Tag Archive for: intuitive eating

How Can You Tell When You’re Feeling Satisfied?

This week’s Intuitive Eating Wednesday Question comes from Kristy, a member in my online community.

 

She asks:

 

“How can you tell when you’re satisfied??”

 

A short straight to the point question. But often so difficult for someone to figure out.

 

Kristy is referring here to when she is eating a meal, how does she determine when she is satisfied enough to stop eating.

 

If you’re someone who has dieted for quite some time, then likely you’re also struggling with not being able to hear your fullness signals. The mere act of dieting causes your signals to atrophy.

 

Why?

 

Because you aren’t using them. You are stopping your meal when the diet plan tells you that you have had enough. You are pushing the plate away when it’s empty. You are putting your fork down based on a limit imposed on you by an outside source. This means, it’s a source external from your internal signals that truly guide your eating.

 

Remember, you were born an intuitive eater. You were born knowing when you were hungry to start eating, and when you felt satisfied to stop eating. You didn’t need to ask this question, because it was just a feeling you had. And, you TRUSTED it, because you knew no other way but to trust your body.

 

All these years and oh so many diets later, you no longer feel those signals. And, you don’t have that trust in yourself either.

 

Which makes it so difficult to know when you’re truly satisfied enough to stop eating.

 

Okay, so you get this. But now what?

 

I’m not going to tell you how to feel your signals. This is something you need to relearn. And it IS POSSIBLE, with the right support, as you travel down your intuitive eating journey.

 

But before you do, you must do these 5 things:

 

  1. Make the commitment to never diet again.

 

  1. Re-affirm this commitment to never diet again.

 

  1. Stay strong in this commitment even though you are surrounded by diet culture and its harmful messages (and family and friends that might be dieting and want some company).

 

  1. Move away from determining success on your journey based on a number on a scale.

 

  1. Re-affirm your commitment to never diet again

 

You see, if there’s any part of you that is still holding on to “maybe that will help me lose a few pounds”, then you will turn intuitive eating into the hunger-fullness diet (aka ‘The Intuitive Eating Diet’).

 

I’ve seen this happen way too many times. So, check in with yourself and ask yourself if you’re truly ready to leave your dieting habit and the scale behind.

 

Let me know in the comments below.

 

 

Can Intuitive Eating Lead to Your Natural Healthy Weight?

This week’s Intuitive Eating Wednesday Question comes from a new member in my online community:

 

“Can intuitive eating lead to a natural weight?”

 

This is a great question. The short answer is yes, I believe that it could. But the longer answer requires us to have a bit of a conversation.

 

What does ‘natural weight’ mean to you?

 

Do you mean that if you “do” intuitive eating, will you lose weight? The truth is, some people lose weight, some gain weight initially, and some people’s weight remains stable. Keep in mind that the process of becoming an intuitive eater is NOT a weight loss program.

 

I’m going to repeat that. Intuitive eating is not a weight loss program. And if anyone tells you that it is and promises you weight loss, then run the other way.

 

Intuitive eating helps you change your relationship with food and your body, it helps you regain the trust in your inner body wisdom to guide your eating. You have this ability deep within you, it’s just buried under years of dieting and trying to interfere with what your natural weight is.

 

Back to the question…what is a natural weight?

 

A natural weight is the weight your body will maintain with ‘normal’ eating and ‘normal’ movement. This means no food restriction and no boot camp exercise regimes pushing yourself beyond your limits.

 

The problem is that your natural weight may not match the weight you have in your mind that you desire, which is likely influenced by the surrounding diet culture, current fashion, celebrities and even recommendations of your doctor to lose weight to an unrealistic number based on outdated height and weight charts and calculations.

 

So take a moment and ask yourself if you are chasing an unrealistic weight or body size. A lot of clients that I start working with are. They have a number or vision in mind of what they want to look like, but that is not realistic for them. And, let’s add to this equation your genetics. Genetics also plays a role in determining body size, and this may not match up to the weight or size you have in mind.

