Introduction to Food & Body Therapy
So what is intuitive eating? My definition sounds something like this:
Eating without rules or guidelines.
Eating in response to our body’s mental, physical, and emotional needs.
Honoring body wisdom over outside sources providing advice on food, eating, or nutrition.
Sometimes the easiest way to understand intuitive eating it is by comparing it to what you already “know” about food, bodies, eating, and weight. For most of us, what we already know is what we’ve absorbed or obtained from our parents, peers, the media, societal influences, and our greater culture. Oftentimes when discussing these influences, intuitive eating practitioners like to lump it all together and refer to it as “diet culture.”
Here’s a list of some of the most common (and unhelpful) messages that circulate in diet culture. Some of these are so indoctrinated and normalized, that most of us don’t even think to challenge them:
The shape and size of your body is important. Society cares about it, and so should you.
Your body is something that can and should be controlled. If it doesn’t meet a certain standard, you should start controlling food intake and physical activity in order to shape it into something more acceptable or desirable.
You will be judged by the shape and size of your body. In general, fat is bad and thin is good. Calling yourself fat in a derogatory way is normal and acceptable, since it implies you’re aware of your body’s “problems.”
If you gain weight, you should be very worried. You should start focusing more intently on diet, exercise, and controlling your weight.
Weight gain is dangerous, and fat on the body is unhealthy. Fat on the body should be monitored and controlled.
Food should be monitored and controlled.
Your appetite cannot be trusted.
Your body cannot be trusted.
Without intense monitoring and control of food intake and exercise, you will gain weight.
If you have weight to lose you should go on some kind of diet. Food should be controlled or restricted in some way and physical activity should be increased. This can be accomplished in a number of ways and may include:
Monitoring or controlling calories, portions, fat, carbs, or sugar
Monitoring or controlling food quality (i.e. only eating “organic,” “clean” or “whole” foods)
Following endless numbers of diets that include lists of “eat this, but don’t eat that”
Following guidelines that pertain to how and when you should move your body
In contrast, here’s a nice introductory outline of what intuitive eating and body positivity sounds like in comparison:
Your body’s shape and size is unique to you as an individual. Just like bulldogs can’t be made to look like greyhounds, your body cannot be forced into a shape or size that it’s not.
The size and shape of your body is not something that’s meant to be controlled. The size and shape of your body is a side effect of your genetics and your lifestyle. It can never be bad, and it can never be wrong.
When we try to control out body by controlling food intake and exercise, we have a higher chance of developing disordered eating behaviors (including food and body obsession), than achieving optimal health.
Fat is not “bad”, and thin is not “good.” Your version of a “perfect” body guarantees nothing. It doesn’t guarantee happiness and it doesn’t guarantee health. There are unhealthy people in small bodies, and vibrantly healthy people in higher weight bodies. The size and shape of your body is nobody’s business but your own. People will judge you no matter what body you’re living in, because people will always judge other people. But working to let go of fear of judgment and of what other people think is a worthwhile endeavor for all of us.
If you gain weight, it’s no big deal. The shape and size of your body might fluctuate throughout the lifespan, and it’s normal. It’s even normal for weight to fluctuate day-to-day. Periods of weight gain due to puberty, stress fluctuations, pregnancy, and/or changes in health, hormones, and environment are all normal and nothing to fear. Responding to weight gain with a controlling diet actually increases your chances of further weight gain.
Weight gain is not unhealthy and fat on the body is not inherently dangerous. New research continues to show that we can be optimally healthy in any size body, and that a focus on health instead of weight promotes greater improvements in physical and mental health. When we try to monitor and control body fat, it promotes further weight gain due to powerful physical and psychological survival drives.
Our fear of fat perpetuates weight stigma and fat phobia in society, which is a social justice issue. People in larger bodies are marginalized by their peers and by our greater society as a whole. When you fat shame yourself, you inadvertently shame others.
