Liberate Yourself From Binge Eating

Introduction to binge eating and fasting 0:00

We are honored to have with us today Sandra Scheinbaum, who I've known for some time now, but never got to, you know, do this interview and dove into your knowledge. But first of all, thank you for joining us. Thank you. I am thrilled to be here. So we you know, so that everybody knows we know what we're going to be talking about, binge eating and how fasting may and support that or not support that. We're going to find out from you what your thoughts are. And this is where, you know, people will say, oh, I wish I had a coach.

I wish I had somebody to train me. Sandra has trained hundreds or maybe thousands. I got the number wrong, probably. Thousands and. Thousands of coaches on how to support people at work. Getting right to the, you know, the source now of the person who's taught all these health coaches how to do what they do. And they're out there now supporting people. And it all came from you, which is amazing, the ability to speak to you about all this. And thank you for for that. And what we're going to talk about today is how fasting time, restricted eating can affect bingeing, you know, and some people don't even know that they are bingeing.

You know, they it's really like this, first of all, called awareness moment. So what do you even consider binge eating to be like? How does someone even know that that's a problem? Sure. So first of all, there are differences between somebody who is just overeating Thanksgiving meal and they just eat a lot. They have second and third helpings and it happens infrequently, often during special celebrations like that, where we're encouraged to eat big quantities of food. And then there are people who actually have a binge eating disorder.

And this is where there's a real loss of control that once they start to eat, there is no stopping and they may each to the point where they are stuffed. Now, it's not bulimia when someone is believing they are going to binge and then they're going to find some way of purging. But somebody who is binge eating, they are going to be just at that point where they going to they may want to purge, but they don't go into that process. But it is dysfunctional and it can take over their lives.

What binge eating looks like 2:25

And I know because I was a binge eater when I was in my twenties, actually, it started when I went away to college and I remember just not stopping. I would go there is I went to Northwestern and it was in Evanston, Illinois, and there were ice cream shops like Baskin-Robbins. And I would go to one and get an ice cream, but that wasn't enough. That would trigger something where then I would go and I would get a second one, and then sometimes I would eat a whole pint of ice cream at a time. And I remember things like I would eat to the point where I was so full and then I would throw it away.

But then when I got there wasn't full. An hour to 3 hours later, I would even be digging it out of the garbage pan and people who have binge eating issues would do that. So when we talked, I'm very hesitant to talk about calling something a disorder because that labels you the person. And now it's like you have a label, I have a disorder, there's something wrong with me. Whereas we all have the capacity for self-regulation. And in this area with food it is really challenging. So maybe we can say no to consuming too much alcohol.

We're not binge drinkers, but eating can be very addictive. And when to stop being able to do that is really, really challenging. That's interesting that you separate alcohol and say that it may only happen with food because the way we understand binging at the genetic level and this is not this is one answer. It's not every answer is that some people bind dopamine much more efficiently than others. It's very easy for them to experience pleasure and their clearance or their clumped enzyme is a little slower, so they get stuck.

So they're feeling away way up here and the clearance is so slow that they just are in this endless loop of like it's like all walls are starting the process over again while it's happening and they keep going, keep going, keep going. But then that would apply to anything. So what you're saying is that this is a separate issue that's only related to food. Right. And so is there anything to be said about emotions and other issues or what what drives this? What's it rooted in? Yeah, emotions can be part of it, but there's many, many reasons.

So people can start to overeat and then that can shift into binge eating. When they're frustrated, they have a call. It didn't go so well. Somebody was angry with them. They're upset, they're stressed and they could eat, but it can also be triggered by just by joy, just liking the taste of food. And in my case, it was sweets. And many people are going to binge. They're not going to binge on broccoli. They're going to binge on chocolate and desserts and carbs. Some people may eat that whole bag of chips and still not be satisfied.

So what else can they eat? It's a habit. And that's what I was a clinical psychologist specializing in health psychology for many, many years. And I saw a lot of people with eating issues and sometimes it is just liking the taste and then you lose aware ness of that ability to stop it. In other words, it just feels good. You're eating and you're continuing to eat because you like the taste of the food. And it might be like with, let's say, ice cream. And I was notorious for like eating ice cream by the pie.

