The Livy Method Podcast - Food Addiction with Sandra Elia - Winter 2025

Episode Date: January 22, 2025

In this Guest Expert episode, Gina and Certified Food Addiction Counselor Sandra Elia dive into the intricate world of food addiction. Sandra shares her deeply personal journey, unpacking how food addiction shaped her life and the emotional complexities many face when it comes to self-soothing using food. Together, they explore the science of how the food industry designs products for addiction, the difference between overeating and addiction, and how to regain control. Sandra offers practical steps for identifying food addiction, breaking the cycle, and building meaningful connections to support lasting change.You can find the full video hosted at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/livymethodwinter2025Sandra is the founder of The Food Addiction Recovery Program and the author of "Never Enough: Three Pillars of Food Addiction Recovery".Find Sandra Elia:Instagram: @sandraelia.cawww.sandraelia.com/8week-online-programPromo code: LIVYLOSER for 75% offFind her book Never Enough on Amazon:https://www.amazon.ca/Never-Enough-Pillars-Addiction-Recovery/dp/1990700187/To learn more about the Livy Method, visit www.ginalivy.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I'm Gina Livi and welcome to the Livi Method Podcast. This is where you'll have access to all of the live streams from my 91 Day Weight Loss program. With a combination of daily lives, guest expert interviews, and member stories, there is something new almost every day. Miss the Morning Live? Want to relisten to one of our amazing guest experts? Well, this is the place.

This podcast is hosted on Acast, but it's available on all podcast platforms, including the one you're listening to right now, Spotify, Apple, and Amazon Music. I wanna stop right here and take a minute to hear from our new sponsor. It's a good one, and they are offering a promo code, so you're gonna wanna listen up.

It's Joe Fresh, known for great value. So you know you are getting quality for the price point. You know that we love that around here, as well as stylish everyday activities. Their balance line is their medium support, perfect for things like yoga or studio classes that are made with soft fabric that's made to move as you move. And then their momentum line, you know what, come on, this name is amazing. This is their medium to high support level

for more intense workouts, a fabric that helps you power through every rep. However you choose to move, Joe Fresh has you covered. And here is the promo code. It is LivyMethod25. Just use the code when you check out online at joefresh.com or through the Joe Fresh app. This is an opportunity to become curious. To learn some things. How do we help you feel less overwhelmed so you can continue on your journey? Keep believing in yourself and keep trusting the process.

Just be patient. Is it cravings? Is it habits? Are you being triggered? Or is it something more? Today we're talking food addiction with Sandra Elia. She is the author of the book Never Enough. She is also the founder of the food addiction recovery program. And we're going to get into it here because for so many weight loss is so much more than what you are eating and when.

So much more than managing your stress and trying to get a better sleep and moving your body. It has to do what's happening in your brain, your thoughts, how you are feeling your relationship with self your relationship with others in your relationship with food, which can feel really overwhelming. So to help us navigate and walk us through is Sandra Eliel Hello, hi. Hello, happy New Year, everybody. I hope everyone had an amazing holiday. I know it seems like a distant past but

we're almost into February. And I have to show you what I got is a gift from my friend Zena. I got one of the cozies. I guess this is from one of your lines because she's a big fan of yours and this ended up under my Christmas tree. So it is wonderful. It's perfect for this kind of weather. I'm going to see how long I can keep it on because I will get a hot flash. It's like wearing it's like wearing a blanket of love. I have one in every color. And it looks great on you. Colors. Oh, I love it in this camel. It's, it's perfect, especially for the weather here.

Can we talk about, you mentioned the holidays. Some people are really struggling. They're carrying forward their choices that they made on over the holidays and they have feels about that, that they're still trying to reconcile and deal with, even though they are back at it and they're doing all these things.

They're still dealing with that. Yeah. Well, here's the thing, especially if you have tendencies to have compulsive eating or addictive eating. So many of us think, listen, the holiday season is just two weeks. I mean, let me just let loose, eat what I want, have a good time. Oftentimes, it makes us feel pretty bad though. And then come January 1st, just like a light switch, I'm gonna turn everything off and I'm gonna get right back on track.

However, we find it just doesn't work that way, especially if you've ignited the cravings because eating sugar makes you wanna eat more sugar. It's, you know, we kind of fall into that idea. If again, if you're a food addict, that maybe if I just have a little that's craving to go away, maybe I'll scratch that if but then we find ourselves just ignites the hunt for more and more and more. And also if the only way to keep a setback alive is feeling remorseful and guilty, right?

