker 4:Good Thanks for having us over to record this episode Anytime.
Speaker 3:Welcome to. I Beg your Pardom, yeah. Today we're talking about eating disorder yeah, katie's version. Katie's version oh, buddy, and we had some witty banner planned for the beginning of this, and now I can't remember any of it well.
Speaker 4:I think we were talking about. We were talking about a hundred things like Monica Lewinsky and cheeseburgers and what the boys five guys orders are yes, and that both of the boys think that monica lewinsky is super hot, I think because she was. She was stunningly gorgeous. So I think that actually the beginning little patter could be about diet culture in the fucking 90s and through the 2000s was just unbelievably like how we don't all have terrible eating disorders, yeah is is actually that's actually the thing I think that like the more you see it.
Speaker 4:Like jade said in the last episode, it's like the, the water we swim in. Right, it's so normal.
Speaker 3:No, she's so gorgeous now walker's entire screen is just pictures of monica it's wallpaper.
Speaker 2:She looked. She looked good then, but like she's even better now.
Speaker 3:She's really. Yeah, she's very cute now.
Speaker 4:She's got great hair, yeah and she actually talks pretty candidly about that. Getting all that feedback and being in the public eye made her have eating eating disorder issues and body of course, of course it did they were brutal yeah to her and I did at that time think she was slut shamed, but body shamed as well constant and like yeah, rough
Speaker 3:I used to get told when I was growing up that I looked like kate winslet, which is the highest compliment oh stunning. No one's beautiful. But then, like I remember watching family guy and then referring to her as like the fat girl from the titanic or something because she was a solid like size eight in that right or something.
Speaker 4:But titties up to her neck, they look so good.
Speaker 3:She looked amazing but like the, the like who, who was considered fat when we were growing up is, like right, insane and even um about, not about love.
Speaker 4:What is the stupid girl? The stupid christmas movie? Oh, I love actually yeah, they're like oh, I love her even though she's chubby.
Speaker 2:They're like oh, I love her, even though she's chubby, yeah what was she like a size four? No, she's a six.
Speaker 3:It was like the secretary that the prime minister falls in love with. Please Google fat secretary from Love Actually.
Speaker 4:Hugh Grant's love interest in Love Actually.
Speaker 1:And they go on and on. Tremendous thighs like tree trunks, oh my.
Speaker 3:God, yeah, isn't she like real fat? She's like the thinnest thighs, like tree trunks. Oh my God, yeah, isn't she like real fat?
Speaker 2:She's like real thin.
Speaker 4:She's like a normal looking. Yeah, I also. I'm just like these little flat.
Speaker 1:She's like a belly with a chunky butt she just had thicker.
Speaker 4:So we I'm just having these flashes of like very specific times in the 90s and 2000s where I was like, either I want, want to like. That's what it looks like to look thin and I like the way that looks. So if you look back on those episodes of friends, where. Jennifer Aniston, courtney Cox and Phoebe. Like Phoebe, god, she has it. Her actress has a name. Dang it, what's?
Speaker 1:her name Pat, you know? Oh uh, because she's my favorite um Lisa Kudrow. Yeah, she's my favorite um lisa kudrow.
Speaker 4:Yeah, she's the best, obviously um, but they're showing her back truly uh. But the the ribs in the front, the sternum ribs right, showing on all of their with their implants. I think they all had pretty nice implants actually, but like it's like the implants and then like just the flat skeleton board happening and Lisa Kudrow talks about how the pressure to be thin and they get thinner as the show happens.
Speaker 1:And it's truly, truly sad. That's why she looked so different and so hot to me in Romy and Michelle's high school reunion.
Speaker 4:She's still pretty thin in there she's super thin, but it was before she got there's.
Speaker 1:There's more body fat than she had on friends as friends progressed yeah for sure.
Speaker 4:No, it was crazy. So, and then the the last like kind of vivid memory I have is that I remember thinking that britney spears when she went on stage to do the I think it was like 2006 show on MTV Music Awards yeah, and she came out in the black bra top and the black boy shorts Like months after having a child.
Speaker 3:True, yes.
Speaker 4:And I remember thinking, holy shit, she looks so fat which, obviously, looking at her now, I'm like Katie, your brain, I know looking at her now I'm like katie your brain, I know, but it's like there weren't any there was. There was not a single fat person on television and the if you go back and look at the coverage and they do this in the that fantastic and disturbing britney documentary that came out, um, when she was still in her conservatorship uh, oh my god, they, they.
Speaker 4:All of the press coverage was like porky britney comes out and blah, blah and it's like this, yeah, and like jessica simpson got the same thing oh, jessica simpson in the her mom jeans with the situation, and now she's terribly thin now I know, uh, but I see that's not good either, like people oh.
Speaker 1:Patrick is shedding a tear in the purvey. Porn went out for Jessica Simpson for real.
Speaker 4:Oh, pouring one out. I thought he said porn went out.
Speaker 1:No, okay, yes, oh my gosh, if you know where there's Jessica Simpson porn.
Speaker 4:Oh, I'm.
Speaker 3:You know who to send that to.
Speaker 4:No, but so. But again, I don't know what's going on with her. I don't know if I want her to be happy. Again, we don't want to shame thin or fat or make that kind of judgment on anyone. I just In the spirit of remembering just how cruel the media and public discourse was around any celebrity that was above a size four.
Speaker 3:Yeah, truly, I was thinking about it earlier today and I'm a bit younger than you. I'm like eight years younger than you.
Speaker 4:Do we need to explicitly state this? Sorry, oops.
Speaker 3:Anyway, I grew up watching like Disney Channel, like the Suite Life of Zack and Cody and things like that which I'm sure were after your time before your time?
Speaker 4:Yeah, but I'm aware of some. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but like Ashley Tisdale and then the other girl on the show whose name is escaping me London, tipton, nice who has a Brenda song, she has a real name too. Had like the thinnest legs, because that's what was in at the time right, which was unachievable for me, like I just do not, will never be achievable have the body type to maintain tiny, tiny legs, truly, and a thigh gap right so I felt massive because it was like every girl on disney channel right had this like unachievable body type and then there would be plot lines about them having eating disorders because they thought they were fat and so I'm like if they're fat, then like I'm off the charts.
Speaker 3:Right, it was. It was like there was there was no like representation of like, any actual like normal size diversity of any kind, right, and it's like, but the moment that you and this was in the body pod is positive. Body posi panda book too. It's like if you can control your own algorithm and, just like, start following models of different sizes this was revolutionary for me.
Speaker 4:Yes, it'll fix your brain Like you will suddenly be like oh guys, actually, if we can give you one, two pointers, one therapy, but two, very importantly, change what you look at. When I was looking at these body, I got into my spoiler alert. My eating disorder included, like a weird bodybuilding sort of phase, so it's a version of orthorexia. So, but start change your algorithm now. Unfollow some supermodels, unfollow some celebrities and go find and we can maybe give you some suggestions of, like, gorgeous curve models that are out there. Plus size models, like just looking at women feeling confident in their bodies that are larger bodies is revolutionary, yeah, and there's so much good plus size fashion right now. It's awesome.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was about to mention a particular model and Walker's already over here Googling her.
