Episode 390: Food Isn’t a Willpower Problem: The Emotional Roots of Eating Patterns with Ali Shapiro
Listen on Apple Podcasts | Listen on Spotify
If you’ve ever felt stuck cycling between food rules, emotional eating, and guilt, this conversation offers a completely different perspective. Erin and holistic nutritionist Ali Shapiro are talking about eating disorders, cultural norms, GLP-1s, self sabotage, and why food struggles are actually about unmet emotional needs.
Ali explains how many people unknowingly stay trapped in black-and-white thinking around food (swinging between restrictive diets and “anything goes” eating), while missing the deeper drivers behind these patterns.
You’ll learn how to recognize common emotional triggers that drive eating behaviors, including burnout, anxiety, self-doubt, and loneliness, and why food can soothe these feelings without ever truly resolving them.
In this episode:
How food can become a stand-in for unmet needs around safety, belonging, and emotional connection
Why food can “soothe but not satisfy,” creating an addictive loop that keeps people stuck
The four MAJOR emotional triggers behind eating struggles and how each one drives different eating patterns
How black-and-white diet thinking (i.e. “good vs. bad foods”) keeps people locked in restriction-rebound cycles
What it means to move toward body-led eating and how to trust your internal cues instead of outsourcing decisions to diets, trends, and experts
Resources mentioned:
LMNT Electrolyte Replenishing powder (Use code FUNK and get a free sample pack with any purchase!)
Qualia Senolytic (get up to 50% off and an extra 15% off your first purchase with link + code FUNKS)
Bon Charge (Use code FUNK to save 15%)
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Ali Shapiro
When I found functional medicine, I made all these connections that actually my gut health had been destroyed from when I had cancer at 13 and I went through heavy antibiotics or steroids, I'm sorry, heavy chemotherapy. Right. But up until then I thought I was just like broken. And so functional medicine was this huge one den well, like as you do. But it was remarkable for me and I had what I thought reversed my ibs, I thought I had reversed my depression. My skin got better and my eating got a lot better because I was still emotionally eating and binging at that. But what really happened is I got to zero, essentially.
Welcome to The Funk’tional Nutrition Podcast, spelled with a “K”, because we do things a little differently around here. I'm your host, Erin Holt, and I've got 15 years of clinical experience as a Functional Nutritionist and Mindset Coach, creating a new model that I call Intuitive Functional Medicine™, where we combine root cause medicine with the innate intelligence of your body. This is where science meets self trust. Your body already knows how to heal and this show is going to show you how. If you're looking for new ways of thinking about your health, be sure to follow and share with a friend, because you never know whose life you might change.
Erin Holt:
Hey, you guys, I got a great episode for you today. I have Ali Shapiro on the show and man, did we talk for a long time. We chatted for over an hour and a half. Only some of it was recorded for you guys. In this podcast, we're getting into eating disorders, cultural norms, GLP1, self sabotage. We're basically talking all things food and our relationship to food and eating and emotional eating, which is really Ally's sweet spot. She's a holistic nutritionist, she's the host of the top ranked podcast Insatiable and she's creator of Truce with Food. She's academically, practically and empathically aware of how the medical system, wellness world, diet culture and body positivity movements all have their own flavor crazy.
We got into that a little bit because I have certainly seen all of that too. Ali developed Truce With Food while in graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania, where she drew from her years of working with real life clients and her own personal healing journey from battling food and having cancer as a teenager. She's going to share some of her story with us today, so I hope you guys enjoy this one. It was a really, really dynamic conversation. We covered a lot of ground and I really enjoyed talking to her and I hope you guys enjoy listening.
Hi Ali. Welcome to the show.
Ali Shapiro
Thanks, Erin. I'm so happy to be here.
Erin Holt:
I'm pumped to have you here too. I want to set the context for today's conversation by asking a question. Have you seen the new Diddy documentary?
Ali Shapiro
No, but I have the one by 50 Cent. Yeah, this was a big conversation. I know you love Tupac. Tupac is like, my sister almost got beat up for wearing a Tupac shirt in our suburban high school in the 90s.
Erin Holt:
Was it like east coast, west coast?
Ali Shapiro
No, no, it was people who like. No, it was a very sheltered suburb. We'll just put it at that.
Erin Holt:
But they were like throwing down.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah, they were so sheltered that they just didn't like to see Tupac, so they wanted to throw down about it. Anyway, I know you're a Tupac fan, so he's featured in episode one.
Ali Shapiro
Oh, my God. I've heard this documentary is pretty intense, but it's also 50 cents, you know, perspective. So.
Erin Holt:
Yeah, but like, I'm a long time 50 Cent fan. And he's like, I've heard. So obviously I don't know him personally, but I've heard he's like, actually like a solid dude. And I just like love this kind of petty. This level of petty is like right where I'm at. And I'm like, yeah, put him on blast. He's an awful person. Let's do a four part documentary about.
Ali Shapiro
How terrible he is.
Erin Holt:
I love this. Let's go. Anyway, that wasn't my real question. To set the context. We're not going to talk about documentaries.
Ali Shapiro
We can.
Erin Holt:
We thought we could. We could go in that direction. I really would love to hear just a quick background on who you are, what you do, and how you came to do what you do. Just for those who are not familiar with your body of work.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah, so I'm a Libra, Taurus rising. No, just. Just kidding. So, like you, I came to Functional Medicine pretty early. I found it about 22 years ago when it was like this band of misfits. And I was being. I found it at holistic nutrition school, actually.
Institute for Integrative Nutrition. No one had heard of Mark Hyman yet. You know, he was one of our teachers. But I found that. And I had had all these symptoms.
I was diagnosed with IBS. I had a colonoscopy when I was 22 from really bad work stress. I had really bad acne that I had tried antibiotics and Accutane with. And I had chronic depression. And I had tried all the antidepressants. I had tried traditional therapy. And I was also obsessed with my weight. So it was like this kind of perfect storm.
