Are You Passing Down Your Pain? Dr. Shefali on Body Image, Midlife and Unlearning the Programming

When did you first learn how to talk about your body? Maybe it was a parent who said you had to watch what you eat. Maybe you overheard your mom call herself fat in the mirror. Or maybe a coach said you'd be better if you were just a little bit smaller.

Most of us didn't invent these ideas about ourselves. We absorbed them from the people who raised us and the culture we grew up in. And without realizing it, we may be passing the same patterns down to our own kids. That's why I wanted to have this conversation with Dr. Shefali Tsabary on The Tamsen Show.

My Own Inheritance

While I was preparing for this episode, a memory came back that I hadn't thought about in a long time. My grandmother was in the fashion world, and for her everything was about clothes and women's bodies. I remember her telling my mom, "Tamsen is too big for her size." I was 16. She said I had to get smaller for men to like me.

Later, in TV news, I was told to be more like "the girl next door": skinny, straight hair. They even wanted me to change my name because it was "too ethnic." I still think about it when I write my name down. That programming is still running in the background.

The Emotional Heirloom

Most women don't remember the first time they judged their body, but they do remember where they learned to do it. Dr. Shefali described how body image is passed down like an emotional heirloom, not only through words, but through energy.

You might tell your daughter she's beautiful, but if you're constantly criticizing your own body in the mirror, counting calories or hiding your aging skin, she's learning that love has conditions. This isn't about blame. It's about awareness.

"We have to heal ourselves so that our daughters don't spend decades recovering from our wounds," Dr. Shefali says. That healing starts with self-acceptance, not self-correction: looking in the mirror and choosing compassion instead of criticism. When you make peace with your body, you give your daughter permission to do the same.

I lost my mom at an early age, and I asked Dr. Shefali whether we still carry these things into adulthood: body image, insecurity, even jealousy. Her answer was yes, and that the way we pick them up is so subtle it's almost imperceptible.

You're Not the Problem. The Programming Is.

If you've ever felt like you were doing everything "right" and still felt invisible, stuck or unfulfilled, Dr. Shefali says you're not broken. You've been programmed. Gen X women were raised in a system that measured our worth by external validation: be a good girl, be quiet, be thin, be nice, be needed. The result is decades of over-functioning, approval-seeking and putting everyone else first.

And midlife is when it starts to crack. "Midlife is a spiritual reckoning," she says. "It's when the roles stop working. The mask falls off. And you start asking, who am I without all of this?"

When the Pursuit of Health Becomes Self-Rejection

Hot flashes, weight changes, insomnia: midlife is full of new symptoms, and the pressure to "fix" them can feel relentless. Dr. Shefali warns that the quest for wellness can become another form of self-rejection. "We treat our bodies like problems to be solved," she says, "and we think that if we just do it right, we'll be okay."

What if your changing body isn't a betrayal, but a teacher? What if rest isn't a failure, but a requirement?

Takeaways From My Conversation With Dr. Shefali

1. Inner worth is the buffer

Dr. Shefali explained that when our sense of self depends on an image out in the world, we become fragile. When the CEO loses the job, when the market crashes, "when the woman puts on weight or when she becomes older, she now goes through an existential crisis." The way through is to develop an inner worth that doesn't depend on that image.

2. Accept and care for yourself at the same time

I asked her how a woman in menopause, whose body is changing, can accept it and still work at feeling good. Her point was that many of us are doing neither. We're not accepting our changes and we're not caring for ourselves. The goal is to hold both.

3. Let your kids be ordinary

This surprised me. Dr. Shefali teaches parents to find worth in their children's ordinariness. Insisting a child must be special, she said, "creates only anxiety and breeds this fragility that I need to be special. So if I'm not special, I am nothing." The same is true for us.

4. Stop pitting women against each other, and against ourselves

She described how cultural messaging pits woman against woman, and woman against herself. Even women who seem to meet the ideal are suffering under the pressure to live up to it. "We're all suffering," she said.

5. Don't romanticize "how it used to be"

We criticize the next generation as entitled, she said, but "this is not their song to sing." Every generation gives the next one more. When we criticize what's unfamiliar, we lose touch with our kids, and they pull away. Instead, see their strengths: they're getting better and better at owning their truth.

Stop Performing and Start Being

Dr. Shefali's prescription isn't another hustle or glow-up. It's unlearning the performance, letting go of the attachment to perfection and returning to your inner knowing. The path to freedom isn't doing more. It's doing less of what was never yours to carry.

Listen to my full conversation with Dr. Shefali Tsabary on The Tamsen Show.

About Dr. Shefali Tsabary

Dr. Shefali Tsabary is a clinical psychologist, international speaker, and New York Times bestselling author of The Conscious Parent and A Radical Awakening.

Featured book: A Radical Awakening: Turn Pain into Power, Embrace Your Truth, Live Free

Also by Dr. Shefali Tsabary: The Conscious Parent

Resources

• Dr. Shefali's official site
• National Eating Disorders Association
• Listen to the full episode