High Fiving Ourselves For This Year!

You're listening to Burnt Toast! We are Virginia Sole-Smith and Corinne Fay.

Happy Christmas if you celebrate! If you don't, happy Thursday where everything is closed! Either way, today we're taking a look back at your five favorite episodes of the year.

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Episode 225 Transcript

Corinne

So we dropped an episode on Thanksgiving Day, and we're back with another holiday episode. This time we're going to be looking back at your five favorite episodes of the year.

Virginia

This is so fun for me to put together every year. I think this is our second or third time doing it, and it's just really satisfying. Plus the top episodes are not always what I would have predicted! Some are, but some aren't. 

So a little background before we start: Since we moved platforms—we went from Substack to Patreon-—it was actually incredibly difficult to compare all the usual stats. The way Substack tracks episodes and the way Patreon does it—it's not an apples to apples situation. So this isn't the most scientific ranking. But I tried to find the different metrics we're interested in as podcasters —and I found the most popular episode for each of those metrics. 

1. The Episode You Shared Most: Dr. Mara Will Not Sell You A Weighted Vest

Virginia

So this one got the most shares on Substack Notes, on Instagram, etc. This is the one that people sent to other people as much as possible.

Corinne

I was recently recalling this episode because one of my friends texted me to say "What do you think about weighted vests?" And I was like, weighted vests have not gone away. 

Virginia

Did you say I wear a weighted vest all the time? Because that's what I say.

Corinne

My weighted vest is my body. Yeah, I feel like we had a little chat about it. it's one of those things people have got to try for themselves. if you're interested in weighted vest then me being like, "eff a weighted vest" isn't gonna deter you, necessarily.

Virginia

No, no. Well, and they're not harmful. Dr Mara, who is a weight-inclusive doctor and writes the excellent newsletter Your Doctor Friend, was definitely not saying they were harmful. It's just this idea that as a perimenopausal woman, can never be not strength training. it's okay to just go for a walk as well, right?

Corinne

Well, and also, just the thing of, you need to be at least as lean as possible, but put the weight on your body. Just not as part of your body,

Virginia

Yeah, only weight you can remove. That's the deep irony. Let's listen:

Virginia

Okay, so now let’s get into some related weight questions.

I was just told by my OB/GYN that excess abdominal weight can contribute to urinary incontinence in menopause. How true is this, and how much of a factor do you think weight is in this situation? And I think the you know, the unsaid question in this and in so many of these questions, is, so do I have to lose weight to solve this issue?

Mara

Yes. So this is a very common refrain I hear from patients about the relationship between BMI and sort of different processes in the body, right? I think what the listeners’ OB/GYN is getting at is the idea that mass in the abdomen and torso might put pressure on the pelvic floor. And more mass in the torso, more pressure on the pelvic floor.

But urinary incontinence is extremely complicated and it can be caused by lots of different things. So I think what the OB/GYN is alluding to is pelvic floor weakness, which is one common cause. The muscles in the pelvic floor, which is all those muscles that basically hold up your uterus, your bladder, your rectum—all of those muscles can get weak over time. But other things can cause urinary incontinence, too. Neurological changes, hormonal changes in menopause, can contribute.

Part of my size inclusive approach to primary care is I often ask myself: How would I treat a thin person with this condition? Because we always have other treatment options other than weight loss, and thin people have urinary incontinence all the time.

Virginia

A lot of skinny grandmas are buying Depends. No shame!

Mara

Totally, right? And so we have treatments for urinary incontinence. And urinary incontinence often requires a multifactorial treatment approach.

I will often recommend my patients do pelvic floor physical therapy. What that does is strengthen the pelvic floor muscles particularly if the person has been pregnant and had a vaginal delivery, those muscles can really weaken, and people might be having what we call genitourinary symptoms of menopause. Basically, as estrogen declines in the tissue of the vulva, it can make the tissue what we call friable.

Virginia

I don’t want a friable vulva! All of the language is bad.

Mara

I know, isn’t it? I just get so used to it. And then when I talk to non-medical people, I’m like, whoa. Where did we come up with this term? It just means sort of like irritable.

Virginia

Ok, I’m fine having an irritable vulva. I’m frequently irritable.

