Tag Archive for: body love

5 Ways to Embrace Your Body

We have all been in the position where we’re standing in front of the closet, and although we see numerous clothes, there is nothing that looks appealing. So, you reach in and grab the closest item and just throw it on. Then you realize that outfit doesn’t look good, and the next thing you know you have tried on almost everything in your closet before reluctantly settling on something.

 

When you are uncomfortable with how you look, it is often hard to find clothes that you feel empowered in. Body acceptance is not an easy journey for most people. Even for those who do feel comfortable in their skin, often there will be days when they will go back and forth between how they feel about themselves.

 

How often do you look in the mirror and find yourself criticizing how you look?

 

“If I could just lose ten more pounds, then I would definitely be happier!”

 

This is not uncommon! In fact, several studies have found that 86% of all women are dissatisfied with their bodies and wish to lose weight to “feel better/happier about themselves.”

The Reasons for Body Dissatisfaction 

  • Bullying and teasing
  • Childhood traumas
  • The social media culture—Instagram, Facebook, Tik Tok, etc.
  • Other forms of media—magazines, television, computer ads, etc.
  • The culture we live in which is rooted in dieting and weight controlling behaviors to manipulate our bodies to appear a certain way.

In today’s society, many people use size and weight as a definitive element of their identity, personality, and a way of defining their self-worth.

 

For example: 

  • Not purchasing a pair of jeans because they don’t fit in the small size that you want
  • Saying no to a social event because you don’t fit into a certain dress or don’t feel good in your here-and-now body.
  • Using the scale as a way to determine your mood for the day

 

Loving your body and appreciating it takes time. No amount of exercise or dieting will help you achieve that goal. Only when you change your mindset can you truly feel comfortable with yourself.

 

There are some steps that you can take to help learn to love the body that you have.

 

Here Are 5 Ways to Embrace Your Body  

 

1. Acknowledge the Work it’s doing 

Your body has gotten you to the place that you are at today. Through many years of labor and hard work, you have survived and that’s all because of your body. It has even taken you through a pandemic! When you are feeling down on yourself, just try to remember all the wonderful things your body has accomplished thus far.

 

2. Say No to Negative Talk

When you feel yourself about to say or think something mean about yourself, rephrase your thoughts. Instead of focusing on all the negative, think about the positives instead. This also goes for what other people are saying about their bodies or yours.

 

Prioritizing your self-care can help with your perspective and self-talk.

 

3. Incorporate Joyful Movement

This does not mean exercise for weight loss, instead, move your body to help you feel good. Find a movement you enjoy and do it. Exercise releases endorphins, which can elevate your mood and help you see things in a positive light.

 

4. Create a more body positive newsfeed.

Start by doing a deep cleanse of your social media accounts, then fill it with all different body shapes, sizes and colors!

Remember: thin bodies are not the only bodies out there. Filling your newsfeed with all shapes, sizes, and colors will help change your perception of what is “normal” and allow you to learn to accept and love all bodies (even your own!)

Once you’ve rid your social media of all things “perfect” and “unrealistic” watch your “standard of beauty” will quickly change!

 

5.Embrace Intuitive Eating

Say no to dieting and all the empty promises. Understand the underlying reasons why you turn to food for reasons other than hunger, why you eat mindlessly, and commit to taking a different approach to eat. Commit to learning to become an Intuitive Eater, learning to identify gentle hunger and comfortable fullness as your guide to starting and stopping a meal. Learn to cope with your emotions with kindness and not food.

Don’t wait to find the love your body deserves, try to embrace the wonderfulness of you now!

 

Need support? Contact me to set up a free consultation now.

 

Navigating Food and Body Challenges During the Pandemic

Trying to maintain a sense of semblance in these uncertain times can be challenging. I know it is for me. During the day, while I’m working remotely with my clients, my mind and thoughts are one hundred percent focused on supporting my clients. But when the evening falls and I wind down after a long day, I start to feel uneasy. The reports coming in with the latest stats on positive COVID-19 cases and unfortunate deaths sends chills up my spine and my heart and mind fill with worry.

I know I’m not alone. My clients have shared with me how challenging it is for them and I’m sure you feel it too. Being home all day has been bringing up food and body issues for many people. The biggest challenges I’m hearing are:

  • Challenge #1: “I’m finding it difficult to eat on a regular schedule.”
  • Challenge #2: “When I feel anxious or the worry gets too much to bear, I numb out with food. Only after, I feel worse.”
  • Challenge #3: “I find myself looking in the mirror all the time and cringe at what my body looks like. My desire to change my body is all I can think of now that I’m home.”

