Katharine McPhee Relies on ‘Intuitive Eating’ After Past Food ‘Issues’

Katharine McPhee has learned to give herself grace when it comes to her health and nutrition after struggling with an eating disorder for years.

“I’ve really been a big believer in intuitive eating,” McPhee, 40, exclusively reveals in the latest issue of Us Weekly while celebrating Bio.me’s new Daily Prebiotic Fiber flavors, chocolate and chai. “If your body is craving things that are heavy in fiber, heavy in protein, [it’s] because your body needs those things.”

The actress explains that she tries to be “mindful and logical” about what she eats, noting that if she’s “craving” something she doesn’t deprive herself.  “You just let yourself have it,” she says.

McPhee explains that whether it’s a stop at Burger King — which she tells Us was her most-recent indulgence courtesy of her husband David Foster, who is “obsessed” with the chain — or drinking a milkshake, it doesn’t matter — she’s listening to her body.

“The problem is [when] you’re having, like, three milkshakes instead of one,” she adds. “So I’ve been into intuitive eating for a long time.”

McPhee — who sat down with Us earlier this month at the Bio.me’s APRÉS BIO.ME launch event at Little Lunch in Venice Beach, California — notes that listening to her body also means not having “so many rules and regulations” during certain times of the year.

“I had a lot of issues around food,” she recalls. “And the more pressure that I had put on myself, like, ‘Oh, my God, it’s the holidays. Don’t go crazy. You can’t eat this,’ the more crazy that I went.”

McPhee opened up in February 2010 about her seven-year battle with bulimia, telling Shape that “the more I focused on my weight, the worse my bulimia got.”

“Now I’m more easygoing,” she told the publication. “I stopped fighting myself and became more forgiving of my body. Ironically, the weight came off naturally through exercise but no dieting.”

At the time, the Broadway star said she stopped paying attention to the scale and focused instead on being healthy. When McPhee was pregnant in 2020 with her son, Rennie, she went through another bout of “body-issue stuff.”

After gaining 40 pounds, the singer confessed that she worried she might backslide into her disordered eating habits. “It just suddenly came up in a way that hadn’t been present in a long time,” McPhee explained during a March 2021 episode of the “Dr. Berlin’s Informed Pregnancy” podcast. “Feeling like there was a relapse after getting pregnant was shocking and upsetting and concerning for me because I was suddenly so obsessed with food, starting from this first trimester, and I had such a distortion of the way that I looked.”

It took the Smash alum time to realize that feeling “ravenous” in her first trimester wasn’t the “eating disordered-version” of her, but what she needed to fuel her body during pregnancy. Since welcoming her son in February 2021, McPhee has continued to embrace her body’s signals.

Part of that process means treating the holidays like a “continuation of the rest of the year.” She tells Us, “You can indulge a little bit, but it’s no different than indulging on Valentine’s Day and indulging on the Fourth of July.”

McPhee continues, “I don’t feel pressure on myself, just the more pressure you put on a certain time, the more you’re likely to overindulge. So that is the principle I live by — not setting such rigid rules for myself.”

Outside of giving herself grace with food, McPhee tells Us she’s been doing her best to improve her gut health. “I’m a big believer in that the gut is essential to great, strong immunity,” she says, pointing out that she’s “always been into” probiotics and yogurts.

Adding fiber into her diet, however, has been a tougher feat. “We all know fiber is important,” McPhee explains, revealing that like protein, fiber is a must-have to keep your gut in check, which is why she takes supplements.

“I’m thrilled to have another thing to make it easier to just feel good,” she says, gushing over Bio.me’s new Daily Prebiotic Fiber flavors. “I have a lot of joint issues, even for only being 40, I have a lot of aches and pains from years of dancing. So all that kind of [fiber] stuff is a [godsend].”

Learn more about gut health innovator Bio.me and its new Daily Prebiotic Fiber flavors at bio.me.

For more on McPhee’s health journey and plans for the holidays pick up the latest issue of Us Weekly, on newsstands now.

If you or someone you know struggles with an eating disorder, visit the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa & Associated Disorders (ANAD) website or call their hotline at (888)-375-7767 to get help.

With reporting by Amanda Williams