Mara

And so that can cause a sensation of having to pee all the time. And that we can treat with topical estrogen, which is an estrogen cream that goes inside the vagina and is an amazing, underutilized treatment that is extremely low risk. I just prescribe it with glee and abandon to all of my patients, because it can really help with urinary symptoms. It can help with discomfort during sex in the menopausal transition. It is great treatment.

Virginia

Itchiness, dryness…

Mara

Exactly, yeah! So I was doing a list of causes of urinary incontinence: Another one is overactive bladder, which we often use oral medications to treat. That helps decrease bladder spasticity.

So this is all to say that it’s multifactorial. It’s rare that there’s sort of one specific issue. And it is possible that for some people, weight loss might help decrease symptoms. If somebody loses weight in their abdomen, it might put less pressure on the pelvic floor, and that might ease up. But it’s not the only treatment. So since we know that weight loss can be really challenging to maintain over time for many, many reasons, I think it’s important to offer our patients other treatment options. But I don’t want to discount the idea that it’s inherently unrelated. It’s possible that it’s one factor of many that contributes to urinary incontinence.

Virginia

This is, like, the drumbeat I want us to keep coming back to with all these issues. As you said, how would I treat this in a thin person? It is much easier to start using an estrogen cream—like you said, low risk, easy to use—and see if that helps, before you put yourself through some draconian diet plan to try to lose weight.

So for the doctor to start from this place of, “well, you’ve got excess abdominal fat, and that’s why you’re having this problem,” that’s such a shaming place to start when that’s very unlikely to be the full story or the full solution.

Mara

Totally. And pelvic PT is also underutilized and amazing. Everyone should get it after childbirth, but many people who’ve never had children might benefit from it, too.

Virginia

So the excerpt we just listened to is Dr. Mara talking about urinary incontinence. The listener's doctor was implying that it was because of their weight. And we were just getting into how many health issues, especially in perimenopause and menopause, you're gonna hear that explanation for. And that's just not always true, and even when weight is a factor, there are almost always other treatment options besides weight loss. 

Corinne

It also makes sense to me that this is the most shared epsiode, because I feel like menopause is such a hot topic right now.

Virginia

Oh, it is. And we will continue to see this theme as we talk about our most popular episodes.

Corinne

Oh, interesting, yes, for sure.

2. Episode With The Highest Open Rate: You Can Count Your Protein And Still Be Nice to People

Virginia

So for folks who don't know: "Open rate" means the percentage of people on the Burnt Toast newsletter list who actually open the email each time. It's okay, we know you don't all open the emails all the time. But it's helpful for us to know which emails get more or less opens than average.

This podcast episode, when it got emailed around, had the highest open rate all year. It was the Indulgence Gospel episode where Corinne and I both talked about the diet-y or diet-adjacent behaviors we still participate in:

Virginia

Do you personally have any diet-y somethings, Corinne?

Corinne

I struggled a little bit to think of some, but I actually feel like I have so many!

First of all: Right now, I am wearing a fitness tracker.

Virginia

Oh my God.

Corinne

I wear a Fitbit. I love wearing a Fitbit. I am not one of those people who gets into a certain type of headspace about steps. I almost never look at the steps. What I love it for is the sleep tracking. I like waking up and getting a grade on my sleep, which might be—

Virginia

You like being judged first thing in the morning?

Corinne

Yeah! It’s like, good job I did great. Or I find it kind of validating sometimes, like, if you wake up feeling like shit and you’re like, Yeah I didn’t get enough REM last night.

Virginia

This is a big revelation, because I have written pieces critiquing Fitbits, which you have edited and never told me.

Corinne

I go in and out of it. I will wear it every day for months, and then sometime I’ll take it off and just not put it back on. And this is part of where, like, I’m not addicted to it.

I like getting the grade on the sleep. I like the watch element. I’ve never been a watch wearer, but then when I started wearing it and was seeing the time on my wrist, I was like, “h this is actually helpful to not be pulling my cell phone out to look at the time.”

Virginia

Yes. What must that be like?

Corinne

Sometimes at the gym, I will use the stopwatch thing.

Virginia

Sure.

Corinne

So it has a few elements that I like using that I could use my phone for, but it’s easier to just have on my wrist.

Also, I would say I’m very susceptible to supplements, which feels diet-y to me.