I'm not kidding. And so you just you it it feels good and it's a pleasure aspect and your your ability to have that good judgment at the time to apply prudent self regulation is just out the window. But yeah, so I could I was never a drinker. I remember I got drunk once in college at a party and I was so sick and I remember just, you know, being sick afterwards, it's like never again. And so I and I actually don't have the genes, the enzyme that processes alcohol, but even if I did, I know I could say no to that.

I could say no to other things as well that require self-regulation. But eating is something that is. The other thing that is often considered when we talk about binge eating is that it's paired with other activities. So often, if somebody had to just sit there and do nothing else but eat, they might stop sooner. But if they're they're watching television or they're scrolling social media, so they're not aware that they're eating so much. And then they may not they may finish what they're eating and they don't feel satisfied.

So then they search for something else. So that would be another aspect of it as well.

Emotions, habits, and hidden triggers 7:10

Yeah, it sounds like this gray area where it's like it, like you said, it's a habit formation problem. And that's why we're so lucky to be speaking to you, because health coaching is about habit. It's not so much about prescriptive or diagnostic. It's like, okay, now we know what's going on. How do we actually change our habits and get you to be the new version of yourself, you know, which is, you know, it's a blessing to talk to you about that. So then I would ask, how do you actually deal with it?

Because it's so gray. It's not like, here's your condition, here's your pill, here's your treatment. It's like step one is like it's taste. So awareness is like, how do you even what do you do with this? Yes. So step one is to normalize. It is to follow because we tend that's the problem with calling this a disorder and labeling it. Now, you think you're damaged and you think you have this condition and it starts to define you. And there's so much embarrassment or shame. So people who are binge eating, so I never would be a binge eater in front of other people.

In fact, I would go out to dinner and I would refuse the dessert and then I'd come home and I'm down three, four candy bars. It's it tends to be an isolated activity. And so the first step is to make it known, to tell people and that's what I love so much about time. Restricted eating is where you can tell people that I may open my feeding window at 10 a.m. or at 11 or whatever that might be for you. And you've now made that announcement and then you've changed the way you characterized yourself.

You start to say, instead of saying, I have a binge eating disorder or I'm a binge eater, which is even worse, like your whole self is, is that that disorder? But you say I practice time restricted eating. I don't eat after 8:00 at night for example. So you are now defining yourself that way. You have a different sense of who you are and you're talking about that with people in that positive way. That's one. The other is it's habit change, just as you said. So, for example, a lot of people will eat in their car.

Again, this is a solitary activity. It's a solitary habit in most cases. And so you start with, well, where do you see yourself making that change? And might be that you start in the smaller the better. It's okay. Like I am going to stop eating at ten an hour or half hour before I go to bed even there. So it might not be where you ultimately end up because maybe you want to stop 3 to 4 hours before you go to sleep. But a habit builds slowly. And so when you're a health coach and you're working with someone with these issues, I said, That's great, let's focus on how were you going to do this?

What are you going to say to yourself when it when 10:00 comes along or 9:00 comes along and you've made that decision, and so you start there and the key is you celebrate. So let's say it's 9:00, you stop eating. And that would be something. When you do that, you celebrate and maybe you pair it with maybe turning on alarm or maybe it's something like every every night at nine, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do something that you enjoy, do it, and you pair it with something that's pleasurable that's going to take the place of eating.

Or it might be that you are habit changing around eating with somebody else, or even eating sitting down. Like every time I eat, I'm going to sit down. And when you do that, you celebrate, but you start with like one meal. Yeah. So it is a slow process. And B.J. Fogg talks about tiny habits, and that's how this changes tiny habits. Yeah. You know, when I listen to you, there's one thing that kind of stood out to me. I tried to put myself in the shoes of someone solving this problem and you talk about the solitude and this being a habit of solitude, like being alone.

I have my little secret space where I binge eat and think about change and not having any support and not people not knowing, you know, and that the advocacy of the people around me knowing that I need and want to change, it's so easy to slip back into that my my little cave, my whole, my, my, you know, whatever it is, my bunker and hide and do my thing because nobody even knows that this challenge exists. So how do you deal with that? Because without support, it becomes so much more difficult. Absolutely.