Yeah, it's gone years is gone or whatever holiday you celebrate, it's gone. It's a moment in time. We can never get it back. There's nothing we can do to change it. But what will keep it alive today is feeling bad about it, right? We've got to kind of just move forward, have that acceptance, I am where I am. This journey, right, it's long and nobody has a straight, you know, path to their goal. Everybody, human change looks like five steps forward, two back, four steps forward, three back,

you know, three steps forward, one back, but as long as you're progressing. And I was talking to someone last night in one of my groups and they're like, I've blown it. I'm back at step one. No, you haven't blown anything. You cannot undo the success that you have. You can't undo all those great days that you put together. There is no going back to square one. There's just setbacks. It's sort of like being in university for two years

and failing a course going, well, I guess I gotta go back to day one. No, you don't. You've thrown the success of those two years. You just had a setback. A lot of people have that mentality from doing those deprivation diets or, you know, eat less, exercise more. The minute you mess that up, you've messed up everything and you have to restart again.

I want to get into how do you know if it's food addiction or like, or versus just a craving or you've been triggered or it's just a habit. But first I think we need a bit of an introduction because I know you joined us in our last program. We had some amazing conversations, but we have so many new members joining us. So maybe just a little bit about yourself, your passion for this topic of conversation. For sure. So I'm a certified food addiction counselor. I created Canada's only outpatient program that runs in medical clinics across Canada. I also helped to create the first inpatient program here in Renaissance in Toronto. So that's a treatment center that's been

open since the 1970s treating drugs and alcohol addiction, but they opened their doors to food addicts. And I wrote that program and I executed it. And I have to tell you, Gina, that was one of the most rewarding years of my career, working, it was a women's only center. So I have an affinity for working with women and just, these are the most beautiful souls you ever want to meet. People trying to face their demons and overcome their addictions. And what really struck me was how some of the same thinking patterns are there across all addictions and what really struck me was how some of the same thinking patterns are there across all addictions. But what really qualifies me for this work is that I am a recovering

food addict. In my 20s, I lived with over 100 pounds of extra weight. And I wish I could tell you that my eating and my weight were my only problems. But as a lot of people probably know, it really affects and almost devastates every area of our lives, right? There's always an area, especially if you're living with obesity or food addiction or both, it affects our relationships. It affects our health. It affects our careers. Sometimes we don't know how bad we feel until we on to the other side. And we sometimes don't realize how small our lives become until we get over to the other side. I remember being in my early 30s and I had lost over 100 pounds. I divorced my husband. It was like I was reborn. I was getting out in the world.

I was, you know, cave, hiking through caves and doing marathons and everything that I didn't know was possible because I was trapped in this body, but not only trapped in a body, trapped in this mind frame that I was a failure, that I couldn't get this right. What was wrong with me? Why didn't I have willpower? Everybody said just eat less and move more. And that was so simple, but I couldn't do it. I could, and I that was so simple. But I couldn't do it. I could. And I know I'm intelligent, but I couldn't do it. And I didn't know why. Well, you know, we talk about this all the time that weight loss is complicated for a lot of reasons, but also because of the way we our relationship with food, the way we utilize food,

we use food to show love, some people's love language. We use food to celebrate when times are great. We use it to bond over. We use it to cope when we're sad. And we use it to distract. And we use it because we just, some people just really enjoy it. They enjoy making it they enjoy eating it So it's very complicated because it's not like that's gonna stop happening food is the one thing that we need in order to survive And I think this is where the food addiction the concept of food addiction Is also complicated because you look at something like drugs or alcohol when you have them You know, there is that true addiction where I don't think food addiction gets the same notoriety

for lack of respect because it is something that we need to eat to survive, which makes it even more difficult to reconcile your relationship with it. So it's not an easy thing to do. And weight loss, as we know, we have what I love about the living method, it has the formula for you, right, just do exactly what we say when it comes to eat this and do that. But that mental part, like that's that can be the hardest part for a lot of people. I don't know where to start. I love that you said use food because that's a very interesting concept, especially in addiction, right?

I feel like I had two ways of eating. I either ate to nourish my body or I used food. I used food in a very different way. I used food to obliterate pain. I used food to numb out. I used food to escape for comfort. So there's that really important distinction. Am I using food to alter my state or am I consuming food for a variety of reasons like celebration and energy

and all of that? Now you bring up a really important point. So I go to at least two medical conferences. I think I'm gonna see you in Montreal, I hope, for the obesity Canada summit. And yeah, whenever I give a talk, that's the first question people say, Sandra, we can't be addicted to food, we need food to survive. And I said, really? Okay, so we need Doritos to survive, right? That's not food. And it's tricky because Doritos

look like food. But when you turn over over the package and the ingredient list is the size of my face that is more chemical and more drug than food. So you're right, food addiction is not the right term and we're working on it. I'm part of the Food Addiction Institute. We're working on what is the right name for this because most people aren't addicted to real whole foods because they react in our bodies in real and natural ways. We get satiated. We are addicted to these chemical concoctions that have been put together in a certain way to overwhelm our reward system. And for some of us then we become addicted. Not everyone, but for some of us we do. Yeah. Well that's a big conversation is the food industry and the way they are literally

sitting around in labs or rooms trying to figure out how to make food more addicting. Like this is that's not, you know, hearsay that that's actually happening. And you know, I went to I was saying the other day, I was making a chili. And I haven't made it probably in a few years. And I went to get my regular tomato sauce, sauce crushed tomatoes. And for some reason, I just turned around the can and they've added sugar to it. I'm like, why have they added sugar to my crushed tomatoes? What is, what is happening here?