Speaker 2:Great yeah, we should just do a little list.
Speaker 3:Her name's Iskra Lawrence. She went viral right as we started dating because everyone was calling her like fat and she's like contributing to the obesity crisis all this shit, she's hot, she's so hot and she had done this like shoot, where she's just posing in like a pool of potato chips and she's like yeah, and I remember Walker, who I've been dating for like two days at the time, was like oh, she's fucking hot.
Speaker 3:And I was like this is great, like thank God, um, yeah, she's. Oh, that is hot, yeah, yeah. So what is her name again is girl lawrence? And she also like is discriminated against for not being fat enough to be a plus size.
Speaker 1:Oh, oh, oh, she's just like screwed on every side you reference the theory is big here, but I also think oh well, at either end of a horseshoe, basically that's where they're closest like.
Speaker 4:So a concept like conservatism versus liberalism. You have like conservatism is one end of the horseshoe and then you have like the spectrum along the horseshoe and then the other pointy or flat end of the horseshoe is like liberalism yeah, right so but once you get to that, but they're oddly close they're very close, like you can like the far right and the far left have a lot in common uh beliefs that they share correct. So like that's, that's horseshoe, you just call it horseshoe theory, right?
Speaker 3:yeah, okay, got it yeah, um, but it was really refreshing and like I don't believe that you should have body goals that aren't your own fucking body, but like when my body goal in my head in like college pivoted to like, oh, I want to be Iskra Lawrence, who is over 200 pounds.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was like this is.
Speaker 3:I mean, it's still not achievable because I am not her, but like it was a way, different experience.
Speaker 4:Right, it's like one of those. It's a phase in your journey where or like a phase in recovery, where it's better than the goal pictures you used to have, because those are terrifying but now, but it's still an unhealthy like paradigm, right?
Speaker 3:right, right, like idolizing other people's bots is probably like not the best thing to do.
Speaker 4:Right, it's just moving in the right direction.
Speaker 3:yeah, exactly, exactly um yeah, I'll also say, and then I'll let you talk, uh like lizzo became popular right as I was recovering and like and she still gets a lot of shit she gets, I mean, endless shit, and I'm also off her right now.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, and like I mean, you know, since shit has gone down in different directions.
Speaker 3:But like seeing her on television meant like so much to me and when I was feeling like terrible, she did this incredible performance of like Truth Hurts at like a BET award show where she like comes out of a giant cake and goes you want some cake? And it's like the greatest thing I've ever seen. Um, and just like her joy meant a lot to me at the time.
Speaker 4:Oh my God, the show. Watch out for the big girls which don't I don't know who gets money from what and don't give money to Bezos, like whatever it's on Amazon. But, um, I watched that and cry every single episode because I'm like this is representation of athletic large people.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Like dancing, beautifully, doing things that many, many, many in shape thin people could never fucking dream of doing. And they are doing it fat and it just makes me truly happy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it kind of debunks a lot of the things people like to say about oh well, they're not healthy, they're not capable of doing shit.
Speaker 4:I'm very grateful for her because you can't do the stuff that they do on stage for three to four hours at a time unless your cardiovascular health is fucking great Fantastic, so get out of here with your heart disease bullshit. Anyway, yeah, ed journey great, fantastic, so get out of here, your heart disease bullshit.
Speaker 3:Anyway, yeah, ed journey, do you want me to talk about it? Yeah, all right, so it's so easy to just jump into, just jump into it do?
Speaker 1:do I need? Do I need to warm me up? Tell us tell us really nice things, like you were first yeah, can I just say that that that to preface katie's story, she has in in the the 14 years that she and I have been together. She has been through many ups and downs through it, but like this eating disorder precedes even me knowing she existed by like 20 years.
Speaker 1:So she has been struggling with this, for much like Jade that you know, for like, essentially like her entire life, and undoing those things is so hard, but like I'm so proud of where you are now, so proud of where you are now, I'm so proud that that you can, you can go through pregnancy and all the feelings that it makes you feel and all the things it does to your body, and that you see those things as beautiful and as functional to a baby's health and it's just there's, there's something so remarkable in you being at this point here in 2024, yeah, which I honestly it's not like I didn't think you could get here or something like that, but it's just like you have been through it so many times that it's just so nice to see you where you are now, which is just happy. Thanks, man, and proud of yourself. That's very sweet. So I'm so proud of you, thanks. So spoiler alert there's and proud of yourself, that's very sweet so I'm so proud of you, Thanks.
Speaker 4:So spoiler alert, there's a mostly happy ending.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 4:But I'll try to keep like somewhat brief. I guess my I didn't start. You were like well, I had an eating disorder, like when I body dysmorphia started from consciousness right. Yes, when I body dysmorphia started from consciousness right. And I think I had a very blissful childhood of like being like I'm great and my body is great and I don't think about my body and I like to be a little artist, and I just really wasn't aware of any of that until around but seventh grade you said also that's really when it like hit.
Speaker 4:So I I think it's that that preteen to teen transition of adolescence, that's like the dangerous time Cause, like so. My background is a master's in public health, but my background's in like adolescent, um, risk behavior basically. So I'm like adolescent brain development and so I know a lot about this now. Um, but there's something that happened. The big thing that happens when you're going from like a child to a teenager is that you go from thinking about your family and your community as kind of your biggest influences, um, your parents or your siblings being your bigger influences to you have this massive shift to your peers being your big influence.
Speaker 4:And so I think that was where stuff, that's where the shift happened for me in my brain, because my mom I know I'm deaf, like normal mom levels of diet, but never, never once, did either of my parents say to me you need to lose weight, you need to, you shouldn't eat that, you shouldn't. We didn't eat necessarily all that healthy, but also not. We ate vegetarian meals, sometimes, um, around the same time as the eating disorder, but I really wasn't related to disordered eating. I did become a vegetarian, but mine was because I read Peter Singer's Animal Liberation, which is a book from the 70s. That's basically like they put the lipstick on in the bunny's eyes.
Speaker 3:That'll do it.
Speaker 4:Oh it's terrifying. So I didn't use Procter and Gamble, so the activist stuff came out of me real early. So I wasn't allowed to be full vegetarian because basically my parents couldn't afford to get that much. I was still growing so they were like we can't afford not to get some kind of, so I didn't eat red meat okay, but.
Speaker 2:I tried to eat, it's like how old were you when you read that book? Seventh grade wow like intellectually so advanced.
Speaker 4:I did like a book report by Melville.
Speaker 1:I did like a book report. Yeah, she read that book by Melville Earlier.
Speaker 4:inside stupid joke about Moby Dick y'all.
Speaker 1:Boys About one book.
Speaker 3:Herman Melville Wow.
Speaker 2:Is that book about factory farming?
Speaker 3:We all have our big white whale Right.
