In this episode of The Healthified Podcast, Sara sits down with writer and content creator Mallory Andrews to talk about her “millennial midlife awakening” — what it really means to rediscover yourself after years of motherhood, people-pleasing, and perfectionism. Mallory shares how her parents’ divorce became the catalyst for her personal growth, what it looks like to shed old belief systems, and how she’s learning to trust herself, speak honestly online, and embrace authenticity without apology. This powerful conversation explores self-trust, courage, and the freedom that comes from showing up as your true self.
In this episode we discuss:
What a “millennial midlife awakening” really looks like, and how to know if you’re in one
The role motherhood plays in identity, self-worth, and rediscovering who you are
How Mallory’s parents’ divorce helped her question her beliefs and begin her healing journey
The difference between control and trust when it comes to personal growth
How to express yourself online authentically, without performing or people-pleasing
Letting go of perfectionism and the power of honest storytelling
Why redefining success often means slowing down, simplifying, and listening to yourself
• Follow Mallory Andrews on Instagram
• Read Mallory’s essays on Substack
• Healthified on Instagram
• Explore recipes and wellness resources at Healthified.com
After taking time away from entrepreneurship after the birth of her second baby, Sara returns to the podcast with an honest solo episode about her gut-healing journey and personal transformation over the past year. From closing her natural foods company, Gratisfied, to navigating postpartum burnout and eventually being diagnosed with methane SIBO, gut dysbiosis, and a parasite, Sara shares the pivotal lessons that led her back to balance, both physically and emotionally.
She opens up about what functional testing revealed, how reducing protein and embracing water-based cooking helped her heal, and why she now believes digestion is the true foundation of wellness. You’ll also hear her reflections on mindful eating, meal timing, and simple lifestyle changes that supported her recovery.
If you’re navigating gut issues, burnout, or simply want to feel more grounded in your body, this episode offers insight, encouragement, and plenty of Healthified inspiration.
Mentioned in this episode:
Today’s guest is Dr. Nina Smiley, Director of Mindfulness Programming at Mohonk Mountain House and co-author of The Three Minute Meditator (translated into 7 languages), Mindfulness in Nature, and MetaPhysical Fitness. Nina delights in sharing simple and effective mindfulness meditation techniques and philosophies that can be used by real people in real lives (when they really need it) - one moment at a time! As the Director of Mindfulness at New York's Historic Mohonk Mountain House, Nina presents programs and teaches private classes on mindfulness and wellness. She creates and leads special topic sessions that address issues including weight loss, insomnia, relationships, parenting, and more.
In a world with constant distractions that abound in modern life—from smartphones to social media—it is imperative we seek the solace and comfort of nature for our well-being. Nina's philosophy is rooted in giving guidance to mindfulness techniques that allow a meaningful way to nurture ourselves through a sense of spaciousness, calm, and connection with the out-of-doors. Nina’s work has been featured in The New York Times, O, The Oprah Magazine; Real Simple; Shape; Self; Huffington Post; InStyle; Organic Spa; Spafinder; Family Circle; and Prevention.
In our conversation, we discuss:
How there are many different ways to meditate, and incorporating a mindfulness practice into your life might be simpler than you thought
The components of mindfulness, how the breath can be used as a tool, and how we can get more curious - and less judgmental - about our thoughts
What creating more space even means, and how you can use nature to tap into this spaciousness, and have more of a sensory experience
The power of nature, the benefits of forest bathing, and how you can reap the benefits even when you might not live in an environment with a lot of nature
How to live more simply, learn to let go of things you don’t need, and free yourself from distraction
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
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Today’s guest is Rachel Lavin, author of The Doughnut Diaries, Professional Speaker and Body Love Educator, Certified Personal Trainer and a Certified Health Coach.
Rachel has been a certified fitness instructor for almost 25 years, teaching a plethora of classes both in big box gyms and as an independent trainer. She took her passion to the next level in 2018 when she became an ACE certified Health Coach.
In 2020 Rachel wrote her first book "The Doughnut Diaries" about her own struggles with her weight and restrictive diets which lasted for over thirty years. You will hear more about her story and how she made a decision to take her power back and heal from decades of negative thinking and self sabotage. She realized she had to do the deeper inner work on her mind, body and soul, and now helps her clients with negative body image feel more nourished in their journeys towards holistic health.