Virginia

This I did know about you, because you are an electrolyte girlie.

Corinne

I’m an electrolyte girlie. I like electrolytes. I like fiber. I’ve dabbled in creatine, which is another gym one.

PLUS: 

Corinne

That one we’ve talked about before because you’ve written about protein girlies or whatever, the growing popularity of people kind of tracking their protein and gotten a lot of pushback on that. Then I’m like, “Virginia, you eat protein powder.”

Virginia

Every day! Every day I have it for breakfast unless it’s like the weekend and I’m making eggs or something fancy. But yes. I am a morning protein girlie. I couldn’t tell you how many grams of protein is in it, but I do know I feel better and more functional if I have a significant amount of protein in the morning time. I have high protein needs then.

Another of mine that’s maybe a little more of a mental game I play is when it comes to my exercise routines. As you know, I mostly lift weights, I do resistance training videos, and I walk the dog, and I always have a goal that every week, four of those workouts will happen.

But if I know it’s a busy week and I’m not going to get in all four workouts, I think the math I do to decide which workouts I’m going to skip is often rooted in a diet-y place. For example, I’ll never give myself permission to cut the easiest workout.

I’m like, “Well, you have to do whatever’s feeling hardest right now in order to feel like you did enough this week.” This is definitely a diet culture holdover, because why not just do whatever workout makes sense for my schedule, or it sounds interesting, and trust that over the course of life, it’s going to be enough? But I’ll feel this pressure that whatever I’m enjoying the least, I still have to do. I don’t know, but I have a weird sort of punitive attitude towards it. Which I often recognize and talk myself out of, but, that’s the starting point. So that’s more of a mindset than a specific habit.

Corinne

I think when we look at these individual behaviors, sometimes we’re reclaiming legitimately useful things that the diet industry stole from us—

Virginia

Like Diet Coke!

Corinne

Like Diet Coke. So in these scenarios, reframing the intention can change a habit from diet-y to a form of genuine self-care.

Virginia

Like you using your FitBit for sleep, not for weight loss.

Corinne

Yes, I remember this episode.

Virginia

Do you remember my being scandalized when you shared that you were wearing a FitBit while we were recording?

Corinne

When did this come out? Because you know what actually happened since is that my FitBit broke. It just stopped working. And I think I tried to replace it, and then that one broke, and I was just like, fuck this. So currently living FitBit-free.

Virginia

Corinne is showing me her FitBit-less wrists. 

Corinne

I do miss having the time on my wrist.

Virginia

Well, they make watches.

Corinne

I've never heard of that. 

Virginia

Yeah, this is an episode from last January, and we deliberately did it in January because January is peak diet culture noise time. And we were like," let's talk about some of the diet-y things we do," because we wanted to reduce the stigma. Because it's okay that you do some diety things, you can still stand up for fat liberation. We're all just flawed people. And sometimes you can reclaim a diet practice or product, and do them in a non diet-y way! Like, your FitBit relationship really did not seem diet-y to me at all. You could pick it up and put it down again. 

Corinne

Okay, well, before we listened to the clip, I could remember what mine were, but I had completely forgotten what yours were.

Virginia

Diet Coke and protein powder! We also talked about how I have a thing where it's hard for me to give myself permission to do an easier workout. So if I'm trying to decide which workout to do, I think I should always do the one that sounds the least fun. I think I've actually made a lot of progress on that issue this year! I really feel like I'm getting a lot of joy out of my workouts lately. So that's good. 

Corinne

That's awesome. 

Virginia

I would love to hear which ones other folks are either struggling with. Like, yeah, this is a little diet-y, but you know what? It's fine. It serves me in other ways. I think it's an interesting conversation, and it's good to be honest about it. 

3. Episode With The Most Comments: How Much Did You Pay Your Pumpkin Stylist?

Virginia

Okay. Next up we have the episode with the most comments, and it's really interesting to see what generates the most conversation.

Would you have a guess about which episode it will be, before I say it?

Corinne

Let me think. I would think it would have been, like, maybe the Mel Robbins one?

Virginia

Well, we'll get to Mel Robbins. But no, the episode with the most comments was the one where we talked about my love of porch pumpkins.

Corinne

Wait, that was such a recent one.