And I found functional medicine, and it helped me connect all of these dots, because up until then, I only thought food could be calories, and doctors were just giving me more and more medications. Like, nobody was teaching me food as medicine. So when I found functional medicine, I made all these connections that actually, my gut health had been destroyed from when I had cancer at 13. And I went through heavy antibiotics or steroids. I'm sorry, heavy chemotherapy. Right. But up until then, I thought I was just, like, broken. And so functional medicine was this huge one then.
Well, like, as you caveat. Yeah. Again, it wasn't a whole industry back then. Like, I was like, how do I know this? And the doctors don't. Like, I felt crazy. Right. But it was remarkable for me. And I had what I thought reversed my IBS.
I thought I had reversed my depression. My skin got better and my eating got a lot better because I was still emotionally eating and binging at that time. But what really happened is I had gotten to zero, essentially. I still had to, like, restrict, like, night shades. I still couldn't eat three hours before bed. I, you know, I still had to take digestive enzymes. And when I was really stressed, I would still emotionally eat. And so I would have a really hard time keeping up all of the things that I had to do to feel well.
And I went to grad school at the University of Pennsylvania with this question, because at this point of, like, what if falling off track is a symptom, not the problem? And at the time, I had started seeing clients on the side, and these were the days that I was doing, like, grocery store tours and no one knew what kale was, and everybody was saying quinoa instead of quinoa. Like, it was. It was a time, you know, that time, Erin.
And I was finding my clients were, like, me, highly functioning, highly successful. And it was like, food was the one thing, like, the nut we couldn't figure out. And so I really took this root cause resolution approach that I had learned in functional medicine and applied it to why we fall off track and realized that food is really not about willpower or discipline. It's actually about safety and that's how I created my Truth with Food Framework.
Erin Holt:
I can see a lot of overlap with your story and mine. Mine came from a little bit more of a restrictive background. You know, I was also obsessed with weight. I grew up through the 90s, and so we were very much indoctrinated with the belief and the idea that your value is in your pants size, how skinny you are. You know, skinny was always, at least when I was growing up, it was always synonymous with health. And so it was easy to hide behind the quest for skinny as the quest for health. So it could kind of like, you know, like there was this eating disorder festering, but nobody really understood that or saw that because they were like, oh, Erin's just more interested in health now. But for me, it was really the quest for validation, the quest for worthiness, the quest for value.
I can see a lot of overlap with your story and mine. Mine came from a little bit more of a restrictive background. You know, I was also obsessed with weight. I grew up through the 90s, and so we were very much indoctrinated with the belief and the idea that your value is in your pants size, how skinny you are. You know, skinny was always, at least when I was growing up, it was always synonymous with health. And so it was easy to hide behind the quest for skinny as the quest for health. So it could kind of like, you know, like there was this eating disorder festering, but nobody really understood that or saw that because they were like, oh, Aaron's just more interested in health now. But for me, it was really the quest for validation, the quest for worthiness, the quest for value.
And so I struggled with eating disorders starting at age 13 and through my early 20s. And long term listeners will know this, but I'm trying to be a little bit better because I've been doing this for podcasting for eight years, in business for close to 15. And I, like, sometimes forget, like, it's important to highlight how far, you know, this has come, how far I've come in my healing journey, especially for newer listeners. But when I first started my nutrition work, my health coaching work, that was really, really a big focus because of what I had gone through and what I had navigated. That's really where I. So I kind of cut my teeth on anti diet rhetoric, helping people rewrite the narrative that skinny equals worthiness, that your appearance equals worthiness. And I really encouraged women to fuel themselves. I always thought of, like, that proverb, when sleeping, women wake Mountains move and I'm like, under fueling women is a really good way to keep us asleep.
So, like, let's wake the fuck up. Like, let's go. And so that's where I started my career. And it obviously evolved into different places and spaces, namely functional medicine. Part of the reason for that, part of the reason that I was like, let's evolve a little bit past this, is because it started to feel like that space lost its nuance. It felt to me, granted, this is my perception and this is my opinion, but it felt to me like it was becoming very black and white, very dogmatic, like, body positivity, all foods fit. It was like, we're not allowed to talk about weight loss anymore and you're actually no longer desired, are allowed to desire weight loss. If you desire weight loss, there's something wrong with you or that's just brainwashing.
It's not actually your true desire. So I'm kind of like, hey, where did autonomy go? You know, like, where did autonomy of thought go? Where did body autonomy go? Where did autonomy of eating go? Where did our autonomy of choices go? Like, we're still outsourcing our power to somebody else to tell us how to think, what to do, how to eat, what, how to behave, how to think about our bodies, what our relationship with our bodies should be. And I'm like, I don't, I don't really agree with that. You know, like, that's, I can't buy into that hook, line and sinker. And this was the same time that I started to get into functional medicine for my own physical healing. And people started to ask me with a greater frequency, like, how do we bridge intuitive eating or like an all foods fit mentality with functional medicine? Because at the time, functional medicine was really steeped in elimination diets, which can be a very restrictive mentality for some people. Right. And so I, I think I attempted to answer that and solve for that in my own body of work and here on the podcast.
But it was a very, and it still is, a very dynamic and nuanced conversation with a lot of moving pieces and parts. And a lot of the work that I do is in the gray, allowing for more multiple truths to coexist all at once. And in your story, I'm hearing a lot of that from you too. So I'd love to hear just at the top of the call kind of how, like, where do we even start to bridge this more intuitive self led eating? And I don't want to use intuitive eating as like the Trademarked intuitive eating. But let's say self led autonomous eating. I'm going to let my body be the guide. How do we bridge that with functional medicine in a root cause approach? Is there a way to even do that?
