Comfort Food with Kelly Rizzo

Dr. Laura Berman spent decades helping people through their most painful experiences. Then she lost her 16-year-old son, Sammy, to an accidental fentanyl overdose, and had to rethink everything she thought she knew about grief.She joins Kelly for an intimate conversation about surviving unimaginable loss and her book, Crying Out Loud, which Kelly calls the best book she’s ever read on grief. It brings together Laura’s professional knowledge and her experience as a grieving mother to offer something people desperately need: real, practical steps for getting through their grief.Kelly and Laura share the moments their lives changed forever, the anxiety that followed, and what it takes to begin living in a world that no longer feels safe. Laura explains why grief isn’t only something we think about, but something we experience in our bodies, relationships, and daily lives.They talk about finding support, making room for overwhelming feelings, maintaining a connection with the person you’ve lost, and allowing joy back in without leaving your love behind. Laura also shares how her book offers different exercises for different days, including the days when you can barely lift your head.This is a conversation about a path through grief, taken at your own pace. Sometimes that means five minutes at a time. Sometimes it means ten seconds.Find Dr. Laura Berman’s book, Crying Out Loud, and her community, the Grief Healing Collective.Follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzo.This episode is sponsored by Lifeway Foods. Look for Lifeway Kefir and Farmer Cheese in the dairy aisle.

Craig Conover was bullied as a child, then faced ridicule as an adult for loving to sew. Now, he’s sharing that experience through his new children’s book, Patchwork, to help kids understand that the things that make them different can become their strengths.The Southern Charm star joins Kelly for an honest, funny, and personal conversation about bullying, heartbreak, and finding the confidence to build a life other people might not understand.Craig opens up about the criticism he faced for sewing, how childhood experiences stayed with him, and why he wanted to write a book that helps children and parents start conversations about bullying.He also shares what it’s been like to process a public breakup, learn to travel alone, and figure out what to do with three years of good memories after a relationship ends. Craig and Kelly compare notes on grief, gratitude, and letting go of the pressure to hit certain milestones by a certain age.Plus: solo snowboarding in Switzerland, his move into romantic acting, and why he’s learning to stop waiting for permission.Follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzo and Craig @caconover.This episode is sponsored by Lifeway Foods. Look for Lifeway Kefir and Farmer Cheese in the dairy aisle. learn more at www.lifewaykefir.com

Kelly saved one of Sabrina Zohar’s dating advice videos two days after her first date with Breckin. The message? You don’t need to text every day, and you don’t need to turn one good date into your entire future. More than three years later, Kelly gets to thank Sabrina in person.The host of The Sabrina Zohar Show joins Kelly for a candid, funny conversation about dating anxiety, anxious attachment, mixed signals, and what a healthy relationship actually feels like.They get into the difference between wanting reassurance and getting to know someone, why consistency can be more attractive than chaos, and how to stop making someone else’s behavior a verdict on your worth. Kelly opens up about dating after losing Bob, protecting her independence, and learning to say no without a long explanation. Sabrina shares her own painful relationship experiences and what finally helped her change her patterns.Plus: separate bedrooms, the pressure to follow a relationship timeline, and Sabrina’s book, Why Am I Like This?, including the two questions she returns to: “How old do I feel?” and “Where did I learn this from?”Follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzo, and find more from Sabrina on The Sabrina Zohar Show. @thesabrinazoharshowThis episode is sponsored by Flav City. Explore their Protein Smoothies at shopflavcity.com.Go Buy Sabrina's new book: Why Am I Like This? Out Oct. 16th.

What happens when you’re already hurting, and then you judge yourself for not handling it better?Kelly sits down with mother-daughter duo Barb Schmidt, known online as Peaceful Barb, and Michelle Maros, the team behind the nonprofit and online community Peaceful Mind, Peaceful Life, for an honest, surprisingly funny conversation about trauma, grief, recovery, and learning to be on your own side.Barb shares her experience recovering from bulimia and childhood trauma, and how mindfulness became part of her life more than 40 years ago. Michelle opens up about losing her dad at 21 and why losing her nearly 20-year-old cat reminded her that every experience of grief is different. Kelly shares how anxiety and PTSD have shown up since losing Bob.Together, they talk about letting go of grief timelines, interrupting negative self-talk, the lasting impact of comments about our bodies, and finding people who make us feel less alone. Plus, Barb explains her practice of stopping, pausing, and asking yourself what’s actually happening when emotions feel overwhelming.Find Barb online as Peaceful Barb, and explore their work through Peaceful Mind, Peaceful Life. https://peacefulmindpeacefullife.org/Follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzo.Follow Barb on Instagram @peacefulbarbFollow Michelle on Instagram @michellemarosThis episode is sponsored by Lifeway Foods. Look for Lifeway Kefir and Farmer Cheese in the dairy aisle. https://lifewaykefir.com/

