Katherine Zavodni, MPH RDN

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Katherine Zavodni, MPH RDN Katherine is a registered dietitian/nutritionist specializing in eating disorders, child and family feeding, and body concerns with a non-diet approach.
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Hey y’all… once again, I find myself in need of an extended pause on the podcast. My life has been turned upside down th...
05/10/2022

Hey y’all… once again, I find myself in need of an extended pause on the podcast. My life has been turned upside down this past year, in ways that were really difficult for a while and are now mostly really wonderful, but this has brought about some massive changes in my time management and priorities.

I am not certain if/when the podcast will return. I love creating it, but for now I need to focus on my nutrition therapy clients, as well as some new creative projects that are bringing me to life in ways I haven’t been in many years. So I am choosing to honor my heart and simplify where I can to make more room for those things.

Thanks for being here with me, for following the podcast, and for understanding that sometimes life has other plans.

To inquire about my 1:1 services, please email me at [email protected]. I am currently in network with BCBS, so if you have any sort of BCBS policy, my team can check your benefits for nutrition counseling, so feel free to reach out.

Sending you big, warm hugs until we meet again 💗

Eating disorder pros, dietitians and other helping professionals, hope you will join me and Center for Change] for this ...
21/01/2022

Eating disorder pros, dietitians and other helping professionals, hope you will join me and Center for Change] for this webinar! I can’t wait 🤩
Repost from Center for Change]

Mark your calendars for Wednesday, February 16th! will be presenting a free webinar on "The Internal Family in Nutritional Self Care: An IFS Perspective on Healing with Food".

Register today by clicking the link in our bio and heading to our Events page.

I love back to school season. Bouquets of sharpened pencils and all that. ✏️📌✂️🖍📚When summer is ending and I'm getting e...
21/09/2021

I love back to school season. Bouquets of sharpened pencils and all that. ✏️📌✂️🖍📚

When summer is ending and I'm getting excited about things like sharpened pencils (and my kids being occupied elsewhere during the day, amen?), I'm not thinking much about the stress and grind of homework folders, early mornings, and... packing lunches.

The lunch struggle is real, no?

Today we hear from Terri Ney, RD, of and on surviving and thriving feeding school age kids.

We cover:

What to pack in the lunch box 🍎

How to set your kids up for success 👍

When lunch doesn't get eaten 🙀

Packed lunch vs. school lunch (a choice many Canadians wish they had!) 🍕

How to handle interference from school staff 🏫

And more... what's your biggest back to school struggle? Drop it below ⬇️

09/09/2021

Have you listened yet? validates and encourages parents who have struggled with feeding and struggled to find the right support. Check it out wherever you get your podcasts!

Have you come up empty looking for solutions and support for picky eating concerns?

If your kids’ near obsession with snacking isn’t driving you bonkers, are you even a mom? 🤷‍♀️I’m with ya. Sometimes it ...
17/08/2021

If your kids’ near obsession with snacking isn’t driving you bonkers, are you even a mom? 🤷‍♀️

I’m with ya. Sometimes it feels like no matter what we do, chaotic kid eating persists. Crumbs on the couch, wrappers scattered, recently purchased jumbo bags suddenly empty.

True confessions: I have experienced this in my own home. Had a little who-am-I-to-give-advice-on-this moment.

But I believe in my cells that things that behavior is communication. Behavior is information. It’s trying to tell you something. And if we remember this, we can start to put the pieces together.

I’m here to help you do just that. In my FREE workshop next week, I’m going to give you a framework to start to figure out what your kids’ eating behavior might be telling you.

It very well may be not what you think.

So join me, will ya? This workshop will kick off my Calm, Confident Feeding group program, launching in September. But whether or not the program is for you, this workshop will give you valuable insight to start to effectively address what’s bugging you about your kids’ eating, and how to rein in the food chaos.

Grab your spot here: https://kznutrition.com/sneaking-snacking-live-workshops

Questions? Drop it below. Or bring your kid feeding questions to the workshop and I’ll answer them live!

Have you heard of set point theory? It's the idea that our bodies have a natural weight where they settle, despite reali...
30/06/2021

Have you heard of set point theory? It's the idea that our bodies have a natural weight where they settle, despite realistic day to day fluctuations in our eating, activity, and environment. I talk about it in this week's episode of the Feeding Humans Podcast, about respecting your body. Or as authors and would put it, "respecting your genetic blueprint." We don't actually get to pick out a size and shape we'd like to be and then choose behaviors to make it happen. That's a recipe for misery.