Here are some strategies you can try for each of these challenges:

Challenge #1: Haphazard eating

Solution: Create a flexible schedule of eating

The most important thing you can do for yourself is to take care of your basic needs, and that includes nourishment. Creating a flexible schedule for when you will eat meals and snacks will help you to fuel your body on a consistent basis.

Note that I said flexible. While I am a big proponent of allowing your body’s hunger signals to guide your eating versus eating by the clock, during times of stress your hunger signals might be blunted. Therefore, having a flexible schedule will allow you to be sure you are fueling yourself even if those signals can’t be relied on right now.

Challenge #2: Numbing out with food

Solution: Pause and determine what you really need

Sometimes it seems as if numbing out with food might be a good solution, so you don’t have to deal with the difficult emotions you are feeling. However, once your binge eating is over, you feel guilty, ashamed, and physically uncomfortable in addition to the original emotions that drove you to the food in the first place.

The best gift you can give yourself in this moment is to PAUSE. Before reaching for the food, hit the pause button and give yourself the space to consider what you are really feeling in that moment. It likely isn’t physical hunger, so what are you truly hungry for? Maybe it’s connection, especially in this time of self-isolation. Maybe it’s a needed rest. The worry of the coronavirus can be exhausting you and the fatigue can be driving you to the food.

Pausing and asking yourself what you are really feeling and what you really need will allow you to take the best care of yourself.

Challenge #3: Body worry

Solution: Appreciate your body as it is now and seek support

This might be asking a lot of you, to appreciate your body as it is right now. I realize that. We live in a culture that tells us the only way to have an acceptable body is to have a thin body. And you’ve been doing whatever you could over the years and decades to achieve that cultural expectation. Maybe you achieved it for a short time, but most likely you didn’t stay that size for long.

It’s not your fault either, contrary to what diet culture tells you. We all have a genetic blueprint of where our natural body size lies. Trying to change this is working against nature. The only thing that’s accomplished is creating a poor body image. This negative body image prevents you from living your life.

Is it easy to heal your body image? No!

Is it possible to heal your body image? Yes!

With the right support and guidance, you can heal. You are fully capable of cultivating a positive body image and learning how to handle difficult body image moments.

Join me and a small group of dedicated women who all want to heal their negative body image.

The Body Image Healing Program™ is a 12-week small group coaching program where you will:

  • Move from body hatred to body neutrality
  • Stop body bashing and body comparisons
  • Define your worth outside of your body
  • Learn how to navigate “bad body image moments” with self-compassion and kindness

To learn more and express your commitment – free interest, just click this LINK.

The investment for the program is now 50% off the regular investment to make it easier for you to get the support you need during the pandemic. The program begins April 20, 2020.

We all need support during this difficult time. Allow me to help you. Click HERE to learn more and express your commitment-free interest in The Body Image Healing Program™.

3 Strategies to Turn Self-Hate into Self-Love

Society has women believing that they need to look a certain way and weigh a certain number and if they don’t measure up, then they are not worthy of love, success and happiness. They tie their self-worth into a number on a scale which leads them to body hatred and self-hatred and continuously looking for the next diet.

 

What is self-love anyway?

 

You’ll likely find various definitions for self-love. To me, self-love means caring for yourself, meeting your needs and making yourself a priority in your life. It means valuing the person you are on the inside and not measuring your worth based on the outside.

 

So, you might be thinking that sounds great, but how do I do that with all the messages I’ve received since childhood into my adulthood that if I am not a size 2, I am not worthy.

 

Here are 3 strategies to help you turn self-hate into self-love:

  1. Focus on Self-esteem boosters: Make a list of the accomplishments you’ve had in your life. Read this list and add to it daily. Remind yourself that you are capable, smart and can do anything you set your mind to. You are awesome just the way you are!

 

  1. Make yourself a priority: Identify your needs that are being unmet and set self-care goals to fill those voids. Be sure to attend to your needs first so you can give to others from a place of abundance. Is this challenging when you have a partner, parents and kids relying on you? It sure is. But are you worth it? You sure are!

 

  1. Give thanks and show gratitude: You have a lot to be thankful for. Your body is amazing and keeps you alive. Each day look in the mirror and give thanks to each part of your body from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. Proclaim your love to yourself. Do this every morning and every evening and watch how your feelings toward yourself change.

