Finding Satisfaction with Food

Honoring our bodies’ cues of hunger and fullness when we eat is a huge part of intuitive eating, but “what and how” you eat can be just as important. Finding satisfaction with food is all about allowing yourself to eat the types of food that you enjoy and an in environment that is pleasing.

Why is satisfaction important?

Dieting tends to create the sense that you can’t be trusted around food. To avoid feeling out of control with food, my clients tend to eat foods that they feel are “healthy” whether or not these foods are truly what they want to eat, they may not even find the foods enjoyable at all. This can lead to deprivation and the desire for more food.

Let’s look at an experiment:

Have you ever really wanted to eat something but told yourself you should not because it wasn’t “healthy?” Say for example you wanted a cupcake at your child’s birthday party but think that’s a NO, NO! Then you find yourself munching on the veggies and dip, and then some crackers, and some of the cheese tray, and some fruit… then you start to feel over full and probably judge that you have eaten so much, after the party is over you pick on all the leftovers as you put the food away… feeling more guilty…. end of they day rolls around and everyone has gone to bed and you end up going in for the leftover cupcakes, eat one, maybe even more than one, after trying all day to avoid them.

What would it have been like if you would have honored your desire for a cupcake in the first place? You may have been satisfied with just one, and you likely would have eaten a lot less throughout the day and never ended up feeling over full and uncomfortable.  Instead you spent the whole day trying to satisfy a craving for a cupcake with a whole bunch of food that wasn’t a cupcake. IT DOESN’T WORK!

How do you find satisfaction?

It starts with what you choose to eat. I like to think about the 3 T’s. To determine what you want to eat think about:

Taste – do you want something salty, sweet, sour, bitter, or umami

Texture – do you want something creamy, smooth, crunchy, crumbly, oily, gooey, chunky, thick, thin, dense, light, moist, or dry

Temperature – do you want something hot, cold, or room temperature

Picking from each “T” can help you decide what type of food you want. For example if I am craving something salty, creamy, and hot, I may go for a bowl of chowder. In addition to the 3 Ts, consider variety and appearance as these can impact the satisfaction that we get from our meal and even the nutrition!

The environment in which you eat plays a critical role in the satisfaction of an eating experience.  

You don’t have to eat on fancy china with a candlelit table, but eating at your desk while reading through emails is not the best way to truly connect to the pleasure of eating. Consider taking a break from distractions, plating your food in a way that is appealing, and giving yourself the time to savor your food. This can help you connect to your meal and determine if you are actually enjoying the food you are eating. If you aren’t enjoying the food, stop eating it! Find something that may actually be satisfying if you are able.

Life happens – I wouldn’t expect anyone to be able to eat with full attunement 100% of the time. I encourage my clients to do their best with their schedule and what life throws at them. Trying to allow for satisfaction as often as possible can make a huge difference in your overall eating patterns. Sometimes we get stuck in a situation where the only food available is something we don’t enjoy, in this situation you may eat as much as you need to feel full even though it isn’t very satisfying, that’s okay you are still honoring your body by nourishing it! Finding pleasure and satisfaction with food can be a game changer in healing your relationship with food and yourself – give it a try!

Want to connect? Contact me today!

Feel your Fullness

In a previous blog post, I talked all about the importance of honoring your hunger. Now it’s time to discuss how to know when you are done eating, how much is enough, when are you satisfied, and what happens if you eat until you are over full or uncomfortable.

It’s time to talk all things fullness!

It’s important to note that if you have been dieting for some time, honoring your fullness may be a foreign idea to you. Most diets, meal plans, lifestyles etc, have rules that tell you how much you are supposed to eat. You have likely relied on external cues to tell you when it is time to stop eating, including things like calorie counts, pre-portioned meals, bars or shakes, or regimented diets with recommended portion sizes. Because of this you may be disconnected from your internal fullness cues.

This can often lead to the “clean plate” mentality where you tend to eat everything that is portioned no matter what the portion is because it has been “approved” or “allotted” on said diet or plan. Cleaning your plate can also be a pattern developed from childhood if well-meaning parents encouraged you to eat everything. Financial constraints and values systems that avoid waste can also contribute to the desire to eat everything that is available. I find that sometimes my clients aren’t even aware of the fact that they clean their plate, and that it is just an ingrained habit from years of dieting. Not eating regular meals/snacks or getting too hungry before a meal can lead to finishing everything on the plate. I like to think of it as a weighted pendulum, if you wait until you are starving to eat you will likely swing to the other side of being over full and uncomfortable after eating.