In real life, we don't eat the exact same amount every day. Our physical activity most likely varies. Which is totally cool because our caloric energy needs actually aren't constant. 🤯 But our bodies have a weight/weight range where they are happy and safe, maintaining homeostasis. (It may be within the "normal" range of BMI, it may not. The CDC doesn't get to decide what is right for your body.) And our bodies will shift and adjust and respond to those variations to maintain that weight, whether they are natural, inevitable fluctuations in intake/output, or whether they are intentional efforts to manipulate our body's energy balance. When we fight out set point, it fights back. And we usually lose.

I'm guessing you have evidence of this in your own life and history. Want to tell me about it? I'd love to hear. 🙂⬇️

New episode alert! We're wrapping up the intuitive eating series with a discussion on respecting your body. I got a litt...
29/06/2021

New episode alert! We're wrapping up the intuitive eating series with a discussion on respecting your body. I got a little fired up in this one, y'all. Had to work hard not to fall down alll the rabbit holes, but I still fell down a few. ;)

Do you struggle to accept the body that you have, and find yourself working to change it? Do you feel compelled to make your body smaller for your health? We're covering that and more, including why everything you've been told about body size and health is patently false. In order to respect our body, and partner with it instead of constantly battling it, we have some things to UN-learn. Tune in to find out what they are, steps you can take to start respecting your body even if you don't like it, and what your underwear has to do with it. 🙈

Comment and tell me what body respect means to you. 💗

For COVID summer last year, we sprung for an above ground pool that takes up our entire backyard. Rather than let it sit...
12/06/2021

For COVID summer last year, we sprung for an above ground pool that takes up our entire backyard. Rather than let it sit in the garage this year, we decided to put it up again, and it’s so worth it. For this sunny Saturday, it was just perfect to take a swim break for lunch, pre-plated on cute summery paper plates.
🍒🍕🍧🍓
Pre-plating is not technically aligned with best practice division of responsibility, family style meals are encouraged. But today I chose to prioritize SIMPLE. And my kids loved it. This was my version of deciding the what/when/where today, and they are always in charge of the whether/how much. After a quick and happy lunch together, they hit the pool again, and after an easy cleanup, I might join them.
🌊☀️🐠
In episode 2 of the podcast, I talked about flexibility with the DOR, and making it work for you. And in episode 7 I talked about goals and values in feeding, and how choosing one value necessarily displaces another (like today, when I chose simplicity and ease over minimizing waste). YOU get to choose. Hopefully sometimes you have the opportunity to choose simple, joyful, connecting meals, and you take it. Happy Summer to you northern hemisphere folks!! What are your values for summer feeding? How can you be flexible to make that a priority?
☀️☀️☀️

We ALL have cycles to break. We all have the work to do. I see you, showing up and doing the work. It's messy. It's long...
09/06/2021

We ALL have cycles to break. We all have the work to do. I see you, showing up and doing the work. It's messy. It's long. It's never going to look perfect, and sometimes it doesn't feel like we're making progress. Believe me, this is as true for me as it is for you. But we're doing the work together.
💗
Episode 13 of the Feeding Humans podcast is the beginning of a three part series exploring intuitive eating. It's about the work, what it is for us and what it means for our kids. This is the work. Healing ourselves, breaking cycles, and protecting our kids. We can't shield them entirely from a culture that scrutinizes, shames, and commodifies bodies. But we can take steps to teach them to respond with resilience, and we can make sure they hear, over and over, that all bodies are good, that worth is unrelated to size, health and appearance, and that the most important wisdom resides right inside of them, from the voice that matters most (yours).
💗

Bring your questions and an open mind and heart, and a willingness to support others with kindness. 💗 can’t wait to meet...
25/05/2021

Bring your questions and an open mind and heart, and a willingness to support others with kindness. 💗 can’t wait to meet you! Link in bio

People often ask me, in near despair, what if the damage is already done? It can be so painful as a parent to realize in...
13/05/2021