I ended up, you know, finding another brand, but it seems like they are chemically altering our foods to make it more addictive to us. So there is that. But let's say someone is doing a program, and they're eating all this good, nutrient-rich foods. They're eating their breakfast, focusing on protein, and having fruit, their lunch, their vegetables, proteins,

leafy greens, healthy fats. They're adding in their heavier carbs, their rices, their quinoas, their potatoes, they're having an afternoon snack of vegetables and combining it with maybe some hummus and having their nuts and seeds, which are full of protein and fat, and then having their dinner,

and they've got that protein and vegetables and leafy greens and healthy fats. They've eaten all this nutrient rich food all day long, and then the evening hits, and they just, they feel this need to snack. Now I tell people, make sure you are making your food choices nutrient rich, make sure you're not skipping meals and snacks, make sure that you are eating enough to feel satisfied in the moment. But what do people do about that? What is that? Is that is that a trigger? Is that a? Is that a habit? What was habit? Why is it so difficult for people to break that? First of all, I want to normalize this in that anybody who's ever struggled with their relationship with food or their weight, nighttime eating is a problem for everybody. This is not uncommon.

I am very familiar with your meal plan. I've done your meal plan. It's excellent. It reminds me very to what we used to do at Renaissance, which was an inpatient treatment, we made people eat nutrient rich foods, we would weigh and measure. Oftentimes, the clients would say this is too much food because remember, they moved into the treatment center for 28 days, this is too much, I can't even eat all this food. And

then they would say at night,'t even eat all this food. And then they would say at night, I want something I'm craving. And the reason is, those nutrient rich foods didn't give them the buzz. It didn't light up their brain. They weren't experiencing the dopamine and the serotonin that those ultra processed foods. So even though their body was absolutely satisfied, they were not, you know, if you said to them, here have some apples, we'll give you some more salt. They're like, no, I know what I want. And it is a tantalization of the brain. It's the comforts, the ease that comes over you, especially carbs. If you're a carb, you know, I used to be like carbs, carbs, carbs, more carbs. I used to say my full switch was broken because if you gave me a plate of pasta that was that big

or that big, I was eating it all. And the rush of serotonin, which is the neurochemical of ease, of comfort, of feeling safe. That's what I needed at the end of the day. Like I just held it together all day. And then at night when I was alone and it was dark and I was even married at the time, but I was so lonely. That's what I wanted. That's what I needed. And it actually didn't matter if

I was full or not. And I remember in my 20s going to the doctor and the doctor suggesting bariatric surgery. And the way they explained it, then they explain it much better. Now they understand the hormone disruption. But we're talking 25 years ago or more. They said to me, you know, your stomach will become the size of a shot glass and you won't be hungry. I said, but I don't eat because I'm hungry. I didn't understand that.

Yeah. I used to do this and I was just talking about it on the live yesterday when I was younger and my kids were younger and I was watching Grey's Anatomy, Thursday nights were like my Grey's Anatomy time where my kids didn't bother me. It was my one hour a week that was just for me and I would grab the red wine and a bag of sour cream and onion chips.

And I haven't watched that show in forever and still to this day, whenever I see Grey's Anatomy on the TV, I immediately want chips. So it's my association. I do wanna go back to what you said about apples and people being hungry. And this is a great kind of explanation for people when it comes to how our food is being created

to be addicting is that you have a hard time just eating one chip, but you won't eat like 50 apples. You won't overeat broccoli. You won't even overeat steak or chicken. I mean, you might finish your whole plate because that's what you're used to doing and that's what you were taught. And your sense of satisfaction is finishing your plate or eating till you're full. But whereas- It's delicious. Yeah. And it's not like- Yeah. Yeah. So like a steak with a side of lobster and asparagus.

Like we're not talking about deprivation. Delicious, too, but we can put the brakes on it. We can put the brakes on it. We can put the brakes on it. Okay. So how do we... Okay. How does food addiction differ from overeating? How does it differ from cravings? How does it differ from snacking habits? Yeah, so what's interesting about obesity or elevated weight is there are many, many contributing factors, many, and that's why there's not one single solution. So there's that first piece. And also understanding that many of the contributing factors are outside of your control. So I really hope that people listening can put down the heavy bags of shame, of guilt, of like you know hating yourself because there's so much at play. There's a genetic role, there's the food environment, there's you know childhood traumas linked to this like there's so

much outside of your control. So when we talk about you know overeating, compulsive eating, cravings, food addiction, you can have all of them. So the line that helps you understand when you've crossed over to food addiction, and I actually have 20 questions that I'll share with your team and we can throw it up and people can ask themselves these 20 questions. But one hallmark of addiction is if your eating

is causing you consequences in your life like if you're if you're suffering physically so that could be being prediabetic loss of mobility hypertension fatty liver if you if you're eating is causing your mental health to decline your mood depression anxiety and I'll tell you ultra processed foods have been linked to anxiety. And I'll tell you ultra processed foods have been linked to decreasing mood and depression and anxiety. And you're starting to pay that spiritual price and spiritual prices. I think I'm a loser. Like I don't know what's wrong with me. I don't, the bigger I get, the less I feel that I'm worthy. But you can't stop. But yet you cannot stop. Think of anything else in your life. If it caused you so much pain, you would stop, right?