Cheryl Burke spent 26 seasons and 17 years as one of the most iconic pros on Dancing with the Stars. Then in one year, she walked away from the show, went through a divorce, and moved to a city where she didn't know a soul. Starting over at 38 with no idea what her favorite color even was.Kelly and Cheryl connected through mutual friends and bonded over tough times, and this conversation goes wide open. They talk about the addiction to chaos and what it takes to finally choose peace, learning you can be okay alone after never once being single since age 13, body image trauma from years in a world that shamed curvy dancers, going sober, choosing celibacy (and why it's way more nuanced than the sound bite), perimenopause hitting at 42, and the quiet guilt that comes with feeling genuinely happy after grief.This episode is sponsored by Lifeway Foods. Find more info at https://lifewaykefir.com/Please follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzo and follow Cheryl at @cherylburke.

This episode was recorded in early 2024, and it means even more now knowing everything Dave has been through since. He was diagnosed with Stage 3 Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, beat it, and then just seven months later was diagnosed with a second cancer. He has since been declared cancer free, and everything he says in this conversation about finding joy, honoring the people you've lost, and getting through the unthinkable hits differently with that context.Dave Coulier was one of Bob Saget's closest friends from the very beginning, dating back to a comedy club in Detroit when they were 18 and 21, broke and scrappy and just trying to make each other laugh. He talks about what made Bob tick, what Bob was really like behind the Danny Tanner reputation, and why humor has always been the way their group got through the darkest moments.And Dave has had a lot of dark moments. In a single year, he lost his best friend Bob, his brother Dan to suicide, and his father. Nine people total in 12 months. He opens up about finding his brother, the conversation he had with his dying father where he grabbed his hand and just talked, and why he believes comedy isn't just a career, it's a survival mechanism.Please follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzo and follow Dave at @dcoulier.

 Kelly sits down with Courtney LaCorte, aka Cheese Gal, the Nashville-based content creator who accidentally built a brand around beautiful, approachable hosting and never looked back. They make the Bob Martini together (Stoli Elite, no vermouth, stupid cold, dead penguins floating), talk about the reality behind the perfectly curated feed, and get into what it actually takes to build a community online without chasing virality. Courtney also opens up about her early 20s divorce, her years as a flight attendant, and how a career pivot four and a half years ago changed everything. Plus: her new cookbook "Oversharing from My Kitchen to Yours," why she closed her storefront to bet on herself, and what real comfort food looks like when life gets hard.Follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzoFollow Cortney on Instagram @cheesegalBuy Cortney's Book "Oversharing" OUT NOW on Amazon https://link.amazon/B08IXaDCOThis episode was sponsored by FlavCity. Get the limited edition Pumpkin Spice Latte All In One Protein Smoothie HERE- https://www.shopflavcity.com/collections/protein-smoothies

Kelly sits down with comedian Kelsey Cook, whose brand new Netflix special Happy Hour is out right now and it is absolutely spectacular. Kelsey grew up in the most wonderfully bizarre household: her parents met at a professional foosball tournament, her mom is literally in the Foosball Hall of Fame, and her dad toured Europe and Hawaii as an International Yo-Yo Man. But underneath all that quirk was a painful childhood divorce that gave Kelsey the kind of dark fuel most comedians run on.Then Kelly and Kelsey get into the full-circle moment of how Bob became a mentor early in Kelsey's career, and what his generosity meant to a young comic just trying to get in the door. It is a truly beautiful conversation.And then things get really real. Kelsey opens up about her mom's frontotemporal dementia, a rarer and often misunderstood form of the disease that can strike people in their 60s, and the night a routine emergency surgery during the pandemic changed everything overnight. Two women who have experienced two very different kinds of grief sit down and get incredibly honest about what the long goodbye actually looks like.Go watch Happy Hour on Netflix. It's HILARIOUS. Follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyrizzoFollow Kelsey on Instagram @kelseycookcomedyThank you to Lifeway Foods for sponsoring this episode. To learn more about Lifeway visit. https://lifewaykefir.com/