Ali Shapiro
Yeah, well, this may seem academic and not related because it's. I'm not going to talk about nutrition, but I'm going to talk about mindsets. And when you were talking about like again, when you kind of wake up to something, right? Like when you finally can have a name for diet culture, it's very natural to get angry and be like, I am not subscribing and go to the other extreme, right? And my background is actually in adult development. And so this is again, when I even like woke up to food could be medicine, I was so angry, I'm like, no one's in charge at the wheel, right? And I was asking that the deeper, like, how did I invest all this trust in doctors when I figured out more from reading some books and mentoring with someone for four years, like without my medical background, right? So that's a natural developmental process to see all of that and be like, oh, I don't want to be part of it. But the problem is that's called in my work, I call it the good girl mindset. You're still stuck in black and white. And from a developmental perspective, it's called the socialized mind. And when you're in the socialized mind, your belonging is around.
What works is, am I following the protocol? Am I being good based on what this person told me to do? And we all start here, right, kids, this is how we develop. This is not a place to be shameful of. This is just how we, this is how we grow the first couple decades of our lives. And you know, this like, our prefrontal cortex isn't fully online. So even physiologically, we don't have the capacity to think in gray and all that stuff, let alone when we're triggered around something like body and weight. So a big part of my work is getting people to realize that as adults we have to mature and say, okay, I have internalized that. They. Right? We say, I'm worried what they are going to think of how I eat.
Or I can't say that I want to lose weight because of their thinking. They is just this like, shortcut of internalized authority that we put on everybody else, right? And so the task of adulthood and development and what I think true health and what I found really reversed, enabled me to have health and a truce with Food is looking at the underlying patterns that make us think our safety and belonging is dependent on appeasing an authority, right? And that comes out as perfectionism. It comes out as people pleasing. But that's also the case we put that baggage onto the people we hire, right? Like I train people, my framework. And I'm like, your clients are going to come and say that they're going to rebel, like they don't want rules and they're going to rebel against rules. But they also feel unsafe without rules because developmentally they're still looking for someone else to tell them what to do. And I was in that space myself. So again, this is.
When you're in that space, this can sound shaming or like you're wrong or right because you're always evaluating, am I wrong or right? Am I doing it right or wrong? But this is just like a place to start. And you literally just don't know there's other options when you're in that I'm going to outsource my authority to somebody else. Like, you just think you're doing the right good thing, right? When you go through your Instagram feed and it's like, oh my God, keto for menopause. That's the answer, right? You're looking for the answer because part of this rigid binary, you know, I used to think I'm all or nothing with food in life, right? I used to say that to myself. And it's like, no, that's actually a way of viewing the world world. And it's not a mindset. Like, you think more positively because that's keeping you in the binary. You're negative or positive, right? It's actually really understanding different ways of making meaning.
In this case, could weight be not about punishing myself or my worth? Is there a path where this could be nourishing and could actually repair my relationship with myself? If that's what's necessary. And so I'll give you an example. I had my son at 41 and I actually went because of cancer. I went through menopause early. So I went through postpartum and menopause at the same time during the pandemic. Not really.
Erin Holt:
Great.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah, Talk about a midlife initiation.
Erin Holt:
You're like, do not recommend.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah, I do not recommend. I had just maintained my weight for 15 years because of the work that I do. And I hadn't thought about weight. And I had really internalized a lot of “health at every size” body. Cause I agree with so much of it. But then one year into all of this. And again, nothing really changed.
I don't emotionally eat anymore. I walked all the time outside because there was nothing else to do. But I had plantar fasciitis and so I had to go get a referral. And I went and I got on the scale and I was 30 pounds above my pre pregnancy weight. One year postpartum. And I had a very healthy pregnancy, right? Like, everything went very great. So this was like, odd. And I definitely came home and cried, right? I was like, what is happening? I wasn't sleeping.
I found motherhood transition very hard. And I was just like, what is happening? And I really had to sit and say, like, okay, here are the two binary options. Like, I did want to lose weight, and I was having joint pain, I was having foot pain. I mean, there was like a lot of health stuff going on, insomnia. And I was like, wait a second. The binaries here are I either punish myself and I don't have the energy to go on a diet. I just can't do that anymore, or I just like kind of think health at every size. But I see that my blood work and all this stuff is not going to be heading in a great direction if I don't do anything.
And so I was like, the middle path, the gray is like, how do I nourish myself in this? And for me, the first step was like addressing my overworking, because that's what made no time for me to have time to eat or anything. So it was like, okay, actually, what's the problem? The reason I don't have time for anything is because I'm overworking. And so the nourishing thing that will also help weight loss but is also going to help my wellbeing is I have to address my overworking patterns now, because I don't overeat, I never drank. So it was like, this was my last addictive pattern. And then my food choices became about sleeping better because my main menopause symptom was insomnia. I hadn't tracked my food. I thought I was eating enough protein. Turns out I was kind of eating keto without trying to.
Because if you eat whole foods, you're eating a lot of fat, right? And not a lot of protein and carbs. So that's just an example of how this was not about I've got to lose weight. It was, how do I get my sleep better? How do I make time for my health? It was a very nurturing way and it forced me to repair my relationship with myself because my belonging at that point had been resting on how much can I accomplish and achieve and work. But you have to be able to what they call in developmental work self author your story. And it requires taking a step back and really being honest with what you want, but also realizing there's other ways to do it than what often the authorities or the experts out there tell you.
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Erin Holt:
Yeah, and I think it's like you had said something at that right at the beginning where it's like, okay, if you are like super aware of diet culture and you're like this, right. I think it's very normal, natural part of anybody's healing process to pendulum swing to the opposite extreme. So we had diet culture and then we had anti diet culture. And I think anything that binary, like maybe it works for small percentage of people. I just don't historically see it work for most people. So there's kind of this like harsh pendulum swing that can be a really important part of the healing journey. But I think ultimately where we kind of need to come back to is just like the you of the pendulum, like somewhere in the middle.
And then what I've noticed for myself and clients is that if we go through a hard time or, or we go through something new like postpartum period, being a great example of this, we can maybe like rock back into one of the, you know, the pendulum extremes and that can just be good information to us that like, oh, like I'm rocking one of the extremes right now. What else is going on in my life that needs my attention? Because it's so easy to use food as the fixer. It's so, so freaking easy because we're told all the time that it is just change your diet, you know, just change your caloric intake in all problems will be solved. You guys, I tried that for like so much of my life. It's literally why I went to school to become a dietitian. I went to dietetic school, a whole ass college, to fix myself. Because people kept saying, if you dial in your food just right, you will be fixed. It didn't work at all.