 

I am committed to helping women learn how to love themselves and their bodies exactly as they are now and gently move into a place of trusting their inner guidance system when it comes to nourishing themselves. If you’re interested in working together, schedule a call with me at www.TalkWithBonnie.com .

 

 

Is Your Dieting Harming Your Daughter

Grace walked into my office with her mom by her side. Grace is a 9 year old adorable girl who has been restricting her food intake. She fears getting “fat”.  Due to her restriction, she has lost weight and is now off the bottom of growth chart.

 

I spoke with Grace and her mom for a while to get a bit of the family history and to understand when and how the restriction began. I then asked Grace’s mom to take a seat in the waiting room so I can talk with Grace alone. It was very important for me to build a good rapport with Grace so she will trust me.

 

Grace openly told me that she started restricting for several reasons. She broke it down as follows:

  • Her mom and sisters were dieting. They were speaking about foods that are good and bad, and were replacing foods they once ate, such as pizza, with alternatives such as cauliflower pizza. This made her feel like these foods wouldn’t be good for her either, so she stopped eating them.

 

  • Her friend’s moms were putting them on diets. Grace told me about at least 4 friends who bring only salad to school for lunch because they are on diets. Their moms told them they have to lose weight.

 

  • All the women in Grace’s life seem to hate their bodies. She’d constantly hear comments such as “do I look fat in this dress?”. “Is my butt sticking out of these pants?”. The message is clear. Fat is bad.

 

Grace wanted to be healthy, she really didn’t want to restrict her intake, but she was afraid of gaining weight. Grace started working with me each week to learn how to eat to nourish her body and to regain the trust in her body again.

 

You’re probably thinking that Grace is so young to be dealing with these fears around food and body. Perhaps as a teenager it would seem more common. But more and more young girls are falling into disordered eating patterns and being diagnosed with eating disorders than ever before.

 

The reason?

 

The diet culture that we live in today! The messages that women and young girls receive is that their bodies are not good enough the way they are. They must mold and sculpt them into a thin, model-like figure to have any worth in this world. It is so sad to me that so many women spend so much of their days worrying about what they are eating and how they look to others. And this worry is being passed down to the younger generation.

 

Do you have a daughter(s)?

 

Are you aware that the way you speak to yourself about your body is influencing the way she feels about hers?

 

Are you aware that she watches every move you make when you eat and when you choose to avoid grains/carbs with dinner?

 

I know for me, when I was dieting and restricting, the messages were loud and clear to my two daughters. They knew that I wouldn’t eat dinner until I calculated how much I’d eaten throughout the day. That would determine how much and what I ate for dinner. What kind of messages was I sending to them? It was a very loud message that I couldn’t trust my body to guide my eating. I had to trust a calculator.

 

I was able to break free of this restriction and teach my daughters that their bodies are smart and has all the wisdom housed inside as to what, when and how much to eat. It’s a matter of listening and trusting.

 

Here are 3 things to do right now if you want your daughter(s) to have a future of food peace and body love:

 

1. Stop restricting. Even if you think you are not restricting, you probably are. The diet mentality is very sneaky and shows up in ways you wouldn’t imagine. Be honest with yourself. Are you substituting zoodles for pasta? Are you choosing cauliflower pizza for regular pizza? Are you ordering 2 veggies instead of a potato and veggie at the restaurant? If yes to any of these questions, then you are restricting.

 

2. Watch your language. Be very careful how you speak in the home, especially when your daughter is around. Do not be judgmental of food, such as this is a “good” food and this is a “bad” food. Putting labels on food demonizes food and ups the fear of eating those foods.

 

3. Stop body checking. When you are getting dressed and looking in the mirror, be aware of your comments about yourself and your body. And, be aware of your non-verbal behaviors as well. Looking in the mirror and wincing or grunting are all heard and seen by your daughter. Instead of instilling hatred for your body or body parts, teach what it means to have respect for your body.

 

The truth is, I recognize that this is all easier said than done. It takes time, patience and fighting back against the messages you hear every day. But if you want to save your daughter(s) from going down the rabbit hole of dieting, food fear and body worry, then now’s the time.

 

Do you want a brighter future for your daughter? It all starts with you. Book a call with me www.TalkWithBonnie.com.

 

 

Intuitive Eating Sounds Glorious. Count me in!

“Intuitive eating. You mean I can eat whatever I want?”

 

This is a common question I hear from people when I introduce them to this practice of relating to food.