You will be unable to respect your fullness and stop eating if there is a voice in your head telling you that you “won’t be able to eat this food again”, “this is the last time”, or that you “shouldn’t be eating”. This is why it is important to be working on rejecting the diet mentality and making peace with food as you begin to try honoring your feelings of fullness.

If at this point you are feeling like you will never be able to understand fullness, there are several steps you can take to feel your fullness and then honor it.

Feeling your fullness is really one big giant experiment.

I love this outlook because it gives you the opportunity to play and figure out what works best for you. Knowing that you can’t “do it wrong”, “fail,” or “mess it all up.”

The first thing to do is try taking a time out during you meals to notice if you are enjoying how the food tastes and how hungry or full you are feeling. It may be helpful to plan intentional pauses 25%, 50% and 75% of the way through the meal until you are more used to naturally checking in. Note that this does not mean you have to stop eating, just notice and then continue eating. At the end of the meal, check in again to see where your fullness level is. This is where the experimenting comes in. If you think you are full but unsure, try stopping eating there. If you get hungry within the next 30min or hour you probably didn’t eat to a satisfying level of fullness, but that’s okay just honor your hunger at that point. Same thing is true if you are eating and don’t want to stop or aren’t sure if you are too full or not and then realize that you feel over full or uncomfortable, NO PROBLEM! Just allow yourself to wait until you are hungry again. In each of these examples you are learning about your fullness and what feels best for you.

It’s important to notice how different foods make you feel.

I love to use the example of the giant, plastic spinach containers that are packed full of greens – If I was really hungry and ate my way through a whole container I would be really full (and likely have some serious GI issues ;)) but I would probably only stay full for a short period of time because there really isn’t much in the way of macronutrients: carbs, proteins and fats. Getting to the same level of fullness on a balanced meal will last way longer and keep my energy and my mood stable.

Another point to note is that if you start eating when you are not hungry, it is harder to tell when you are comfortably full. You can overshoot your fullness because you don’t get the gradual filling you would if you were moderately hungry before eating.

As I mentioned the previous steps, notice if you became anxious at the idea of pausing during eating or leaving food behind. This fear may be coming from an old diet that encouraged you to leave ‘so many’ bites on the plate, or a fear that you may not be able to eat what you want if you tap in and notice your fullness. It is important to notice these fears and realize that with intuitive eating you are always allowed to eat more if you want to. In fact, it is common for my clients to start to realize their fullness but eat past it while they are still figuring it out and learning to trust themselves. As you continue to make peace with food and understand that you will always be able to eat what you want when you are hungry, it becomes easier to leave food behind when you are full.

Be ware of turning ‘stopping when you are full’ into another diet rule. 

Eating until we are over full can be part of normal eating and not something to be judged or beat yourself up for.

If you feel you are unable to stop even once you work to feel your fullness or just don’t feel satisfied after eating but know you are full, you may be using food as a coping skill or not finding satisfaction in the types of food you are choosing! These are topics to be discussed in future blogs.

Disclaimer: For those struggling with eating disorders, you may need to eat past the point of comfortably full to re-nourish your body and normalize your portions. It is recommended that you get the support of a registered dietitian to learn more about the amount of food that is needed for your body vs trying to start off with intuitive eating or determine physical needs on your own.

Book an Appointment!

Challenge the Food Police! (Get out of my head!!!)

What is that negative, judgmental voice in your head?

You can call it what you want; I often hear it described as Ed, the eating disorder voice, or the Food police. This voice follows you around all day judging what and how you eat, criticizing your body, and constantly comparing yourself to others. It often sounds like “don’t eat that,” “there are too many grams of sugar in that,” “that will make you fat,” “you haven’t exercised enough to deserve that.”

You are not alone with these critical thoughts.

One study showed that nearly half of people experienced some guilt after eating foods they like. This completely makes sense as our culture often labels food as good and bad and associates certain foods as “guilty pleasures” or “sinfully delicious.” We all have internal belief systems, which affect our thoughts. Your core food beliefs are likely a culmination of the information you have learned and cultural influences. Unfortunately, with so much misinformation in the media about food, your core beliefs are likely to be cognitive distortions.

Cognitive distortions can feel so real it can take a long time to really root them out and challenge them or replace them with healthier thoughts. The first step is to become aware of the distorted thoughts. Mindfulness is a helpful tool in becoming familiar with the thoughts that you have related to food and your body. Intuitive Eating (the book by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch) labels different food voices to help you better understand your thoughts.

