Once Shattered: Picking up the Pieces

Barbara has lived all her life in the Rochester area and has a lakehouse on Keuka Lake. She raised 3 daughters, one who was diagnosed with anorexia at age 11 in 1969. At age 88 Barbara has experienced the impact of alcoholism, mental health issues and anorexia/bulimia, starting when her youngest daughter was 5 years old, all during a time when NO ONE was talking about any of it. Barbara’s youngest...

Shannon Calvert is a Lived Experience Educator and Advisor from Australia after experiencing more than three decades with a severe and enduring eating disorder as well as complex physical and mental health challenges. Her expertise has been working with government and non-government organizations in an advisory capacity, as a peer-work coordinator and trainer. She has presented papers, workshops,...

Kaitlyn Vittozzi of Rochester, NY is a C-IAYT Yoga Therapist who specializes in chronic pain relief, stress-reduction, and perinatal struggles. A SUNY Albany School of Business graduate, she is no stranger to corporate stress and the physical ache that working and striving for the next big thing all the time can leave on a body. Kaitlyn began teaching in 2014, taking yoga teacher training as a hea...

Barb Klein is the author of 111 Invitations: Step into the Full Richness of Life , and the founder of Inspired Possibility.  Barb is a certified recovery coach, life coach, Invitation to Change group facilitator, meditation instructor, retreat leader, and writer. Barb is also mom to two young men, one of whom struggled with substance use disorder, eating disorder, and other mental health challenge...

Sue is the current president of Lilac City Rochester Writers LCRWriters.org , a group that focuses on the craft of writing and publishing for fiction writers. She has a short story published in their No Page Left Unturned anthology. Both books are available on Amazon. Sue Spitulnik was Air Force wife, living in four states and England from 1972 to 1979, and worked until 1990 in a Tacoma, Washingto...

Shari Botwin, LCSW has been counseling survivors of eating disorders, trauma and abuse in her South Jersey private practice for over 27 years. Her second book, Thriving After Trauma: Stories of Living and Healing was released in an updated paperback in October 2021. Botwin is working on her third book, Stolen Childhoods , which focuses on reclaiming life in adulthood after surviving childhood abus...

MATT VENUTI is an award-winning multi-instrumentalist composer/performer and music video artist who is known for introducing rare and expressive acoustic and electronic instruments to the world through his concerts and videos. Matt has been the featured performer at multiple TED and TEDx Conferences. Two of Matt’s albums charted in the top 10 of the College Media Journal and Zone Music Reporter. M...

Brooke Huminski, MSW, LICSW, is a psychotherapist with a private practice in Providence, RI. She specializes in treating individuals with eating disorders, perfectionism, ADHD, and school-related stressors. Brooke has her own eating disorder recovery and is passionate about reducing stigma in the field, especially among professionals. Related to this, she co-leads a supervision group for eating di...

Scott has been working in media production for over 30 years. In 2017 the planets aligned and he was able to form ROC Vox Recording & Production - the first podcast studio in Western New York and only the second one in the state. He co-wrote and produced a feature film in 2020 titled Bottom Feeders which can be seen on Amazon Prime Video. He's the winner of multiple Telly Awards for his produc...

Jason was born in South Korea in 1970, only 18 years after the end of the Korean War. When Jason was 5 years old, his parents moved their family to the United States. Starting a new life with Jason and his two younger sisters in a foreign country and culture was a struggle for their whole family and Jason’s father developed alcoholism. Throughout Jason’s childhood, he experienced many of the chall...

As a lived-experience professional, Kym is passionate to provide siblings who have a brother or sister with an eating disorder the acknowledgment, connection, and resources they have never been afforded. To highlight this need, she has collaborated alongside clinicians, researchers, and organizations for over a decade. In 2018 she co-created a sibling needs survey with Bridget Whitlow LMFT, that h...

Betsy Brenner is an author, recovery speaker and peer support mentor. In her 2021 memoir, “The Longest Match: Rallying to Defeat an Eating Disorder in Midlife”, Betsy details her life, one filled with blessings and privilege, but also with emotional trauma, profound grief, anxiety, depression and ultimately a diagnosis of anorexia in midlife. Her eating disorder became the catalyst for healing. He...