The power of community, the power of social connection. And so when you start telling people what you'll find, this is what I found. Oh, I'd like that too. I used to do that as well and I have a friend. We have attended many events together. I think you were at some of them and you know, at these events they're snack tables, they're those people donate. And so for me, anything that looks like a candy bar like the the energy bars, the the high protein bars, I was addicted to to those as well, because it just feels like you're eating a candy bar and they do sweeteners.

Time-restricted eating and tiny habit change 12:40

And so at what we did and she is actually an expert in emotional eating and she went to the state house, Tricia Nelson, because she was an emotional eater. And so we bonded at these conferences and we made a pledge to ourselves, we are not going to go to that snack area and start on these bars. And so now her voice is in my head and vice versa. So we became accountability partners. That's one of the beauties of working with a health coach, because there is no judgment, no shame, because often people won't talk about this.

They're they're afraid. It's shameful. And so when you have a coach and you are feeling in a safe space that you're talking about with your coach, and nine times out of ten, your coach will have been there all as well. They'll get you and so you your coaches, you hear their voice in your head, right? And you start to go to to eat more. And that's what's wonderful about making an announcement about being a time restricted eater. You've put it out there, you now are thinking, I'm accountable. I don't want to go back on my word.

And you know that there's that chicken call coming in a few days. There's an accountability call and progress is obvious. You know, if things haven't changed, you can't lie your way through it. When you're dealing with a coach, you can perhaps lie to yourself if you're alone, but not when you're working with somebody. That's very important, and that's why coaching is so successful for people. And then there's community confi. I'm sure there's Facebook groups and places you can go where there's other people that you'll see that are struggling, that when you put these groups together, the support makes it so much more powerful and easier to get through.

So when someone's going down this road and like, okay, step one, I'm going to acknowledge this. Step two, I'm going to take action. I might bring higher coach. I might go to some group and start learning. Where do you see people failing and like things fall apart? I'm glad you brought that up because it is not all or nothing and that's where people get into trouble. They make is decision, okay, I'm going to not binge. I'm going to eat three meals a day, I'm not going to stack. And then they find themselves doing it and oh, I'm I'm eating, I'm devouring this bag of potato chips.

And now they say to themselves, so this is why most diets then I blew it. It's all over. I blew it. I'm I'm worthless. I can't do anything right. I'll never overcome this this issue of why can't I stop? And when they have that thought in their head, that is like saying, okay, I can eat more. Or they'll might say, This is a good day, this is a bad day, this is not a bad day where I'm bingeing. And so I might as well continue or I've just had company and people brought desserts and I've got all of this in the house, so I'm just going to eat it all up and throw half of it and then I'll start fresh tomorrow.

And it's that kind of thinking that is really self-sabotage. And so I would always tell people where ever you are, you can be holding that that spoon or fork and about to eat something and you make that decision. No, I've had enough. And so you put it down and then you focus on celebrating your restraint. Yeah, wherever it was. Because we are all human, we are not robots, we are. We are fallible, and therefore we're going to screw up. And so when you say, okay, I am following time restricted eating, I'm going to only eat from, let's say 10:00 to 10 a.m.

to 6 p.m., and then you find your at a dinner and it's seven, eight, nine and you're eating and oh, I blew it. And you get very discouraged as opposed to I'm going to do this 99% of the time because it took a long time to develop. The bad habits didn't happen overnight. It's still take a while and it's never perfect. We can't do it perfectly. And that's where often people get depressed and down on themselves. But as opposed to, let's say you are charting like as if you were doing a research study and you're you're plotting or like a stock market and you're following, you're doing trend lines.

And so now you might say, oh, yes, I'm on an upward trend. I it's getting better, but it's never looking at I'll have to do this 100%, no exception. I'll never eat before 10 a.m. again for example, because that's is where you do yourself it. Yeah I find so that made things easier for me. You know when I first started off saying I don't eat sugar anymore and I still say that about myself, I don't eat refined sugar. That's challenging because there's events and families and birthday parties and kids stuff going on.