Judgmental (non-supportive voices)

Food Police: Culmination of all the food rules and myths that you have developed over your life

Nutrition Informant: provides nutrition information to keep you in line with your diet or in line with the current cultural myths about what is and isn’t healthy

Diet Rebel: the part of you that wants to rebel against any food rule placed on you, especially if placed on your by another person, ex; when your husband asks why you are eating something if you wanted to lose weight, you tend to say “screw you” and eat even more than you intended – that’s your rebel!

Compassionate (supportive voices)

Food anthropologist: neutral observer that states facts about food and your food experiences without judgment

Nurturer: Compassionate and supportive voice used for positive self-talk

Nutrition Ally: Helps you make food choices that make you feel your best without judgment or criticism.

Intuitive Eater: The sum of all or your supportive voices, the intuitive eater is the voice you can use to challenge the food police, and make the best choices around food to support your body.

You can use these voices to see when you are having cognitive distortions, and then work on replacing your distortions with compassionate, non-judgmental thoughts.

To challenge the food police you need to use several therapeutic techniques from different therapeutic modalities including CBT and DBT as well as nutrition education to replace food myths not backed by science or that are leading to a harmful food relationship. If you are having trouble with these skills it may be time to get additional support from a dietitian and therapist trained in work with disordered eating and intuitive eating.

Schedule an Appointment today! 

Make Peace with Food

Peace, Love, Food!

In my previous blog post on hunger I discussed the physiological reasons that restriction can lead to overeating. Today I will be talking about the power of the brain and that making peace with food is rooted in how psychological restriction of food can actually effect our bodies and how we eat. Note when I say restriction – I mean any limitation or rules placed on your food intake including restricting the amount or type of food that you let yourself eat. 

We want what we “can’t” have.

This is one of the reasons restriction leads to increased desire and cravings for the foods you tell yourself you can’t or shouldn’t have. This fear of deprivation can grow so strong in dieters or restrained eaters, that before even starting a new plan, diet, program, you can have a “last supper” effect where you find yourself eating all the foods that will be forbidden once your diet starts. With each successive diet or attempt to control your weight, you can find the intensity of craving for food increases. Last supper binges can become more extreme and you can even find yourself vacillating between restriction and binge behaviors throughout months, weeks, days, or even within an hour.

To normalize this sensation, think about a time when you had access to a special food, a food you don’t often get to have. An example of this may be a holiday, special restaurant, family recipe, or on vacation. Did you notice that you ate more of the food because you realized it may be the only time you get to have it, at least the only time for while, until mom makes her famous holiday cookies again? This may be normal when it happens occasionally with special foods, but with dieting and restriction, this list of foods can be enormous and you can feel like everything is special and off limits, leading to increased desire to eat it all while you can, like the night before your next diet starts.

If you often restrict the types and how much food is allowed in your house you are more likely to overeat right after grocery shopping when the amount of food available is higher because your body wants to get it all while it can. It’s used to having limited options. This can lead to cleaning the plate every time you eat b/c you feel like this amount is what you are allowed to have and your body is fearful it won’t get what it needs at future time. Diets actually encourage cleaning the plate because they often restrict you to limited portions that are approved; it makes sense that someone being restricted would eat every morsel of “allowed” food. Unfortunately, this wears away at your self-trust and can increase feeling of loss of control.

Note: learning to trust that food will be available and making peace with food can be additionally challenging for those who have experienced any sort of forced dieting; or anyone who has experienced food insecurity – both of these have been shown to play a roll in the “get it while you can” mentality with food. These are important topics to discuss with trained professionals like a dietitian and therapist.

What does the evidence say?

Research on restrained eaters has shown that the restraint can lead to over eating when self-proclaimed food rules are broken, or there is a perception of being “bad” with food. One studied from Northwestern University examined how much ice cream restrained eats vs. non-restrained eaters would eat after being filled with milk shakes. Ironically, restrained eaters ate the most ice cream when they were fed more milk shakes prior to the test. Non-restrained eaters on the other hand ate more ice cream when fed less shake and less ice cream when fed more shake. This study shows how physical hunger and fullness can be ignored completely once a “rule” is broken if you have a restrictive mindset with food. In another study, restrained eaters ate more pudding when told the pudding was high calorie than when told it was low calorie. It didn’t actually matter how many calories were in the pudding! This shows how powerful the brain really is, just the thought of eating “too many calories” led to over eating.

What to do about it?

