Ups & Downs in the Intuitive Eating Journey

A few weeks ago I talked about the “food police,” the strong internal voices that judge whether you are abiding by all of your dieting and food rules. We were not born with a set of rules about food or an encyclopedia of calorie counts in our minds. Alleviating hunger with food is a biologic response; the rules about eating and food are what we call “socially-constructed” or ideas that our minds create based on our environment and life experiences. Sometimes the socially-constructed, pervasive rules are called “diet culture.” Messages prompting us to hate our bodies, imploring us to fix our bodies, dictating rules about eating the “right” way etc. are everywhere. Messages may be given to us non-verbally by looks from loved ones in our homes, visually on magazine covers in grocery stores, verbally in work conversations or doctor’s appointments, on social media and so on. Try to go through a regular day without seeing or hearing at least one message about weight loss, “clean eating”, diets, exercise, body shaming, body hatred, etc. Even if you spend your whole day in bed with the covers over your head you might have diet culture thoughts judging your decision to lie in bed all day!

Releasing yourself from the rules dictated by diet culture can feel exciting and freeing in some moments, and equally as terrifying and anxiety-producing in other moments. Liberation from diet culture is a process with many steps and challenges along the way. If you think that sounds like bad news, I hear you. It’s still possible to move away from diet culture messages, nourish your body as you see best, and make peace with your body as it exists despite the fact that we’re constantly bombarded with unhelpful messages. Setting realistic expectations that the process will involve ups & downs, and will take time, goes a long way in helping you to tolerate the discomfort arising from the process. Striving for success, perfection, and “wins” is the antithesis to the non-judgmental curiosity, self-compassion, and gentle learning that’s part of becoming an intuitive eater. Each time we feed ourselves we have an opportunity to get curious about the body sensations, thoughts, and feelings that emerge. Instead of expecting an outcome, we get to be curious, reflective, kind to ourselves, and learn something we can take to our next eating experience. Perhaps you will even have some experiences that you find comical, create an “aha” moment, or inspire someone else to heal their relationship with food!

Nurture Notes- June 27, 2019