So what I just got asked this question. I told you, I was at a speaking engagement on Friday and somebody in the audience said, like, how did you recover from eating disorders, like, after all that time? And I'm like, for me, it was taking the focus off of the food, it was taking the focus off of my body, it was taking the focus off of my appearance, and it was putting the focus on literally everything else in my life. Like, I left a relationship, I changed my job. Like I did. I had everything else had to change. And then recovery from the eating disorder was just like a natural byproduct of that because I got my needs met in my life. And I know that this is like the crux of the work that you do. And I know that, you know, you talked a lot about a root cause approach.
And where I think I differ from potentially like a lot of functional medicine practitioners is that part of a root cause approach in my eyes, through my lens, is we also have to look at emotional root causes of what is going on in your body. And I know that that is huge with what you do. So from an emotional perspective, why do people either, like fall off track with food or feel like food is a struggle?
Ali Shapiro:
Yeah, I love this question and I love that you can even articulate that really what shifted to recover your eating disorder was you shifted how you related to yourself. Right? I left a relationship. Like, ultimately you are oriented towards nourishment instead of restriction. I bet, I bet you can look at that if you were going to look at. Yeah, yeah. So if we go back to kind of, you know, when I said food is safety. So when we're growing up, the way that we secure our needs is we have other people like us. Right.
Like, you know, like, I always think, like, I couldn't pay rent and pay for groceries until I graduated from college. I mean, I've worked since I've been 12 years old. But like, my job at the bagel shop and babysitting was not going to cover like rent and electricity and my Tupac tape. Right. Like, I mean, bmg, you could get eight for a dollar. I don't know if you were, if you were out in that era, they might, they might have realized that wasn't a great business model by the time. Because I'm a Little older than you, but it was like, okay, so what we do when we're younger, when we're in what I was saying earlier, that socialized or good girl mind is we're like, what gets approval and what gets docked, right? And part of that binary thinking is either or, like, this person's needs have to get met or my needs get met, right? So a lot of my clients, for example, grew up in very chaotic homes, very instability. I grew up in a great home, but having cancer definitely produces a lot of uncertainty, uncertainty, a lot of fear into the mix.
And so when we are younger, we essentially try to minimize our needs to make other people like us, right? And your peers become really important, right? You grew up in the 90s. I grew up 80s and 90s. It's like, oh, what do the popular girls like? What do they do? Right? And, you know, for me, it was like, who do the boys like? You know, it's like. And to your point, attention, right? Like, I lost a ton of weight on chemo, and it was like I was getting attention. People told me I looked great, and I was like, yeah, you know, health equals people's thinness, even though I'm almost near death, you know, like, it did not compute. So belonging and safety, the first couple decades of our life is about, are other people going to look after me to get my basic needs met? And so what ends up happening is if we don't have something like food, something like alcohol, something like a chronic health condition that is going to get us to pause and say, hey, is this working for me? We will keep on keeping on, right? There's no reason to question that this isn't working. And this is, again, to hold the grayer nuance. This is why, again, my own battle with food.
It's why I went to nutrition school, too. It was 18 years. I went to Weight Watchers starting at 11. I wouldn't wish it upon anyone. And it forced me to look at these deeper things that now I wouldn't trade my life for. Like, it has created such a rich life that I've had to look at how I understand belonging. So when we're little, it's often like, either my needs or other people's needs, right? Or I have to be good or bad is often how we're. We're thinking about it even as adults.
And so what ends up happening is when we are older, we're still operating with this old operating system, right? Like, I think of it as, like, the apple Iie, right? Which I had growing up Was like, nobody knows that our meaning making system doesn't know that there's an iPhone anymore, right? It's like I'm still on this old operating system of I got an A. You know, I studied and got hard and got an A. That works, right? I got approval from the authority, but maybe I don't even like what I'm learning, but who cares, right? Or I went to Weight Watchers and lost weight. Okay? I get the stamp. Even though I'm starving and have cravings, right? So you can see how we start to internalize. It's either my needs or other people's needs, specifically authority. So as we are older and let me also back up that nature designed food to actually be a place of rest and resourcing. So it's coupled with belonging.
So if I ask you, Erin, like before your eating disorders, what was some of your best food memories? Like, what pops up before food was so complicated for you?
Erin Holt:
I. Let's see. That's a good question. I told you I was bad at thinking on my feet.
Ali Shapiro
We have time.
Erin Holt:
It's not because I don't have any. It's just genuinely because when somebody asks me a question in real time, my brain goes, good night.
Ali Shapiro
We’ve got time.
Erin Holt:
Actually, what I will say this would not be. I think my memories are maybe more contextual. So my kiddo had the stomach bug this weekend and I was making her broth with these gluten free. So we use Kion Aminos pasta. It's rice pasta. Because my mom used to make me. They were like these little tiny pastas and she cooked it in broth. And I think there was like parmesan cheese maybe and butter.
And it was just like as like I was making it and I had this like visceral like, body memory of being like, oh, my God, this was such a comfort food. We used to love this when we were little. So, you know, not something that I think about day to day, like, oh, remember that good food memory? But, like, there's certain, like, food as comfort and something that my mom did to show love that I'm now doing to support my own kiddo when she's not feeling good.
Ali Shapiro
Well, and that's a great example of. Right? It's like that pastini and what you associated with, I mean, even your body language, it was like, it was a place where you felt like you could rest. I bet. Like, it was a good com. Like, it wasn't comfort. Like, when I used to think I was comfort eating, which was like, it tastes good for the first bite, and now it just hurts. It was comfort. Like, oh, this is a place of rest. This is a place where I feel like I matter. This is a place where I feel resourced because my mom was showing that she loved us. Right?
Erin Holt:
Totally. Totally.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah. So underlying, right, Your needs were getting met. And that's a positive memory. Now, if you think about when your eating disorder started, what around that time of your life was hard.