Give yourself unconditional permission to eat. Like with honoring your hunger you have to fully commit to eating when hungry, making peace with food goes a step further to saying that you will allow yourself what you actually WANT to eat when hungry. Unconditional is a key word here, this means knowing that you can truly have whatever food you want without any sort of compensation for eating it. Example of conditional permission: “I can have cupcake tonight, if I eat a salad tomorrow,” “I can enjoy this pasta tonight, if I workout for X amount of time tomorrow”, “It’s okay to honor my cravings as long as I have portion control and only eat half.” These statements may seem like you are letting yourself eat what you want, but the fact that they come with a condition can cause your brain and body to want more of the foods. There still isn’t freedom to have it whenever.

This is often when clients want to run out the door, it’s terrifying to think you can eat whatever you want, I am often met with fears about eating too much, never stopping once you start eating, not eating “healthy” enough if you eat whatever you want. The truth is though that the restrained eating has caused an unhealthy relationship with food and that once you have permission to eat you will be able to find balance in that food intake, a balance that is right for your body. When you actually allow yourself unconditional permission you are able to connect to your body’s cues because there isn’t fear and guilt overriding connection to taste and hunger/fullness.

To begin making peace with food you can try the following steps.

Make a list of foods that you think you may enjoy eating but limit yourself of in some way. It may help to consider different food groups like dairy, fruit, vegetables, grains, proteins, fats, other – this can just help you get some ideas going. Then the goal is to slowly incorporate these foods. Pick one, purchase it, and try eating it as often as you would like, you may find that you overeat the food at first, that’s okay! It’s likely that old fear of future restriction sneaking up on you. Keep buying the food and keep incorporating it when you want it.  You likely won’t have to go down the whole list because as you continue to give yourself permission with more foods you will start build trust and won’t have to experiment with each one. If you are finding that you are bingeing regularly when you try this experiment it may be time to step back and go back to the previous intuitive eating skills, talk with your treatment team or get one if you don’t have one! They will be able to help you more safely incorporate foods in a way that may feel more supportive and successful to you. Also remember if you do over eat on the new foods, it’s okay it’s part of the process. You can continue to work on normalizing your relationship with food. You have already taken a huge step by trying a food that was previously forbidden!! 

Book an appointment today - if you want additional support making peace with food.

Hungry? Honor it!

Principle 2 of intuitive eating is to honor your hunger.  

What does it mean to honor your hunger? What even is hunger? My clients struggle often with understanding the “appropriate” level of hunger to start eating. Diets and restriction can teach us that we should only eat if we are famished, we only deserve food after a certain amount of time has passed, if we have eaten a certain amount of calories, or if we have been “good” with the amount of exercise or types of food we have eaten. Doing this can lead to a whole host of problems including most importantly disconnecting you from your body’s natural hunger cues. Reconnecting with your body’s natural hunger cues, and honoring those cues, is a crucial step in the intuitive eating process.

What happens when you ignore your hunger?

Hunger triggers a primal need for food. Any form of restriction can lead to the effects of starvation even if you do not feel like you are “underweight” or think your diet is healthy. Dr. Ancel Keys performed a semi-starvation study during WWII that shed light on the many effects of restrictive food intake. The men in the study experience intense food preoccupation, unusual eating habits like eating rapidly or very slowly, hoarding food, episodes of bulimia, and out of control eating to name a few.  Rat studies have shown that restricting food leads to over eating.

There are several brain chemicals that play a part in our hunger signals. When restriction takes place these signals are disrupted and typically fire away to increase food intake for survival. One example of this is how neuropeptide Y (NPY) increases when food is restricted. NPY is higher in the morning just after our nighttime fast, so imagine after any continued restriction or fasting. Elevated levels of NPY trigger increased cravings for carbohydrate rich foods. Biologically this makes sense because carbohydrates are the body’s preferred energy source and only energy source for the brain and red blood cells.  Carbohydrate energy stores only last about 3-6 hours; therefore, consistent food intake  (including carbohydrate rich foods) is crucial for sustained energy levels and functioning throughout the day. When we don’t have enough carbohydrate energy the body turns to breaking down protein from our diet and from our muscles.

Have you ever gone on a low carb diet and thought it worked splendidly while you stuck to it because of quick weight loss?

SORRY to burst your bubble but you lost mostly muscle and water.

For every pound of muscle lost you lose an additional 2-4 pounds of water. Not to mention how dangerous it is to break down your muscle including all of your organs when you are eating low carb or even just going to long in the day without replenishing your carbohydrate stores. 