People often ask me, in near despair, what if the damage is already done? It can be so painful as a parent to realize in retrospect that things we've done or said might not have been the most helpful, or may have had consequences we did not intend. In the context of diet culture and weight stigma, this is all too common, because the messages encouraging food policing and body shame are way louder and more prevalent than the ones I share here. When people realize many years into their parenting journey that there is another way, the regret can be enormous and painful.
Please hear me: It's never too late!
Like many dietitians, I cringe at the advice I gave people early in my career, before I learned that there was another way, and that the mainstream way we talk about health and nutrition hurts more than it helps. To those people, I sincerely apologize.
When it's our own family though, we get a do-over. And what better skill to model to our kids than the practice of "I was wrong, I'm so sorry, I want to do things differently?" LAWD, if more people developed that skill along the way, my goodness, that would change the world.
This can be a beautiful opportunity to teach your kids about the power of diet culture and what it looks like to push back against that. You can tell them that you were fooled too, and it hurt you too, but together you can support one another to live a different truth.
I talk with so many adults who received shaming messages their entire upbringing, whose parents seemed to never escape the clutches of diet culture and it infiltrates their relationships to this day. So if you begin to break free as the parent of an adolescent or a teen, or EVER AT ALL, that is something I absolutely celebrate! We can begin the process of repair and healing ANY time, and it is ALWAYS meaningful.
feedinghumans

I talk with a lot of parents, and it is pretty devastating to witness how frequently healthcare providers cause harm wit...
27/04/2021

I talk with a lot of parents, and it is pretty devastating to witness how frequently healthcare providers cause harm with careless weight and body talk. There are few professionals in western society whose credential inspires more automatic, no-questions-asked trust than medical doctors, so we are inclined to believe them when they suggest (or tell us outright) that our child’s body is a problem to be fixed. It's frightening, and causes us to question our competence as a parent. And when we start to question our most basic instincts, and change our parenting out of fear, our kids' wellbeing is impacted. Disordered eating may gain a foothold. Family trust and connection unravels. Our kids' ability to trust themselves erodes. In many families, the results are devastating.

Parents, if something feels off in the doctor's office, you are allowed to speak up! You can communicate to your doc privately that weight is not to be discussed in the presence of your child. The more knowledge you have, the more confident you will be in these potentially awkward moments. In the latest episode of the Feeding Humans Podcast I share a lot of that knowledge that will empower you to be the advocate your child needs in the doc's office. I also share some fantastic resources from my colleagues that will give you the words and the format to deliver a clear and collaborate message with your provider on your child's behalf. Give it a listen and prepare yourself to step into that Mama Bear power. It could save your child and your family a whole world of hurt.

Have you experienced weight stigma at the pediatrician? (I’m so sorry 😞) Did it help or hurt your family’s health?

Physicians take an oath to "First Do No Harm." When docs make these assumptions and provide medical care accordingly, th...
22/04/2021

Physicians take an oath to "First Do No Harm." When docs make these assumptions and provide medical care accordingly, they are breaking that oath.
➡️Children who drop drastically in their percentile weight for age often do not elicit concern.
➡️Heavier children are told their bodies are a problem, compelling parents to overhaul their feeding practices and introducing mealtime stress, power struggles, and shame into the home. Body shame and eating disorders are triggered.
➡️Eating disorders are missed in patients who "look thin and healthy". Lives are lost.
➡️Eating disorders are missed in patients who are larger because they don't fit the stereotype, and weight loss is assumed to be helpful anyway. Lives are lost.
➡️Heavier people and their serious symptoms are dismissed with a prescription to lose weight. Diagnoses are missed. People get sicker. Some will die.
➡️Weight bias in medical settings is so intense for larger people that many avoid the doctor altogether, including routine screenings such as colonoscopies and mammograms. Diagnoses are missed. People die.
➡️Arbitrary, biased dieting advice is given, despite there being no scientific evidence whatsoever of ANY method of weight loss that is safe and sustainable. *NONE*. If a doctor prescribed a medicine that not only has a 95% failure rate but also is strongly associated with a life threatening mental health condition?
➡️Symptoms are dismissed in thinner people because they "look fit and healthy."
There is no excuse for this. Parents, get educated on this and have the courage to advocate for your family and your child. This week on the podcast I talk about how to *support* children's growth across the spectrum of body size and shape. I include some great resources for advocating for your child in the episode and the show notes. Hope you'll check it out. If they won't stop it, we have to stop them.