Erin Holt:
Oh, my gosh. I, an eldest daughter, you know, I like, on for, like, literally everybody. I'm like, I'll get that. You can't handle that. I'll get that for you. Don't worry about it. And so I think I hit a moment where I'm like, I am so drained from our running everybody's emotions through my own body. I think that was part of it.
I also think that I just grew taller in seventh grade. I just hit puberty and just, like, sprouted up. And I was a chunky kid growing up. And so I naturally leaned out and got a lot of positive feedback for that kind of like what you were saying. Like, people were like, look at you skinny. You're killing it. And I'm like, oh, this is how I receive love. Like, I'm like, I live for the gold star.
Like, I'm gonna keep doing this. And I took it and I ran with it. Like, literally, I dropped what I was eating, I started running, and I got as skinny as I could. Like, I will go all in on this. If this is how your people are telling me that I can have some value in this world, I'm gonna do it times 10. So that is really what. Like, I think there was a lot of factors that kind of colluded into a full blown eating disorder. But I would say that was like the proverbial straw.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah. And what you're saying, there is a lack of belonging, because belonging is where we feel significant just for who we are, right? And so in your family, even though maybe. And you could love them, they could be great, or it could be hard, but all of a sudden, if I'm the one taking responsibility, I'm separate, right? I'm the one that has to manage all this. And then I get, oh, my God, but you matter because you're skinny now, right? Because belonging is about significance, right? So we have an attachment drive, but belonging satiates that drive. So it's like, oh, here's how I can feel. Not separate, right? I get the attention. You're killing it. People like me.
And when we are teenagers, our peers are so important, right? Like, as we start to individuate and differentiate from our family, they become just as important. And so with both hard and good memories there, the belonging. That belonging can be abstract, but that feeling of being seen, significant. You were finding it through your eating disorder and being thin. But it was also at a time, interestingly, that you probably felt separate because you felt super responsible for everyone in your family. Even though it was like, I'm managing all of this, that separates us as well, versus the. The pasta and the pastini, you know, I mean, I'm not Italian, so I don't want to butcher it, but it's like, that was just, like, I could rest in my value. Like, there was nothing.
I didn't have to be the responsible one. I didn't have to put everyone's energy through me. I didn't have to be skinny. I was just. I could just rest in my value.
Erin Holt:
Yeah, There was, like, no resting. Like, at a certain age, there was no. It was only striving for approval, striving for significance, striving for belonging. To your point, my life has been constantly striving and setting the bar higher and higher and like Adam, go moving the goalpost further and further and further away. So for sure. And I am not alone in this. You know, I think so many people listening right now are like, yeah, me too. Same girl, same.
Ali Shapiro
And again, because belonging, when we're little, nature designed it this way. Like, you're supposed to have a moral code when you come out of being in your early 20s. So that's part of this natural development. And so what ends up, what's interesting? So then as adults, the reason we turn to food or fall off track, whether it's nighttime eating, binging, whatever we want to call it the underlying mechanism of action is a lack of belonging. And what's interesting about why food is so different, because I have a lot of clients who are sober, a lot of clients who've through some other stuff, is that food stimulates attachment chemicals. So this work comes from Dr. Deborah McNamara, who's actually a child developmental psychologist, and she has this great quote that, like, just hits everybody that's like, food stimulates attachment chemicals, but it doesn't satiate the deeper belonging need that it's supposed to be coupled with. And so the quote that everyone loves is like, there's nothing as addictive as something that almost works.
So food soothes, but it doesn't satiate our deeper belonging need.
Erin Holt:
Okay, Whoa. Can we, like, do, like, a little, like, pivot? A little pivot, yes. Can GLP-1s enter the chat for a minute?
Ali Shapiro
Yes. Yes.
Erin Holt:
Because, like, say that quote again.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah. So food stimulates attachment chemicals, but it doesn't satiate. So it soothes our attachment drive, but it doesn't satiate the deeper belonging needs. The addictive one.
Erin Holt:
No, like, the second one.
Ali Shapiro
Yes. That we have nothing as addictive as something that almost works.
Erin Holt:
Here's what I want to say. I'm like, I want to be really mindful of how I articulate this. And for context, we're recording this at the end of 2025. So in case somebody's listening, like, four years in the future, just let's contextualize it with the onset in the explosion of GLP-1s on the market a couple of years ago. I was like, oh, shit. Like, regulators, mount up. We got to get ready. Like anyone doing any kind of work similar to us need to get ready. And I want to be really, really clear. We talked about this at the top of the call. I. We have no issues with GLP1s in our practice. In our clinic, we support clients right now in real time who are on GLP1s. We do not, I repeat, do not stigmatize their use in our practice. Hard stop.
And I think people are surprised to hear me say that this show is not about GLP1 agonists. So we don't have to talk about why, but eventually we can, and we will if people need to hear that. But there's no stigma here for us. We view them as a tool. Let's say that we view them as a tool. Like, with any tool, tools are not good or bad inherently. It's completely dependent upon how the tool is wielded and by whom. So you, like, you can take a knife, and you can use it to slice a watermelon.
You could take a knife and you could use it to shank somebody, right? It's not the knife's fault. It's not the knife itself that's a problem. A knife can be really useful in some situations and really harmful in others. And so I think, like all tools, GLP1s are in the same category. But because of my background personally, but also having the privilege of working with thousands of women over the years, when I saw these hit the market and hit the market, like, whoa. I was like, we're going to have a major league problem on our hands. And it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. When it happens.
My prediction was like, we're going to see a surge of eating disorders, disordered, distorted relationships with food. We're going to see more food fear. We're going to see more. More like head when it comes to food and eating. And if we take a peek at what's happening in Hollywood right now, because Hollywood kind of does set the precedent of. Of what the new standard is. People are dropping weight fast, scary kind of weight. And so this is what is being modeled to us as the standard.