 

To someone just hearing about intuitive eating, it sounds glorious, almost too good to be true.

 

“You mean I can eat all those foods I’ve deprived myself of all those years? And still lose weight? Where has this been all my life?”

 

Today I want to address 2 misconceptions about intuitive eating:

  1. Intuitive eating is not about losing weight.
  2. Intuitive eating is not about instant gratification.

 

Weight Loss is Not a Goal

It’s very hard for most chronic dieters to immediately embrace the idea that the path towards intuitive eating does not guarantee weight loss. As a chronic dieter, you’ve started each diet with one goal in mind – weight loss. You were willing to restrict your food intake, say no to eating your favorite foods, even turning down social occasions (where there would be a ton of food you’d have to face) all with the final goal in mind of losing weight.

 

You’re tired of this battle. You are at your wits end. You don’t want to count another calorie, point, carb grams or mile walked. You just want to eat. You just want to be.

 

So, when you hear that there are no food rules in intuitive eating, it sounds glorious.

But what about your desire to lose weight?

 

It is of utmost importance that you put weight loss on the back burner. This means put it out of your mind for a while. Don’t think about it. There is no promise that you will lose weight with intuitive eating. Some people do, some people don’t. Some lose weight, some gain weight, some stay the same. Your body will do what your body will do, and no one can tell you what that will be.

 

You were born with a genetic blueprint of what your natural weight is. All the years of dieting has messed with that natural body weight. So when you finally stop interfering with nature, your body will likely settle in to where it was intended to be all along. This might be at a size or weight that you are happy with, or it might not. The next step is then body acceptance. This is not an easy step by any means, but with the right support, you can get to a place where you really accept and respect wherever your body lands.

 

Intuitive Eating is Not Instant Gratification

See it, want it, eat it.

 

That’s what a lot of naysayers think intuitive is. But it’s far from this.

 

Intuitive eating is not about eating whatever you want, whenever you want. It’s about changing your relationship to food, your mind and your body.

 

As you move through your intuitive eating journey, you learn to ask yourself questions before you decide to eat. You recall how this food felt in your body the last time you ate it. You turn inward and ask yourself if you are physically hungry or if you are eating because the clock says its time. You explore whether there is an emotion underlying the choice to eat in that moment.

 

At first, it might seem like you are eating without thought. This is because you have opened up the gates to enjoy all foods, you have taken off the handcuffs that kept you in diet prison, and frankly, you are eating all the foods you didn’t allow yourself to eat for years.

 

This is part of the process, but over time, your eating will normalize. Eventually, you will come to a point that you choose foods that help your body feel energized, not because you think you “should”, but because this is what feels good in your body.

 

Is intuitive eating glorious? You betcha!

 

But embark on this journey for the right reasons: to change your relationship with food and your body so you can live a fun filled life without food worry and body shame.

 

To learn more about intuitive eating, click here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

How the Power of Your Self-Talk Can Help You “Just Do It”!

Guest blog Post by Anonymous

How do you know when it’s the right time? What sign do you get? What feeling do you have when you absolutely know without a shadow of a doubt that THIS is the right time?

 

Sure, there’s fear!

 

Fear of the unknown, “what will be, how will I manage?”

 

Fear of capability, “can I do it? Do I have enough confidence in myself do be able to survive?”

 

Fear of loneliness. “What happens when it’s only just me?”

 

Fear of the talk. “What will people say? Are they feeling sorry for me, shushing when I walk in the room? Are they staring at me? Will they pity me?”

 

I am broken. I am sad. I am angry at myself for letting it go this long. For not facing my fears. For not having the confidence in myself. For not thinking more of myself. For not feeling deserving.

 

It STOPS right here, right now!

 

Yes, I AM deserving.

 

Yes, I CAN do this.

 

Yes, I WILL have the support of people who love me.

 

Yes, I WILL pick up the pieces.

 

It all starts with ONE decision.

 

Just ONE!

 

Just do it!

 

————————————————-

This writing can define different things for different people. I won’t divulge what this author was referencing, but I feel that it can relate to you if you are contemplating leaving dieting behind.

 

There’s fear – “will I gain weight?”

 

There’s the unknown – “how will I know what to eat without following a meal plan?”

 

There’s fear of capability – “will I be able to learn to trust my body?”

 

There’s fear of loneliness – “all my friends are dieting, I’ll feel like an outcast!”

 

There’s fear of the talk – “will people speak behind my back, saying how I gained my weight back? Will they pity me?”

