Thrive Beyond Size

In this episode of Thrive Beyond Size, Michelle gets refreshingly real about the things that drive her absolutely crazy in the diet culture and wellness industry — and yes, that includes some corners of the anti-diet world too.

Topics covered:

The Diet Industry's Sacred Cows

If intuitive eating has ever felt frustrating, overwhelming, or strangely out of reach, this episode explains why.

In this conversation, I share more of my personal evolution — from weight loss coaching and obesity medicine training to binge eating recovery and body trust work. There was a moment during my binge eating certification when everything clicked: intentional weight loss wasn’t just ineffective long term — it was often contributing to the very behaviors I was trying to help people heal. But even then, intuitive eating didn’t immediately “work” for me. And that realization led me to the deeper missi...

In this episode of Thrive Beyond Size, Michelle dives into the psychological process of transition and why healing your relationship with food and body is far more than a surface-level change.

Drawing from Transitions by William Bridges, she explores the difference between change (external events) and transition (internal transformation), and why the “neutral zone” — the messy middle — is both unavoidable and necessary.

You’ll learn:

In this episode of Thrive Beyond Size, I’m talking about a moment many people experience on the intuitive eating and body trust journey, but rarely name out loud: the experience of doing all the “right” things and still finding it hard.

Inspired by a recent personal experience and a reminder of how deeply diet culture still shows up around us, I explore why food struggles can resurface even when you’re committed to healing, why the word stuck is often misleading, and how our nervous systems respond to both personal growth and collective stress.

This epi...

This episode was inspired by a quiet morning that quickly became emotionally charged after Michelle encountered a long-time friend’s post about yet another weight-loss attempt. What once would have felt familiar or even inviting now landed as unsettling and activating, prompting reflection on why seeing others engage in diet culture can feel so destabilizing when you’re doing healing work around food and body.

Michelle explores the idea that there is a particular phase of healing where diet culture becomes louder—not because it has intensified in the world, but because your awareness has changed. Using the fa...

In this episode, Michelle takes a deep and compassionate look at self-betrayal—a word that often carries shame, but deserves far more nuance.

Rather than framing self-betrayal as weakness, lack of integrity, or poor follow-through, this conversation explores how self-betrayal often develops as a protective response—a way the nervous system learns to prioritize safety, connection, and acceptance over authenticity.

You’ll hear how self-betrayal shows up in everyday life, especially in our relationships with food, rest, boundaries, and decision-making, and how diet culture in particular trains us to distrust our bodies and override our intern...

In this episode of Thrive Beyond Size, I share a very personal story about a rough week that ended with severe food poisoning—and the unexpected clarity it gave me about body trust, intuitive eating, and how our bodies communicate with us.

In this episode, we explore:

What if the most valuable part isn’t the most obvious one?

In this episode of Thrive Beyond Size, Michelle shares a series of small synchronicities that led her to reflect on Earl Grey tea—and the surprising fact that its signature flavour comes not from the fruit itself, but from the oil in the peel of bergamot.

From there, she explores how this metaphor applies to so many areas of our lives.

Michelle unpacks how diet culture and dominant wellness narratives train us to focus on what’s visible, measurable, and socially reward...

In this episode, Michelle explores what happens when you don’t know the next step—and why that experience is far more human (and helpful) than we’ve been taught to believe.

She discusses:

This New Year’s episode is both a moment of accountability and an invitation—to myself, and to you—to approach 2026 with more patience, presence, and trust.

Rather than setting resolutions or performance-based goals, I share the principles guiding me forward, shaped by the lessons of 2025, my changing relationship with energy, and a deepening awareness of what it truly means to feel at home in my body.

We begin with an overview of A Year of Coming Home, my year-long container designed to support intuitive eating from the inside out. I explain why nervous system regula...

This episode drops on Christmas Day, and instead of a polished year-end recap, Michelle offers a slow, embodied reflection on the year that was. She shares why she chose rhythm as her guiding word, how that intention reshaped her relationship with movement, rest, and energy, and why perimenopause became an unexpected teacher in listening more closely to her body.

Michelle explores the cultural pressure to “account for” ourselves at the end of the year—and why not following through on a plan is not a moral failure, but often information, wisdom, or a nervous system response asking for ca...