 

I do believe that your body will balance out at your natural healthy weight by practicing intuitive eating consistently, respecting and caring for your current body, and practicing self-care.

 

How long will this take? No one knows. Just enjoy the process as it’s happening.

 

 

Mastering Intuitive Eating

My client, Amanda, who is working with me on intuitive eating, walked into my office, sat down and starting crying. Once she was able to stop crying, she told me how she recently had a breast cancer scare. Her doctor called her and told her she needed to go for a second mammogram, they “saw” something on the first one. After the mammogram, a biopsy needed to be done. The results came back as benign, and she was crying of happiness.

 

What a sigh of relief.

 

Now, her focus shifted back to taking care of herself since in the 2 weeks prior while she was going through what seemed like torture and waiting for results, she found herself soothing herself with comfort foods.

 

Isn’t it crazy how life often throws you curveballs? They come with no warning and can sweep you off your feet.

 

These curve balls can often make it difficult for you to stay focused on your intuitive eating journey. You may come face-to-face with various obstacles you don’t expect, and feel like you have no support, even when you need it the most.

 

In theory, you should be able to use the techniques you learned throughout your journey, but training is one thing; practice, support and accountability is another. It can be extremely beneficial to continue to have support while you start integrating your intuitive eating training into your daily life.

 

This is where my new membership program Intuitive Eating Mastery Circle can play a role. This program will provide you with the support and accountability you need while you embark on integrating your intuitive eating practice into your daily life. You will have my support as well as the support of a group of wonderful women who are all on the same journey.

 

With this membership program, we meet twice every month for live, small group coaching calls on the phone and during open office hours in our private Facebook group. During these calls and during open office hours, we work through any lingering diet mentalities you may have, bust through your limiting beliefs and, most importantly, deal with challenging times in your life without falling back to using food to cope.

 

The best part of this Mastery Circle is that what we focus on and discuss depends on YOU. Whatever obstacle you may face or struggle you may have, you can ask me and your new family for support and we can help you through it. You will always have someone on your side.

 

Head on over to IntuitiveEatingMasteryCircle.com for all the details and to get started right away. Register by midnight Eastern on Wednesday September 13th and SAVE 50%.

 

If you have any questions about the program, please email me at Bonnie@DietFreeRadiantMe.com so I can help you and see if this program is a right fit for you.

 

I look forward to seeing you in our Mastery Circle!

When Eating is a Non-Issue and Food Decisions Just Happen

When you want to get into a routine and build something new into your life, one way to do so is to schedule and plan.  As a chronic dieter, this was (or maybe still is) also true for you when it comes to eating for weight loss (a.k.a. dieting).

 

You schedule the number of meals you’ll eat that day based on when the plan tells you to, and you restructure your life around that plan.  You find that you’re constantly thinking about what you’re supposed to be eating next, will you be eating it “on time” and if you didn’t pack it with you, will you be able to find something comparable.  You find the only thing you are thinking about is food.

 

I want you to remember a time where you weren’t worrying about your weight or your food.  You lived your life and when you were hungry you ate, you stopped when you were full and you weren’t frantically wondering if a food fell into your plan if you wanted to have it.  For many of you trying to get back to this memory, it might take you all the way back to your childhood days—and that’s OK.

 

When you were younger and there’s less to worry about, that carefree attitude translated easier to food.  Eating was just something you did in between all the other fun things you did each day. And you enjoyed every bite you took.

 

This is intuitive eating at its finest….when

 

…..Eating is a Non-Issue and Food Decisions Just Happen

 

Now that you are older and have been influenced by the diet culture that surrounds you, well, it hasn’t been so easy for you to return to the way you were born.

 

I know you have this deep desire to become an intuitive eater again. I know this because I have spoken to hundreds of you wishing it were easier.  I know how easy it is to fall back into diet mentality, and I also know how important support is for you on this journey.

 

Free Training

Join me tomorrow, Thursday September 7 at 8 pm EST for a Facebook Live training where I will discuss how you can make intuitive eating second nature again.