And, you know, there's the world is still happening around you. And, you know, last night, I'll admit it, I actually had apple pie and ice cream. Right. And I didn't care. It didn't bother me. Why? Because I know I'm on that upward trajectory, like you said. And I know that I'm doing things so well for the majority of the time that once in a while it's almost like I'm doing things so well so that my body is ready to take that hit on the day. I need to do it right. There's a wedding where I just can't say no. All right?

But my mom's house and she's forcing something down my throat. I just can't reject it. Right? So if I do everything, if I control the majority of my time, then I'm prepared for that once in a while, problem that I otherwise wouldn't have wanted. And I get to enjoy things once while with the people I want to enjoy it with. So I, I prescribe to that myself and that makes it so much easier

Community, accountability, and avoiding all-or-nothing thinking 18:40

for me to make things happen. One of the thing you said, you know, when it comes to I'm missing out on this pleasure and I'm saying, no as the spoon is right here, what people have to realize is dopamine. This thing that allows you to feel the pleasure also allows you to feel reward. And both of those things are satisfaction. So you can actually shift gears and no longer need the pleasure if you get hooked on the reward, which is a much more positive way to experience satisfaction. And this is what ends up happening with people like the last time I talked to you, you are bouncing up and down.

I was like, What's going on with Sandra? And I realize you were walking on a treadmill during a zoom call, right? Yes. Well, this is what ends up happening is you get hooked on reward and achievement and that becomes your new binge, which is a healthy place to be. And you can replace sort of the bad habits you don't want with better ones because they both provide you satisfaction. You don't need to have pleasure necessarily. So one question for you just from listening to you again. So time restricted eating, somebody changes their habits.

There's a small eating window. They may, you know, walk into that or run towards it or how how would they get there different for different people. If somebody has a history of binge eating, which seems like the relationship with food is a bit problematic, could they then develop other problems? Some time restricted eating of like, I don't eat food. Like the things you were talking about earlier, the anorexia and bulimia, could that can it spin itself the other way? Have you seen that happen? Certainly it can.

And that's where it's being too rigid comes in. It's so you would be you want to be really careful in what you are telling yourself, the rules you are setting up, and it would be that it is desirable. I want to narrow my eating window and then you would also be part of that is because you could have a narrow window, but you might be snacking all day. And so that would be the network you've narrowed. Let's say you don't start eating to a certain time in the morning and you cut it off at night. But what if you're eating the entire day or what if every meal is a massive binge?

And so then you would address that issue and the awareness of when your rules are too rigid would because you would be less likely that you would become anorexic. And I do want to preface everything I'm saying by if you are anorexic, if you are bulimic, if you are bingeing and then purging it, you definitely want to work with a licensed mental health professional. You want to be in therapy, you want to be getting help for that eating disorder with binge eating, it's more you can work with a health coach, you can there is weight.

It depends on, again, how severe the issue is. And there's always a whole spectrum. And so we're not talking here about people who have serious bingeing and purging disorders or serious anorexia. What can happen is that people can become what we're now calling orthorexia, where you tend to have too many rules. And if I'm not careful, that could be me, where I might go into a restaurant and there's nothing on order because I can see the danger in everything. Well, the fish has mercury. The it's not pasture raised, not grass fed beef.

The canola oils that they're using going the end up at a point where you are suffering and the stress of that is probably more deleterious than if you were to eat something. And I was at a dinner recently where they didn't start serving. It was called for six and by the time people sat down and then they didn't start serving until seven. And so and that was this dilemma like do I and it was a whole, you know, roundtable of people, people I had never met before. And do I want to be this oddball, like saying, all right, you know, I don't typically I don't like to eat after six, 7:00.

And so here was this dilemma as well as the food itself wasn't food that I was. It was that I would care to eat under normal circumstances. And so the rigidity and the the issue of what if I had eaten a little bit and socialized and earned and enjoyed the company of those other people. So that's why it's when you set too many rules and it's 100% of the time that you are telling yourself, I must follow these rules, no exception. That's quite stressful. So the pleasure of being at a social event and relaxing your restrictions a bit, you know, so it's still not and still not going to have the hot fudge sundae that they served a dessert, for example, because I know that I have blood sugar issues, which probably came from, you know, all those years of bingeing on sweets.

