The Hidden Anxiety of Weight Loss w/ Dr. Robyn Pashby

Ana Reisdorf, MS, RD, talks with Dr. Robyn Pashby, clinical health psychologist and founder of Health Psychology Partners, about the mental load of weight loss - why anxiety often climbs as the scale drops, why diet rules feel impossible to release on Ozempic, Wegovy, or Zepbound, and why weight management works better as lifelong care than a finish line. If you've ever felt afraid to trust your body on a GLP-1, this conversation gives you a calmer framework for what actually matters.

IN THIS EPISODE
- Why anxiety often goes up when weight comes down on Ozempic, Wegovy, or Zepbound
- The hidden "diet backpack" that keeps people stuck in food tracking, calendar countdowns, and on/off-the-wagon thinking
- Why GLP-1 medications should be treated as one tool in a lifelong toolbox, not a permanent solution
- How to build an obesity-medicine-trained care team (physician, registered dietitian, psychologist, movement specialist)
- How to respond when family, friends, or neighbors judge your decision to use a GLP-1

ABOUT THE GUEST
Dr. Robyn Pashby is the founder of Health Psychology Partners and a clinical health psychologist with a dual-track PhD in medical and clinical psychology and nearly 20 years of clinical experience focused on weight, eating, internalized weight bias, anxiety, and relational concerns. She serves on the National Board of Directors of the Obesity Action Coalition, the American Diabetes Association's Obesity and Weight Management Advisory Group, and the Clinical Practice Committee of The Obesity Society, and holds a research faculty appointment at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. A PSYPACT-approved psychologist, she trains physicians and allied healthcare providers on weight-inclusive care and provides telehealth therapy in more than 40 states.

CONNECT WITH ROBYN
Website: https://www.healthpsychologypartners.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynpashbyphd/
Instagram: @robynpashbyphd
YouTube: @robynpashbyphd

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*The content of this show is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. The goal of this show is to provide various points of view about GLP-1 Medications. The personal and professional opinion of the guests and their content does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Ana Reisdorf or GLP-1 Hub.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You know, I've said for a long time that I can plot anxiety going up as people's weight goes down. And it's not because of the weight loss, it's because the minute you lose a pound, it's really normal to immediately begin worrying about what happens when that pound comes back. And it brings two friends.

SPEAKER_01 0:20

Welcome to the GLP One Hub Podcast. If losing weight has ever made you feel more anxious instead of more peaceful, this episode is going to feel very validating. I'm Anna Reisdorf, registered dietitian and GLP1 user. And today I'm joined by Dr. Robin Pashby, a clinical health psychologist whose work focuses on the intersection of physical and mental health, especially obesity, eating struggles, and body image. We're talking about the mental load so many people carry around weight, the fear that weight loss won't last, the pull to keep tracking in dieting, even when GLP1s quiet the food noise, and why weight management is better understood as long-term healthcare and not a one-time finish line. And as always, if you're enjoying our podcast, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And if you're watching over on YouTube, make sure you share your comments below. Now let's get on to the episode. Thank you so much for being here. Dr. Robin Pashby, we met at a downsized meetup very, very briefly in Atlanta in November. Right. And ever since I heard about you and watched this YouTube video, was it a TED talk? A talk that you did on a stage. Sure. A talk that you did on a stage about the weight we carry. I was like, I need to have her come on the podcast. Because this is such an important topic for those of us on our GLP1 journey. So could you introduce yourself? Sure. And uh let people know what you do.

SPEAKER_00 1:59

Sure, sure. So I my name is, like you said, Dr. Robin Pashby. I'm a clinical health psychologist. So I actually got a dual PhD in clinical psychology and medical psychology, which is kind of a unique specialty. And I completed my PhD in a medical school. So I've been, I always like to say that I my work and my interest and my passion lives at the intersection of physical and mental health. And for the past 20 plus years, I've been really interested in the work around obesity, around long-standing weight-related struggles, eating struggles, body image concerns, that whole area. And I come to that both out of personal lived experience and also a long family history of struggles with weight and eating and all kinds of things that we learn throughout our lives. So I come to it with a genuine passion for it because of my own experience. But then also after decades of working with patients, I feel like it's it's just sort of my duty to continue to talk about the importance of mental health in obesity care.