Virginia

It was! It's because this was the episode where we talked about our problematic favs. And people really liked sharing their problematic favs. 

Corinne

That makes total sense.

Corinne

Is this just like putting a pumpkin on your porch?

Virginia

No, it's putting piles of pumpkins on your porch. 

Corinne

Oh, okay, I have seen people do that.

Virginia

Wait, there was a Wall Street Journal article. I'll find it.

Corinne

When I see people do this, I'm like, I'm tired. I don't have the energy to be stacking pumpkins on my porch.

Virginia

According to the WSJ, "Families are paying north of $1,000 to create Insta perfect tableaus for porches and yards."

Corinne

Okay, so how much did you pay for your pumpkin stylist?

Virginia

Let me tell you about me and my porch pumpkins. I've been craving this look for a few years, ever since Julia Marcum first posted it. And she bought fake pumpkins, which she just keeps on hand and brings out every year to make her pile of pumpkins. And I was like, well, that's actually a more like responsible way to do it, right? To buy and reuse your pumpkins every year?

Except then I priced out her pumpkin collection, and it was like, $800 and I said to my then-husband, like, should I buy all these pumpkins? And he said, no.

Corinne

And that's why you got divorced.

Virginia

Exactly, yes. No — he was right. But every fall, I'm like, I kind of wish I had that. It looks pretty. I'm not going to spend that money, but it does look cool. So then this year the kids wanted to get pumpkins. And so Jack and I took them to a little local pumpkin patch, and I discovered the trick is to go the Saturday before Halloween. The pumpkins are on deep discount. And I now have 14 pumpkins on my front porch that I spent only $70 on.

Corinne

14 pumpkins is a lot. 

Virginia

It is a lot! They just kept giving us more. I paid $70 for maybe, like, seven pumpkins. And I was still like, well, $10 a pumpkin. We'll feed them to the chickens. Jack's like, I can bake something with this cheese pumpkin. I was like, it's it's fine. And then they were like, here. Take more. Take more. I was like, well, now the pumpkins are basically paying me to be on my porch.

Corinne

So funny. 

Virginia

I think it looks delightful and harvest-y, and I like that. It's a trend that works for both Halloween and Thanksgiving. So you can leave it up for a while. And then you could feed the pumpkins to your chickens, or bake with them, if that was the type of person you were, or throw them in your woods and let the deer eat them, which is what I would also do. 

Corinne

When I was at my mom's house in Maine, we did get a pumpkin for her front steps, and it immediately got eaten by squirrels.

Virginia

Another reason to wait until the Saturday before Halloween. So you're not trying to make this trend last all fall. I think it's also like, at this time of year, I'm getting sad about the leaves falling. I'm getting sad about the coming cold, anything that makes me like anything better. It's a pile of pumpkins. They're pretty, that's all.

Corinne

They are. The pumpkins in this photo are very beautiful.

Virginia

Yeah, no, that's the key. You don't just get orange pumpkins, you get the Cinderella pumpkins, the fancy gourds and whatnot.

Corinne

And also, how is this WSJ article/photo, leaving out the fact that there are 14 foot tall skeletons in the background?

Virginia

Yes, in that photo, they are also doing the very tall skeletons, which is a trend I'm not on because I don't know where to store it. Where does one store the 12-foot skeleton the rest of the year?

Corinne

I don't know. And those are also like $500, I think.

Virginia

They're not cheap. That's like $2,000 in Halloween decorations just on their porch. It's a commitment. And I didn't go that route, but I just enjoy it. That's all.

Corinne

Did you put them out and step back and rearrange them? 

Virginia

I sure did.

Virginia

Now that I think about it, this episode is very similar to the episode where we talked about our diet-y habits. People just like us to talk about problematic stuff, I guess?

Corinne

They like us to be three dimensional people with flaws.

Virginia

I'm here for it. These are the most fun episodes to record, too, I think. So we need more ideas on this theme! I definitely would re-do problematic faves in a year or so to see if we have new ones.

What are other what are other ways you want to hear about our flaws? Tell us in the comments. What else do you want us to fess up to? We'll think about it. 

4. The Episode That Converted The Most Paid Listeners: Mel Robbins Has a PHD in Diet Culture

Okay, now we get to Mel Robbins! The episode that converted the most paid listeners is a very important metric for us as podcast business ladies. Paywalled episodes exist to convert new paid subscribers, and that is how we pay all of our bills, and survive this lifestyle of making internet content.