Speaker 4:Anyway, sorry, it's all right. No, so I read that and just that shifted Like that was kind of more of an activist thing. But then I also I really did become really interested in fashion and so I started getting like Marie Claire magazine, which is actually a little bit more healthy, but I would pick up like Vogue's and then I would like really was into drawing, like fashion style drawings, and was really into Archie comics and drawing Archie comics and so like they are unbelievably thin, yeah, right, and then so that's unrealistic. And then of course, everything's photoshopped in the 90s and 2000s. So you know, you see these models and it's just no one has a single even skin roll. That was my obsession, was like does my stomach roll over when I sit down? I don't think I've spent. Oh yeah, I don't think, unless I was in the car alone, I think I spent at least 20 years of my life sucking in.
Speaker 3:Yeah, when I sit, yeah, at times, yeah, you can actually get like scar tissue from that. What yeah?
Speaker 4:That's crazy. Oh my God, yeah, so many things. So mine started seventh grade. Uh, I think there's something in the adolescent brain that allows you to have that quote unquote willpower situation. But I think also I think a boy something in the adolescent brain that allows you to have that quote unquote willpower situation. But I think also, I think a boy. So fashion magazines, plus just awareness of what other people looked like and what was normal in culture and around me, but I don't remember anybody being like this is a diet. Let's go on the diet.
Speaker 3:I do. I'm sure it was in Vogue though.
Speaker 4:Like it had diet stuff in Vogue. Oh yeah yeah. But I really just looked at the pictures. That's reasonable. I was just really obsessed with them.
Speaker 2:The articles were boring.
Speaker 4:They were about like lasers on your face, you know like for skin care and stuff, and I was like I don't give a shit, let me see the dresses, you know, like for skin care and stuff, and I was like I don't give a shit, let me see the dresses. So yeah, I think that. And then a boy called me not fat, but he said I had a big ass, like in the hallway In a good way. See, but I didn't process it.
Speaker 1:I don't know if it was good or bad. She comes from the, the so. So western civilization didn't properly accept a fat ass until about like 15 years ago so it's like every boy loved a fat ass right and I couldn't say it, I don't.
Speaker 3:What was the? What was the?
Speaker 4:problem? I don't, but I and I don't remember the specifics. I just have this vague memory of the hallway at my middle school and being embarrassed because he said something very loudly. How did he say it? It was really just like she had.
Speaker 3:Hey yo.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sorry, basically probably.
Speaker 4:But I just remember being mortified and then being aware of my ass after that, Right?
Speaker 1:So how does how does it make you feel that I think you're a fat ass now?
Speaker 4:I know that.
Speaker 1:That's like your eyes are blue.
Speaker 3:Gravity you have a fat ass.
Speaker 4:I'm aware of your fondness for for that part of my body. Yes, so, um, so, yeah, that happened and so I started slowly, um, restricting food, started being aware of what calories. I think health class we learned about how many calories were in a pound and then I was like, well, let's do some math reverse engineer that one yep, exactly.
Speaker 4:But yeah, eighth grade, my family started noticing that I wasn't eating dinner or and I was skimping on the lunch, and then I was running every weekend like hills in my neighborhood. So so my dad the incident that I'm referring to is like my dad noticed, but I was kind of persisting. They were asking questions. But my poor dad, who comes from this Midwestern family where you just eat all the food that you have and I think the concept of anorexia was just mind blowing to both of my like it just didn't process. And again, mom wasn't this big time dieter, dad wasn't this big time dieter. Of course there's like food awareness and exercise awareness, but this isn't like part of our family or our community's culture. So dad notices that I haven't been eating.
Speaker 4:He gets so mad one night he basically makes this giant pile of cooked chicken that he's pulled off the bone and I know that the pile can't have been that large, but in my head it is a mountain. It is like it's like five pounds of pulled chicken in a pile, plain, no sauce, no, nothing. And he's like you're going to sit here at this table until you finish that chicken. I remember sitting there until it was dark and being like not only it was less at that point about not wanting to eat it and more about how gross, like who wants to eat a giant pile of plain pulled chicken, but I laugh because it's just really sweet in its ignorance and care, but also like the masculinity of it, all of like, well, she's not going to eat, I'm going to make her eat this chicken and it'll be solved, you, I like you've told me that story before and I look back on it fondly, like this is a memory of mine.
Speaker 3:But also like pulled chicken yeah, is like incredibly nutritionally dense. Like dense, it's actually pretty good for you. Yeah exactly that used to be like a weird diet. Thing we do is go get the rotisserie chickens and be like, oh, we can eat as much rotisserie chicken as we want, like that's a fucking treat.
Speaker 4:I know it's so bizarre, so that's what I remember. And then I do remember my. Then I switched, so that was my around that time. About eighth grade was my. So ninth grade probably was my switch to bulimia. Because, like then you can hide bulimia a lot easier and you can eat when you're hungry. I can't handle like hunger pains like that. I just you go. I couldn't handle it for longer than a year and it could restrict, but it was like again I wanted to be very thin you know, so you've got places to be, yeah it's.
Speaker 3:It's not good.
Speaker 4:Smart or not hard, right and so I started fencing during that time, which is actually like an incredible workout yeah, the thing in the Olympics with the swords and stuff and so you sweat a lot. It's both aerobic and anaerobic exercise and you really have to have enough food in your system to do well at it. So I think I was eating enough and bulimia you get more calories usually just because you're eating. But I was what I guess they call like atypical bulimia, like even if you took the DSM-5 and like looked at the definition of bulimia, it requires like binging.
Speaker 4:And I didn't really have a binge, right, I just had eating basically normal amount of food, and then I would purge to get rid of what I thought was eating too much food yeah right, so rare, maybe like once or twice, like anybody ate too much pizza at a stupid party or something, you know, like I think that sort of thing, and then I would definitely puke that up. But, um, I learned how to do it from a girl. Oh no, it had to happen in the eighth grade, because I learned how to do it from a girl in band, oh boy.
Speaker 2:I know super, not cool forgive me if this is a stupid question so is this sort of like like anorexia and bulimia combined.
Speaker 4:Combined yeah, it's like restricting. Via barfing and then purging Correct.
Speaker 2:It's not okay.
Speaker 4:It's basically the bulimia comes in because you can't High turn your beard, you can't yes, a can't hide it. You can hide bulimia a lot better than anorexia, right, because you eat normally and you don't normally look as unbelievably thin.
Speaker 3:If you're bulimic, I mean you look thin you don't get the fun dark circles on your right the fuzz anyway.
Speaker 4:Yeah, some scary stuff. But yeah, I definitely think it was a combo and that's why I never like related to any of the stories in media around anorexia or bulimia, because I'm like I didn't do that whole thing or I didn't do the whole, but obviously you know that throwing up is not good for you. Yeah.
Speaker 3:You know, so like you're.
Speaker 4:You're very aware that something is wrong and that you shouldn't be doing this. But yeah, so then I just thought if I could stop throwing up, then I would. Then that's curing my eating disorder, right. So by like college, so all through high school, I'm, you know, throwing up in order to remove calories from the diet, exercising a lot, just like as an as a high school athlete in a club sense. Right, but not crazy unhealthy? Well, still crazy unhealthy. And then, by high school, I stopped. By the end of high school, oh sorry. In high school I started Metabolife.