SPEAKER_01 3:05

Yes, it is always a missing component, I think, in many people's journey. They think that we're talking before this, the weight is going to solve all the problems. I know. I wore a size two. Everyone would like me. My husband would be nice. I get the job I wanted. Right.

unknown 3:22

Right.

SPEAKER_01 3:23

I'd be on the cover of Time magazine.

SPEAKER_00 3:25

You know, I always, you were just saying, I posted about this today because people so often, we we all, I mean, including me, have been stuck in that way of thinking at times of life, right? Like, if this is gone, I will be fill-in-the-blank, happier, more successful. And and I want to be truthful that there there is some truth to that. If we look at bias statistics in terms of who gets promotions, who gets job offers, those sorts of things, there is some reality, even pay gap around living with obesity. There are documented incidents that bias and stigma really do exist in those settings. So it's not all false, right? But it also is built on this idea that weight is the cause of all of our problems. So, you know, people for, I think for a long time have been taught that anything wrong with them is weight related. You go to the doctor for a sprained pinky and they talk to you about your weight. So it feels like, well, obviously, if weight is the root of all of my problems, then losing it will solve all my problems, right? It's kind of a natural conclusion to jump to.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

Yeah, definitely. And even hell, even with health, you know, you can lose a lot of weight and your health issue maybe will get better, but maybe it won't. Depends on what the health issue is.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Right, right. Yeah.

unknown 4:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:40

Right. So the same with mental health issues, right? So if people have depression or anxiety, sometimes it's secondary to experiences living with obesity, whether that's bias and stigma or chronic inflammation and HPA activation. So there's lots of reasons, but sometimes it's because of a, you know, unhappy childhood or a or trauma in your past or a difficult marriage or things, and those things don't go away just because your clothing size changes.

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Right, right. So in your talk, you started by carrying this backpack.

SPEAKER_00 5:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:14

And it was full of stuff. Oh my god. And then you started taking it out. So tell explain to me like what are the people that maybe haven't watched it, what it was about, and what the like metaphor you were going for there was.

SPEAKER_00 5:26

Sure. So I had this idea, and I've been wanting to do something like this for some time, but the the stars aligned because I was at the Your Weight Matters conference for the OAC. I'm on the board of directors there, and the conference happened to be near my hometown. So it's one of those things where I could pile a bunch of stuff in my car and drive to the place instead of jump on an airplane. And I wanted to make a visual representation of what I have experienced and what my patients have shared with me for the last 20 years about what it is like to live with weight struggles that has nothing to do with your pant size, right? Or nothing to do with the number of calories you eat. And I wanted to represent how heavy all of that can feel at times. And I thought, what better way than to walk on stage with a backpack on full of the heavy stuff that we carry? And so I hope people listening to this will go watch the talk and give me their feedback. But some of the things I put in there were I bought one of those toy red flyer wagons for this idea of being like on the wagon, off the wagon, on the wagon, off the wagon, for, you know, like, oh, I'm either being good today or I'm being bad today, that whole thing. I put a calendar in there because how many of us over the course of our lives have picked a date by which we will lose X amount of weight or, you know, and we like start doing the math backwards and thinking, okay, my class reunion is in November. That means I need to start losing a pound a week by this time and sort of all of that. And I put a food scale in there, no need to explain why. I put all these things to represent the heaviness that can come psychologically. And I tried to play it out as this big metaphor, and um, it really resonated with people more than I even expected.

SPEAKER_01 7:16

Yes, because for me, and this is something I'm actually struggling with for talking to my audience about a little bit, the GLP one to for my life, because I am a GLP one user, has helped me let go of 90% of that. I don't track, I don't count, I don't think of what diet I'm starting on Monday. I do my exercise, I eat my protein, I drink my water, I eat vegetables, and like that entire personality is gone. I became a dietitian because of all of that.