So I'm not shocked this was our biggest converter. Well, I guess my only surprise is that I honestly wasn't super aware of who Mel Robbins was before we did this episode. But then I realized she was, like, a pretty big celebrity, so it makes sense that this converted a lot.

Virginia

Do you want to talk us through the morning routine post?

Corinne

So, “this is the morning routine that’ll supercharge your energy all day.”

Virginia

“Backed by science,” that’s what she says.

Corinne

Starts with getting up when the alarm goes off. Once again, it’s not bad advice. Like, yes. But also is Mel Robbins telling you to do it going to make you do it? I don’t know.

Virginia

Sometimes you’re just not going to do that, and you might still have an okay day. It doesn’t mean the whole day fell apart because you didn’t get up the second your alarm went off.

Corinne

The next thing, making your bed, tidying your space—another very common self help tip!

Virginia

It’s “the simplest way to practice discipline,” Corinne. “A promise kept no matter what.”

Corinne

I’m going to be honest, I feel okay with the first two. Number three, “high five yourself in the mirror.” Like, no. I’m never going to do that. I hate that. I really hate it.

Virginia

I can’t stop laughing. She’s so serious in the photo. She has a selfie of her high fiving herself, and she’s so serious in the photo. Like she is earnestly high fiving herself.

Corinne

Let me tell you, “giving yourself a high five in the mirror rewires your brain to focus on self love and positive reinforcement.”

Virginia

The science behind that is all in her book, The High Five Habit. So there you go. The PhD level science that she’s done to confirm. I just imagine saying to someone actually struggling with depression or anxiety, like, “why don’t you just high five yourself in the mirror?” And, like, I think they would be justified in throat punching you. Like, “I’m sorry your mom just died. Have you tried high fiving yourself in the mirror?” Like, fuck you.

Corinne

This is the thing, right? This is what we talk about. It’s like, exercising does make us feel better, but you can’t tell someone struggling, “Just exercise.” Like, this advice is good. Like, get out of bed, have a glass of water. Exercise. And, no one needs that advice. Everyone knows that.

Virginia

High fiving yourself in the mirror I’m going to say is not good advice. Like, I’m going to say for most of us, that’s not going to be transformative in any way. It’s just going to be dumb.

Corinne

I have been surprised to see how much staying power her book has had. I'm still seeing people talking about it! And one of the things we talked about in this episode was the scandal around it being...

Virginia

Plagiarized, question mark? Allegedly plagiarized? Certainly, some lack of clarity about source material and original authors?

Corinne

I just kind of thought that would make people stop paying attention to that book. But it really has not.

Virginia

No, does not seem to have made a dent. Also, I would have thought people would have stopped paying attention when she told everyone to high five ourselves. And yet, here we are. Have you high fived yourself yet in the mirror?

Corinne

Absolutely not, have you?

Virginia

Absolutely not, never will. Truly terrible advice. And frankly, very patronizing towards anyone struggling with actual mental health issues. This is the last thing you need to hear, in my opinion.

Corinne

I think I agree with that.

5. The Most Downloaded Episode of 2025: Is Dr. Mary Claire Haver Making Menopause a Diet?

Corinne

Oh, back to the menopause.

Virginia

Back to the menopause. This was a great episode we did with Cole Kazdin, an Emmy Award-winning television journalist and author of What's Eating Us: Women, Food, and the Epidemic of Body Anxiety. Cole came on Burnt Toast about two years ago to talk about What's Eating Us when it first came out. It's a really great resource about the industry of eating disorder recovery.

And then Cole emailed me and was like, "Can we please talk about menopause and why it is a diet, and why I think so many millennials are going to get eating disorders in the season of life because of the diet culture being created here."

Virginia

All right, we are going chat a little bit about one of the folks that we see on the socials talking about menopause relentlessly —Dr. Mary Claire Haver.

Cole

She wrote the book The New Menopause, which is a really great, significant book in many ways in terms of providing information that has never been provided before.

Virginia

Oh yes, this is @drmaryclaire.