Jillian Rigert, DMD, MD has formal training in dentistry, medicine, and oral medicine. She is currently a postdoctoral research fellow in Radiation Oncology at a cancer institution as well as being a life and leadership coach with primary focus on life and career transitions. Jillian is a quality of life, mental health, and eating disorder awareness advocate and YouTube enthusiast where she shares...

Tamie is a marriage and family therapist and marketing professional with a specialty in the treatment of eating disorders, addiction and trauma. Tamie is an advocate with the Eating Disorders Coalition, President of Southwest Philly IAEDP (International Association of Eating Disorders Professionals) and is on the board of SOSORT (International Society on Scoliosis Orthopaedic and Rehabilitation Tr...

Jackie Patmore's involvement in the eating disorders field spans multiple roles of researcher, educator, clinician and patient advocate. Before occupying these roles, however, it was her personal experience of developing anorexia as an elite volleyball player when she was 14 years old that ignited her desire to enter the field in the first place. As a patient, Jackie was subject to care that lacke...

When a trusted physician tells Renée Schuls-Jacobson that he has the solution for her chronic insomnia -- a "tried & true medication without any side effects," she believes him. For seven years, she takes clonazepam exactly as prescribed until, one day, she learns that her doctor is wrong: long-term prescription benzodiazepine use causes all kinds of problems, including profound changes in bra...

Episode #113 Things I’ve Seen People Do With and Without Food Debra Spector M.S, R.D.N, C.D.N Debra Spector M.S, R.D.N, C.D.N is a Registered and Certified Dietitian-Nutritionist who has upheld a private practice since 1990 on Long Island, New York (Nassau and Suffolk Counties) as a nutritional therapist, mentor, educator, entrepreneur, and consultant. She holds an Undergraduate Degree from SUNY a...

112 Robyn began her career at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles as the in-patient dietitian in the Department of Cardiology. Over the last twenty-five years she has developed her own private practice in Los Angeles, CA, where she specializes in medical conditions, disordered eating, eating disorders, Health at Every Size, pre-pregnancy nutrition, and people in recovery. Robyn is a Certifi...

Dr. Beharry is board certified in both Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine. She was born in the Caribbean, grew up in the suburbs of New York City, and attended the Sophie Davis School of Biomedical Education which was a seven-year pre-med/medical school program and is now CUNY Medical School. Dr. Beharry completed medical school in 2001 at SUNY Downstate (SUNY Health Sciences Center at Brooklyn) w...

110 - Jane was born and raised in London, in what can only be described as a very ‘normal’ household, with four siblings, and a mum and dad, who quite simply, adored each other, and still do! There was always a pet of some kind in their household. Nothing remarkable happened, certainly no great traumas, yet, at the age of 11, Jane developed a serious eating disorder. It wasn’t until age 35, that J...

109 - Resilient and determined are two very apt words to describe Tamara MacDuff. After the heartbreak of losing her daughter, Emily, to Fentanyl poisoning in 2018, she founded YOU MATTER: The Be, Do, and Have Path Forward to help people in recovery from addiction, as well as funeral directors and business owners. Her Emily’s Blend coffee, created with the women of the Coffee Connection, is their...

108 - Clinical psychologist Cynthia M. Bulik, Ph. D., FAED is the Founding Director of the University of North Carolina Center of Excellence for Eating Disorders, Distinguished Professor of Eating Disorders at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Professor of Nutrition in the Gillings School of Global Public Health. She is also Professor of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics an...

107 - Dr. Janet Schebendach is a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist. She received a master’s degree in Clinical Nutrition from New York University and a PhD with Distinction in Behavioral Nutrition from Columbia University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Dr. Schebendach has over 40 years of experience in the field of eating disorders. From 1978 – 2002, Dr. Schebendach worked as a nutritionist...

106 - Listen to our enlightening conversation with Jennifer Haefele, In our conversation with Jen, we discussed the benefits of having a dietitian’s guidance and support as individuals heal their relationship with food and discover new ways to stay on their healing path, despite the pervasive, toxic diet culture that surrounds us. Jennifer Haefele (Hay-flea) Registered Dietitian Nutritionist speci...

105 - In this episode, we interview Dr. Seema Khaneja. Listen to our conversation about her journey as a pediatrician, and as an integrative, holistic practitioner—melding science, compassionate care, and spirituality. She shares heartfelt stories regarding the impact of compassionate care with her patients and their families and what led her to write her book Physician, Heal Thyself : A Doctor’s...