SPEAKER_00 7:48

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 7:48

And so now what I'm what I see people still struggling with is still wanting to hold on to all of that. You know, still not wanting to let go of those diet behaviors, not wanting to let go of measuring your food, not wanting to let go of doing keto all the time. How can we get to like a more I want the gift of freedom for everybody from all of these things we carry? Do you think that's possible? Or do you think that people are just too ingrained?

SPEAKER_00 8:17

So I would challenge us to think about it a little differently. Okay. I, in my experience, in in coming at it from a psychology side, it's not that people want to be carrying this around. No. It's that people feel terrified of letting it go. And why wouldn't we feel terrified of letting go of something that has been taught to us as the answer to everything? Right. Like tracking your food, for example, you mentioned that first. People have such a love-hate relationship with it, you know, and uh including me. And I remember the very first time I tracked my food as a little detour and went to show it to my doctor at the time. And I I like went to give my diary and I said, I feel like you just asked me to get naked and stand here in front of you. Like it felt that vulnerable and scary, yet also I knew it was important. It was this really crazy experience. And so I try to remember what that's like when you don't know the person sitting across from you, right? It's really vulnerable. Yet also you've been taught this is how you do the thing that you want to do. So I don't know that people want to hang on to the diet mentality or to the keto plan or the whatever. I think people are just really afraid of trusting themselves and trusting their bodies when it feels like time and time and time again, they've tried that through one of these plans or programs and it's not worked out for them. And people really internalize that as a failure of themselves rather than a failure of the treatment modality or a failure of the plan that they were on. And so, I mean, I don't want to sign up to, you know, feel like a failure again, right? I think so. I I challenge us to think of it not as people being hesitant to let go, but being afraid to let go.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

Yeah. Yeah. And I think that it's the diet culture and all of these things that we have tried and many of us failed at that gives us fear. Like GLP one is just another thing we're gonna fail at. Why wouldn't it be? Right, right.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

And I, you know, I've said for a long time that you like I can plot anxiety going up as people's weight goes down. And it's not because of the weight loss, it's because the minute you lose a pound, it's really normal to immediately begin worrying about what happens when that pound comes back and it brings two friends. Like people, when you've gone through weight cycling over and over and over, I mean, I have many clients that will sit across from me and say, I have lost and gained 900 pounds in my life, right? Up down, up down, up, down. And so isn't it normal then to expect that, right? We always say history repeats itself. And so it's scary to think about maybe this is different, but also even scarier to think about believing that.

SPEAKER_01 11:09

If you're in a GLP1 and you're feeling overwhelmed, confused, and trying to piece together information from random Facebook groups. I built something just for you. This is the GLP1 Hub membership. It's a supportive, evidence-based community led by me and a fellow registered dietitian designed to help you feel your absolute best, stay consistent with your goals, and understand what your body really needs while on your journey. So inside you're going to find nutrition guidance, support around creating habits, vetted resources, and a community of people who really gets it with no judgment, no misinformation, and no extreme diet plans. So if you're wanting a little bit more structure around your journey and you want real answers and ongoing support, this membership is for you. Starts at just$9 a month, and you can learn all of the details at glp onehub.com backslash membership or find the link in the show notes, and I hope to see you inside. So do you try to help them maybe manage some of that anxiety? Yes. What are what's some advice that you have around that? Because that's what I would like, you know, is to help. I mean, I can't, I can only help them on a platform. I don't see them one-on-one, but like in a better way that they can understand that this could actually be, you know, a solution or a they don't have to worry so much.