Cole

When I bought her book, I saw that she has also written The Galveston Diet, and I said to myself, hmm. And then bought the book anyway. And you know now it all makes sense. Because The Galveston Diet is is very geared towards the perimenopausal, menopausal lose belly fat, but also have more energy help your menopause symptoms, right? How can you knock that? Come on.

And so it's very sort of interwoven with all the diet stuff. So it's not surprising that she would bring so much of that up in her menopause book and a lot on her Instagram. She wears a weighted vest all the time. I thought, “Should I get a weighted vest?” And I again, I wasn't sure if I was doing it for menopause diet culture reasons, or I just love to lift heavy things reasons. I thought, “That could be cool. Maybe that'll be fun. I'll just wear a weighted vest around the house, like this woman, who's the menopause authority.”

I guess what’s coming across in this interview is how vulnerable I am to any advertising!

Virginia

No, it's relatable. We all are vulnerable! I mean, I'm looking at her Instagram right now and I'm simultaneously exhausted at the prospect of wearing a weighted vest around my house and, like…well…

Cole

Wouldn't that be convenient? But let me save you a minute here, because when you go to whatever your favorite website is to buy weighted vests, and you look at the reviews, it's split between people saying, “This is the best weighted vest [insert weighted vest brand here],” and other people saying, “Gee, the petroleum smell hasn't gone away after two months.”

Virginia

Okay. I can't be walking around my house smelling petroleum. No, thank you.

Cole

Because they're filled with sand that comes from who knows where, and the petroleum smell doesn't go away. And according to some reviews I read—because I did go down the rabbit hole with this—it actually increases if you sweat. So I thought, You know what, I can do this in other ways.

Virginia

I'm sure there are folks for whom the weighted vest is a revelation. And, it's a very diet culture thing to need to be alway optimizing an activity. You can't just go for a walk. You need to be walking with a weighted vest or with weighted ankles. Why do we need to add this added layer of doing the most to everything?

And I'm looking at a reel now where she talks about the supplements she's taking. Dr. Mary Claire is taking a lot of supplements.

Cole

So many supplements!

Virginia

Vitamin D, K, omega threes, fiber, creatine, collagen, probiotic… That's a lot to be taking every day. That's a really expensive way to manage your health. Supplements are not covered by insurance. There's a lot of privilege involved in who can pursue gold standard healthy menopause lifestyle habits.

Cole

And it's always great to ask the question, who's getting rich off of the thing that I'm supposed to be doing for my health? Because it's never you.

Virginia

Yes. She keeps referencing the same brand — Pause.

Cole

It's hers. It's her brand.

Virginia

Oh there you go. So, yeah, taking advice from someone with a supplement line, I think, is really complicated. This is why it's so difficult to find a dermatologist as well. Any medical professional who's selling their own product line has gone into a gray area between medical ethics and capitalism that is very difficult to steer through.

Virginia

I think Dr. Mary Claire Haver is very similar to Mel Robbins in a lot of ways. I mean, she is a medical doctor, Mel Robbins has no relevant credentials to tell people what to do with their lives. But they have the same kind of energy on social media. They are both tiny women with a really good blowout telling you how to run your life. And you do not have to dig far to get into their super diet-y and anti-fat content. It's all right there at the surface.

Corinne

Yikes. No, thank you.

Virginia

But this is a good episode. If you missed it, if you missed any of these, I recommend giving them a listen.

What do you notice about these five? Any standout themes or observations? Other than, yes, we're all obsessed with menopause.

Corinne

Definitely menopause. And like you alluded to earlier... flaws.

Virginia

It's interesting that there were two about problematic white lady influencers, which has been a cornerstone of Burnt Toast coverage for a while. We do a few of those every year, so I'm not surprised two of them made it into the top five. But then the others in the top five were like Corinne and Virginia just being humans.

So that's kind of like a nice counterpoint. Because it's us just being messy people, right? 

Corinne

Two were about menopause, and two were about problematic white ladies, and two were about us having flaw.

Virginia

That's right, yes. One was about both menopause and a problematic white lady. We had some overlap, yes. Then the ones that were not in those two categories were us just saying, "here's some weird stuff we do."

So, all right, more hot mess express in 2026. We can do it. 

Corinne

Oh God. 

Virginia

I mean, honestly, it's easier than trying not to.