Like, once again, we're right back in the 90s, gang. Get ready. Buckle up. It's going to be a time with weight loss. So this is why I wanted to say this, because of what you said about the addiction. There's nothing more addictive than something that almost works, I think, but doesn't actually kind of fulfill you. Totally paraphrasing here. With weight loss, there can be an addictive quality.
I know it because I lived it. So once you start losing weight, we both said this. This is both part of our stories. This is not planned. This is just coming out organically. Once you start losing weight, especially if you get positive feedback, positive reinforcement, it becomes this feeling of like, I have to keep this up. I have to keep it going. If not, I have failed.
And everybody's going to witness me in my failure. And that frequency becomes way too much to hold, way too much to hold for most people. So we set the bar higher and higher and higher by making ourselves smaller and smaller and smaller. And this is just going to happen with GLP-1s. Like, I am a prophet. This will happen. If it hasn't already started, it will. So, like, how can we support people? How can we speak into that? Because there is this addictive quality.
But just losing the weight, you might see lab markers change. You might see health benefits. Of the dropping weight. That is true. But what is also true, if there's emotional, unmet needs, the weight loss will not fix that for you. My dudes, listen up. You got to get your mind right, too. Like, this has to come online or else this is a game you're never going to win.
You're never going to win it. How do we support people? Yeah.
Ali Shapiro
Oh, my God. You said so much good stuff there. And the reason I like to take a developmental look is because if you are in. In the socialized mind, you also adopt the values of the culture and how the culture defines those values. Right? So, again, right? So like us growing up, health was thinness, right? And again, like, I was the most thin when I was on chemotherapy, but I couldn't see that I wasn't healthy. Like, I couldn't, like, challenge that belief. Right? And so I think the reality is we all have to live through a lived experience of actually realizing that our weight cannot be the main driver for what we really want in our life. So, for example, when I was struggling with my weight, I was like, oh, my God, I hate my corporate job.
But once I lose weight, I'm going to know exactly what I want to do with my life. And I believe that, right? Like, somehow weight loss was going to help me find a fulfilling career. Or, like, I was traveling all the time, and I was like, like, oh, my God, once I lose weight, I'm gonna and change jobs, Then I'm gonna meet someone, Someone that I would want to date and that I'm attracted to. And, like, so everything that actually required a skill set and managing some sort of discomfort and complexity, I was putting off and using weight loss as somehow that's going to teach me the skills and the tools to be in a healthy relationship. That we cannot do that. We see people in Hollywood divorced all the time.
Erin Holt:
Right.
Ali Shapiro
You know what I mean? Or finding a meaningful career. A business like weight cannot teach you how to be on a learning curve and, like, face all your. You know, this entrepreneurship is really spiritual and soul boot camp. It's not like weight loss cannot teach you that. But we can say that. You and I can say that all we want, but we want to believe that weight loss is going to satisfy those needs. And until we can start taking small risks, not all or nothing risks, but small risks. And realizing that weight loss can teach us those skills, it can't meet the deeper needs.
Then it feels like we can't keep it up. Then it becomes more obsessive versus realizing that what I work with clients is as we get their needs met more and more, it doesn't mean that they don't still want to lose weight, but they hold it completely different. It's like, I know it's going to happen, but this is the more important foundational work. And they also, as we start living a life that feels good and is fulfilling, I think the weight we're experiencing what we thought weight loss would give us. So the illusion dies, right? And I think as part of maturation, because a lot of the work I do is like, when are we strong enough to lose the illusion? Right? Like, when are we strong enough to lose the illusion that weight loss is not gonna fix everything. And so if we can start taking these risks and, you know, like, I met my husband when I was like 30 pounds heavier than I wanted to be. But I was like, I have to do this for me, not for him. I have to do this for me to get practice.
And he was like, living in D.C. I was living in Philly. I'm like, I'm never going to see him again. This is a safe risk, right? You know, And I did do shot. I don't even drink, but I did shots before we went out because I was so nervous, you know, but like, so it was sloppy, it was awkward, but, like, it made me realize, like, oh, this actually has nothing to do with my weight. This is like, can you communicate effectively? Can you? You know, so I've gone on and on, but. And I just said a lot of stuff, but I think, like, you just have to start to experience in small ways how you don't have to wait on your weight and then the weight loss doesn't become the thing that's going to change your life. Like you have proof.
Because most of us as adults don't need new information. We need new experiences to pierce through this very intoxicating illusion that life is so simple, that weight is just going to solve everything.
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Erin Holt:
If people are listening to us and they're like, okay, I'm picking up what you're putting down. Like, I kind of get this, that there's like emotional needs that need to be met, but I don't know what they are. Like, you know, part of my, my issue I think is that I couldn't pinpoint like these are the areas in my life in which I, I didn't fucking know. Clue me. So if some, you know, if some, somebody's there being like, okay, I get this, I'm open to this idea, but I actually don't know what the emotional needs are that I need to have met, never mind how to meet them. Like where does someone start?
Ali Shapiro
Yeah, that's a great question. And I want to say too, because I know that you work with practitioners as well, is that you can never make someone wrong for wanting to lose weight. Because when you are in that state where you think weight loss will fix a lot of things, when someone tries to tell you that it won't, you will double down on it 100%.
Erin Holt:
100.
Ali Shapiro
So this is part of what, like I think a lot of our well meaning people, when you don't understand the developmental phase that people are at. Like, and again, I didn't know either, right? I was like, no, weight loss is the thing, right? Like I, you know it until you don't know it, right? It's just how it is. So I just wanted to like put that out there for someone who's like, I really do think it's weight loss. I get what you're saying intellectually, but emotionally I feel that we. Wait, that makes sense. That's. But as Erin said, if you're willing to be curious and pick up what we're putting down, that can be an important step to start to unpack that. You're not going to unbelieve it instantly.