And so that's an area where I am more adamant. But in terms of just, you know, having something to eat, pass my feeding window is not going to be a catastrophe. And this is where your point of community becomes so powerful, because when you have habits changes, you have them, but everybody else in your life maybe doesn't now. Right. And and now you have to go bring those habits into your reality. And they don't fit because nobody else believes in them. And so it doesn't mean that you need to purge your family and friends.

It just means you need to have some new friends that do both think the way you think and support it, and people that have the same habits that you can talk to, you know, that you can even meet up with potentially, you know, it makes a big difference and you're going to evolve in that direction anyway.

When fasting becomes too rigid 24:50

Anyone that purposely drives themselves towards change will often stumble across people that are on the same path because that's what drives success. You know, you you have, you know, peers that are doing the same and it just makes everything so, so good. So another thought is I'm thinking about, again, just practical terms, somebody binge eating. And the way you suggest it, it's typically going to be like your soul food. It's going to be ice cream and sugar and and fatty stuff. And not that fat is bad, but it may be, say, snacks like Doritos, for example.

Right. So that's that wow factor flavor. You're in it for the flavor. You're not in it for nutrition protocol. Right. So that I'm assuming then it comes with its other sort of multitude of problems of gut issues and inflammation. And you know, there's probably other things that are coming out, you know, part and parcel of this eating style that you may not even associate because they have their own clinical labels that also get resolved. Absolutely. Yeah. So the more you are eating, we don't binge again on broccoli, but we're bringing on ultra processed foods.

And so, yes, you are going to have other health issues are going to be in a state of inflammation. And I was able to hide when I was doing pretty well because I was never obese. I was I certainly was not healthy back then and I was overweight, but it wasn't so obvious. Another issue that we haven't talked about is that the food industry wants us to be binge eaters. They want us to be because it will sell more products. If we're a company that has these chips that, you know, you can't just eat one, you have to eat the whole bag.

And so their whole research is on that magic combination of sugar, salt and fat that's going to have you eating a whole lot more of these types of foods. Mm Yeah. So that the flavor profile, the texture low fat profile, that satiety of the palate is like, Oh wow, this is amazing. I can't stop. So it's literally desire thing to work against you. So it's kind of like you might have to go purge the pantry. I don't know how when it comes to coaching, how do you actually do that with people that is that actually what happens?

Oh, absolutely. You would say what foods do you want around you and what foods would be trigger foods for you? And so you avoid them and then really being understanding and kind to yourself to know that this does not happen in terms of getting being in a better place, in a better relationship with food. It doesn't happen overnight. So you may start by setting up the time restricted pattern saying, I'm going to every time I get into the car, I'm going to drive. I'm not. And you have different habits.

Every time I finish dinner, I'm going to have a cup of tea. And that'll be my signal that my reading in reading window is closing. And something that I wanted to to bring up in that is when you talked about the dopamine, the pleasure. So there is that immediate satisfaction, but the real pleasure is the so there's enjoyment, but the satisfaction of working towards something that is really important in your life. And so it health coaches will do is ask those questions like what do you want your health for?

Where would you like to be in five, ten years? What is most important to live for? And then they might say, Well, you know, whatever that might be, I want to be around and see the birth of a grandchild, for example, or whatever that might be and that be. Richard Wyatt's is talks about this as a positive emotional attractor. In other words, just imagining that, picturing it puts you in a really good, sympathetic state. So and some people are motivated by negative, emotional attractors. It's valid, not as strong as getting to the PTA, but the negative emotional attractor would be, I better stop eating this because I don't want to be diabetic.

I don't want to get cancer, heart disease. And so it is the negative consequence that is scaring you and now you're going to change your behavior. And so a health coach works with people to say, which one are you? It could be both. I know for me I'm both, but because I will be. I was sitting at dinner with people the other night and everybody got desserts and they're saying, How can you like you're so good, how can you not order this or take a taste? And what I thought was, well, I know I have, you know, I'm wearing my CGM, I continuous glucose monitor and I know that if I went down that road of eating that dessert, that would set off craving more.