SPEAKER_00 12:35

So here's how I think about it. Yeah. I think that the GLP ones have been life-changing for people, but I don't think of them as a solution. I think of them as one of the many, many, many, many tools that people use over the course of their lives managing their weight, right? Yeah. And I think that it's helpful to put that in a real perspective so that people don't worry that if food noise creeps back a little bit after being on a GLP one for a year or two years, that they don't automatically jump to that's it, too bad it's over, right? But to sort of normalize like this is a tool, and you have a bunch of them at your disposal, and we're gonna keep pulling from the toolbox over and over and over again. And we will continue to work in like research and in science and things to expand options for you. That's why the GLP ones exist because people didn't give up. People kept working at it, and that's happening tenfold now, right? So I always say, like, people will ask me things like, Well, am I gonna be on this medication forever? Fill in the blank with the name. And I say, I have no idea, but probably there will be something better coming in whatever way. It better, not meaning like lose more weight, but maybe more personalized for the things that you particularly struggle with, maybe different dosing mechanisms. We've already seen that with the, you know, the oral GLPs being more available. I try to like normalize it and and help bring down the temperature around it, but I don't want people to think like, oh, this is the solution stamp done, because we don't know that to be true exactly, right? They can be life-changing, but I don't think that the management of health is a solution-focused thing. I think the management of health in general is like the rest of our lives. And hopefully those are long and rich and full, and we get to do it for a long time.

unknown 14:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:29

Does it help at all to like maybe reframe a lot of people I see thinking in the short term, right? So now I'm on a GLP one, I'm gonna lose this 30, 50, 100 pounds, and they have no plan for after that. Right. Like you just said, I thought it was interesting. Like, this is a health management thing long term because your life continues on. Right.

SPEAKER_00 14:53

Okay. Are you ready for like kind of a weird thing that I sometimes tell my clients? I say, I want you to think about managing your weight, kind of like managing your dental health. Uh all like jokes aside about how scary dentists are, because usually I say, like, I want you to think of me like you're a dentist, not in the scary way, like, I'm not gonna drill your mouth. But dentist, like dental health, hopefully, if you have your teeth for your long, your whole life, right, is something that you have to do a lot of work to maintain. It's not always fun and it doesn't always work perfectly. Meaning I can brush and floss and get my fluoride and do all those things, drink plenty of water, blah, blah, blah. And I can still get a cavity. I can still chip a tooth. I can still do those things. And that is not a direct reflection of my willpower or my execution of said brushing and flossing, right? And hopefully you have a support person there to kind of check in with along the journey when things are going well and when you chip your tooth and you need to go in for all kinds of appointments. So weight health is kind of like that. It's like your lifelong journey. You can do everything, quote unquote, healthy and all of that, and still have a blip. And hopefully, you have a good support team there that jumps in and starts problem solving with you to get you over that blip, right? And that's what I hope so much is going to grow out of this GLP one explosion, not just more meds, but more recognition of how important it is to have this comprehensive care team at your fingertips so that you can navigate these journeys as they come up, knowing that they might come up, even with all the tools.

SPEAKER_01 16:31

Right, right. So, who are the people that you think you ideally need on your team in a perfect world?

SPEAKER_00 16:37

In a perfect world, like I do advocacy stuff on Capitol Hill all the time to try to advocate to make this a reality. So I'm I'm fully aware that this is not a reality for everyone. But in a perfect world, in my mind, you have an obesity medicine trained physician, you have an obesity medicine trained psychologist or mental health professional, you have an obesity medicine-trained registered dietitian, you have an obesity trained physical therapist or personal trainer type, right? A movement specialist. That's like the core. But I would add, in addition to that, people like a relationship coach, maybe like an occupational therapist to help deal with how things change in your home as you age. There's just so many layers to this. Now, in reality, I wish that everybody had that, independent of what their weight struggles are, right? I wish we all had a team of people we felt like we could hold on to for support when we need it.

SPEAKER_01 17:32

Right. Yeah. I think that having some level of support around you, especially as life changes, because stress happens, you get diagnosed with an illness, there's just so much.

SPEAKER_00 17:42

Or your partner gets diagnosed, or your aging parent, or you have a kid, or you lose your job, or you get another job, there's just like a million variables always changing. And I think people get worried about like holding on to the habits that they form when they're losing weight and are so afraid. This is back to the fear thing that if I do anything different, like I'll lose that, I'll lose the grip on that. But of course, it's it's not really fair, even to us, to assume that what we're doing when we're 35 is the same as how we're gonna be living when we're 65 or 75, right? Our bodies age over time. That's normal.

