[This episode is part of the Weight-Neutral Health Care In Aotearoa NZ Series]

This week I'm talking with Andrea Palmer, a Wellington-based dietitian, about weight-neutral family feeding — what it actually looks like and why that's harder than it sounds in a culture obsessed with kids' weight.

In this episode:

• What family-style feeding is, why the parent's job stops at what/when/where, and how removing the moral hierarchy between foods changes the whole dynamic at the table
• Why restricting a bigger kid's food usually backfires — and why pressuring a smaller kid to eat more does too
• How to handle a GP who suggests weight loss for your child, including a question that exposes the bias behind that advice
• Why yo-yo dieting costs kids and how never restricting a child sets them up for a steadier relationship with food for life

As Andrea put it: whether it's fear of weight gain, fear of sugar, or fear of "bad" food, fear has no place attached to something as basic as eating — and taking it off the table is the whole point.

About Andrea Palmer: Andrea has been a dietitian since 2007 and has practised from a weight-neutral perspective for most of her career. Based in Wellington, she supports families — including her own — in feeding their kids without making weight the focus, drawing on her own experience raising a selective eater.

Connect with Andrea: https://foodhabits.co.nz/

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Intuitive Eating by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch: https://www.intuitiveeating.org/
• The Satter Division of Responsibility in Feeding by Ellyn Satter: https://www.ellynsatterinstitute.org/how-to-feed/division-of-responsibility/

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[This episode is part of the Weight-Neutral Health Care In Aotearoa NZ Series]

This week I'm talking with Dr. Meg Vardy, founding chair of JourneyED, about why taking weight off the table is central to eating disorder peer support, and what it actually means to rebuild trust with your own body. In this episode:

• What peer support actually is, how it's different from clinical treatment and recovery coaching, and why "fixing" or diagnosing isn't the job
• Why a weight-neutral approach to peer support matters, and how eating disorders that don't fit the "underweight" stereotype get missed
• The U-shaped relationship between weight and health, why BMI doesn't hold up, and how framing obesity as a disease creates its own harm
• Why moralising food and bodies (even well-meaning tools like Health Star Ratings) keeps people stuck

On rebuilding trust with your body: "My body is for me, my body is safe, and my body is home." Meg's words on what it's taken to get there — and why it's still very much an ongoing practice, not a switch you flip.

About Meg Vardy: Meg grew up in Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland) and now lives in Ōtepoti (Dunedin) with her whānau. She has a background as an academic researcher, including time in London researching psilocybin-assisted treatment for anorexia (recently published). Meg has lived experience of anorexia and is the founding chair of JourneyED, Aotearoa New Zealand's eating disorder peer support organisation.

Connect with JourneyED: Website [link]

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Unshrinking by Kate Manne: https://www.katemanne.net/unshrinking.html
• Mrs D is not on a Diet: https://www.unitybooks.co.nz/products/mrs-d-is-not-on-a-diet
• Bite Back by Genevieve Mora: https://www.penguin.co.nz/books/bite-back-9781776950447
• Body Confident by Emma Wright: https://www.harpercollins.co.nz/9781775542421/body-confident/

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Part of the Weight Neutral Health Care in Aotearoa NZ.

Therapist Nicole Gaviria, founder of Binge Free Bestie, talks about her binge eating disorder, why bariatric surgery didn't fix it, and the three real triggers behind binge eating.

We unpack why the number on the scale was never the actual problem, and Nicole walks through the three triggers she sees behind binge eating in the women she works with: physical restriction, mental restriction (diet rules and food morality), and a dysregulated nervous system. We also get into a GLP-1s — not from a pro- or anti-drug stance, but what happens to food noise, body image, and eating disorder risk when the injectable stops working and the underlying relationship with food is not addressed.

This is a raw, unedited conversation, as all Talking with Emma episodes are.

ABOUT NICOLE GAVIRIA

Nicole Gaviria is a registered counsellor based in Christchurch, New Zealand, and the founder of Binge Free Bestie, where she works with women on binge and emotional eating using a weight-neutral, anti-diet approach. She also hosts her own podcast and runs a 90-day program called The Breakup, focused on breaking up with diet culture and binge eating.

Website: https://bingefreebestie.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bingefreebestie/

Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/0hNizRK1dJAfy52fq9odV5?si=846ea7959d7b4e43

The Break Up: https://checkout.bingefreebestie.com/the-break-up

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