 

I’m going live in my private Facebook group, so if you aren’t yet a member of our group, click here now to join us for free.

 

Here’s what you’ll learn during our Facebook Live training:

  • The #1 reason you struggle with implementing the intuitive eating principles
  • What it really takes to make intuitive eating a part of your being
  • How you can be at peace with food and yourself so you can enjoy life to the fullest

 

Oh, and if you are not on Facebook and want to watch the replay, just send me an email to Bonnie@DietFreeRadiantMe.com and I’ll send you the recording.

 

Here’s the BIG Difference Between Intuitive Eating and Dieting

Picture this: A new diet comes to market. It’s exciting; this will be the one. You start the diet and things are going well. But then you had a bad day at work, you went on vacation or you had a fight with your boyfriend. Or, you get on the scale on weigh-in day and it hasn’t budged.

 

Either way, you ended up in the pint of ice cream saying to yourself “forget it, what does it matter anyway”.

 

You have just “thrown in the towel” from another diet. If you are a chronic dieter, then more than likely you have “thrown in the towel” quite a few times.

 

But, have you ever asked yourself, “When will this end?”

 

I’ll tell you when! When you finally realize that diets are not working for you. Never have, never will. When you decide that to give up dieting, you need another path. And, you have discovered intuitive eating is that path.

 

Okay, so let’s talk about this intuitive eating path.

 

You start working with me to learn how to reclaim being an intuitive eater (I say “reclaim” because let me remind you that you were born an intuitive eater). And you immediately are having major “aha” moments. Wow, you are discovering things about yourself, your past, your beliefs that you never realized impacted your relationship with food.

 

This is great! You laugh, you cry, all from a good place of finally moving forward.

 

Then it happens. You disappear, stop showing up for your appointments and stop returning emails and phone calls.

 

What is going on?

 

More than likely, an old familiar trigger has popped up and you haven’t yet learned how to handle it. So, you fall back into past overeating habits. Now you feel bad, embarrassed and say to yourself “you see, this won’t work either”. And, you throw in the towel.

 

Now here is the difference between intuitive eating and dieting….

 

THERE IS NO FAILURE IN INTUITIVE EATING!

 

THERE IS NO “THROWING IN THE TOWEL” IN INTUITIVE EATING!

 

Intuitive eating is a learning experience. It’s a process of ups and downs. Whatever trigger has thrown you “for a loop”, you’ll learn from it. Don’t let it take you back to a place that you DON’T want to be….back to the land of dieting!

 

I am here to help you become an intuitive eater. I can help you reach your goal of being diet-free.

 

Reach out to me if you are interested in going from Dieter to Intuitive Eater! We can have a strategy session to see how I can help you and what will work best for you.

 

Eating Intuitively While You’re Sick

Do you ever worry about what will happen the first time you get sick while on your intuitive eating journey? Do you worry that you’ll find it hard to listen to your body and may fall back into old habits? Unfortunately, it can be harder for you to eat intuitively while you’re sick, but that doesn’t mean you have to fall back into old habits.

 

Let me tell you a lesson I learned a few years ago about a time I was sick and how it affected my intuitive eating journey.

 

I don’t usually get sick so when I do, it really throws me for a loop.

 

After I woke up one morning from a difficult night sleep, with a sore throat, coughing, and achy body, I went into the kitchen to prepare my breakfast. What I realized as I tuned into my hunger signals was that I wasn’t really hearing hunger. I stopped to think about this. The last time I ate was dinner the night before, and I am usually hungry in the morning. Yet, I just wasn’t feeling it that morning.

 

So, what do you think I did?

 

Well, I could have left the kitchen and said I’m not going to eat because I don’t hear my hunger. But that’s not what I did. I changed up my breakfast a bit, and had a much smaller breakfast with a cup of tea.