Speaker 1:Oh, what is that so?
Speaker 4:do you know about Metabolife? So these are these that. So do you know about metabolife? No so these are these wild ass pills that are now illegal Epinephrine.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 4:In pill form they taste like a giant multivitamin. But when I and no dose, so I was taking like all those AP classes and so I had like a lot, you know. So we was taking all those AP classes and so I had a lot. So we're also high achiever here. So staying up late to do papers and getting all your work done. But then also the fen-phen, the metabolite, has so much caffeine it kills your appetite, so much caffeine. I remember sitting in my AP chemistry class and holding my arm out straight, kind of like making a little salute thing out with my arm, and I'm vibrating, just like vibrating with all of the uppers.
Speaker 2:Were you sleeping at all?
Speaker 4:I think I was sleeping fairly normally somehow.
Speaker 3:Kids are crazy.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you're still like a teenager, you know, and I was like working out will get you, so like fencing is exhausting. I was fencing like four days a week, but you still don't have that much food in your system, so maybe there's crashing, right? Yeah, I remember my boyfriend in high school found them and, like threw them in the trash can. But you couldn't get them unless you were 18, so I had to shoplift those, oh God, or get them from a friend. They were expensive and I didn't have an allowance or a job. So when he threw them away, I went back maybe an hour later to that trash can and dug them out of the trash can.
Speaker 3:That's really interesting like a side note, that's like, that's really interesting, Like it just had me thinking.
Speaker 2:it's sort of like having a drinking problem in high school.
Speaker 4:Right, it's a secret.
Speaker 2:Where it's like the legality of it is the issue, where it's like you had to shoplift it because you weren't old enough to buy it Yep, I got to find the older guy with the fake ID or something like that. But a lot of times I think in those situations people go to street drugs. It's like oh well. I can't drink every day because I can't go buy it, so I'll smoke weed every day or something like that.
Speaker 4:I'm kind of surprised that you stuck with that and you didn't move to some other sort of thing with that and you didn't move to some other sort of Cocaine or something. Yeah, yeah, I totally think that would have been a possibility if I had known a single human being that had access to cocaine. Growing up half an hour away from school and being a nerd and then my extracurricular activity is fencing. I meant so Wait, no, coke and fencing. Not a teeny, tiny little molecule, no, none of that, just wholesome nerdery, just so much nerdery. And cute boys. That was great for me. I was like the only girl. For the most part Good deal. So, yeah, that was that was rough. I think I also taught a couple. I know I don't think I do. I feel a lot of shame about this. I taught one of my girlfriends who was in fencing with me how to throw up. Not good, not cool, but also felt like a cool thing to share.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, because you were the diet friend, because then I'm diet friend yeah.
Speaker 2:Also, you're also a teenager too. Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 4:Yes, I was like 16. So that was high school, and then by college I was like let me just not throw up so much, and that cures it. Right, that means I'm cured.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 4:Fine, you did it. Then I had like depression for the first time my sophomore year of college and that was due to like being high anxiety. Oh, I also found out about Adderall my beginning like first semester of sophomore year.
Speaker 3:And I was like An incredible way to high achieve and not eat.
Speaker 4:And not eat.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so good.
Speaker 4:And I thought Adderall. I thought it was bullshit. I was like there's no way, there's like a pill you can take that makes you like more smart, like better. At school I was like there's no way, no way can there be a drug that makes you work harder and smarter. And then I tried some. I was like this has got to be bullshit. And then I wrote the best paper of my life and so then I had a fun relationship with that. That was similar to the metabolite. I think it was taking metabolite until and I had a couple bottles stored up until that was very illegal because someone died, like they took it off the market because there was a baseball player who died because they took metabolite into the huge lawsuit, I think holy shit yeah, and there's still crazy diet pills on the market.
Speaker 4:They just don't have the, the epinephrine like the pure epinephrine I have a question about this.
Speaker 3:Is that? What's an epipens? Yeah, what does it do? It's like an adrenaline rush that makes you not eat. Mm-hmm, that's crazy.
Speaker 4:I'm really glad I didn't know that about you guys. In your heart rate, your heart rate. Like that's why I was shaking.
Speaker 1:You are buzzing. In class you burned like 300 calories just sitting there.
Speaker 4:I'm glad I didn't know that about my epi pens.
Speaker 3:Well, that's like one mega dose, I know, yeah, that's an incredibly expensive addiction, so scary.
Speaker 1:I remember I had only knowledge of this because of what the metabolite of metabolite and it being pulled off the market because, uh, when I was, because I'm younger than you, uh, for the listeners and wow and uh, when my mom would drive home, drive us home from early morning saturday swim practice, she'd always be listening at npr and they would have episodes of the show that may still be on, called the people's pharmacy.
Speaker 4:Oh yes, that's every Friday, the people's pharmacy.
Speaker 1:I'm Joe and Joe and Bobby, yeah, and they would always say so fin fin. You know just, the side effects are just, you know, maybe outweighing the benefits here.
Speaker 3:They would call it FinFin, yeah.
Speaker 1:That does seem insane, because Metabolife is like a patented formulation.
Speaker 4:A brand name. There were other diet pills that had this stuff in it Metabolife was just the one, the cool one.
Speaker 1:But yeah, like I do remember them, basically saying like because again this was still peak, peak 90s, early aughts, where it was basically like yeah, this is the miracle drug, you know.
Speaker 4:That keeps the weight off you yeah.
Speaker 1:Like it is undeniable and disputable that it works.
Speaker 4:You should definitely have a heart disorder instead of being fat.
Speaker 2:That is definitely better Be dead instead Not to sidetrack too far, but aren't we sort of doing that with a Zip-Pick right now?
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 2:Where we're just like hey, we don't know what this does to you, but people lose weight, so fuck it.
Speaker 4:So we don't give a fuck. Also give it to children. Oh, I didn't know that. Wow, yeah, listen, we're one. We're gonna go into the american academy of pediatrics. Uh, guidelines that came out in 2023. Damn, where it's bad.
Speaker 1:That should be next episode because basically, where, where does american medicine sit vis-a-vis you guys' future progeny? You know, yeah, what are you going to have to protect them from?
Speaker 4:We are going to have like that is definitely going to come up, because that is something I think about a lot that, regardless of male or female, how do they not get this brain worm? You know, Like this is if I can prevent this, I would be so happy. Yes, For them to just and I think there's a lot we can do, thank goodness. There are smarter people who have already thought about this for a while it's already like so different as well.
Speaker 4:Yeah, there's a lot that's better. There's a lot that's better. I feel like it did take us back though.
Speaker 3:Oh my God.
Speaker 4:I don't even know what to do. We were having plus-size models on runways in Sports Illustrated.
Speaker 3:But now you can just be thin.
Speaker 4:Why would?
Speaker 3:we even accept anything other than that.
Speaker 4:I'm so bummed. Because, Oprah was Anyway all right, it's rough. We had to do a bunch of research on baby led weaning for like a marketing baby led weaning.