Like if I put my hand on the stove, I stop. If I go out on a date with a jerk, I stop, right? But I can't stop with food. And I saw that with my own mother who had four kids and the doctors kept saying, if you don't lose weight, you're gonna die. If you don't lose weight, you're gonna die. And we would leave those doctor's appointments and go get food because that was her drug.

And that's how she got through her day. So if you have consequences that you do not want, and yet you cannot stop. The other big hallmark is having going through withdrawal. So trying to stop. And this is how addictive sugar is. Anybody, whether you have a weight problem or not, who tries to go cold turkey on sugar, like really do like the no sugar challenge goes through withdrawal. So that's headache, irritability, sleep disturbance, like all a whole mishmash. And then what happens is

our brain tricks us and says, you know what, just have a little, just have a little like this withdrawal, this pain that you're experiencing is going to go away. And we used to see that at Renaissance because pop is highly, highly addictive that coming off pop. Oh my god, I call it liquid poison. It is it is really tough to come off pop. And they would they would say, Listen, if I just had half a glass of Diet Coke, this headache, this migraine, I could focus, please just give it to me, right. And that's withdrawal. So it's persistent attempts at trying to get, to get off of the substance and having a hard time with it.

And that's often also looks like dieting or you know what, I'll have my trigger foods just on Fridays or I'll just have it on my birthday, but the, you know, I have a cheat day, but that cheat day turns into three days, turns into three weeks. And it's just this unmanageable ability. And what I do appreciate about your program, I think you said something really that hit home for me when you're like, we tell people exactly what to do. And that's so important. Because when you're living with elevated weight, your best thinking, right, has maybe

gotten you to a place in your life where you're not happy. So then to trust something else, to say, you know what, for 90 days, I'm just going to trust this process. I'm going to trust this food plan because I can't trust my own thinking because my best thinking got me here. So let me not trust that anymore. And let me trust this. That food noise. I want to get to that in a second that your brain constantly, you know, okay, I'm not going to eat today. Okay, then I'm going to eat this and why did I eat that?

And then you're, you know, you eat something that gives you that dopamine hit and then immediately start ragging on yourself and feeling bad about it. Why did I have that? Oh my goodness, I'm a failure. I'm never going to lose my weight. You wake up the next day, and you get on the scale and it's not down. Maybe it's not up, but it's the same. And oh my goodness, I ruined

everything. And here we go again, that that food noise is like that is that is, that's tough. But we know your brain is wired to change. We know with cognitive behavioral therapy, you can you can you can rewire how your brain comes to function. I wanna talk to you about how that factors in, but first, I have this comment here from Haley. I stopped drinking due to addiction. Now I find myself 100 plus pounds

and I've replaced the alcohol with food. How do you ultimately help get past addictions instead of replacing addictions? So we call that cross addicted. So first of all, Haley, congratulations on recovering from alcoholism and not drinking, that's huge. And you know what that tells me? That it's also possible for food

because if you can do it with alcohol, you apply the same principles to food. However, it is a little more complicated with food. Because our brain is wired already. Our brain is not wired to want alcohol. Our brain is not wired to want cocaine. Our brain is wired to want food and sweet food. That's evolutionarily what the safest food was.

So there's that piece to it. And so what does, as I was saying, like just trying to do the same principles that you did with alcohol. Looking at what are your triggering foods, one meal at a time, avoiding them, not thinking for the rest of your life, because food's a little trickier. We can't do it perfectly like we can with alcohol and really bringing

it down to one meal at a time. Yeah. That's not an easy thing because you're bombarded by food and then that affects like it's one thing to not go to the bar and drink, but if you want to go out for a nice dinner, you want to go over to your friends for for dinner there's like there's food everywhere. I want to stop right here and take a minute to hear from our new sponsor it's a good one and they are offering a promo code so you're gonna want to listen up it's Joe Fresh known for great value so you know you are getting quality for the price point you know that we love that around here as well as stylish everyday essentials

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at joefresh.com or through the JoFresh app. Here's a comment from Risa. I grew up where treats were used for celebration, sickness, good grades, cleaning our rooms, holidays, et cetera. I mean, mom loved to bake a lot. That's that's that association that you're rewarding yourself with a treat. And yet it's not a reward if

then you're punishing yourself afterwards for having it. Right. And so I've identified three thinking traps when it comes to addictive eating. The first one is I deserve a treat. And the answer always is, absolutely, you do deserve a treat. You are a beautiful human. Life is hard. It's short. You deserve a treat.