Erin Holt:
I'll layer onto that. Because there was a while where people were coming to my practice because they wanted a functional medicine root cause approach. And they were like, I have these health goals, but I also have weight loss goals. And what I had to be really clear and like, like, really clear with people is like, I am not going to position your weight loss goals over the health goals in my practice because that won't work. I can't sacrifice your health for this. Like, so you can be the same size you were in like high school, but like doing it in a way that didn't instill shame just by like making it me like, this is not the way that I practice. You are a fully autonomous being and like your desires are so, so, so, so valid. But I can't help you lose the, these last five pounds and actually do the health work that we need to do.
And so I think, you know, if you are a practitioner, it doesn't mean that you have to all of a sudden become a weight loss coach in addition to everything else you're doing. We just want to give people the opportunity to like truly express themselves and be autonomous in their own decision making. And you just like continuously like, I was like, I'm not going to fist fight you to believe that you don't have to lose weight, but I also cannot abandon and myself by taking you on as a weight loss client. So like both, both of those things are true, both of them are valid. It just means that we're not a good match and that's it, you know, no problem. So there's that.
Ali Shapiro
That's why I love your work. You are very clear that you're health first. Right. And I think that is such a sustainable, ultimately what people really want, especially as we age. You know, you're right. So it's funny, I have like kind of my entry level program for people. I mean, it depends on where they are developmentally. And I, I have a assessment people can take, but it's called truth with food.
Then when people come in, by the end they're like, oh my God, now I realize I have needs. I don't even know if I can admit it to myself yet. So I totally get where people are like, wait, I have needs. Like, first of all, I have to just do the work to admit that I have needs. So you're exactly on par with especially I'm sure, the type of women you work with. I mean, my clients are over functioning. It's like, no. Like I've gotten so many gold stars because I fix everything for everyone and I'm, I'm, you know, I'm doing all the things right.
Erin Holt:
You're like, I'm not codependent, I'm independent. Yeah, well, actually funny you should say that.
Ali Shapiro
I know we just wrapped up over my truth with your consistency program and one client. I love her so much. She's like, you know, my kids are grown. She's like, but they came home for Thanksgiving, they live out of the house. And I was still sitting on the couch waiting for someone to need something from me, you know, and she's like, then my deeds didn't get met. And she's like, just in case someone was there, you know, and everyone was like, this is so relatable, you know? So again, it's like admitting you have needs is a huge step. So where I always start with clients is whenever they're turning to food again, whether it's in the nighttime. Nighttime is often when we just have space to feel our feelings because feeling feelings require safety.
Right? We've all been at that. Like you said you were at that speaking event last Friday. It was like.
I can't feel my way through this right now. I'm on, right? So it takes space to feel our feelings. So whether it's nighttime, eating a lot of my clients eat alone because it's just a pattern revealing itself that they feel alone in some way. Right? Secret eating. Even if you're out with people you like and you just are fantasizing about the food or when you're going to get home and eat alone, just showing that you're belonging, that you feel alone in some way, our food patterns reveal a lot about ourselves. So the first thing is, because so many times clients want to get into a fix, like, I need to fix it. What's wrong with me? The first question is like, first ask, why does this make sense? Just calm your system, calm your nervous system, calm your prefrontal cortex. Get out of shame and guilt.
And first ask yourself, like, why does this make sense that I am turning to this food whenever it is? And you can, in the beginning, you'll do it after the fact because your nervous system, your belonging radar is on such high alarm, you can't. You can't. A win is. Is just doing the reflection after the fact. And of course what's first is going to come up is like, it doesn't make sense. You suck. You just love food too much, or you just love the taste or, you know, whatever we tell ourselves, right? It's really protective resistance from digging a little deeper. People call it an inner critic, but it's really protective.
So after you just start to ask, why does it make sense? And sometimes the answer will come the next day, like, kind of catch you on the side, right? Like in a way you're not expecting. Then what I've identified is there's four top triggers, and each trigger has a need. And so what I have my clients, and this is where I start with everyone, is just to start to make this food a safety connection. Because again, we're taught it's about willpower and discipline. And even if intellectually we know this emotionally, or even if intellectually we know that may not be the case, we are still like, no, I. I'm looking for just a better plan to control myself often. Right. Like, our behaviors tell otherwise.
So I always have clients say, like, what's at the tail end of this eating episode, whatever it is, or eating out of alignment with my goals. Because that, you know, and so T stands for tired. And tired comes from, you know, in the halt framework around emotional eating. It's just about, like, sleep or not. But tired comes from burnout. It comes from lack of agency. It comes from, you know, sitting at your desk all day. Right, right.
Erin Holt:
Lack of purpose.
Ali Shapiro
Lack of purpose. Yeah. Yeah. That's a big thing. Clients realize it's like, oh, I have agency, I have choice. That's one of the big results that come out of my Truce with Food Consistency program is like, oh, I have choice. Because they're in the all or nothing black and white binary thinking. They don't realize there's more flex, you know, more creative solutions in the beginning.
The second one is anxiety, and this is uncertainty from the outside. So, you know, during COVID we saw eating issues and alcoholism, like skyrocket, right? And it can also be like menopause, right? Like all of a sudden your body doesn't feel like your own. That was my case. I'm like, what is happening here? Like, I had a healthy pregnancy, I had a great birth. Like, I take care of myself. I know my, like, what is happening, right? Because I went through right before the menopause explosion. So it was like, somehow I found Stacy Sims' book, like Next Level.
And like the first chapter, I was like, how did I not know hormones were about more than getting pregnant? You know what I mean? Like, because hello, hashtag patriarchy, right? Like that's all you learn. Don't get pregnant, you know, or how to get pregnant. So uncertainty when you're really feeling uncertain about, you know, business goals or even what should I eat, right? Like some clients are like, I'm so overwhelmed. I've read so much conflicting stuff. And then when I try to tune into my body, it's just this like black hole. Like I don't know, right? I just don't know what to do. So then I is inadequacy. And this is when we feel self-doubt.
Not enough, too much from the inside. I didn't lose enough weight, right? Or I don't know what to do in terms of my health. How am I having this flare, this setback? And we blame ourselves. So that is what inadequacy comes from. And then the L is the loneliness trigger. And what's sneaky about this is loneliness. Like the textbook academic definition is when your social needs don't get met so you can be around other people and still feel very alone. This is when a lot of times people, like I said, if they're secret eating.