Speaker 3:Baby led weaning, it's where you don't do baby food, you do like solids immediately yes, so like you would give them like a banana after six months they're six months of age. So, like you, just kind of give them a few things to like mash on, yeah, and so like it's not even about them eating.
Speaker 3:It's about them like kind of like getting used to textures and whatever yeah, when there's like a lot of benefits to that, like you're actually getting introduced to different like food types and like textures and like touching it and whatever. Uh, and I was trying to figure out what is like the main reason people are doing this, because it seems a little scary when you first hear about it, because you're like that's obviously like a choking hazard, or is it, or whatever. Yeah, and I like the idea of like textures, colors, blah, blah, blah, not just like pureed spinach, which is like a way you would never consume spinach at any other point in your life.
Speaker 4:Unless you're at Morton's Steakhouse.
Speaker 3:Yes, but like one of the main drivers is to prevent, like infant obesity, get out of here, because, like they're like, oh well, the baby will know when to stop eating better than if they're like eating a puree and I was like I'm officially not into this anymore. Also, how big of an issue is infant obesity?
Speaker 4:I want a fat baby.
Speaker 3:I want this baby to have a thousand rolls. I found a baby picture of myself yesterday and I'm the fattest baby I've ever seen, to the point where I felt shame, I'm sorry, I'm totally deranged. I'm not ashamed of that baby.
Speaker 4:So I was a very wanted first baby to an older mother in the 80s. So like mom was 34 when she had me which is very old for someone in the 80s to have their first kid and mom was insanely she kept going. She told me. She kept going to the pediatrician and asking if I was getting enough food. She just like couldn't. But like the doctor literally like pulled out, like I had like five fat rolls on just my just just little, just little hawaiian buns like all over my forearms and it's like it's good.
Speaker 4:I was a healthy baby, um, but he kept just being like she's getting enough, it's fine. But you see me in pictures and it's like I don't know. I think it's cute.
Speaker 2:I want a biscuit rolls, rolls on rolls, um, emily oscar did say one thing on a podcast where she was like you know, like there's this big debate about like baby, like weaning and whatever, and she was like but one massive benefit of it, like, especially if you have multiple children is like you can just give them whatever you're eating, yeah, so you like it.
Speaker 3:Like she says it's lazy yeah, she's like it, just makes your life easier.
Speaker 2:It's not like, uh, it also seems crazy health benefit. It's just like you're busy and your life's insane, like give them a piece of macaroni yeah, I.
Speaker 4:So I'm totally on board, up until you kind of throw obesity in, which is like what I appreciate about maintenance phase, which is a fabulous podcast, and like a lot of the like um, anti fat bias folks that are out there. They literally you, they say obesity like a slur word. They, they they bleep it or they'll. Um, they spell it with an asterisk and, like OBE, they replace the E with that, and so I'm like, yeah, we're not even saying that word because it's dumb, right. So I'm a big fan of that.
Speaker 3:Uh, so infant obesity can go fuck itself in my professional and personal opinion, so like as a, as a data person, and I think you probably already know this but it's like those were just supposed to be metrics of measuring people size.
Speaker 4:Essentially, it wasn't a diagnosis, even the people person who invented it said that this is not an accurate or valid measure of health.
Speaker 3:Yes, thank you it was based off of French men in the 1800s. So we're looking at like maybe walker size individuals. You know we're not looking at like any person of any other race.
Speaker 4:We're not even looking at women no, who are built differently than men? None of this is what? Oh my god, I just forgot the word I just think, look like a French caddy. I just think, like you know, oh ha ha Like none of them are probably over six foot.
Speaker 3:You know it's the 1800s, like it's just Right. I'm sorry, it's not a measurement of health.
Speaker 1:I've had a diet of 10 cigarettes Right and a coffee and some bread.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:It's like 90% wood shaving Well.
Speaker 1:I remember going on my little when I started my power lifting thing because I was just like, yeah, let's get strong, let's gain some weight. And I went and saw my doctor for my checkup and he was just like I want to start thinking about cutting back and I'm like cutting back. And I'm like cutting back what I am 220 and I can deadlift 400 pounds you are made of muscle.
Speaker 1:Tell me what's what I was like find, find, find, the, the like. Like I don't care about your bmi, but literally in my chart since, or since 2012, I have, I have been overweight.
Speaker 2:I'm technically overweight as well.
Speaker 3:That was one of the best days of my life is when we found out that Walker was overweight.
Speaker 2:I was so happy for the listener.
Speaker 4:I'm a skinny ass motherfucker both of these boys are yeah, just to quickly finish the those are. These boys are oh my gosh, yeah, yeah, just to quickly, quickly finish the metabolite eating disorder stuff. Adderall started in college, which then had a crash and depression, and then in like my seat in my the spring of my sophomore year and then I went to France for art school and that was like the first the summer between sophomore, my sophomore year, and then I went to France for art school and that was like the first the summer between sophomore and junior year for my undergrad, and that was the best summer of my life and I walked like eight miles a day carrying my easel and stuff up to class. I basically did like French immersion because the host mom that I lived with and her daughter spoke no English, so I learned so fast, so much.
Speaker 4:And the food it's in Aix-en-Provence, which is this like incredible town in the south of France. The food and you're talking about cantaloupe. The last episode, like it's just called melon there and I thought I did not like honeydew, melon or cantaloupe. And I thought I did not like honeydew, melon or cantaloupe, and when I tell you this is like orgasmic levels of deliciousness.
Speaker 4:Of the most boring fruit, but it's not boring there and yes, I'm sure there's like a lot of the like it's fancy, it's in France, but like truly the food tastes better because I hadn't had there was no like slow food movement yet that.
Speaker 4:I had access to, you know, as a like late teenager. So I just remember telling myself that I'm going to go to France and I'm going to eat and I'm not going to throw up and being and I'm going to journal. It was the first time I kept like a regular journal and I just have never been so fucking happy in my whole life. And I smoked a whole lot of cigarettes, uh, um, but truly like and I. But I came back and I had gained like 15 pounds despite a great deal of like regular exercise. But when I tell you, I was like housing madeleines dipped in Nutella and eating because I just had never it had been so much, so long before since I had like eaten without thinking or counting. Yeah, I just had this like kind of magical, like sunshine filled summer. But when I got back, um, a couple of my mom's friends made a comment about like well, french food, it's very fattening or whatever then I then that started like a fun new diet and like lots.
Speaker 4:That's when I started drinking diet coke and smoking menthol cigarettes it sucks.
Speaker 3:It was like almost a really nice story.
Speaker 4:No, sorry, what kind of cigarettes did you smoke?
Speaker 2:Galois in France, I don't know what that is, but that sounds very fancy.
Speaker 1:It's a French cigarette French themselves only smoke Marlboro, yes, they smoke Marlboro.
Speaker 4:They smoke Cowboy Killers, marlboro Reds or Marlboro Lights. So I started with I miss smoking, like I'm not obviously pregnant, not smoking Guys don't get off my dick, don't apologize, it's so good Smoking rules. It's true, it's so bad, I'm so sorry. Everyone Again, not a medical advice podcast.