Because sugar is so addictive physically and I don't want to be pre-diabetic or diabetic and so that is a strong enough negative emotional attractor for me in combination with the positive. I want to be energetic and I want to be strong and I want to live a long time, even though I'm I'm 73. So I have a lot of reason to to cultivate good food habits. Yeah. I mean, you're 73 based on how many birthdays you've had, but if you compare yourself to the average American, you're running a company. Coaches are relying on you to learn.

You're innovating, you are running, you are walking on a treadmill while talking to me on Zoom. You know, you're 73 is not your label at all. Right? You're you're you're living like the average 40 year old right now. I try to truly like you and that's. Yeah, yeah. And so, you know, that makes me think of this whole thinking around what you just said about the positive versus the negative and those choices and even the awareness that these are choices like chronic disease is an option. And this choice of, you know, how you're going to eat.

And it's not just about the calories and the weight, the longitudinal effect of the insulin response and the inflammation and everything else and mood and behavior issues

Dopamine, satisfaction, and mindful eating 31:00

and the serotonin dysregulation and the gut disruption and all this stuff. You are making a conscious choice to eat towards health or to eat towards pain. Right. And that power of knowing that it's your choice when it comes to chronic disease, is this something that health coaches are able to support people with. 100%. 1,000%, yes. And so it's through that conversation where that person feels supported, they feel heard, they feel like they are in control and coaching, build self-efficacy. And that is where you have a sense that, yes, I do have the ability to change.

I can do this and it's not going to be linear. It's going to be there'll be setbacks and that's accounted for. But they're excited by the idea that I don't have to be stuck in this pattern and I just don't like I have this disorder and I have to suffer with this and I can't change and coaches can focus on that times when you do have self-regulation. So if we're talking about not being able to stop eating, that's inaccurate. There comes a point where you did stop. You know, maybe it was after you had two pints of ice cream and half of that chocolate cake.

At that point, you got the signal like, I can't eat one bite more and you stopped. And so now let's backtrack. Let's let's pull back and let's shorten that window of eating and having the sense that I'm doing this. And you have this practice every day where you say, I am a time restricted eater. I am going to enjoy my food between ten and six. I'm going to have a great lunch breakfast. I'm going to look forward to having something at dinner. And then there are issues we haven't talked about the nutritional aspects, but obviously like when I was bingeing on carbs, I was very getting and I was nutritionally deprived.

I didn't have the right minerals, I didn't have protein enough. And so coaches, they're not nutritionists, but they can help people make that decision to have more balanced eating in terms of the micro and macronutrients. And that will help to have more self-regulation because you're feeding your brain the executive functioning ability. And so now your decisions every day will be better because when you are bingeing and typically people do binge on high carb foods and you are and also foods that are loaded with bad seed oils and other, you know, and toxins.

And so all of that is hijacking your brain and so the next day you're going to binge again because you don't have the right nutrients for your executive functioning. Yeah. You know, when you talk about again, you mentioned time restricted eating. So I think of it as sort of like a hack like you're creating, call it a biohacker to like force yourself to do something that gets you your goal. And I'm thinking, well, what other hacks may there be? And I remember hearing at this lecture about this Japanese, I guess, theory around eating and I might be getting this wrong, but I think it was called Hari Shibu where essentially means like you're full with food, somewhat with water and somewhat empty space, right? Yes.

And so you can people really learn what it actually means to be full. Like we think full is like I can't stop anything else in my gut as puffed out and like that's full. Like truly the word for that in the literal sense. But what is full? Can we relearn what that is like? How much am I actually supposed to eat? Why then stop and have a little bit of water and a little bit of empty space? Yes, that is something you can cultivate as a habit and pausing, eating slower. Most people eat quickly. The standing up there rushed and so forcing yourself to to chew more and a lot and then eat more slowly to not multitask.

Now that is tends to be difficult for a lot of people. And so you may start slowly and again, it's like wherever you're going to start. So maybe I'm going to take the first few bites of food and really savor it. You know, there is a saying that is the the taste is in the first bite. And so often you may not realize afterwards that you will have actually enjoyed this and you really savor. There's an old exercise from good comes from gestalt therapy. It's been used a lot in mindfulness training and that is where you take something like a cracker or a piece of chocolate or a blueberry and you put it in your mouth and you hold it there for so long.