But is food really a treat? Here's the test. A treat should leave you feeling better than before you had it. And so the treat, we always say, tell yourself the whole story. The story starts with, it was a hard day. I've been doing well. I deserve a treat. It starts like a wait.

And then it's like, oh, I think there's leftover cookies. I know where I'm going to get them. Yeah, I'm going to be alone. I'm going to have them. Then you eat the treat. That's the climax of the story. And yes, it's pleasurable. Otherwise, we wouldn't eat them, so long as you're eating it.

I want you to be really conscious the next time you have a treat. And when you swallow the last bite, what happens afterwards? So if you have that sharp decline of I'm upset, I'm angry at myself. I feel bloated. I feel sick. I feel like I've ignited my cravings. Now I want to know what's next. What's next.

I've blown it. Might as well go to town. I'll start over tomorrow. That's the whole story. Does that actually sound like a treat? No. We compare it to other things. So what we know through research is that people who struggle with their weight or elevate or obesity lack self-soothing techniques. We, so I'll give you an example through my own story. So when you,

the day that you start using food to soothe is the day you stop emotionally maturing in a way. So as a child, let's say I went to school and I got a bad grade in math. If I had a supportive home environment, I would have gotten homes and, hey, mom, dad, I'm struggling in math. Maybe they get me semester help.

But that was not available to me. many food addicts I grew up in a home that was unsafe and chaotic and my mother was addicted to food so that was not an option so when I got a bad grade at school I would go home and I eat an entire family-sized bag of chips and guess what the bad grades didn't bother me then I became a teen I had a boyfriend we would have a big a big blowout fight. I didn't know how to communicate. And again, teens don't know how to communicate, but I started practicing. I didn't practice. I went home and had a tub of ice cream.

Guess what? Fight didn't bother me. And then I could see him again and pretend like it never happened. And then in my 20s, I landed this great corporate job. And if I made a mistake at work, whoa, like I would lose two, three nights of sleep on it. But I learned if I ate a party-sized pizza or a large pizza, then the mistake didn't bother me.

So look at what I'm doing. Every time life presents natural ways to self-soothe, to problem-solve, to grow mature, I used food instead. And then I'm there in my 30s going, holy crap, I can't do this anymore, but I don't know how to self-soothe. I don't know how to problem solve. I don't know. Every answer was food. And now my food, I decided to let go of that.

So that's the other piece to it. Well, we hear this all the time. You know, when my husband leaves for work, my kids go to school, I dig in and I just have this need to eat. And that could stem from something in your past. I love the awareness piece. And so this is where when someone, for example, is hungry at night, and this is they're like, What can I have?

And I'm like, it's not about what you can have. It's why are you hungry? This is where you want to start to physical? Did you eat all your meals and snacks? Did you make them nutrient rich? Did you eat to satisfaction? Did you drink enough water? So let's make sure your body's gotten what it's needs. So you're not actually legitimately hungry. Yes.

Right. And then what is it? So what's going on? What is the hunger about? Is it because I did have a bad day or I'm bored? Or just trying to analyze and understand that awareness piece. And then let's say you did have a bad day or I'm bored or just trying to analyze and understand that awareness piece. And then let's say you did have the thing.

I like what you said when you swallowed that last piece, then pay attention to what's going on in your brain. What's your thought? Do you immediately start ragging on yourself and then punish yourself? And then also when you recognize that you do that, every time you are back in that situation, you're going to be like, Oh yeah, I do this because of that.

Or you're recognizing that that's not going to give you what you want. Now you may continue that behavior a few more times, but that awareness piece is huge because that gives you a fighting chance of like rewiring your brain and stopping it being like, okay, well, wait a minute. Every time this happens, I do this. Or when I have this, this is actually not a treat. But that's a process. This is not something that you can figure out overnight. No, because also that compulsive eating wasn't something you started overnight. It wasn't like one day you decided every single night at eight o'clock, I need something.

That happened over time. So I love what you said about retraining the brain because I want everybody to know if nighttime eating is a problem for you, your plan cannot be just stop. I just gotta stop, that's my plan. That's not a plan, right? That's actually a way of shaming someone.

You just need to stop. So what we know about addiction is it touches several parts of our brain. It touches our euphoric recall, right? So that's why when you see gray synatomy, you're like, yes, I need my wine and my sour cream and onion potato chips. It touches our habit center. It touches our reward center.

So there's so much going on. So if nighttime eating is almost become a habit for you, it's almost like an automatic behavior. It's almost like it doesn't matter. If even I just finished eating and I feel so full, I have this drive to have it. It's important to retrain your brain with another ritual, another routine.