In our conversation, we discuss:
How we both share similar stories of dieting at a young age, and the advice she would give to parents to help prevent their children from experiencing body image issues and poor food relationships
Why when she got to a size 0 - the body she thought she always wanted - she was still unhappy, and what she really needed to do in order to heal
How starting from a place of self-love and acceptance doesn’t mean you set goals or want change
Why she had to start with her inner dialogue, the way she was talking to herself, and her advice for uncovering what some of those thought patterns are that might be standing in the way of your goals and optimal health
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Today’s guest is Paul Weeden. With 12 years of professional experience as a psychological therapist and coach, Paul’s expertise lies in guiding individuals towards authenticity and purpose, which are crucial for achieving optimal mental and physical health. In addition to his therapeutic background, Paul has a passion for music spanning over 25 years, providing him with valuable insights into himself, others, and the world.
In our conversation, we discuss:
Why personal growth, self-development, alignment and authenticity are important for our overall health and wellbeing.
How we can overcome certain fears in living authentically, such as fear of failure, fear of success, and other’s expectations
What we can do as parents to support our children in becoming their authentic selves, while also offering healthy guidance and boundaries along their paths
How to take baby steps towards living more authentically, especially within the limitations of your day job and remaining financially secure
A visualization exercise and questions to ask yourself if you are feeling stuck
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
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Today’s guest is Alison Bladh, a registered nutritional therapist and beauty therapist living in Sweden. Having worked in the health and wellness industry for over 30 years specializing globally in menopausal women’s health, she now runs her own online clinic helping women worldwide manage the negative symptoms of menopause. Her mission is to support her clients with bespoke changes to diet, health and lifestyle so they can harness their hormones and get their confidence and sparkle back.
She believes that all women, no matter what age, deserve to reclaim their health and feel great. Life is too short to suffer symptoms that hold you back! Every woman has the right to feel and look amazing in midlife.
In our conversation, we discuss:
Skin health and inflammation. How to take care of your skin through nutrition and hormonal balance
Estrogen dominance. What you need to know and how to naturally detoxify your body and support elimination pathways if this is something you struggle with now, and especially as you enter the perimenopause phase of life
How to support your metabolism in your 40s and 50s to avoid unwanted weight gain that many women experience, as well as the importance of sleep, nutrition, and strength training as we age
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
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Today’s guest is Chad Hufford founder and owner of the boutique financial planning firm, Veritas Wealth Management. Born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska, Chad grew up in the financial industry, but also developed a strong background in athletics, nutrition and performance psychology. Chad brings a coaching mindset and the heart of a teacher to financial planning and investing as he strives to both empower and educate his audience to not only become better investors, but to live more intentionally and create an abundant life.
When I first got introduced to Chad, I thought he would be a great guest to talk about financial health and our relationship with money, but the conversation evolved to be about so much more. In fact, and you probably can’t tell, I got choked up at one point, and who knew it would be a conversation with a financial advisor to almost bring me to tears. Chad believes that evaluating our mindset around money can help clarify our mindset around other areas of life as well, and we talk a lot about health, wellness, general goal setting, and how to create a more purposeful and abundant life.
Other highlights of our conversation include:
Why identity and getting clear on your future version of self can help create sustainable habit change for your physical and financial health
Why celebrating the inputs of the process is more important than looking at the outcomes and results
The one question to ask yourself when making a decision
Why we view our future self as separate from who we are today, and how to integrate this vision into our current self
Why Chad believes money is a tool and why gratitude and having a positive attitude will set you up for success
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
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Today’s guest is Dr. Sheila Carroll, a board-certified pediatrician and obesity medicine physician who is dedicated to helping children achieve their best health. She does this by working exclusively with parents who are willing to focus on modifying their own behaviors to ultimately improve their child's health.
While Dr. Sheila and I talk a lot about parenting and establishing healthy food relationships for our children, we also talk a lot about emotional eating, the power of our thoughts, and habit change and formation that anyone will find valuable, whether you have kids or not.