But it begins to break down. The exercise with the cracker is that you now start to to taste the butter and the salt, and you're getting these different components and it's complete mindfulness of breaking that down. So that is a exercise, but that has traditionally been useful where people get the realization like, Yeah, I'm just swallowing my food whole, I'm not even realizing. And so it's, yeah, often there's no joy in that binge eating, but there would be more joy if you were to slow down and really savor like I'm going to take one spoonful of something of ice cream, let's say I'm going to really tasted them and are savoring the taste of sweet fruits.

So when you are bingeing on sugar laden foods, you regain your taste buds are hijacked.

Personalized fasting and protein needs with age 36:45

And so you may not taste the sweetness of a carrot. For example. And so when you are eliminating that or not binging, you really can savor the taste. So there's many ways that people can work with this to feel like they are in control, that the food is not controlling them. Yeah, that's that's amazing because you can really change your perception, you know, of what it means and then change. And this is I think we're a really important place for people to start is to learn what they don't know about what it means to be full and what it means to satisfy themselves.

And satisfaction doesn't need to be gobbling it up. Could be, like you said, savoring it. And I've done this, you know, I've done this where and I've done it actually with the fruit, which is you're just reminded me of that, where it was so powerful I just kept chewing on chewing. On chewing. And then you don't need as much because you got the satisfaction that dopamine hit just arrived in a different way as opposed to volume. It was through quality, right? So in terms of fasting, do you see any difference between the average man and the average woman in terms of protocol?

Like, are there is there anything we said or is it just like everybody needs to be doing the same time restriction? I think it's highly personalized. I don't think it's one size fits all. So and also how men approach eating. I've taught a lot of courses in the psychology of eating and there are gender differences. A lot of them are culturally reinforced. But if you look at, you know, women go out to lunch and they're going to order salads and men would see salads as more of a female kind of food.

They might like to have a big steak and potatoes with a a steakhouses are are decorated yeah are usually masculine with and and so we do have these food rules and patterns that are different and so many. And also biologically there may be reasons why men do better with fasting. Women in terms of just really being aware of the when you're looking at fasting why you're doing this. And often if somebody has been binge eating and has sugar as it has blood sugar dysregulation, you know, going for a full fast might be difficult.

You might want to do it under some medical supervision if you're so you think that what we're talking about is looking at a way to notice what happens when you don't eat and get used to that feeling. So I remember if I didn't have always been told, you have to, you know, eat within a half hour of waking up and before I had my blood sugars under control would feel really bad before I ate and feel like I need to eat. And and now, you know, I can go a much longer time without eating. But you want to again look at this is personalized.

You want to look at balance and sometimes you can you can. We often think if something is good, then a lot of that must be better. Yeah. And so if fasting is good, how you have to fast longer, if time restricted eating is good, I have to fast. I have to time restrict longer and be down to one meal a day, which by the way, might not be the best way for people with binge eating issues. Because if you bottle it all up now, let's say you open your feeding window at four or five and now you have one big meal, you are going to.

That will be like a Thanksgiving meal. Yeah. Because, Oh, this is my only chance to eat and you'll keep eating and eating and eating. And so that might not be the best approach as opposed to having two or three meals during the day. And also if. You're. Yeah. I'm just saying that's so true. We see that all the time with people that are on this one meal a day. It's like the spread that gets laid out, you know, edge to edge on the table that just every animal and fruit and plant you can think of as food cooked overnight.

And it's because while I'm getting all my calories in that the total. No, the total. And it adds up pretty quick, you know, and and what about for you personally, are you seven days a week or what are you doing? Yeah. So I do. Fasting. Yeah. So my issue now at 73 is avoiding sarcopenia. And so I really are paying attention first and foremost to protein and I follow the suggestions comes from Dr. Gabriel Lyon, a friend of mine, and she talk about one gram of protein per pound of body weight, of ideal body weight.

