Why we struggle with addiction is rarely about the thing we reach for. Addiction is rarely about the thing we reach for. It’s about the ache beneath the thing.The longing that never learned another way to speak.The fear that found relief in whatever quieted it fastest.The memory that refused to stay buried. People don’t return to a cigarette, a drink,…
A calm, mindful reflection on reducing holiday stress The holiday season is meant to feel joyful.And yet, for many people, it arrives with a quiet heaviness beneath the sparkle. There’s pressure to host, to decorate, to cook, to show up generously and to do it all with a smile. As a result, even moments that are supposed to feel celebratory…
A gentle reflection for anyone who’s ever felt pressure to hold it all together I’ve noticed something over the years — in my clients, in conversations, and in myself. There’s an unspoken rule we learn early on:People praise you for staying composed. If you carry your pain quietly, people admire your strength. But when you let it show, when your…
Fear has many faces. Sometimes it’s the quiet whisper at three in the morning, when the world feels heavier than your chest.Sometimes it’s the tremor before change — that moment when you know the old chapter is ending but the new one hasn’t begun. We all know that feeling. And yet, even in humanity’s darkest hours, there are those who…
Behind every woman who struggles with food, there’s often a story woven from survival, tenderness, and the quiet ways we learned to cope. My story — the one that shaped my understanding of emotional eating and healing — began the year my body stopped working the way it once did. After a serious car accident, I found myself trapped inside…
Emotional eating and love often grow from the same place: a kitchen filled with care, intention, and the only love language many mothers knew. For many of us, love arrived as buttered toast, warm casseroles, or second helpings we didn’t ask for. We heard things like: “Eat, you’ll feel better.”“Don’t waste food.”“Take another helping — I made it for you.”…
One rainy night, everything I thought I could count on shattered. My car spun out, my body was thrown, and in an instant, I was broken open on the pavement. Here is why diets never worked for me after that: I survived, but I did not feel free. Survival did not feel like freedom. While my bones healed, I unraveled…
One of the best things about living in Los Angeles is that you don’t have to hop on a plane to taste the world. A few blocks in any direction, and you can be transported into new flavors. Healthy eating in Los Angeles means sushi in Little Tokyo, rich stews in Little Ethiopia, curries in Artesia’s Little India, or steaming…
It was New York Fashion Week, 2007. I sat front row at Karl Lagerfeld’s show, notepad on my lap, every inch the unassuming journalist. What I did not realize was that my vintage blond mink coat, a 1950s beauty with embroidery fit for royalty, had just made me public enemy number one with the fashion police. The temperature outside was…
Paris is a city of contradictions—grand yet intimate, indulgent yet restrained. When I lived there, I often found myself at Café de Flore, one of those legendary Left Bank cafés where the tables spill into the street and every moment feels cinematic. And so I did what expats often do best: I watched. Not idle people-watching, but noticing what French…