Other highlights of our conversation include:
How understanding the power of her thoughts helped Dr. Sheila lose 50 pounds, tools that she learned as a life coach, not as a doctor, and how she translates these tools for families and children
What she wants you to know if you have a child struggling with a weight issue
Why cooking more at home and decreasing take out and processed food is the number one takeaway for creating positive change
Why acceptance can help you overcome resistance to anything
How to better navigate picky eating and why children no longer need to be a part of the clean plate club
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
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I am so excited to announce that my book Counting Colors, Not Calories: A Shift From Restriction And Scarcity To Abundance And Beauty is finally here!! It is a true labor of love, and one that I have been working on for over 5.5 years. I can’t believe it is actually available on Amazon.
tell you a little bit about what the Counting Colors philosophy is, and how it may help and support your holistic health
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
Today’s guest is Kristin Mallon, CNM, MS, RNC-OB, a board-certified nurse midwife, menopause, and feminine longevity expert, breast health expert, published author, and mother of four. She graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a degree in Psychology and completed her Bachelor's degree in nursing at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, MD. After completing her Master's degree in Science & Midwifery at New York University (NYU), she began practicing as a board-certified nurse midwife in private practice in Brooklyn, NY. In 2022, she co-founded Femgevity, a telemedicine company focused on menopause and feminine longevity, providing concierge care for women seeking personalized healthcare. As a California native, Kristin loves surf, snow, and hanging with her family in northern New Jersey.
In our conversation, we discuss:
The power of functional testing to optimize hormonal and overall health
Changes during pregnancy and postpartum, especially what a woman might go through not only physically, but mentally and emotionally as well, and why having self-compassion during this time is so important
The changes that are taking place during perimenopause and menopause, and how understanding your unique menstrual cycle can better support these changes, and whether cycle syncing is right for you
Why Kristin believes so strongly in precision based nutrition and testing specifically to help navigate these life stages
What you need to know about metabolism and muscle mass maintenance as you approach your 40s and 50s
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
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Today’s guest is Elwin Robinson, the Founder of Genetic Insights, an easy to use, direct to consumer platform that allows people to upload their raw DNA data from any Ancestry service. You can get access to over 350+ Reports with insights on
Health Risks, Nutritional Requirements, Allergies and Intolerances, Sensitivities and even Personality Traits.
These reports are extremely accurate and include personalized recommendations unique to your DNA.
Elwin Robinson is also passionate about helping people reverse the effects of Premature Aging. When he was in his 20s he felt like a 60 year old, and now at 43 he feels like a 20 year old!
His Rejuvenate Podcast, and the website FeelYounger.net are dedicated to providing people with resources, both educational and practical, to help them Feel Younger.
Highlights of our conversation include:
How an ancestry kit and genetics testing results completely turned his health around when nothing else was working
Why every “body” is different, the concept of bioindividuality, and how all of this is evidence that blanket approaches to health and nutrition are ineffective
How the information can be applied to your individual life to assist your health and wellness habits and behaviors across so many areas from nutrition to sleep, to exercise to stress management
Why having this information not only makes you more compassionate towards yourself, but towards others as well
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
Today’s guest is Dr. Tamar Lawful, a Doctor of Pharmacy, Advanced Practice Pharmacist, and Certified Nutritional Genomics Specialist. She is a trailblazer in the integration of pharmacy, nutrition and genomics. Beyond her academic achievements, she's CEO and Founder of LYFE Balance, Inc, where LYFE stands for Love Yourself First Every day.
She designed the transformative InHer Glow™ health coaching program, which has empowered numerous working moms towards optimal health and reducing the need for medications.
Dr. Lawful offers practical insights into weight management and reversing diabetes, while utilizing nutritional genomics for a customized health approach.
Incorporating her expertise, she provides busy, working mothers with solutions to overcome personal health hurdles and prioritize self-care, ultimately helping them enjoy life and thrive once again.
In our conversation, we discuss:
How she blends her pharmacology education with a functional, integrative nutritional approach to create a specialized, slightly clinical, and holistic lifestyle experience for her clients.
Ozempic, what it is, what it does, what it might not address, and how it helps someone lose weight.
Defining self-care on an individual level, and how it doesn’t take much.
Why we might turn to medication instead of more natural remedies for issues such as anxiety, sleep, focus and overwhelm, and what you can do about it
Nutritional and lifestyle factors that you can incorporate for prevention and could help you avoid having to get on medication for common health issues.