SPEAKER_01 18:20

Wow. All right. So how do you help people kind of work through some of that fear, some of that change? I th I mean, even for me, like I think about like business. I had a really successful business and I thought that business was gonna last forever. I had no vision that it could not, maybe not. Yeah, you know what I mean? And obviously, businesses fail all the time.

SPEAKER_00 18:39

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

So how do we how do we like see life in a little bit longer perspective and like kind of prepare ourselves, maybe?

SPEAKER_00 18:47

Well, so my reaction to that is like I spend so much time trying to get people to live in the now, not the future, because truly now is the thing over which we have the most agency. Sure. Right. And I mean, if if literally if the global pandemic taught us nothing, it's that we don't know what's around the corner. And that can be in good ways for some people, right? And it can be in hard ways for others. And I love the idea of thinking like, okay, what's right here in front of me? And what is it that I can do to make myself and the people that I love feel as well and be living as well as we can within the construct that we have: the environment, the social means, the financial means, all of those factors. That is like my ultimate goal. Um, in psychology, you know, we talk a lot about the pendulum. Like, think of a pendulum on a grandfather clock. If it swings too far back, psychologically speaking, it's like people get trapped in things like, oh, I wish I should have, or I could have, or I why didn't I? So a lot of regret. And that is sort of like leaning toward the depression side. If the pendulum swings too far the other side, it's like, what will happen when? What if, what's coming? And that can lean to the anxiety side. And so when the pendulum is kind of in the middle, that's when we have the most agency and calm around our mental health. So I think there's some power in that, while also, of course, balancing the reality of preventive care and all of those other things.

SPEAKER_01 20:17

How do you recommend people stay in the present or focus on the things they can do? You your present goal can be like, I'm gonna lose a pound today, right? But you can't control what your body does. You can go for a walk, you can eat a vegetable, you can drink some water.

SPEAKER_00 20:33

How do you get them to like so I always say, like, can you control the number on the scale? I mean, other than reaching in there and like changing the dial yourself, right? Like you're setting a clock, you can't control the number on the scale. You can't even say I'm gonna lose a pound in a month because you don't know. What you can do is say, I'm gonna go out for a walk, or I'm gonna write down what I ate, or I'm gonna make sure I take my GLP one on time, or I'm going to make an appointment with my doctor, or I'm gonna go talk to my therapist, right? So I asked people to move away from weight-related goals all day, every day, and move in to behavior goals, thinking goals. I'm gonna challenge that way of thinking. I'm gonna, you know, tell myself that I can do this rather than tell myself I'm a failure. I'm gonna change my self-talk. I'm gonna call a friend and ask for help, babysitting my kids so I can get to the yoga class I like. Whatever it is, right? I'm gonna do an action. That's the thing over which we have control. So that's how I work with it.

SPEAKER_01 21:34

Do you ever recommend any forms of like meditation or like being present or any of those types of things? Every day. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

As a former reluctant meditator, I have now embraced that myself fully, fully. And I thought I spent years being like, that's just not for me. I can't sit still, my can't clear my thoughts, all those falsities. And now I get to do it and I think of it as a massage for my brain. It's like a gif. It doesn't have to be long. You don't have to sit on a meditation pillow. You don't have to have perfect posture. You don't have to not move. You don't have to scratch the nose. Like all those things, right? Just sort of take some time to tune in because being present means paying attention. I can't tell you how many mornings I wake up with a plan to, I don't know, go lift weights or go to the gym or something like that. And I'll think, what does my body need this morning? And it turns out, like this morning, I had a plan to do one thing. And honestly, like my lower back was just achy and stiff and sore. And I was like, I don't, that's not what my body needs. What my body needs is a 30-minute yoga class. So I just popped on a 30-minute yoga class. But I can tell you that if I hadn't tuned in, I probably would have just avoided going to the other class because I was like, kind of, I don't want to do that, right? It doesn't feel right today. Right. And I would have launched into that whole thing about how I never follow through with my own promises and all that self-talk that ends up hijacking us.