Next week is Christmas, and as Michelle reflects on the season—what it holds, what it doesn’t, and the quieter spaces many of us feel at this time of year—an insight from a yin yoga class offers an unexpected theme: boredom. In yin yoga, long-held poses can bring up discomfort, restlessness, and resistance…but what caught Michelle’s attention was her teacher’s invitation to notice boredom specifically. That word landed immediately, because boredom wasn’t just present in the pose—it was familiar in life.

From there, Michelle explores boredom as one of the “quieter” emotions...

In this week’s episode of Thrive Beyond Size, Michelle takes you to a tiny table in Canmore, Alberta, where a seven-course chef’s tasting menu becomes so much more than “just dinner.” After choosing the vegan “gatherer” menu, she’s guided through each course like a story—learning where the ingredients came from, how the flavors and textures play together, and what each dish is designed to awaken. Somewhere between the foraged mushrooms and a pot pie-level craving for something creamy and warm, Michelle realizes how present she feels: quiet mind, soft body, senses sharpened. From there, she unpacks why our...

If you’re tired to your bones, craving soup and bread, and wondering why you can’t seem to keep up with… well, anything right now, you’re not alone. In this episode, Michelle shares her own recent crash into winter exhaustion (including a 12-hour sleep after Black Friday) and walks you through what’s actually happening in your body and nervous system at this time of year. She explains how shorter days, less light, and constant holiday demands set the stage for both physical hibernation and emotional burnout—and how diet culture swoops in to sell you control, discipline...

If you’ve ever looked up and realized it’s 4 p.m. and you haven’t eaten, or found yourself grabbing whatever’s around because you’re exhausted, foggy, and starving, this episode is for you. Michelle shares candidly about her current season of “chaotic eating” — coming home from Morocco, navigating perimenopause, disrupted routines, and a fridge that doesn’t quite match what her body can tolerate anymore. Together, you’ll explore how chaotic eating develops, why it can be so hard to shift out of, and how to gently rebuild regular, intuitive rhythms with food using compassion, structure without control, and...

Today, Michelle dives into why she has chosen to remove the words obse and ob*sity from her vocabulary—both as a physician and as a coach—and why she believes it’s time for all of us to question the language we’ve been handed about bodies. Starting from a Facebook scroll that sparked a wave of anger, she unpacks the history behind the term, including insights from Dr. Sabrina Strings’ Fearing the Black Body, the role of BMI in medicalizing body size, and the very real ways weight stigma harms health. Michelle shares how hearing or using this word...

In this warm, story-driven episode, Michelle shares how winter soup cravings led her to dust off the cookbooks she once boxed up on a coach’s orders to eliminate all “food porn.” She traces where the term came from, how restriction made food imagery feel dangerous, and what changed when she shifted to body trust. From Moroccan lentil soup to her grandmother’s church recipe books, Michelle makes the case that pleasure isn’t the enemy of health—restriction is—and that food can be inspiration, connection, and care.

You’ll hear about:

This week I’m getting honest about the messy middle: the place where body wisdom and mindset stories crash into each other. From returning to studio yoga after a 30-year hiatus (hello, vulnerability) to walking on pre-shift days and lifting with a trainer, I explore how fear, ego, and perfectionism can masquerade as “listening to my body.” I unpack the “chimp brain” vs. true body cues, why validation and avoidance both pull us off-center, and how I’m practicing a kinder, clearer check-in before I move. If you’re learning to balance challenge with care — and effort with ease — this one’s for you...

This week’s episode is an honest reflection on the language of diet culture — and how even the most well-intentioned words can carry hidden judgment. Michelle shares how a listener’s feedback prompted her to look more closely at her own phrasing, unpack the emotions underneath it, and re-examine what “neutral language” really means on the intuitive eating and body trust journey. You’ll walk away with new awareness, practical language swaps, and a reminder that this work is about progress, not perfection.

In this episode:

Michelle is back from Morocco with sand in her shoes, stories in her heart, and a body that reminded her (loudly!) what it needs. In this reflective episode, she shares the surprising ways travel challenged her progress with food, body image, and self-care—and the simple, grace-filled practices she’s using to land softly back home.