 

A few hours later, I sensed a gentle hunger, but still not typical of my usual hunger mid-day. Yet, I realized that it’s been some time since I’ve eaten, and it’s very important to keep my energy levels up with proper fuel. And so again, I tweaked what my usual lunch would be, and had a smaller lunch with another cup of tea.

 

The lesson I am sharing with you here is this.

 

While I encourage you to tune into your inner hunger signals as your guide to eating, there are times when those hunger signals might be blunted. And, one of those times is during illness. Therefore, even if you don’t hear and feel the hunger signals like you normally do, it’s still so important to eat so you can properly nourish your body.

 

The best option when you’re sick and don’t feel or hear your hunger signals, is to choose healthful “sick friendly” foods. These types of foods are easy on the stomach (and in my case, easy on my throat). But do keep in mind while you are eating that this might be one situation where you just don’t hear those hunger signals as sharp as when you are feeling well. And that’s okay!

 

The most important thing to remember is that while you are sick, your body needs nourishment to feel better, which is why it is necessary for you to eat, even if you have trouble hearing your hunger signals.

 

If you are on your intuitive eating journey and struggling with this journey while you are sick, please reach out to me. I can help you navigate this hurdle and continue on your intuitive eating journey.

 

Email me at Bonnie@DietFreeRadiantMe.com and we can work through your sickness together.

 

Intuitive Eating While on Vacation

This week’s Intuitive Eating Wednesday Question comes just in time for the mid-end of summer vacation that you might be planning.

 

It comes from a woman who has been following my work for over a year and was ready to speak about starting her intuitive eating journey. At the end of our talk, she asks me:

 

“Do you think this is the right time for me to start this journey? I have a vacation coming up, and then the kids are starting school again…” (she speaks quietly and her voice trails off.)

 

As I began to answer her question, she stops me and says, “this is my diet mentality speaking, isn’t it?”

 

Yes, it is!

 

Remember the last time you were thinking of starting another diet? You would think to yourself that maybe it wasn’t the right time? You had so much going on and you feared you would not be able to ‘stick’ to the diet.

 

When you apply the same thought process to either starting your intuitive eating journey, or continuing it as you plan your vacation, this is your diet mentality speaking.

 

Here are 4 tips to help you navigate your intuitive eating journey during your vacation.

1. Stay strong against the chatter in your head that is screaming “I have to lose 10 pounds before vacation!” This will only put you back into diet mentality and onto the latest quick fix which will keep you riding the dieting roller coaster. Continue on your intuitive eating journey with confidence. And, if you are contemplating starting the journey, now’s as good a time as any.

2.  Be aware of mindless snacking while vacationing. Oftentimes when you’re on vacation, you have less structure to your day. You might be laying on the beach where your friends are passing around the snacks; or touring through a new city, walking the streets and trying the local fare. So just pay attention and have an awareness of whether you’re hungry or not before you dig into the snacks.

3. Be prepared. Whether you are sitting at the pool, lying on the beach, in an amusement park or on a full day tour, you are going to get hungry at some point. It’s very important to be prepared and have snacks with you so you don’t have to wing it. Remember, one of the principles of intuitive eating is to honor your hunger. If you wait too long, you tend to not choose the most healthful choices and you tend to overeat, so be prepared.

4. Stop when you’re comfortably satisfied and not when you’re overly full. I know when you’re on vacation it’s so tempting, especially if you’re at a resort hotel which is all inclusive. This means that all the food and beverages (including alcohol) is included in what you’re paying for the hotel. It’s very tempting to just eat and eat and eat to “get your money’s worth”. This is not staying true to your intuitive eating journey.

 

Honor yourself and honor your body by paying attention, being aware and making conscious food and beverage decisions. Stop when you’re comfortably satisfied so that you can enjoy your vacation without regret and without guilt.

 

Which of these tips will you focus on during your summer vacation? Let me know in the comments below.

 

 

 

Trash the Scale

This week’s Intuitive Eating Wednesday Question comes from Kay, a woman who has been working on overcoming emotional eating. I received an email from her that said the following:

 

“Sometimes eating healthy is easy. But sometimes eating healthy and losing weight feels like a struggle. I had to stop weighing myself recently. The scale was showing that I am going up and down around a pound per day.  I was getting worried, and it seemed like all of a sudden, I was struggling more (emotionally.)