Quick note on the Keto diet – After sustained period of carbohydrate restriction the body will break down fat to turn into ketones for energy, but only about 50% of your brain can use these ketones; therefore, you are still starving your brain and body!

SCARED of HUNGER?

The fear of eating too much can lead to different scenarios where one may eat very little and try to control food to avoid overeating/diet backlash, while others may fear getting too hungry because of it’s previous resulting binges and therefore try to avoid excessive hunger by eating all day or filling up on non or low caloric foods and beverages. Note that if you are excessively hungry you have not chance of moderation with your food intake and will likely eat until you are excessively full. Learning to honor subtle hunger can increase satisfaction and balance with your food intake.

What does hunger feel like?

Hunger isn’t all about the stomach. There are several ways that our bodies tell us we need food. Tuning in regularly can help you to become more familiar with these different cues. Initial hunger can be noticed by a shift in energy or overall mood to a lower state. Hunger can be detected in the head by a slight headache, increased thoughts about food, or decreased concentration. Hunger may be experienced in the body by tightness in the throat, salivation at the thought of food, or a rumbling or empty feeling in the stomach.

To honor your hunger – practice allowing yourself to have a meal or snack whenever you experience the above sensations. Remember that waiting longer or pushing off eating will only lead to negative consequences including feeling out of control with food.

Feel like you are always hungry?

Note that if you have a history of restricting yourself, learning your hunger may lead to eating more often than you think you "should." You may also be trying to fill yourself with foods that aren't satisfying and leave you feeling hungry quickly after a meal or snack (I'll discuss this more in a follow up blog on fullness) If you are always wanting food but not feeling the physical signs of hunger, this may be a sign that you are using food to cope with your emotions (this will also be discussed in future blog posts) but remember if you do eat out of emotional reasons and your body wasn't actually hungry, don't beat yourself up, this is just part of the learning experience. 

*** Disclaimer: If you are not connecting to hunger until it feels ravenous including severe fatigue, weakness, light headedness, nausea or stabbing stomach pain this is an extreme level of hunger. You may need the individual support of a dietitian to understand the amount of food that is adequate or necessary for your body. If you have struggled with an eating disorder, you will likely not be able to honor your hunger right off the bat, this will take time and more nutritional guidance to re-nourish your body before being able to honor your hunger.

Schedule an apt today if you need more support. https://www.nom-nomaste.com/services/

Follow me over on instagram: @nom_nomsate.llc for more positive food messages!

Rejecting the Diet Mentality

What is “diet mentality?”

To me, the diet mentality is making choices from a place of hope that that choice will lead to weight loss or a change in your body to fit an ideal. The diet mentality can affect your food choices, and it can affect things like the amount of physical activity you do, or the way you live your life socially.

You may be wondering why this is bad?

Diets don’t work!!!!!!

95-98% of dieters regain all of the lost weight, and 75% of those people gain back even more than they lost in the first place. Dieting can lead to preoccupation with food, increased negative relationship with food and slowed metabolism. Just like if you tell a child they can’t play with a toy that toy is all they want to play with, if you tell yourself you can’t eat a food that food is all you think about. Even just the thought of a diet can lead to increased desire for foods that will be restricted on said diet. This has even led my clients to overeating before starting a diet because of the future withdrawal that they know is coming. Dieting can also lead to increased fat storage, change in body shape, and risk of premature death. When you stop dieting you are at risk of beginning to over eat or binge eat due to the biological drive to restore your body to its natural set point. With each attempt at weight loss, self-esteem can erode due to the negative cultural belief that if you just try hard enough you should be able to lose the weight. Dieting can also lead to eating disorders.

Dieting and temporary weight loss doesn’t work to “fix” low self-esteem.

Self-esteem and psychological well-being are not actually addressed when losing weight; therefore, once weight is lost (and regained) improvements in these areas don’t actually take place as hoped. Sort of like the saying “wherever you go there your are” – your problems are still there no matter your body’s size.   

Maybe you have already acknowledged the evidence that diet’s don’t work, but you may still be living in the “diet mentality.”

You can still have the diet mentality even if you aren’t on a specific diet. Diet mentality includes things like counting calories, macros, or portions, eating only safe or “clean” foods, labeling foods as “good or bad” and then trying to restrict or exercising more after eating “bad” foods, rigidity or rules around eating like time of day, location, and how food is eaten, using diet foods, placating hunger with low calorie or non-caloric foods and beverages, or following food trends like gluten free, dairy free or vegan for the goal of weight loss.

The first step to be able to eat intuitively is to “Reject the diet mentality.”