In this episode:

This week’s conversation zooms in on what Michelle calls “the myth at the heart of them all”: the belief that control equals peace.

She begins by unpacking why control is so seductive. In a chaotic world, rules around food, body, work, or routines promise certainty, safety, and belonging. But as Michelle illustrates, control is like squeezing water in your hands—the tighter the grip, the more it slips away.

Through stories and science, she explores how this plays out:

Michelle opens by naming the belief so many of us absorbed early: smaller bodies are healthier bodies. She walks through where that belief came from (BMI’s rise to medical dominance in the 1970s, the 1990s “obesity epidemic” framing) and why repetition isn’t truth. BMI was built for population averages, not diagnosis; over time it became a proxy for health that crowded out far more meaningful indicators.

From there, she unpacks the evidence in plain language. Large studies that account for key confounders—cardiorespiratory fitness, nutrition patterns, sleep, socioeconomic status, access to healthcare, and exposure to stigma—sho...

Michelle starts by naming the experience so many listeners know well: the panicky, out-of-control feeling around “forbidden” foods that seems to prove you’re an addict. She traces where that story came from—the early 2000s brain-scan headlines—and why “lights up the reward pathways” doesn’t equal addiction (music, hugs, laughter, and puppy greetings light them up, too). From there, she walks through what the evidence does show:

Today’s episode kicks off a four-week series Michelle recorded before heading to Morocco—so your feed stays nourished while she’s away. She starts by naming a trap many of us fell into this month: believing that if we just grit our teeth and push harder, everything will fall into place. That belief is intoxicating because it promises control, but in practice it leaves us exhausted, irritable, and convinced the problem is our character—rather than our capacity.

We zoom out to the bigger picture: how diet culture, fitness culture, and hustle culture all glorify discipline. Michelle...

September arrives with crisp air, new planners, and the quiet promise of a fresh start. But for many of us, that “reset” can quickly morph into all-or-nothing rules, shame, and overwhelm. In this candid episode, Michelle shares how she slid into the September Reset trap after a joyful, fulfilling summer—and how a quarterly planning day helped her course-correct back to care, not control.

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September is here, and while Michelle may be nursing the last of a cold, she couldn’t wait to hop on the mic and give you a look at what’s ahead for the fall and beyond.

Here’s what’s coming up inside Wayza Health:

The Nourished & Free Giveaway (Sept 15 – Oct 10): 25 incredible contributors in the anti-diet and weight-inclusive space have come together to offer free gifts—from intuitive eating resources to joyful movement guides, from style and photography coaching to parenting support. Everyone who participates also gets Michelle’s brand-new course, The Self-Trust Lab, completely fre...

This week, I share a story from a girls’ weekend in Winnipeg that turned into a life lesson. On one of the hottest days—over 32°C—my two med-school besties and I tackled a 10-hectare corn maze themed around Manitoba musicians. Fun quickly became frustration: dead ends, wrong turns, backtracking, and blazing sun. Eventually we found a corner and walked the outer perimeter to exit. It wasn’t giving up. It was acknowledging our limits and choosing what mattered: connection, joy, and the rest of our day—like making time for that field of sunflowers (soul medicine!) and the Nordic-spa...

When I read the headline that Serena Williams is taking a GLP-1 medication — and that her husband is an investor in the very company producing it — it felt like a punch in the gut. Serena has always stood as an icon of strength, unapologetic power, and resistance to the thin ideal. To see her linked with the latest “miracle” weight loss drug is more than disappointing — it’s a reflection of how deep diet culture’s grip really goes.

In this episode, I explore what GLP-1 drugs are, why they’ve become so wildly popular, and the truth behind the...

When we set goals, the focus is usually on what we need to add—more skills, better habits, greater discipline. But real growth often begins with letting go. Just like my backyard maple trees needed pruning before they could flourish, sometimes we need to release old beliefs, habits, and expectations to make space for the wisdom that’s already inside us.

In this episode, I share how the process of letting go can open the door to deeper self-trust and more authentic growth. We’ll explore:

Coming home from a holiday can be a rude awakening. One minute, you’re sleeping well, moving your body joyfully, soaking up nature, and feeling deeply connected to the people you love. The next, you’re staring down an overflowing inbox, a growing to-do list, and a calendar packed with obligations.