 

This early morning, I went out to the backyard to water my lawn on my watering day, and my pajama bottoms almost fell off me. I wanted to go back inside and weigh. But if I did, and the scale didn’t show less, I knew that I would be upset.  How can I give up worries about how much I weigh?

 

This is such a great question and I know it’s something you are thinking as well. As a chronic dieter, you’ve used the scale to measure your success. Each day you’d get on the scale to see how you did the day before and to determine your plan of action for the day ahead. And, if we are being real, you probably go on the scale more than one time per day.

 

Let’s look at a few scenarios.

 

Scenario #1: You get on the scale in the morning and the number is a “good” number. Your mood for the day is happy.

 

Scenario #2: You get on the scale in the morning and the number is a “bad” number. Your mood for the day is depressed, even angry.

 

Both scenarios can trigger overeating, whether it be celebration eating (“I lost weight, I can have a treat”) or consolation eating (“I was so good and didn’t lose any weight. Why bother trying”.)

 

Other self-talk around the result of your morning weigh-in might sound like:

“I ate horribly yesterday, and I still lost weight. Thank goodness, I don’t have to starve today”.

“I only lost ¼ pound, it wasn’t worth it”.

 

This self-talk is the talk of a dieter. Without a doubt, weighing yourself keeps you in diet mentality. It fuels the body worry>food worry vicious cycle of emotional eating and dieting. If you truly want to be break free of this cycle, you must start with throwing away the scale.

 

Do you let the scale dictate your mood? Are you ready to throw it away?

 

Watch this video (click image) as I discuss this topic further and comment below with your commitment to stop weighing yourself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m Dieting But I’m Still Gaining Weight

You’re standing in front of the mirror having changed your clothes three times already this morning.  Nothing seems to fit right.  You are discouraged and start with the negative self-talk you are all too familiar with.  “Why can’t I just stick to my diet”, you say to yourself.  “I am such a failure; I will never succeed at weight loss”.  “Tomorrow I will start my diet again”.

 

Does this sound familiar to you?  If you have been battling your weight for some time, then likely you have been on countless diets that have not worked long term and you have gotten very good at berating yourself for your failures.  The commercials all sound so promising!  The radio ads promise fat burning powers of the miracle pills you just bought at the health food store.  Why aren’t you able to lose weight?

 

The answer lies in the fact that you are dieting. 

 

Let me repeat that!

 

The answer lies in the fact that you are dieting. 

 

You see, nobody lives on a diet.  One goes on a diet but eventually goes off the diet.

 

The Stats You Know

 

Forty to 50% of American women are trying to lose weight and are on a diet at any point in time.  Half of pre-teen and teenage girls are on diets. However, 95% -97% of all dieters regain their lost weight and more within 1 to 5 years.

 

These are very alarming statistics because dieting clearly doesn’t work and repeated “yo-yo” dieting has been shown to have negative health effects, including an increased risk of heart disease and long-lasting effects on the metabolism.

 

The Side Effects of Dieting

 

Dieting makes you preoccupied with food; what you ate yesterday, this morning, 1 hour ago, and what you will eat later and tomorrow.  Dieting makes food the enemy and causes guilty feelings when you don’t eat diet-type foods.

 

When you go on a diet, you are in essence putting your body into a short-term starvation state.  When given the first opportunity to really eat what you desire, you will often experience a feeling of such intensity that any initial thoughts of wanting to be thin fly out the window.  You feel out of control, guilty, and view yourself as having no willpower.

 

However, listen up!

 

This type of eating in response to semi-starvation is actually normal.  It has nothing to do with willpower!  When you are underfed, you will obsess about food.  Period!