And so for me, that is getting 90, 95 grams of protein. So I can't I don't want to do that in just I couldn't do that in one meal. And so I spread it out. And I founded I used to be doing two meals a day, opening my eating window around noon one, then eating dinner at six. And now I've experimented with opening that sooner and having a lot of protein at that first meal, like 30, 40 and 50 grams of protein, and then a bigger amount at the evening meal as well and then a smaller amount at lunch. But having that balance, because I also do a lot of physical activity, I weight train three or four days a week, at least four days a week actually.

And so because of that, I really need to make sure that I'm that protein for avoiding muscle wasting. Hmm. Yeah. And as you age, it's so important because you're people don't realize it. One of the major causes of death is just frailty. People just getting old. Yep. We think. We think of disease and, you know. Yeah, but what about the people that didn't have a disease? How did they die? They slept in the bathtub or they just, you know, they couldn't get around it. That's that's still today. True.

Finding a health coach and closing thoughts 42:55

You know, requires muscle and muscle is also where you metabolize your glucose and you avoid getting diabetic. And anyways, the benefits are obvious and clear, but you need to maintain that. But what what other changes did you see when you changed from like, you know, lesser or more condensed meals to spreading it out a little more? Did your body change at all? Did your mood change? Yes, I was. My workouts were better. So now I always make sure that I tend to do most of it. In the morning I'll do yoga and pilates just because I like to do those on an empty stomach.

It's hard doing inversions when you're stuck. Well, it doesn't. That feels so good. And so I will do that, but then I will have something. I'm sensitive to cow's milk, so I will do something like goat whey protein and have that gigantic shake that is very, very high protein. And so what I have found is that when I emphasize protein first, also that carb craving has completely gone away because for many, many years in my thirties, forties and fifties, I was vegetarian, then I was a vegan, I was a vegan.

I'd gone through it all because that was what was what we thought was healthy at the time. And so but I especially because of the carb cravings that I had and the sweets that was is still the transition from being a real binge eater on sweets in my twenties to being plant based in midlife. That was not the best for me because I was still craving, you know, those huge meals that were I was a carbon holic. And so it wasn't till I went to high amounts of protein and particularly animal protein, that I'm feeling like I'm satiated and I no longer have that craving.

So I can be at a restaurant with people who are all ordering desserts or pastas and yeah, knowing that I'm not going to be craving that or coming home feeling dissatisfied and eating every carbon site in the kitchen. Amazing. Well, this has really been helpful and it's been really even more helpful that you opened up your personal story and told the, you know, what you were able to do and achieve because that's inspiring to people to say, well, if Sandra used to have her nutrition plan was a pint of ice cream every night and she can turn that off.

Well, I can do, you know, and it's even just the awareness of people not even knowing that they're doing it for a step. A lot of people don't. From what we see. So this is awesome. And so if somebody does want to work with a coach, I know you train them, you don't necessarily run coaching per se and that's I'm getting that wrong. But how does somebody actually find somebody to support them? Yes, they can go to functionalmedicinecoaching.org and they can go to find a coach and many people may decide that they want to be coaches themselves, whether they because people who may be suffering from particular conditions now they feel a calling to serve others.

So we would welcome you because the world needs so many more health coaches with so many people metabolically unhealthy. Yeah, and you're doing amazing work there. This is true. You'll find that most great coaches, functional medicine practitioners came from a background of needing to solve their own problem. And so the passion is there. The belief and understanding is there because whatever was conventional failed them. They did get that label. You have an eating disorder. Good luck. Let's manage it.

Versus no, this is we can unwind this thing. It doesn't need to be like this. You can have a different reality. So yeah, I would urge anyone. So is it the same website for anyone? Understand? Yes, they can. If they can get a coach, if they're a doctor, they can hire a coach or refer to a coach or they can become a coaches themselves. And you don't need a background in health care, which is so cool. The best coaches often have no background as health care professionals. Yeah, that's amazing. Well, thank you, Sandra.

This is an eye opening conversation. As expected, we were there years of experience and having trained so many coaches yourself and now, you know, there's some it I'm sure somebody listening is like, wow, I didn't know I could actually solve this problem. So thank you so much. Thank you. It's been a pleasure.