Getting rid of the scale can feel scary. It's also one of the quickest and most powerful things you can do to both find ...
08/04/2021

Getting rid of the scale can feel scary. It's also one of the quickest and most powerful things you can do to both find peace in your body and support your kids to feel at home in their own bodies. Last week's episode of the Feeding Humans Podcast was all about how to support your kids developing a positive relationship with their bodies. Because I know that's your first question. How do we prevent them from the pain and suffering we have experienced? And there's plenty you can do to support them even if your own body image struggles. But eventually, to really do the work, we have to start wading into how we relate to our own bodies. One fast, easy tip to support BOTH of those causes?

🚫 CANCEL YOUR SCALE. 🚫

It feels like you are giving up some control that felt comforting to hang onto, even if it had the power to make you miserable. But the scale does not offer us the control we think it does. When the number on that display has the power to make or ruin our day, we are not the ones in control. 🤔 And it doesn't mean what we think it does anyway.

I haven't owned a bathroom scale in probably two decades and I have never missed it. Have you cancelled your scale? How did that feel? Let me know in the comments 😍

That's about all I have to say about it. 🤷‍♀️ Okay okay, I have a LITTLE more to say. Feeding Humans Podcast Episode 9, ...
06/04/2021

That's about all I have to say about it. 🤷‍♀️

Okay okay, I have a LITTLE more to say. Feeding Humans Podcast Episode 9, How not to hate your body. Hot tip: expose yourself to a wide diversity of bodies in your media consumption. Your brain has been tricked into believing we're all supposed to be the same size. Help it re-learn that bodies look different and that's cool.

What can I say, sometimes you just screw up. 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️ thanks for showing me grace y’all!
01/04/2021

What can I say, sometimes you just screw up. 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️ thanks for showing me grace y’all!

Not tough to grasp why diet culture harms kids. In episode 8 of the Feeding Humans podcast this week, we are talking abo...
31/03/2021

Not tough to grasp why diet culture harms kids. In episode 8 of the Feeding Humans podcast this week, we are talking about ways to insulate your kiddos from this culture, teach them resilience and coping skills for growing up to feel at home and confident in their bodies. Double tap if you're into protecting kid from harmful diet culture messages! 💗

New podcast episode is out! This week we’re talking about how to raise your kids to trust and feel at home in their bodi...
30/03/2021

New podcast episode is out! This week we’re talking about how to raise your kids to trust and feel at home in their bodies.

💗Even if you’re not feeling great in your own, you can start today by being intentional with your words and actions to foster an environment where kids learn that they can trust their bodies and know their worthiness is not related to size or appearance.

💗One guideline for creating a body inclusive space in your home: commit to not complimenting weight loss, ever, for any reason. By complimenting weight loss, even with the best of intentions, we are essentially openly criticizing bodies that are larger, including the former (and likely future) body of the person we’re talking to. Little ears are listening and they pick up everything. Listen in for more thoughts on raising body confident kids and leave me a review if you like what you hear!

We want ALL the good things for our kids, it's only natural. 💗We want them to be utterly safe, but also to learn how to ...
26/03/2021

We want ALL the good things for our kids, it's only natural.

💗We want them to be utterly safe, but also to learn how to take risks.

💗We want them to have deep friendships, but we never want them to get hurt.

💗We want them to develop creativity, but we also want a sparkling clean house. (Trying to keep a straight face here.)

When we go all in on one goal, we are inevitably compromising on another. And when we try to have ALL the goals, things get messy and muddled. This is why the conversation about goals and values in feeding is so important. In episode 7 of the Feeding Humans podcast, we chat about how getting clear on our goals and values helps us settle into our role in feeding our family calmly and confidently, and gives us permission to let go of some of those outcomes that are in conflict with what is most important in the long run. It can be uncomfortable and feel conflicting, but.... welcome to parenthood! When we know our priorities and values, as well as what is in our control and what isn't, we can learn to tolerate the discomfort of letting go of things that once felt really important, and ultimately, when we develop trust in the process and in our kids, that discomfort begins to subside.