Corinne

Do you have any further thoughts about those topics?

Virginia

No, but I'm curious to hear from listeners if you have a favorite among those five, or if you have a different favorite episode for the year?

There were also a lot of little episodes that didn't hit the top metric on something but did generate great discussion or that I'm just really fond of. One that I really wanted to get in here was the interview with Jessica Slice, author of Unfit Parent: A Disabled Mother Challenges an Inaccessible World.

That was one that was second place for a couple of these categories. It did generate a bunch of comments. It did generate a bunch of shares, and I feel like really resonated with folks. So that's an honorable mention.

Corinne

That's one that really stuck with me. I've just thought about a lot since I listened to it. I would say also maybe, the one with Lisa Sibbett.

Virginia

Yes! Lisa who writes The Auntie Bulletin. I loved that conversation with Lisa about community and divesting from consumerism. Perpetual Burnt Toast goals. Oh, it was such a good year making the podcast. It really was.

🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈

Butter

Corinne

Okay, I'm going to endorse a problematic Butter.

Virginia

Oh, a problematic Butter! We love it.

Corinne

Borderline. I mean, okay. I'm going to endorse this product, which was sent to me. So it was gifted. I received it for free. 

Virginia

Okay. Thank you for disclosing.

Corinne

I was just like, whatever. It's a lotion. It's called Talova. And I realized once I got it that it's made from...beef tallow.

Virginia

Oh, that you're rubbing on your body?

Corinne

I did have that realization after I started using it and really liking it. And I feel like beef tallow is one of those things where I'm like, I hear it and I'm like, that's MAHA-coded.

Virginia

Very Huberman Bro. Yes. 

Corinne

It's like, the crossover point between lefty crunchy mom heading into RFK territory. 

Virginia

Oh dear. 

Corinne

That's why this is a problematic fav. But I started using it before I realized that it was beef tallow. And I was using it, and I was just like, why is this stuff so good? I love it. And then I looked at the ingredients, and there's tallow and emu oil.

Virginia

Oh, no. Aren’t emu endangered?

Corinne

I don't know. I'm also like, is Emu oil what it sounds like? Okay, but I will say it's a body balm. It's incredible. It smells so good. It doesn't smell like beef or emu, it has a citrusy scent. It's my winter in the desert thing. It's so good. I love it.

Virginia

I am confirming on the Internet that emu oil is a traditional Australian moisturizer derived from the fat of the emu bird, used topically for skin and hair care. Okay, Down Under listeners, we're going to need you to weigh in on this. Is Corinne being problematic using emu oil? Do we need to cancel her? Or is she allowed?

Corinne

If emu oil is problematic, I think the brand could be canceled, not me. But anyways, I really like this product, and I'm sorry to say, it's made with beef tallow, and it's it really working for my dry desert skin, and it smells good.

Virginia

All right, all right. 

Well, I'm going to give a non-problematic Butter, just so we don't end the year on such a controversial note. My Butter, as you all are listening to this on Christmas Day, or perhaps during the winter break, is to go take a nap. I took a really great nap the day after Thanksgiving, and I thought to myself, why do I not take more naps on holidays? Usually because I'm busy hosting them and parenting my children, and it's difficult to do. And I'm here to say, if that's you as well, take 30 minutes just stop whatever you're doing and go lay down in a room by yourself and close your eyes or read a book, whatever. It is your holiday as well, and you deserve that.

Corinne

I'm a huge nap fan. 

Virginia

I am not a lifelong napper, but I've been getting into it recently. Or even if you don't sleep, just take some quiet, no people time. I think that can be really helpful when you're in the thick of holidays. 

Corinne

As a big introvert, 30 minutes alone can really turn things around for me.

Virginia

And make you like the rest of the day! Instead of getting increasingly spacier and grumpier. So yeah, I want everyone to go take a nap either today or tomorrow or whenever.

All right, this was a super fun episode. 

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The Burnt Toast Podcast is produced and hosted by Virginia Sole-Smith (follow me on Instagram) and Corinne Fay, who runs @SellTradePlus, and Big Undies!

The Burnt Toast logo is by Deanna Lowe.

Our theme music is by Farideh.

Tommy Harron is our audio engineer.

Thanks for listening and for supporting anti-diet, body liberation journalism!