So our lives are actually made up of rituals and routines. Most of them are unconscious. So I want you to understand that nighttime eating could actually just be a ritual that you do and you haven't done it once or twice. You've done it hundreds of times over many years and your brain is primed for that. So to say to your brain, hey listen tonight we're changing this routine that you've always done is really tough. Try picking up a pen with your non-dominant hand and your brain's going to scream at you, stop stop we already learned how to write with the other one. What are you doing? We don't want to learn this. And so what is the high value activities that you can fill your evening with and develop a new ritual.

So a great craving buster is connection. A lot of us are lonely, right? That's the World Health Organization has come out today. That loneliness is a threat to health. That being lonely can, can be as dangerous as smoking. So where can you build in connection? And here's the deal, you have to build in that connection early in the day when that frontal lobe is still working,

when you have the energy, when you're hopeful about your day, not at eight o'clock at night when you're like, I'm craving, I should reach out. Have connection, whether it's FaceTimes or phone calls or walks, but somebody that you connect with, someone that feeds your soul. And as women, we need friendships. I'm sure men do too in different ways. So another thing that I tell my clients to do, I have them all doing it right now, is a tea ritual. So what if that was

your nighttime ritual? So, but I mean going all out, right? So there's something about the cattle going, picking a beautiful mug, having maybe a box of different teas, keep them decaffeinated so you can sleep. So one of my favorite right now is a rich cinnamon tea. And then I foam up my almond milk, my sugar free almond milk. And then I sprinkle on cinnamon. And it's just like this, I don't know, I look forward to it. Yeah, you're indulging, but in your indulging something that makes you feel really good. I want to I want to get into more tips that you might have for people

managing food addiction when following the program. But first, I want to ask you do you believe in out of sight out of mind? Like, do you like what's your what's your what are your thoughts on that? I'm not big on avoidance, right? We want to teach people how to learn to be around food. The end game is lose your weight, yes, but be calm around food physically, mentally. There's a lot of work for a lot of people. But do you believe in out of sight, out of mind?

What's your theory? What's your thoughts on that? You do. So I have a 13 year old daughter. There she is, my beautiful daughter. And so she eats sugar. And when she was young and I used to do my little zoom calls, she'd be like seven or eight.

She'd come into the screen and go, I eat sugar, I love sugar. Like, oh boy. So here's my deal with my daughter. I love her so much, obviously, anybody who's a mom. And I also know that her grandmother died of obesity. I had obesity genetically. She's, you know, she's vulnerable. So the deal is we do not have foods at her fingertips, right? Because that's how much I love her. Does that mean she does? Now she's 13. She goes to Starbucks. She

can have sugar. We just do not have it at the fingertips We don't have a cupboard and she'll go to her dad's and come home and say, you know dad has a junk drawer I can have Oreos and I can have chips and it's all there and I go well I'm too lucky that 50% of the time you have a junk drawer I'm not gonna do that because when is if you have a vulnerability and it is in your cupboard, there's no chance. There's literally no chance. That's like leaving alcoholism treatment and going home to a house with a stocked bar, right?

That's crazy. That's asking for trouble, for relapse. Now, will this person, obviously they're gonna go to parties. They have to go to parties. They wanna go to parties. They might even meet people at bars and restaurants. But in your vulnerable moment, if it's there, you're going to have it. I love that. Okay, so tips for, we talked about how someone knows if you're just joining us, we're talking to food addiction expert Sandra Elia, you would know you'd have a food addiction

because your health is at risk and yet you're not stopping your behaviors because it's affecting your life and yet you're not stopping your behaviors. But it's a blurred line because there are, your habits are factored in, you're being triggered quite often. Food is being created to be addicting for us. So although we just might wanna get a small little bowl of chippies, it might be very difficult for us to stop eating that. So it's a very complicated process. You absolutely can rewire how your body's come to function.

You can rewire how your brain has come to function but it's a process. And obviously that is what we're trying to accomplish here with the Livvy Method. For some people it's so easy peasy. They just do the program, follow along, they lose their weight, they're trying to accomplish here with the Living Method. For some people, it's so easy peasy. They just do the program, follow along, they lose their weight, they're good to go. Thank you very much.

But for other people, it's more complicated. I'm so glad you said that because we have a mutual friend, Quentin, Dr. Sean Wharton. And I met Dr. Sean Wharton about 10 years ago. And he has an obesity clinic here in Southern Ontario. And at that time, his clinics were seeing 1,000 patients a month. And he came to me and said, you know,

Sandra, there's about 20% of my patients. I can't help them. There's nothing. It doesn't matter what I do, pharmacotherapy, the dietitian, I can't help them. And I said, oh, they're likely food addicts. And he leaned in and he's like, what is that? What is that? And so he and I spent the evening talking and he actually allowed me to pilot my food addiction

Recovery program in his clinics. I remember early days He had to sit in on them because he's like, I don't know who Sandra is and I don't know what she's gonna tell my patient And I remember after he sat in for the eight weeks, he said, OK, this is your program. You have my blessing. No more doctor supervision. So it is a particular person. And I think some of the signs are also how much mental real estate.