SPEAKER_01 22:59

Right. And so the meditation kind of allows you to stop that, has the awareness of stopping the self-talk.

SPEAKER_00 23:04

Yeah. Or at least being aware. I mean, I think about this all the time. What are we asking clients to do when we're asking them to make these lifestyle changes? We're asking them to name what habits they already have, habits of mind, habits of action. Name it, understand it, not judge it, but have curiosity around it. Why is it that I walk into the kitchen at 10:45 every night after my spouse goes to bed and look for food? I don't have to say, oh, I'm so disgusting because I do that. Curiosity, what is that, right? Why am I needing food at that time of night? Once you start naming it, understanding it, then deciding is like, is that my habit right now as an ex-old woman, you know, with this situation going on? Or is that stuff that I learned when I was 13 and felt really out of control because my parents were fighting all the time and I was so stressed and I didn't have anyone to talk to? Or is that because I developed that when I was nursing my baby and I didn't have another time to eat? And like now it's just sort of become a habit. Name it, understand it, ask if it's still yours, and then begin to make little tiny challenges. Is there something I can do differently while tolerating a little bit of the distress that comes from any change we make?

SPEAKER_01 24:25

Right, right. That that distress, I think, in the dealing with this anxiety or the upset or the feelings of any kind without turning to food or other substances, maybe that's I think the most challenging part. I quit drinking at the beginning of the year. And I was never a huge drinker, but there was a few times where I was mad and I really want to drink, and it was like, I don't want to be mad. If I had a glass of wine, I wouldn't be mad anymore. I'd be in a great mood. Right.

SPEAKER_00 24:53

But I had to just sit there and it's it's awful. It's hard. And it's so unfamiliar to have to tolerate some of that. And I I mean, I hope people will get enough from just listening to us that I'm not meaning to tolerate things that are dangerous or or that sort of thing, of course. But within within some sort of normal boundary, like feelings are are our guide. What were you mad about? Right? You don't have to tell me, but like maybe you were mad because I don't know, someone at work said something really rude.

SPEAKER_01 25:25

My neighbor did something that I don't like, and she already triggers me. So I was just mad.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

Right. And so, like, isn't it okay to be mad when you feel like you know you've been disrespected, for example? I think so. It doesn't match the situation exactly. If you are happy go lucky in the face of being disrespected, what does that teach us? That teaches us to tolerate disrespect, right? We don't really want that. So, I mean, I I I do think that that's a piece of the work, but I don't that is not all of the work, right? I mean, of course, that this is it's really complex dealing with it's a long, a long game.

SPEAKER_01 26:03

So, one last thing I want to ask you is about stigma still around these medications. There's a lot of pushback.

SPEAKER_00 26:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:12

Um, how do you what advice do you have for people who uh are getting, you know, I've heard a lot of stories where people are at a dinner party and people start talking about the shots and they don't know that that person is on it and they say a lot of things before they know?

SPEAKER_00 26:25

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 26:26

Yes. So how do you, how do you recommend coping with that?

SPEAKER_00 26:29

So I guess I ask a couple questions around that. Is the opinion, is the person voicing that opinion someone that you respect? Is it someone whose advice you would take on other topics? Is it someone knowledgeable about your struggles and your medical history? If the answer to those three questions are not a resounding yes, then I encourage people to not sort of not own it, right? I mean, if the person talking is your neighbor, if you happen to be at a neighborhood party and it's your neighbor who annoys you every time, and you know, he or she is there talking about how GLP ones are overused and misused and all of that, like you don't respect that person. She doesn't know anything about your personal life and your medical history. Why, why would she be the one whose opinion you would listen to? Right? So that's sort of I remember Brene Brown listen uh saying once that the people whose opinions should matter to you, you could write them on a one inch by one inch piece of paper, meaning like it should be a really small group of people. And that really stayed with me because I think that's true in the GLP one world, where literally everyone has an opinion and almost no one has an education. It's wild. Nailed it. Right? It's wild. So think about that, right? You wouldn't listen to someone uneducated about, you know, I don't know, your iPhone use or something if if they had never seen one before. You know, I mean, it's just it just doesn't make any sense.