Speaker 1:But smoking does make you look cooler. I did Nobody looks uncool while smoking. They taste great.
Speaker 2:I don't care what anybody says.
Speaker 3:Oh god, and some eating disorders are better than others.
Speaker 4:So I started with Parliament. Menthol lights Whoa yeah, because that's what my friend smoked, but you can find them in the upstate pretty good.
Speaker 2:I used to smoke sorry, I used to smoke Parliament full flavors. Full flavor, that's what my friend smoked, but you can find them in the upstate pretty good. Sorry, we used to smoke. Parliament Full.
Speaker 4:Flavors, full Flavors. Yeah, blue Box, baby the full Blue Box, same team. So I went Parliament Lights for the majority of my 20s, but the first ones were Parliament Menthol Lights, then Camel Crushes those had just come out. That was cool, great technology, great, a real advance in the, in the fiberglass to your lungs technology.
Speaker 2:This is america yes.
Speaker 4:And then, uh, I had a. My dad smoked marlboro menthol lights for a long time, so I never really wanted to smoke those and I got off menthols pretty quick and went to the marlboro lights or Marlboro Ultra Lights, because that's what the hot girls smoked, sure, sure, sure.
Speaker 1:And then Marlboro Silvers right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the Silvers were the Ultra Lights, gold is the regular lights.
Speaker 4:And then sometimes, what were the little shorty packs? I?
Speaker 2:know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1:The number 76 blend or whatever.
Speaker 4:Yeah, they had little shorty packs and yeah, they had little shorty packs and I had like a Turkish gold phase when I was hanging out with a guy who was into those. Me too, yeah. Not because I was hanging out with a guy. You're just like no, they were great. They were actually smoother.
Speaker 2:Yeah and marble menthols that's like a turquoise.
Speaker 4:Are we just doing it? Listen, this is a fun aside.
Speaker 2:Sorry, my bad, I keep derailing it Sorry.
Speaker 3:Kids, if you're listening. We never smoked and we always went to church.
Speaker 4:I never went to church.
Speaker 3:We waited until marriage.
Speaker 4:No, I can't even joke about that. Yeah. And then Parliament Lights were like the hipster days of the mid, like basically 2006 to 2012 was Parliament Lights only.
Speaker 3:The hipster barista cigarette of my era was American Spirits.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:It's like the only thing we talked about.
Speaker 4:But those take 100 fucking years. Do they To smoke?
Speaker 3:I never smoked anything else so like no.
Speaker 4:You smoked a cigarette.
Speaker 3:Yeah, more than one time. Yes, I think I purchased multiple packs myself.
Speaker 4:I made Patrick fall in love with me Not to brag, with a cigarette. Wow, I thought it was the tampons that made him fall in love. I don't even remember that story yeah tell me about the tampons right from misery.
Speaker 3:He thought she was cool because she used some sort of ob tampons. Like you were, like I bet you're are they.
Speaker 1:they called OB, ob yeah.
Speaker 3:Because they have no applicator Like you just for some reason. Remembering the story? Is you just being like I bet you're an OB kind of girl? Or like whatever it was, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 1:And she was like. She was like fuck yeah. And we high fived about it.
Speaker 3:And then you fell in love, and then she went a cigarette, I guess.
Speaker 4:That and then she would a cigarette. I guess that's a hundred percent exactly how the story went. Beat by beat, jade, you got it. No, we'll do that, that one. That one's like a two hour story, ridiculous sorry to derail you.
Speaker 2:You got home from france. Your mom's parents were mean and you were.
Speaker 4:My mom's friends were rude and I was really into smoking cigarettes and then it was just like intermittent puking. I would go through phases where I didn't and then did. During this time I got very good at calories but didn't understand a lot about actual nutrition, just like how many calories are in things versus how many calories do I need to exercise out of me. So it became a fun mix like anorexia, bulimia and then what we call exercise bulimia, which is where you eat but then you burn that amount, which I think is literally that's what they teach you to do in all diets.
Speaker 3:Now, that is my fitness pal.
Speaker 4:That's what my fitness pal is. So then I went in, so post-college, post-undergrad, so let's say like basically my 20s were my orthorexia phase and boot camp and just so I'm not throwing up and I'm trying to eat normal amounts of food. But also then I was like if you eat this macros, if you get this much protein and do this much and you do this and you work out this way, then you can look exactly this way. Do this much and you do this and you work out this way, then you can look exactly this way. So like the bodybuilding ish stuff was very attractive to me because I was like it's even more controlled yeah but I thought it was a way to not.
Speaker 4:I really did not think that that was a manifestation of my eating disorder that was gonna be.
Speaker 3:My question is like, what were you like thinking was going on?
Speaker 4:thinking that I'm gonna be the best at this okay and I'm gonna look tan and hot and shiny and have abs. But see, that way you can still have a big ass, you can have muscle. Do you know what I mean? Like it's like you're supposed to have like a muscular butt and like thighs, and like I build muscle really easily and so and I had been athletic before and I like working out, I like lifting weights, like truly even to this day I still do, I'm not like fake, like I do like to work out and so it's um, feels good to like exert yourself in that way. So it was kind of like crossfit or like it was just every single fitness trend you could get on. Thus I'm on it.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Plus like personal trainers in between because I had like a nice ass job, I'm making good ass money and I definitely did the thing where you bring your goal picture.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah.
Speaker 4:To a personal. I was like part of my setup for a personal trainer. And then they're like let me they may have access to your MyFitnessPal, and you have they like. And then they're like let me they, they may have access to your my fitness pal, and you have they like are you're accountable to them? I love that, I loved it.
Speaker 4:So fucked up and then I didn't realize how bad any of that was. I was just gaining weight because I was sad, because my dad was sick and it was just like not great. So it kind of got chubbier, got gained some weight just because sadness, and definitely still had the eating disorder, brain and the body dysmorphia that came with it. That's when I didn't look at myself in the mirror for a long time. And then some couple desperate attempts at Orange Theory and stuff like that and getting back on my fitness pal Because again not realizing that that's still a manifestation of my eating disorder. And it really wasn't until 2020 when I started listening to maintenance phase and it just clicked that's amazing and I stopped following the bodybuilders.
Speaker 4:And I stopped and I started following like beautiful fat women, and I started listening to my sweet, kind husband who was like I love what you look like. Gain 100 pounds, gain 100 more pounds. I will still be unbelievably in love with you. And I just finally believed him.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's really amazing.
Speaker 4:I don't want to be like a man cured my eating disorder. That's not what I'm saying no.
Speaker 3:it's like.
Speaker 4:It's just like support, yes, it's like. It's just a very literal promise that, like you're not gonna be left alone and abandoned and shamed and shunned because your body takes up more space yes, and like we were talking about this like off of the the recording moments ago because pat was saying nice things about us.
Speaker 3:But it's like if I I don't think I would have been able to recover without walker because, like I like had a panic attack at work when danny came and picked me up and I was like I just kept thinking like you're not gonna love me anymore if I gain weight in recovery and like you said something like so like smart assy to me about it of like funny, how those stupid little quippy things like help.