You talked about food noise. Well, let's talk about mental real estate. How much of your mind is thinking, where am I going to eat? When am I going to eat? How much did I eat? Did I eat too much? Did I skip dinner, which I never used to do, but I would tell myself that lie.

I'll have a big lunch and I'll skip dinner. Did I have too little? Can I have seconds? Can I have thirds? Can I, does that mean I'm going to see, will there be leftovers? Can I hide some? How much mental real estate?

I'm telling you, I could have run the world if I took all that mental real estate and applied it to my dreams and applied it to my work. Oh my god, so how much of your mental real estate and the other sign is trigger foods. These are foods that you obsess about that once you start there is no having a reasonable portion and it's not your fault right? Especially with potato chips. I bet you just can't have one. No you can't. They're manufactured so you can't have one. And this is the other kicker. Whenever I start on my trigger foods,

I end up bingeing. I end up in compulsive eating. So I end up to the point, you know, for me, I didn't have a full switch. I only stopped when I was sick. That was it. Oh, I'm physically, it would almost be relief. Like, oh, I'm finally physically sick, I'm going to stop now. Right? So that kind of behavior. That mental real estate, I remember that it was very long time ago for me. I remember just from the minute I woke up, walking to work at the coffee shop, should I get this? Should I get a muffin? Should I get it? Whatever. Then I get it. And then I immediately was like, okay, I got to work out extra today. And I think this is one of the reasons why I have such a passion for this topic. This is why we have learning strategist and psychologists along with our doctors and someone like Sandra,

a food addiction expert, because I remember that space in the brain. This is a big conversation with all of the new GLP ones and the weight loss medications. And one of the things that they do is to help calm that food noise for a lot of people so that they can actually get a handle and and and on their hunger and you know start creating these new habits game changer for people. Sandra, sorry, Sandra mentioned Sean Wharton who is one of the brightest minds in obesity research who also works very closely with Sandy Vann who is going to be coming on to talk about GLP-1 weight loss medications, which the LibV method is very weight loss medication friendly. I was actually just watching a conversation with Oprah

this morning and talking about how taking medication is not the easy route. And this is still the kind of work that you need. This here is the kind of work that many people need to do. And then you, of course, are good friends with Sandy Vann, the two of you came on in our last group, and we will all be together at the conference that we're going to be going to. And so what we're learning is that weight loss is so much more than what you're eating and when, eating less and exercising more. And this is what these conversations where I'm getting with this is these conversations are about awareness. And if you're listening today, you're like, Oh, my goodness, I'm never gonna lose weight because I, I have this food noise, I'm never gonna lose weight, because I'm addicted to food, that that's not the conversation here. There's absolutely hope for you. And

this is what we do here. This is what we do here. But I do want I want to validate that for some people. It is more complicated. It does take a bit more work mentally. Okay, so Oh, sorry, man. So I wanted to talk a minute about GLP ones and how you're right, it is complicated. So I always tell people you need a village of support. The more interventions you have, the better. And that's what the GenoLivy program has done for you. You've curated the village of support, right?

And that village has to include a meal plan, which is baked in, has to include community, baked in, has to include movement. And I'm not talking about hit classes, but we're a living organism. Stillness leads to illness. Sometimes it includes counselors to help you understand what's driving you to eat for comfort Sleep if you don't get enough sleep if you're seven hours and last your hunger hormones go up your full hormones go down

There's it's like it's like carrying a 50 pound knapsack as you walk up the hill Well, everybody else who's getting enough sleep doesn't carry the 50 pound knapsack as you walk up the hill while everybody else who's getting enough sleep doesn't carry the 50 pound knapsack. Looking at your spiritual life, so the better the village, the more likely the success. Yeah and the GLP-1s can be part of that village but here's the deal, whether you take a GLP-1, whether you have bariatric surgery, the road is the same for everyone. There is no road that does not include that village. It's not like we can take these GLP-1s and then eat factory-made foods that are nutrient

poor that cause diseases. They cause diseases. There's many people who have never struggled with their weight, never struggled with eating who have decided to live a sugar-free life, to live an ultra-processed food-free life. They're just like, I don't want to eat that food because it robs me of my clarity of mind, my energy, my vitality. It ages me. I've got 50 reasons, even though I might be slender, I'm not touching that stuff.

So every road includes the things that are in this program. If you need help, right, it would be no different than if someone in your program needed an antidepressant. They should absolutely take that so that they can show up and walk this road. And something that Pharma's not talking about is, how do you eventually maybe wean yourself off? So, first off, disclaimer, I'm not a doctor,

but is there a way to use these medicines to quiet the food noise, open up that real estate and really allow you to build a life that brings health? And then we knock off of them. So the other thing, because I work in advocacy work is we have to stop saying that only people with elevated weight need to eat a certain way or exercise. No, everybody does.