SPEAKER_01 27:58

Yeah, that's a that's a good reframe that helps me with my YouTube comments. Thank you. Yes, Robin. Yes. So the last thing I like to ask on the podcast is what are you excited about for the future? Because you're doing a lot of work with advocacy and with uh, you know, obesity uh stuff. So what are you excited about in the future in terms of obesity treatment or GLP1s or or whatever?

SPEAKER_00 28:19

Yeah. Okay, this is so easy for me to answer. Besides the fact of just science in general, could because science is so amazing. I have spent the last 20 years doing this work in the medical side of the house, meaning I've sort of found my place, my niche among physicians, registered dietitians, obesity medicine specialists. So when I think about like the list of conferences that I attend every year, for example, it's like the Obesity Society, the Obesity Medical Association, these sorts of places. And I have lived in that space and have often been one of the very few psychologists at those, because psychologists, probably like dietitians, tend to stay among psychologists, right? And dietitians stay among dietitians. But I found my place with the medical community and I love it there and I am going to stay there. But what I'm so excited about is that I am committed in 2026. I told myself, and I'm doing two things already to do that, that I am showing up in the psychology world and bringing my expertise around obesity medicine and obesity care to the psychology side of the house. There are not enough psychologists who understand obesity medicine. There are not enough psychologists who know anything about GLP1 treatments, about the mental health implications, whether it's substance use, uh, depression and anxiety, uh, disordered eating. There's such a gap. And I feel like I have the potential to really fill that so that more people have access to mental health professionals who understand their journey without bias and stigma. So that's what I'm super excited about.

SPEAKER_01 29:52

Oh, that's gonna be great. I think that every health professional, psychiatrists, I mean speech pathologists, everyone, personal trainers, people who run your MRI, all these people could use that.

SPEAKER_00 30:05

Right. Right. But I have uh some leverage in the psychology world. And it's time for me to use.

SPEAKER_01 30:11

Good. Well, I'm excited about I'm excited for you. I think it's gonna be great. And I love seeing you on uh socials as well. So where can people find you and learn more about your work?

SPEAKER_00 30:20

Sure. Well, my my practice is called Health Psychology Partners, and I'm in based in Washington, DC, although we offer health coaching across the United States, and we also offer virtual uh mental health therapy in uh 44 states around the US. So that's pretty cool. And you can find me at healthpsychologypartners.com. And then on socials, I'm at Robin Pashby PhD, and it's Robin with a Y. And you can find me on TikTok, Facebook, and of course LinkedIn where I'm most prolific because that's my wheelhouse. I'm I came from the academic world, and that's where I'm most comfortable still. Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 30:55

Awesome. Well, thank you so, so much for being here. I'm so grateful you're able to come on and share all this really valuable reframing and information with us. Yes, yes. Thank you all so much. Thank you for listening to this episode of the GLP OneHub podcast. Dr. Pashfi is so full of incredible insight. She is so great in this space, and I'm I'm really grateful for all of her work. And so, since it is Thursday, we will be answering a listener question. And question comes from somebody over on Instagram. Make sure you're following over there at GLP1Hub. And the question is: Do I need to track calories on GLP1? Uh, tracking can be useful for certain situations if you are unsure if you're getting enough food or you don't know exactly how much protein you're getting day to day. But I really want to encourage you to move away from tracking. It really doesn't teach you to connect with your body. You put your stats into an app and it gives you, you know, an algorithm and pops out a number that you're supposed to follow. And you follow that number whether you're hungry or not hungry, or, you know, whatever it is trying to hit that number. And that just seems to me like an obsessive, it can go become a very obsessive thing to have to stick with your calories or track this or track that. So if tracking works for you, you can do it. Like I don't, I'm not gonna control that. I just feel like it really isn't all that useful to do constantly and long term. So my basic answer is no, you don't have to track your calories, but if it's working for you, you do you. And if you want to leave a question for the show, you can text the show now. You can find that in the show notes, and I will feature your question on uh one episode on Thursdays. All right. So I'll see you in the next episode.