Through my work with clients, I have come to believe that this is one of the hardest principles to embrace. Our culture is obsessed with dieting; therefore, asking someone who is worried about the shape of his or her body to give up dieting can be a scary, unthinkable action.

To reject the diet mentality you have to shift your mind by understanding the damage that diets cause both physically and psychologically. It is imperative to understand that dieting is not about will power and failure – you are not bad for not being able to stick to a diet, in fact that is the amazing power of your body over-riding restriction to keep you alive. We need food for survival and not being able to stick to a diet is our body’s way of preservation! Getting rid of your diet mentality tools like the scale, diet books/recipes, apps used to count/track, measuring utensils or food scales if used obsessively, and things like clothes from previous weights that you use to “check your body’s size” are action steps you can take to actively reject the diet mentality.

Reminder that as long as the weight loss industry continues to be a 60 + billion dollar industry new diets and lifestyles will continue to pop up with hopes of trapping vulnerable individuals into paying money for that hope that “this diet will be the one that works” Guard yourself with this knowledge to reject the diet mentality when it sneaks up in different ways.

I feel it is important to validate that letting go of dieting can be extremely difficult because dieting may be the go to coping skill for challenging life stressors. If you feel this way try to be compassionate toward yourself. There will be more info in a future post about the principle of coping with emotions without using food.

And if you are feeling like many of my clients, hoping that you can just go on one last diet before starting intuitive eating, remember the science above about why diet’s don’t work, this is why the diet mentality needs to be rejected prior to fully being able to intuitively eat. 

If you want help rejecting the diet mentality - Schedule an appointment today! https://www.nom-nomaste.com/contact/

Intuitive Eating 101

What is intuitive eating?

If you spend a fair amount of time reading blogs/news outlets focused on health and wellness you have likely heard the terms intuitive eating and mindful eating as their popularity has been on the rise. With this popularity has also come a lot of confusion about what Intuitive Eating really is and if it is beneficial.  That’s why I am here to share the basic concepts of Intuitive Eating!!!

We are all born with the ability to eat intuitively.

Have you ever watched a newborn baby? They cry when they are hungry, get the breast or bottle, and then fall asleep when they are done. As babies grow into toddlers (if they are given permission to eat as they need) they will begin to ask for food when hungry, and when they are full the food ends up in the air, on the floor, and all over the clothes. They are connected to their bodies and understand that they are no longer hungry so the food becomes a toy to be played with. Give them time and they will ask for food again.

We all have that friend or family member who has always eaten whatever they wanted and never “struggled” with their weight or seemed to be concerned about food.

These are the lucky individuals who have continued to live their lives the way they were born, with intuitive connection to their body’s hunger and fullness cues and cravings.

So then why are adult intuitive eaters as rare as unicorns?

There are many reasons intuitive eating can go array. Early on, a well meaning parent may limit the types of food that are allowed in the house which can lead to an increased urge to eat these foods when they are available for example at a friends house or at school.  Parents may also require “cleaning the plate” where no dessert is served until all of the dinner is eaten which can lead to mistrust of fullness cues. Teachers or class schedules may make it impossible to eat when hungry, and one may begin to lose trust in his/her body’s hunger cues. And then there are the diets: doctor recommended, structured diets, diets from magazines/social media/celebrities, and even DIY versions, all that cause us to lose connection with our innate ability to feed ourselves. Recently, I have seen people lose touch with intuitive eating because of trying to honor their health with cleanses, products, “lifestyles,” that are marketed to make you healthy but are really another diet in disguise. These methods are often dangerously restrictive and don’t encourage connection to our body’s needs.

The good news!

Everyone is able to return to intuitive eating if they are willing to do the work. Intuitive Eating involves working with 10 different principles to eventually make peace with food and your body.  The 10 principles are to reject the diet mentality, honor your hunger, make peace with food, challenge the food police, feel your fullness, discover the satisfaction factor, cope with your emotions without using food, respect your body, Exercise – feel the difference and honor your health with gentle nutrition. Intuitive eating has been thoroughly researched and time and time again shows positive health outcomes including but not limited to lower triglycerides, BMI, and emotional eating as well as higher HDL(good cholesterol), self-esteem, and psychological hardiness.

Becoming an intuitive eater is not easy but it is worth it.

If you would like to make this change consider getting support from a registered dietitian who specializes in working with intuitive eating, non-diet approach, and health at every size, and with a therapist who is trained in disordered eating and eating disorders.

Want to work with me? Check out my website and schedule an appointment today!