Everybody does. My 13-year-old daughter does and my 93-year-old grandmother does. It doesn't matter what your weight is because we're all looking for health and vitality. Yeah. Well, change is so much more than the medications you take. Just like if you take diabetes medication, thyroid medication, blood pressure medication, there's still things that you need to do. And when it comes to weight loss, having gastric, taking medications, that doesn't do anything

for you showing up for yourself and doing the things that you need to do, for believing that you are worthy, for reconciling your relationship with food, with yourself, to create new habits in your life, to not be triggered, to work through past trauma. So there's a lot of work there. There's a comment here, Dr. Wharton and his weight loss clinic is great. Long waiting list, however, yes. And that was the big takeaway when I went

to the obesity summit is that there are doctors there who are doing great work with people, but they're doing it one on one. And I remember talking to someone being like, okay, I get set point, right? And I get your brain, it gets wired a certain way, your body gets wired, you're basically training your body to store excess fat. And your brain gets wired in a certain way that makes it very difficult for you to lose weight. But I said, can't you change that? It's neuroplasticity, Your brain is designed to change. And they're like, oh, yeah, you can. But how do you do that for a large group of people that makes

a difference? I can do that in my clinic, but I can only see X number of people a year. And this is where I'm like, this is the living method. This is the message. This is what you are doing here. I've created the formula, the algorithm for sustainable weight loss, bringing in experts like Sandra, who are spending their time knowing exactly what you are doing and giving you the information to help you.

We had Dr. Paul come on, talk about supplements. The supplements that are gonna be beneficial while you are on this program focused on what you are doing. We had learning strategists, Dr. Beverly David, psychologist. What's so great about our experts is they freely share their time, know exactly what you are doing and how hard you are working and giving you the tips and the tools and the insight to make change on your own. So that if you can't get in to see the brightest minds in obesity research, or you don't have the resources to pull your team together, this is why we're doing this. This is why we're doing this.

And also, if you do manage to see the doctor, understand that in Ontario, it's OHIP. That means they get 15 minutes. How much can you convey in 15 minutes? And then you have to wait for your next appointment 60 days later to get another 15 minutes, right? And with Management it has to be daily

Well people can get more of you people can get more of you. So you You do a course that actually helps people great compliment to the program. We're not associated This is what Sandra does on her own. So I don't benefit from promoting what Sandra is doing. But beyond your book, Never Enough, that people can pick up on Amazon. We will add the link for you to this post if you want to grab it. But you also have a course that people can sign up for.

Yeah, so this outpatient program that I have that runs in medical clinics in British Columbia and in Southern Ontario and some clinics, I went to studio and I recorded all of those sessions because I want them available to everybody across North America, across the world actually. I just had somebody join from Australia the other day. And so you go into a portal, you watch the eight instructional videos, there's the resources, the homework, but the real gold is every Wednesday night we come together on Zoom and that's your chance to ask questions, get coached directly by me.

So you're like, Hey, I watched week two and I'm not sure how to implement this or this is my specific example and I'm going to help you through it. I'm going to walk alongside you. So I'm giving the Libby losers 75% off because I want to honor Gina's. I really, you know, you do, you're there for your community and you're all about accessibility and affordability. So that 75% off with the Libby Loser promo code makes it accessible and available to everyone. And right now there's a lot, I would say right now we have 150 Libby Losers in this program. So you'll be in

good company from the last podcast and your community is beautiful. They are the most beautiful souls and they're there to work and you really have enabled them to understand how to focus, how to work, how to follow. It's like, wow, wow. They're like the A plus students. It's the teacher in September who gets those students like, whoa, who was your last teacher? This class is amazing. Well, because what we're doing here is a foundation of change. It's the foundation of change.

And so people are so far ahead. And this is the takeaway. I want everyone to understand, and I know I said this yesterday, that you are doing enough just by showing up and following the food plan. And maybe you are not ready to dive into that mental piece and that mental part or tackle food addictions. That's okay. That's okay. Right? Just focus on what you can focus on a little and often, but it is available for you if you're interested. All you have to do is go to Sanders website. So guys, can you pull that website back up again? So SandraElia, E-L-I-A.com.

You're also on Instagram as well. Yes, Instagram as well, Facebook. That's about it. That's all I can manage is those two. Yeah. You know, what I love about our experts is they, it's not like they have like, you know, hundreds of thousands of followers

because you guys are all so busy actually actively helping people, which is one thing I love about our experts. I hope that you enjoyed this conversation today. Those of you watching live, those of you listening after the fact, if you want to watch it again, we are going to repost it in the guides and the Facebook support group. You can also download and listen by way of our podcast Libby Method. We will also attach information on where to find Sandra and pick up her book. Sandra, thank you so much. She's going to be back with us in the next month and a bit.

So we're going to continue the conversation. Thank you. Wonderful. Bye, everybody.