In this week’s episode of Thrive Beyond Size, I share my own experience coming back from 10 days of camping — and how quickly the stress and old habits came rushing back. We’ll explore:

What happens when the movement you love starts to feel like something you have to do?

In this off-the-cuff episode, recorded from a rainy picnic table while camping, I reflect on a week of intense hiking that pushed me—physically and emotionally. Hiking is my favorite kind of movement. It usually brings me peace, joy, and deep connection to myself and the world around me. But on this trip, something shifted. I started to notice the “shoulds” creeping in. The pressure to push harder, to keep up, to prove something—even when my body was asking me to slow...

Today’s episode is a little shorter than usual, but it dives deep—literally—into the body. Michelle shares what she’s been learning about two often-overlooked players in our physical and emotional well-being: the fascia and the psoas muscle.

Though rarely discussed in traditional medical training, these structures play a crucial role in how our bodies hold onto stress and trauma, and why safety in the body is so essential for healing.

You’ll learn:

We’ve all heard the statistic: 95% of diets fail.
But what about the 5% that don’t?
What’s really going on when someone does lose weight and keep it off?

In this episode, I share a personal conversation with my husband, Rob, that sparked a deeper dive into what “success” in diet culture actually looks like—and whether the elusive 5% is something we should be striving for at all. From relentless control and genetic privilege to disordered eating that’s socially rewarded, we unpack the complex truths behind long-term weight loss and ask the bigger, more important...

We all have days (or weeks… or seasons) where everything feels like it’s falling apart—when you’re exhausted, overwhelmed, and have nothing left to give. So what do you do on those days? In this episode, Michelle shares a deeply personal story about a tough Friday night and the small, nourishing decision that changed everything. It’s a story about tuning in, honoring your needs, and reconnecting with your body in the simplest of ways.

This episode is an invitation to explore the concept of bare minimums—the tiny but powerful practices that keep you tethered to...

Summer is often seen as the season of joy—sunshine, connection, spontaneity, and play. But for many, it also brings body image triggers, food anxiety, and pressure to do summer "right." In this reflective solo episode, Michelle unpacks the paradox of summer: how it can be both a healing balm and a battleground.

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This week on Thrive Beyond Size, Michelle shares a powerful story of envisioning her future self—a vibrant, joyful, fat elder woman—and the unexpected emotional release that followed. But what started as a profound moment of body acceptance was quickly disrupted by a trip to TikTok that served up a harsh reminder of the world we’re still living in.

What Michelle saw was a spectrum of extremes:
🔹 Reel after reel celebrating weight loss, scale numbers, and GLP-1 injections
🔹 Defiant “What I Eat in a Day” videos where rebellion replaced nourishment
🔹 Performances of control vs. perform...

This week on Thrive Beyond Size, we’re lightening things up with a more personal, vulnerable episode. Michelle shares how her intuitive eating journey unexpectedly led her into the world of tarot cards, moon rituals, crystals, and meditation—and why she now embraces practices she once would’ve rolled her eyes at.

Far from being flighty or irrational, these “woo woo” practices helped her anchor into her body, slow down, and reconnect with a part of herself that had been buried beneath the hustle of medicine, productivity, and diet culture.

In this episode, you’ll hear:

In this follow-up to last week’s conversation about trauma and weight, Dr. Michelle Tubman explores a crucial truth that doesn’t get talked about enough: you can’t listen to a body you don’t feel safe in.

While intuitive eating is often positioned as the antidote to food struggles, it’s not always the right starting point—especially for those navigating trauma, chronic stress, or deep disconnection from their bodies. If you've ever tried intuitive eating and felt like it just didn’t work for you, this episode will help you understand why that might be—and why it’...

This week on Thrive Beyond Size, Michelle dives into a growing narrative in the trauma-informed wellness world: that if you heal your trauma, you’ll lose weight.

While well-meaning, this belief is not only overly simplistic—it’s harmful.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

In this urgent and deeply moving episode, Michelle sits down with Emma Cloney and Diana Dimmock—two powerful advocates from Lipedema Canada—to talk about the medical condition most clinicians have never even heard of, despite its potential to affect 1 in 9 women.

Together, they dive into: