Season 1 · Episode 7 · 66 min
In this episode, Carolyn Costin sits down with Dr. Jen Gaudiani, author of Sick Enough, for a thoughtful conversation about eating disorder recovery and what compassionate care can really look like through a medical lens.
Together they talk about why so many people struggle with feeling “not sick enough,” how physical and emotional health are deeply connected, and why recovery often takes a more individual, collaborative approach than standard medical systems allow.
Dr. Gaudiani shares insights from her work in eating disorder medicine, including the importance of looking beyond weight and lab results to understand the full picture of someone’s health. She also explains how conditions like ARFID, ADHD, and MCAS can complicate recovery and why carefully listening to each person’s experience matters so much.
This episode offers a reassuring perspective for anyone wanting a deeper understanding of recovery and the care it deserves.
Dr. Gaudiani (she/her) is an eating disorders expert physician and the Founder and Medical Director of the Gaudiani Clinic. Board Certified in Internal Medicine, she completed her undergraduate degree at Harvard, medical school at Boston University School of Medicine, and her internal medicine residency and chief residency at Yale. Dr. Gaudiani moved to Denver in 2007, choosing Colorado with her husband for its emphasis on the outdoors, incorporation of nature into daily life, and support of family activity time. From 2008 to 2016, she helped run and grow the ACUTE Center for Eating Disorders and Severe Malnutrition, where she fell in love with this patient population and began to learn about the medical complications of eating disorders. In 2016, inspired by her desire to improve outpatient medical care for patients with eating disorders of all sizes, shapes, genders, and diagnoses, she founded the Gaudiani Clinic. Since then, she has learned more than she ever thought possible about both measurable and unmeasurable medical issues that can trigger or perpetuate eating disorders. She has a passion for helping patients make progress on terms they name, by reducing the physical barriers to recovery. In founding the Gaudiani Clinic, she established a nationally unique outpatient medical setting, not dictated by restraints on visit time or insurance rules, where strong, supportive, and healing relationships with patients help them achieve wellness while remaining in their communities. Through lectures, consulting work, and her book, Sick Enough: A Guide to the Medical Complications of Eating Disorders and Undernutrition (Second edition, 2025; First edition 2018), she continues to improve the quality of medical care for patients with eating disorders around the world.
Dr. Gaudiani has lectured nationally and internationally and is widely published in the scientific literature and on blogs, as well as having appeared on many podcasts. She is a past member of the editorial board of the International Journal of Eating Disorders and the Academy for Eating Disorders Medical Care Standards Committee. On a personal note, Dr. Gaudiani is fluent in Spanish and speaks some conversational Italian, loves hiking and spending time outdoors, is a voracious reader especially of young adult fantasy fiction, and lives with her wonderful husband and two daughters in Denver
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Carolyn Costin is a world-renowned eating disorder clinician, author, and speaker. Recovered from anorexia, she pioneered the belief that full recovery is possible. Founder of Monte Nido, she transformed treatment with a holistic, home-based model. She later founded the Carolyn Costin Institute, training coaches and clinicians worldwide. She has authored six books, including 8 Keys to Recovery From an Eating Disorder.
Receive 20% off the 8 Keys to Recovering from an Eating Disorder book: wwnorton.com/promo/costin
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The National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) →
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