Speaker 4:Anyway, sorry, what did he say he?
Speaker 3:made me feel like so, like like silly for like worrying about that, because I think we had already been through something really difficult and you were like, yeah, I'm gonna like stop loving you because you look a little different, or like something like I can't remember what it was, but it, like it was I don't know it lifted like such a weight off of my shoulders yeah, and like I mean, recovery is fucking hard right and like it wasn't like easy for us the whole time yeah, definitely but like I don't know if you have, like I don't know if you have a partner who's like, doesn't believe you have an eating disorder, or like, or encourages, like that's
Speaker 4:the stuff that scares me on the am I the asshole things on where it's like my husband says I'm fat now that I'm pregnant and it's like oh yeah, get away like I love how both of these boys are like, excuse me, like they just don't get it, but it's. It's so common. It's so common that the partners abusive partners usually, I guess are like reinforcing that.
Speaker 3:It's like drenched in the diet culture too. It's like you can't expect, like just because you snapped out of it, for your partner to immediately snap right like what?
Speaker 4:how fucking hard would that be if you did have? Yeah such a vast difference right.
Speaker 3:I remember I think I'm I'm like misremembering, but like when I got pregnant, I got really scared that you were gonna like not love me because I got fat again and you were like yeah, I'm gonna stop loving you because you're carrying my child again. The, the, the pervert corner.
Speaker 2:I was similar thing.
Speaker 1:I'm like oh yeah, I'm gonna stop loving you because you went up three cup sizes. I'm really, I'm really upset. That's where I draw the line.
Speaker 4:Big titties, no sir, not in this house that was actually one of my weirdest body change things when I gained weight was that I didn't have large boobs until I was like 32. That's wild, yeah, but it's weird when button-up shirts used to be fine and now they look extremely slooty.
Speaker 1:This is my favorite button of all of button up here.
Speaker 4:It's the middle button right in the cleavage is what patrick's doing. Yeah, this is very stressed out button.
Speaker 3:Jade, you've been uh pinning your shirts, oh my god, I got boob tape ever since I knew you, yeah every bag that I own, just to tape the buttons shut.
Speaker 4:Here's the good side of all of this where I'm actually feeling like this is an opportunity for me to reevaluate food and exercise in terms of joy, movement and nourishment where I don't think I've ever. I don't know if there's any other situation in terms of joy, movement and nourishment where I don't think I've ever. I don't know if there's any other situation that would force me to do it, to think that way. And now I'm not just thinking about me and shrinking myself. I'm thinking about what nutrients does this food have? What can I eat to make sure that the baby can grow? And then I want to move my body Since, yes, I am older than you, jade, I'm 39. Sorry.
Speaker 3:So I have like I'm a geriatric pregnancy has anyone said that to you yet?
Speaker 4:that it's geriatric? Yeah, no, actually all the doctors, all well, I mean, it's like I mean they did, I thought, I thought well, no, you brought it up to, I brought I I defensively brought that up and the obesity thing, the BMI thing, and she was like you're fine.
Speaker 1:That's amazing.
Speaker 3:I know.
Speaker 4:It was a huge relief.
Speaker 1:What kind of offices did you think you were walking into? It was like a bad one.
Speaker 4:I'm scared.
Speaker 1:She was like women, like 100 pounds heavier than you have the healthiest pregnancies. She was just like nobody here is going to talk to you about your body weight.
Speaker 4:It was wild, yeah. So I think I mentioned this in an early episode, like I was ready to be very defensive and I really didn't need to worry, it's reading 11 pounds.
Speaker 4:So so actually it's in all the books, yes, and it's in. So I Got Scared Because of Expecting Better by Emily Oster, which is a fantastic book. The vast majority of it is very soothing information, right, yes, and data presented in a very human language friendly sort of way. So recommend that book beyond all others. But there's a part in it, well one. There's a table that basically says if you are at this, it's basically by BMI how much weight you're supposed to gain throughout your pregnancy. And I mean immediately. I came to Jade after reading it and I was just like on a full on soapbox rant, like how the fuck am I only supposed to gain 11 pounds when literally, the baby will weigh hopefully at least 6 pounds? And then the blood, the amount of blood.
Speaker 4:Placenta. Yeah, what are the numbers, Pat?
Speaker 1:It was like I found a website that weighed everything, so like placenta, weight of fetus, and then just the weight of extra blood and amniotic fluid. Amniotic fluid Was like 13 pounds all by itself. Hello.
Speaker 4:And that's not including, like titty growth. I was like one boob is going to gain 11 pounds, so like what are you fucking talking?
Speaker 2:about For the uninitiated. The boobs grow so fast and it's not bad, Ladies get pregnant.
Speaker 1:it's cool.
Speaker 4:But yeah, so like I just remember being, I was like so basically, what you're telling me if this is what you're telling me, medical field is that I'm supposed to be in an active state of weight loss, of fat loss my entire fucking pregnancy in order to account for the baby and the fluid that I need to sustain the baby. So you can go fuck yourselves. I'm gaining more than 11 pounds. So I just I was so angry and defensive about that that I wanted because in the book she also describes being weighed every time and the doctor giving her shit if she gained more than a couple pounds each time she came to the doctor, and so I was like, if someone does this to me, I will explode yeah, yeah, um.
Speaker 3:So also, I think the reason you were feeling defensive about that is because I had a totally different experience at my appointment and then told you about it Right, right, right, but at our opening appointment. They were like you are allowed to gain 10 pounds during the pregnancy and I had already gained 10 pounds. It felt like during the pregnancy. It was like from the moment we found out, which was at like four weeks to like five weeks, so like as early on as possible, I like gained a ton of water weight, but I also like knew that like I was gaining 10 pounds and then losing that 10 pounds daily, just depending on, like, the time of day and bm and like whatever.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this is also normal I would go into the doctor and this is like during the winter, and they would weigh me in my coat and my doc martin's every single time, and so I was trying to ask them about it. And they're like okay, so you've already gained 17 pounds.
Speaker 4:And I'm like, except that I haven't, except that I'm doing a blind didn't you do a blind weigh-in and then they told you how much you gained? Oh no, I know, oh okay, okay, oh no, I know, oh okay okay.
Speaker 3:But like we went in the other day and I had lost six pounds in a week according to their charts and I'm like yeah, because I'm wearing my Reeboks.
Speaker 4:You're wearing giant boots.
Speaker 3:I'm just wearing different shoes. But also it's like you retain so much water. And also they're like you have to eat 300 calories more and like I was eating in a deficit before. So it's like I'm eating more and then I'm eating an extra 300 calories but I can't gain any weight, and I'm trying to get the RN to make sense of this.
Speaker 4:No, it doesn't make sense.
Speaker 3:I was like okay, if I've gained 17 pounds, does that mean I need to eat in a deficit to be okay moving forward? And she's like just do the best you can.