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
Today’s guest is Carly Lucchesi a UC Davis trained Registered Dietitian with over 13 years experience. She helps solve for chronic inflammation and patterns of emotional eating so weight loss becomes peaceful.
According to Carly, she believes, our healthcare system is broken and diet culture has only added health confusion. There is so much clutter when it comes to understanding weight loss and ultimately understanding how to achieve optimal health. Through genetic, micronutrient and food sensitivity testing, she helps clients understand what is creating bottom-up inflammation so they can confidently know what to eat and what to do to live in alignment with their body. But once this is uncovered, it's time to start addressing top-down inflammation which is created as a result of living with an unmanaged mind. This is where true behavior change is created, and a true calming of chronic inflammation can occur.
In our conversation, we discuss:
• How there are nutritional and lifestyle drivers of chronic inflammation and also mental and emotional drivers of inflammation such as the thoughts you think. This is the difference between top down and bottom up inflammation and both need attention and healing for health and weight loss
• How people block their healing with judgment and resentment, and how to have a more peaceful wellness journey
• How managing your thoughts and choosing more positive and empowering thoughts is the ultimate form of control.
• Tapping into your future self, to start embracing the thoughts and beliefs of a more evolved identity in order to create change
• Why she believes in functional and genetic testing to gather information on the whole person
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
The Beauty of Blood Sugar Balance
Carly’s Website: Your Living Health
Today’s guest is Krista Hernandez, a wellness coach who empowers women to help heal their bodies, restore their minds, & renew their spirits naturally. She spent over 20 years learning to manage & ultimately heal multiple chronic illnesses, including lupus.
This was a really fun conversation, and one that pretty quickly went off course from my original plan. While we started off talking about her story with chronic illness and the steps she took to heal, we quickly got deep on topics such as healing feminine energy - you will learn what that means - doing inner child work, healing mother wounds, and non-traditional modalities such as acupuncture, reiki, tarot and more. If you have been listening for a while, or know me by now, you know I love to talk about the woo-woo side of holistic health. Both Krista and I believe that so many physical issues, ailments and illnesses can be traced back to our emotional world, especially emotions and traumas that get stuck or trapped in the body.
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
The Beauty of Blood Sugar Balance
Krista Hernandez’s website. Use the code HEALTH20 and HEALTH40 for a discount off of her coaching programs!
Today’s guest is Jenn Edden, a sugar addiction expert, best selling author and women’s empowerment coach for over 19 years. She is the founder of the Sugar Freedom Method™️, and author of Woman Unleashed: the highly sensitive woman's guide to radiant energy, and unstoppable confidence and co-author of BornTo Rise
Jenn is a graduate of the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in NYC and is certified by the American Association of Drugless Practitioners. Growing up in a family with depression, anxiety and bipolar disorder, Jenn has seen the effects firsthand of what mental illness and sugar can do to your physical and mental well-being. After healing herself of gastritis in her mid 20’s and learning how to manage her own sugar addiction, Jenn built a company that teaches busy women professionals how to kick and manage their sugar addiction without deprivation or denial but instead by learning how to bring down inflammation naturally and to manage your emotions without needing sugar!
Jenn’s zone of genius is simplifying the complex and clarifying all the dietary confusion out there while teaching women how to live a life they love waking up to!
In our conversation, we discuss:
• How to tell know if you are addicted to sugar, versus just really like eating it
• All about her sugar freedom method, and the tools and tips provided in each module to help you decrease your dependence on sugar and heal your body and brain
• What gut health has to do with sugar cravings, and how to heal your gut while safely and gradually cutting sugar out of your diet
• Those foods that would be categorized as “eating sugar,” how to know if alternative sweeteners are okay, and why Jenn is supportive of eating fruit in moderation
• What are emotions, life alignment, and more abstract areas of life have to do with our relationship with food
• Why decreasing sugar intake is especially important in later stages of life like perimenopause and menopause
• Why Jenn thinks you should stop caring what other people think when making positive changes to your health and wellness
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
Today’s guest is Lauren Cunningham, health coach, entrepreneur, and founder of So Can I, which is a podcast and community that supports female founders.