What are some things in parenting that you have deliberately prioritized, and what have you let go of? Let me know in the comments :)

What if you let go of control of the immediate outcomes of how your child eats in a given meal, and shifted your focus t...
25/03/2021

What if you let go of control of the immediate outcomes of how your child eats in a given meal, and shifted your focus to your own feeding practice, creating a calm, connecting environment that is more about the people than the food?

Focusing on our jobs of feeding, letting go of the immediate outcome:
☑️invites curiosity, strengthens intrinsic motivation
☑️models desired behavior without pressure
☑️allows child to relax and trust body signals
☑️makes mealtime a calm, safe place
☑️increases likelihood of desired outcome ultimately happening

Putting all our focus on the immediate outcome:
✖️shuts down curiosity
✖️turns food into a battle
✖️reinforces that the food is unappealing
✖️child learns that "correct" eating is uncomfortable
✖️child becomes focused on
either compliance or resistance, disconnects them from their body
✖️decreases likelihood of desired outcome ultimately happening

This week on the podcast, we take a good hard look at long and short term goals of our feeding practice, focusing on practice over outcomes, and identifying the values that guide our feeding relationship. Head on over, give it a listen and let me know what you think! Even better, hit subscribe and hang around for a while! 💗

When we focus on outcomes that are out of our hands, it messes up our process, and we make the desired outcome even less...
23/03/2021

When we focus on outcomes that are out of our hands, it messes up our process, and we make the desired outcome even less likely. Feeding your kid with the goal of making them eat something they don't want to, or making sure they have a certain type of body, actually sabotages those very goals. What does this have to do with juggling? Not that we have so many balls in the air and we can't keep them all up and it's chaos... not that. In my reading recently I learned something about juggling that I didn't know, that is a beautiful metaphor for many things, including family feeding. You know me and my deep love for a good metaphor, and this is a great one. Tune in to episode 7 to hear about it!

When it comes to your own specific nutrition needs, nobody knows like your body knows. This week in the podcast I unpack...
16/03/2021

When it comes to your own specific nutrition needs, nobody knows like your body knows. This week in the podcast I unpack the question of how to know if we are meeting our nutritional needs if we aren't reading from a rule book, especially if our needs are constantly fluctuating. Often when we are trying to ditch diet rules, we aren't sure what's left. Sometimes any structure at all feels restrictive, but how DO we put together a meal that is adequate and balanced? And how do we trust that we and our children are getting nourished well? This discussion will help you relax and trust that your body will tell you, and also provides some general guidelines for putting together meals that will be nourishing and satisfying for everyone at your table. 🍽️

Remember all the things you did to get your baby to sleep? Dark room, night light, tight swaddle (or not), soft music, s...
08/03/2021

Remember all the things you did to get your baby to sleep? Dark room, night light, tight swaddle (or not), soft music, silence, keeping a schedule, feeding to sleep, putting down drowsy but awake, (oh man do I remember all this). Who ultimately decided if they were going to sleep or not? (Spoiler alert--not you) You could support good sleep habits, but the actual *outcome*, asleep or not asleep, was up to the baby. Same goes for feeding. You can do all the things, but the actual eating is up to the child. This can be scary, and also incredibly liberating! You do the jobs of feeding, and then your jobs are done! I talk about this in episode 2 of the Feeding Humans podcast, debunking the myth that if you just feed and parent the right way, your child will responsible in a favorable, predictable way. Nopity nope. Scary to let go of that illusion of control, but it also allows you to just focus on providing what you can-structure, support, exposure-and let go of the outcome. No power struggles, less frustration. Kids learn to trust themselves (and you learn to trust kids). Wins all around.

Assuming I'm not the only one... The caregiver fatigue is REAL. This week on the podcast I talked about all the reasons ...
05/03/2021

Assuming I'm not the only one... The caregiver fatigue is REAL. This week on the podcast I talked about all the reasons feeding is tough right now, and a few ideas for what might help. If you are SO OVER THE FOOD, if your kids are sneaking food, if you're struggling with food and your kids in ways that you didn't before, if feeding just feels harder than ever, if you're just burned out... I'm with you. Under the circumstances, all of it makes sense. And this won't last forever, right??? 🙏🙏🙏🙏

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4505 Wasatch Boulevard, Ste 380
Salt Lake City, UT
84124

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Tuesday 09:00 - 20:00
Wednesday 09:00 - 20:00
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