Diets do not promote weight loss and actually have a shockingly high failure rate. If you go on any version of any diet you are actually increasing your chances of disordered eating and further weight gain. Diets actually CAUSE weight gain and disordered eating behaviors like food obsession, compulsive overeating, and binge eating. At its worst, diets are a jumping off point for the development of full blown eating disorders, which kill more people every year than all other mental health disorders combined. Diets aren’t a good path to health. Period.
Food intake should never be controlled or restricted in any way. Control and restriction cause deprivation and rebellion, which promote disordered eating and further weight gain.
Increasing your intake of nutritious foods should always be done in an additive way. It’s more helpful to add in more nutritious foods versus focusing on what not to eat.
Your appetite can be trusted. You were born with the innate ability to eat when you’re hungry and until you’re completely satisfied. When we’re feeding ourselves consistently we don’t have urges to eat compulsively or to binge. When we’re not dieting or restricting we also tend to naturally gravitate to a wider variety of nutritious foods, because we actually want them.
Your body can be trusted. The human body has an amazing capacity to maintain its weight within a “set-point” range all on its own. Weight simply doesn’t have to be monitored or controlled in order to be maintained. Logically, we all know this. When we eat in response to the body’s natural hunger and satiety cues (like an infant or child), our body naturally settles at a weight it wants to be. In contrast, attempting to monitor and control our food intake and physical activity actually throws off this delicate system and turns on powerful survival drives that promote food obsession, overeating, and an increased capacity for fat and nutrient storage.
The intuitive eating process helps you re-establish natural eating patterns that work for you as an individual. By allowing your body’s innate wisdom to guide you, you’ll find sustainable ways of eating and moving that allow your body to settle into the weight it wants to be.
Before we jump into the details of this work, I want to present you with the following outline for this intuitive eating mini-series. After years of working with people, I’ve stumbled on my own interpretation of the original intuitive eating principles, and I find that it works well for the majority of my clients.
This outline will serve as a sort of blue-print or roadmap for navigating this process. I have found this to be a helpful order of things, but as we go along you will find that all of these topics begin to swim together in a synergistic way. None of them can stand on their own without the others, and they rely on each other for the full spectrum of their magic to begin taking root in your mind, body, and spirit.
Curiosity & Self-Compassion
A lesson in the importance of letting go of guilt and shame in favor of curiosity and self-compassion. Learning how to “notice with curiosity” instead of surrendering to our harsh inner critic allows for a more peaceful relationship with food, body, and self.
Diet Culture & Food Rules
How to let go of diet culture rules and labels in order to begin establishing ways of eating that feel natural and nourishing for you as an individual.
Permission & Allowance
How dieting and restriction actually cause the very problems you’ve been trying to fix. How more permission and allowance with food allows you to regain a sense of control over eating and your own appetite.
Hunger & Cravings
Understanding the difference between physical hunger and food cravings, and how to navigate and respond effectively to both.
Satisfaction & Pleasure
How to reap pleasure from food and maximize your sense of satiety so that “stopping when you’re full” becomes seemingly effortless.
Nourishment & Eating Rhythm
How to integrate nutrition into this process. How to “add what’s missing” and make nutritious foods non-negotiable over time, but never diet or restrict again!
Stress & Emotions
How to address emotional eating and tackle stress and self-care in easy and manageable ways. How to live with more peace and harmony.
Body Image & Self-Acceptance
How to find peace and feel comfortable in your body again. Body acceptance is a worthwhile endeavor, since no amount of force or control will sustainably deliver a body that’s different from the one you have. We are all capable of letting go of the obsession, and doing more important things with our time and energy than worrying about our bodies.
Stephanie Michelle Scott is a Registered Dietitian and Psychotherapist based in Colorado Springs, Colorado. She utilizes unique holistic approaches to help people end cycles of disordered eating and chronic dieting and develop healthier relationships with food, body and self. You can contact her team with questions or to request more information on counseling services by clicking here.