Lauren graduated with a degree in accounting, but quickly realized she needed a place to channel her creativity. She now owns her own social media marketing agency, where she helps other female founders build their businesses online.
In June of 2022, Lauren launched her popular podcast, So Can I. Each episode covers a different female founder, and Lauren hopes her listeners leave each episode thinking, "if she can do it, so can I." Lauren is passionate about connection, community, and sharing the stories of other women in business. She firmly believes that encouragement is one of the keys to success.
In our conversation, we discuss:
• How being diagnosed with Chron’s disease helped shaped her perspective on health
• How holistic health and understanding the mind-body connection became a powerful component of her healing journey
• All about her recipe creating business, how she healthifies recipes and the main ingredient she upgrades in her cooking
• Tips for cooking more at home
• How she has cultivated belief in herself to make her dreams and goals come true
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
Today’s guest is Andrea Nicholson, a Board Certified Holistic Nutritionist, Nutrition Therapist Master, and Restorative Wellness Practitioner. From crime scene investigator to Insulin Investigator, Andrea helps people address health challenges like fatigue, digestive problems and stubborn weight, so they can live adventure-filled lives without unnecessary medications.
In our conversation, we discuss:
• How Andrea’s plant-based diet proved to be making her health matters worse, and the changes she made after taking matters into her own hands
• How healing her gut became the foundation for positive change, and the steps she took to support her gut health
• Various mindset shifts you can embrace to cut the nutritional confusion, stop emotional eating, and break your dependence on sugar and carbs
• Why Andrea thinks we should all get back to basics with our nutrition, and what you can do today to improve your digestion and relationship with food
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
Today’s guest is Tati Garcia, a Licensed Professional Counselor and coach specializing in high-functioning anxiety and the host of the podcast Calmly Coping. Her passion lies in guiding ambitious achievers to stop putting themselves last by overcoming anxiety and burnout so they can feel calmer from within and stop overthinking everything.
Tati has thousands of hours of experience helping clients and uses evidence-based approaches including mindfulness, self-compassion, and positive psychology to help high-achievers make improvements in their mindset, self-care, and work-life balance.
In our conversation, we discuss:
The difference between anxiety and high functioning anxiety, and those common underlying fears that might cause someone to operate in this way
How we can use our emotions are information to make a change, take a step back, or create more space in our lives
Those mindset shifts that are the antidotes to high functioning anxiety, and how to embrace them
Baby steps and self care practices you can start implementing today to heal your anxiety and achieve more balance in your life
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
Today’s guest is Lynne Bowman, author of Amazon best-seller "Brownies for Breakfast, A Cookbook For Diabetics and the People Who Love Them." She has also been featured at women's expos throughout the country. She's received national awards as a creative director for advertising agencies on both coasts, and has worked as an actress, makeup artist, screenwriter, illustrator, legal journalist, wedding planner and television Weather Person.
I learned so much from Lynne and she provides such refreshing insight. What I thought was going to be a conversation solely about healthifying desserts, cutting back on sugar, and increasing nutritional whole foods, turned into a coffee talk with someone older and wiser who has amazing advice to give.
Some highlights of our conversation include:
Resources:
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save
Counting Colors Online Course
Today’s guest is Madhu Dasa, a former monk who is now a Holistic Health & Business Lifestyle Coach training hundreds of health and wellness professionals, coaches and influencers in ancient sciences. He helps them create 6 & 7 figure online businesses. He lived and trained for half a decade as a monk in the Bhakti Yoga tradition. During these years, he traveled extensively studying Vedic arts and sciences under renowned teachers. In his free time he is a professional musician who tours internationally.
In our conversation, we discuss:
How to adopt more of a monk mindset to become the master of your mind, break through subconscious beliefs and fears, and uncover your true self
Where thoughts even come from, the three types of thoughts you experience, and his number one antidote to anxious intrusive thoughts
The first step to living in more alignment, finding your purpose, and defining success for yourself
The four questions to ask yourself that make up his monk mindset method, and how to figure out your passion, purpose, and what makes you feel fulfilled
How doing an ideal day exercise is a powerful tool for living more intentionally.
Instagram: @gratisfied @healthified
NEW Gratisfied Bars! Use the code HEALTHIFIED to save