 

The best solution to achieving peace with food and your body is to embrace an intuitive eating approach to food.  Intuitive eating is eating based on your physiological hunger and satiety cues not based on situations or emotional cues.  So, that means eating when you are hungry and stopping when you are satisfied or comfortably full.

 

Now, I recognize that for the chronic yo-yo dieter, this is not necessarily easy.  It requires you to explore how you got to where you are today in your eating habits and understand deeply what it means to become an intuitive eater.  During this process, it is important for you to begin to get rid of the diet mentality that you have, and to truly believe that you will never diet again.  If you continue to think there is “just one more diet, this time I’ll be good”, then you won’t be able to move forward to becoming an intuitive eater.   You will continue to have foods that are “good” and “bad” and you will continue to think of yourself as being “on” or “off”.

 

To help you get started on the path of intuitive eating, commit to the following 3 steps:

 

  1. Throw out all the diet books and pre-printed menus from magazines that you have tried over the years. Make a commitment to yourself that you will no longer be tempted by new diets that come out because you are committed to learning to listen to your body.

 

  1. Get rid of the bathroom scale. Do you weigh yourself every morning or even several times per day?  Does the number on the scale influence your mood for the day?  Most likely it does, even if you don’t consciously realize it.  Your weight fluctuates day to day and is a measure of more than just fat.  It includes your bones, organs, muscle and substances such as water, food and waste that pass through your system.  Begin to measure your success by other factors other than the scale such as improved blood work, blood pressure, mood, energy level and overall satisfaction with your progress toward becoming an intuitive eater.

 

  1. Seek out caring support to help you on your journey. Becoming an intuitive eater is a process and the amount of time it takes will depend on how long you have been dieting, how strong your diet mentality is, how long you have been using food to cope with your emotions and how willing you are to trust yourself.  It is very important for you to surround yourself with like-minded people who can provide positive feedback and support.

 

You were born with the natural instinct to eat when hungry and stop when full.  Chances are you lost this ability due to all the diets you tried and the media exposure to quick-fixes.  You can reclaim what you were born with and achieve guilt-free eating, a body you love and a life free of dieting.   Intuitive eating is the answer you have been looking for.

 

Reach out to me if you are interested in going from Dieter to Intuitive Eater! There’s no shame in asking for help!

 

Food Deprivation Leads to Binge Eating

Overindulging in a food item that you restrict is common if you are a chronic dieter. This is called deprivation backlash-rebound eating.

 

Here’s a common scenario: you deprive yourself of a certain food, such as your beloved chocolate because you are on a diet and you are not allowed to have chocolate, right? Well an old-time friend comes to visit and brings you a box of chocolates. You put it away vowing you will not open it. A family member spots the chocolate, opens the box and enjoys a piece. Now what do you do?

 

You think to yourself, “I’m not going to have any, I’m on a diet and I’m doing so well”. You walk away.

 

A few minutes later, you think to yourself, “Hmmm, I’ll just have one, really only one.” You eat one. It was yummy.

 

A few minutes later, “I’ll just have one more”. And then…”Oh shucks, I blew it. I might as well finish the box, there are only 4 more. I promise I will start my diet again tomorrow, and I won’t eat chocolate again!”

 

Sound familiar?

 

You probably truly believe that you won’t eat chocolate again, or do you? You now feel guilty and as a punishment you skip dinner only to find yourself bingeing into the evening.

 

The above example is only one example of the backlash that happens when you deprive yourself of a food you love. You rebound by eating, and overeating.

 

There are many different forms of rebound eating.

 

Have you ever engaged in The Last Supper eating? I have had many clients tell me that the night before their first appointment with me they ate all the foods that they thought I would tell them they can no longer eat…. the foods that they thought would be off limits. Boy, were they surprised when I didn’t tell them that at all.

 

Listen, eating shouldn’t be this difficult. It’s time for you to make peace with food so you can once and for all stop the dieting cycle.

 

Need help? Click here to schedule a time to chat.

 

 

Your turn to take action: Tell me about a time that you engaged in rebound eating or The Last Supper. Share your stories in the comments section below.