Speaker 2:But there's like 300 calories in an apple, and I'm like girl, I know how many calories are in everything you literally never have to tell me that it was, it was very clear that she was just like
Speaker 3:there's not the biggest apple I've ever heard, that's Chris.
Speaker 2:But she also very clearly. It was just like this is like the information I'm supposed to give people. This is the line I'm supposed to give them. If they ask me a nuanced question. You know my brain malfunctions. It was just sort of like we weren't having a conversation with her. She was just like this is what we recommend. And we were like, but what about this, and what about this? And then she kept going mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm and you were just like, okay, I'm not talking to you personally.
Speaker 4:Is this chat GPT Kind of?
Speaker 2:I think it was just sort of like this paper tells me what to say and you're asking me questions about it and I don't know.
Speaker 4:It's because they don't actually have any data on it, like on this concept, it was annoying. So, yeah, it's very stupid. And that's what kind of triggers some of the fun eating disorder things in pregnancy, I think because you're just already front loaded with this idea. If you're pregnant in a larger body, you're immediately confronted with like numbers that you have been actively avoiding in your recovery for hopefully a while now.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 4:So like I hadn't weighed myself in months and months. Like you know, I think I weigh, my try only weigh myself a couple of times a year, maximum or not at all, if at all possible, right. But like, because that stuff is super triggering, the numbers of things are super triggering, and so, oh, I was eating too much sodium and I immediately I went, I started tracking in my fitness pal to track my sodium and then I immediately like within a day.
Speaker 4:I'm tracking every single thing that went in my mouth and I was like Katie, that was fast talk about a slippery slope. So there's been. I'll definitely say I feel like I am definitely in recovery. I've definitely made huge strides in terms of like being comfortable in my skin and like changing a lot of bad mental habits and like behaviors, and I'm fucking proud and thank you, pat, for being proud of me. But I also, like I will say, this has been hard because you are, you are forced to be, you're supposed to, you're forced to have a relationship with numbers again, numbers about your body, and I think that's just inherently difficult. But again, we were talking about the self-awareness thing in the last episode with you, where it's like, okay, we're going to deal with the numbers but we're not going to let this get bad again, right, so we know where to stop ourselves.
Speaker 3:Hopefully, or hopefully tell someone that things are getting weird again and, like you, definitely have plenty of people in your life, will be like that's, that's silly yeah yep, I'm pretty sure.
Speaker 1:As soon as you told me you were on fitness battle again, I was just like wait a minute. And you were like. You were like no no it's not, it's not a big deal, and I was just like, okay, and then it was like a day later you were like no, no, no, it's not a big deal. And I was just like okay, and then it was like a day later you were like, okay, I gotta get on with it, but again the turnaround was so quick it's faster.
Speaker 4:But let me tell anybody out there who's maybe a partner with somebody with history of bad either disordered eating or an eating disorder. We're liars with history of bad either disordered eating or an eating disorder. We are liars like we are incredibly good, just like people again, people in substance abuse, like addiction, active addiction, like you are. You just are so good at lying about this specific thing. You might not be a liar anywhere else in your life, but you become very good at hiding your shitty behaviors Just to echo what Pat was just saying that is a very good, in my opinion, a very good sign of recovery.
Speaker 2:That you're lying to yourself is really what's going on, and you're like oh, this is fine.
Speaker 3:And then literally within 24 hours you're like no this has become a problem.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to ruin my life. I'm out. But that actually is really really really solid, positive.
Speaker 1:It's not the relapse, it's how you come back, how you come back from the relapse.
Speaker 4:But that's the thing. A relapse in addiction is very clear. It's like you're using a substance or not using a substance and with eating disorders you're basically in addiction. But you have to have just a little bit of heroin every day you know, and then you have to not have a million heroines, or like not have a million heroines, or like not have One million heroines.
Speaker 3:So yeah, that was so challenging early on. I mean you're two heroines just sitting at this table. Oh, dad jokes. But that was like so challenging early on because it's not abstinence.
Speaker 2:You can't. That's why it's so hard. I guess for me it was the opposite.
Speaker 3:I needed to eat way more than I was, and it's like I would love to just not think about food ever.
Speaker 4:If that was an option.
Speaker 3:I would have taken it.
Speaker 4:And I will say, as you go through recovery, you don't think about food as much. You have joy with food, all that, but right now, having to think about food as much as I do is actually in and of itself exhausting.
Speaker 4:Because that's what's so exhausting about having the eating disorder is like, and it's such a relief to be in recovery because you're like I don't have to fucking think about every calorie that goes in my body all the time, like I just don't have to care body all the time, like I just don't have to care, you have. So I literally remember 2020. I had the first thought of like I don't have to count every calorie, and then I went through like one of the stages of grief, where I was just like so angry that I was like I spent so much of my brain space, so much of every single fucking day of my life Thinking and memorizing how many calories went into my body, how many calories are in everything, how many calories did I burn when I do this workout versus this workout? All of that math and just awareness, I could have cured cancer, yeah.
Speaker 2:For real.
Speaker 4:What the fuck else could we be doing as women with our time?
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's like a real key. Our key theory is like diet culture is to like keep women down and like make our brains not work. We can't even challenge men.
Speaker 4:I want to like slam like Teresa Real, housewives of New Jersey, like table-flipping angry about this and I just I don't think I'll ever not be angry about it, but I just I remember having that revelation and I think it's those funny little weird thoughts that actually keep they're like my little mantras, that keep me in, like like not going back to those shitty thoughts. I'm like no, remember, remember when you used to think about this every second, and now you don't have to, and how wonderful that is.
Speaker 3:It's so terrifying. And when I was worried about having to control food and relapsing. My fear was like I'm going to lose all my friends and my career and my relationship with Walker and all the things I love about myself were found.
Speaker 4:Because you do, you lose yourself.
Speaker 3:Yes, you just lose yourself.
Speaker 4:Yes, you don't have literally everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I was just you mentioned grief like there's identity loss fully you're like, I'm the person.
Speaker 4:I'm the diet friend.
Speaker 2:Yes, exactly, and there's so much disrupt and it's like, well, people like me because of this or that, or yeah, whatever, and then there's so much that's wrapped up and it's like, well, people like me because of this or that or whatever.
Speaker 3:And then there's all this shit.
Speaker 2:And then there's anger about like look at all this fucking time I wasted thinking all this bullshit Right. And then it's like you know, you go through all these like weird identity things and you come back around and you're just like, oh, I was actually fine the whole time.
Speaker 4:Acceptance yeah, yeah, just like. Oh, I was actually fine the whole time. Acceptance yeah, yeah, like.
Speaker 3:this is what happened to me, but I'm gonna do this moving forward. Like you know, it's nice, yeah, and then you get to make cool podcasts yeah, and make friends and eat, eat cereal, eat second bowls of cereal well, this was fun, this was good. Yeah, I could sit here and talk for another three hours, but this was great.
Speaker 4:This was really great. I am getting my um nighttime nausea, so hell yeah let's sign off thank you, cute boys, for being here. Yeah, yeah, this was a great time and.
Speaker 2:I was here too okay, all right see you later you.