Like I had one client, she's like, I was at this work event and I was too nervous to eat, you know, but like while. And it was a high-stakes work event and like all I could think about was like, when am I gonna get home and just like break free with food, and it's because she was feeling alone at that event, because she was putting a lot of pressure on herself, you know, because of the work event. So that's how you can start to just start to interrupt this idea that falling off track, turning to food is bad. It's from lack of discipline, it's from loving food too much, whatever you tell yourself. But why does it make sense? Because you're trying to get your needs met via food. And it almost works. But then there's these deeper triggers that, that tired, anxious, which is uncertainty, inadequacy and loneliness that have needs that need to be met and they're not getting met.
So that can start to really help people get. Oh my God. 80% of the time, this is not about the food.
Erin Holt:
Yeah. And I appreciate what you said about like, how it's called inner critic, but you actually just look at it as protection. Because I don't believe that self-sabotage is a real thing. The self is never attempting to sabotage. There's just.
Ali Shapiro
Yes, it's protection.
Erin Holt:
It's a conflict. You're saying that you want something consciously, subconsciously. Your mind, your brain, your body does not feel safe having that thing. So it's actually going into protection. But when we label it self-sabotage, we're like, what's wrong with me? We double down on the self-criticism, we double down on the self-flagellation, we double down on the shame, we double down on the hopelessness and despair. And it's like, we're never going to move forward from that place. So that is like, can be such like a liberating thing for people to be like, yeah, self-sabotage. You're not actually sabotaging yourself.
You are trying to protect yourself. Let's see what you're trying to protect yourself from. You know, and it's that awareness piece. Like, we cannot change anything that we're not aware of. So if you're like, I have no idea where to start. Bringing more awareness to your behaviors is a really, really, really good place. Like you were talking about a pattern interrupt. Right.
Once we become aware of it, aware of the pattern, then we become. Can begin to redirect it. But the awareness is always the first step.
Ali Shapiro
Yeah. Because you're controlled by it until then. Like you don't know you're being controlled by it. So it's. It's a huge, even spiritual principle. It's of like to be able to say name the thing. Right. It's exactly like until we for so long didn't have the name for diet culture.
Right. But Then once we could name diet culture, we had a choice. And it's the same thing with our patterns. So I'm glad you brought that up and caught that, because I, Like, I. I'm like, I don't see many books for inner critics geared towards men. Like, is it just women that hate themselves? Or, like, are we trying to protect ourselves? You know, like. But I also just want to bring this up in my. Again, in my truth with food consistency group.
This woman, she's caretaking her mom, and, you know, she's obviously working on her food stuff, but it was really fascinating for her to say, you know, I didn't even get to work all the tools you've taught us, But I'm just. I just didn't overeat because I realize it makes sense. Like, I just have more. More compassion for myself now. So rather than beat myself up with the food, just realizing it makes sense is this whole shift into wholeness, into agency, into capability. So I just want to point that out.
Erin Holt:
You know, sometimes healing is deep work. Sometimes we have to get a little muddy and bloody. We have to go deep, we have to go dark. We're, like, rooting around in the bowels of our subconscious, and our shadow in it is a shit show. It's a worthwhile, worthy endeavor. And then sometimes it's just, like, somebody says one thing that just clicks in your head and you're like, that changed everything for me. I love when healing looks like that, personally.
Ali Shapiro
Can I Instagram this?
Erin Holt:
It's so great when it gets to be that easy. And sometimes it really is that easy. You know, it's not always a slog. It's not always hard work. And I think would be mindful of the beliefs that we've created because. Guilty as charged. That, like, healing always has to be hard work. Because that's such a beautiful example of, like, hey, it just, like, doesn't make sense for me anymore.
Like, I didn't do all the steps. I didn't do the whole process, the whole method, but I got the same result that I was looking for. Like, you know what I mean? It was still a huge win. So, like, be open to that, too. Be open to, like, a little ease in our healing journeys.
Ali Shapiro
Yes, yes, yes. Because there are opportunities for that. So you gotta take it. When you can get it, you gotta take it.
Erin Holt:
You're right.
Ali Shapiro
Run with it, sprint with it.
Erin Holt:
Ali, it was so wonderful having a conversation with you. Can you tell our listeners where to find more of you and more of your work? Yeah.
Ali Shapiro
Thanks for Having me. Yeah. So they can go to truthswithfood.com and if people are interested in sort of where they are from a mindset, all or nothing. Where are they on their food stage? I have a, it's, I call it a quiz, but it's meatier than that. You know, food puns forever. But if they go to truthswithfood.com find your food stage. You'll see where you you are in the developmental journey of really whether it's wanting to eat better for just regular health, for autoimmune issues or for even some healthy weight loss. Where are you in terms of really understanding what you need to do from that self authored or you called like that internal body led place between.
So there's four stages between diet hopping and a truce with food. They can find out where they are and then their next best steps. Because you know, I loved how you said about GLPs, right? It's like or another knife. It's the right tool at the right time that makes all the difference. So if we know what stage we're in, we know what sort of emotional work is on our plate to do instead of thinking, you know, we're doing it wrong and by being trying to do one work that's in one stage that doesn't align so.
Erin Holt:
And nothing you do from a self authored place could ever be wrong. That's my personal belief that I hold to be true. And it is important, guys. It's important to be the author of your own story because. Because if you are not, somebody else will be for sure. And we don't want that.
Ali Shapiro
And they'll make a lot of money from it. They'll make so much money from it.
Erin Holt:
So much money. All right, Ali, you have been a joy. Thank you so much for coming on the show.
Ali Shapiro
Thank you, Erin
Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Funk’tional Nutrition Podcast. Please keep in mind this podcast is created for educational purposes only and should never be used as a replacement for medical diagnosis or treatment. If you got something from today's show, don't forget, subscribe, leave a review, share with a friend and keep coming back for more. Take care of you.