 

These are all valid fears! But it’s important to push through these fears if you want to get to the other side and find peace with food and your body…

 

…to live your life to the fullest without the constant thinking and worry about food and your body size.

 

JUST DO IT!

 

Make the decision to say NO to the next diet! Say NO to diet culture! Say NO to chasing the thin ideal.

 

You are deserving, you are worth it, you CAN DO IT!

 

I’m here to support you if you’re ready. Just reach out to me at Bonnie@DietFreeRadiantMe.com.

 

Do you resonate with the author of this guest blog post?

 

Share below for support.

 

End Your Struggle with Food and Dieting!

It’s interesting. Many people know their struggles in life, but choose not to do anything about it. I sometimes wonder why that is. Why would someone identify a challenge they are having in their life, but not want to do what they need to do to change it?

 

While I can be speaking about so many things right now, such as hating your job, a difficult marriage, a strained relationship with a parent or child, what I really want to address with you is your relationship with food and your body.

 

Is one of your biggest struggles in life food and eating?

 

Is one of your biggest struggles in life being unhappy with your body?

 

If you answered YES to the above questions, then are you struggling with dieting?

 

Most probably if you struggle with food, eating and your body image, then you are struggling with dieting. I can say this with certainty because you’ve been led to believe that in order to “fix” your eating and your body, you need to diet. You need to be told what to eat, when to eat, and how much to eat. Let someone else tell you all these things so you don’t have to make any decisions about food, and that’s how you will achieve the body you’ve always wanted.

 

Well, this is a lie.

 

And, I guess that you have realized this lie, but you are caught in the web of deceit in diet culture.

 

Diets are SO tempting. Heck, if someone told me I can lose 30 pounds in 30 days, I’d be suckered into trying that too. Except that I have broken out of the web of lies that diet culture has you believing. But I realize that it’s not so easy.

 

I also want to say that I know that some of you reading my blog have stopped dieting because you know that diets don’t work. But you are still spinning your wheels. That’s because diet culture is very sneaky. You THINK you’re no longer dieting, but you very well may be and not even know this.

 

Now, I am only bringing this to your attention because I want you to stop and ask yourself if you are ready to do what it takes to stop the diet madness. If you are ready to finally break the spell that diets have over you.

 

If so, then click below for an ONLINE EXPERIENCE that will get you started.

 

Yes, it’s free! But it doesn’t mean it’s easy. And that’s okay. Because if you are serious about finally ending the biggest struggle in your life > FOOD AND DIETING > then join this unique experience and participate to the fullest.

 

Click here if your biggest struggle in your life is food and dieting!

 

I hope to see you in the experience!

 

 

How to Help Your Friends Who Can’t Stop Dieting

I received an email from a young woman (let’s call her Susan) this week who follows my work in intuitive eating. She was sharing with me how thankful she is that she never fell prey to the dieting gimmicks and fads that so many of her friends have, and still do. She is also thankful that I share so much with my community by way of blogs, videos, trainings, as it has helped her stay true to herself in trusting her body.

With her permission, I am sharing an excerpt from her email below.

________________

Growing up, I was never exposed to fad dieting at home. My mom had a great relationship with food and taught me how to live my life as an intuitive eater. This was especially helpful when I was in high school, and lunch periods were consumed by friends talking about which new diet they’re trying and how many pounds they were “supposed” to lose by the end of the week. Thankfully, I was rock solid in my beliefs and always brushed off the diet talk.

I was excited to start graduate school and be part of a program with many intelligent individuals and advance in my career. Yet, the dieting talk followed me here too!

“I wanna lose at least 2 pounds by Friday, think it’s possible? I didn’t bring any food for lunch so I’m hoping that’ll be at least one pound down today” read a text I received last Tuesday from a classmate. I thought being 25 years old and in a notorious graduate program, most people moved past the “dieting stage” and wouldn’t give into the pressure of restricting themselves. Apparently not.

I replied to the text and explained that restricting your intake of food will not cause you to lose weight. In fact, it will actually slow your metabolism down! Plus, starving yourself throughout the day will ultimately backfire when you get home and see the food that was prepared for dinner. You’ll be so famished that you’ll eat too much too fast, ignoring your inner body cues.

“Nah, I have a lot of self-control” was the reply. I shrugged and moved on, thinking “oh well”.

Fast forward a couple of hours, I received a text that read “Help! I inhaled my food and ate too fast. I was just starving! I’m in so much pain”.

I feel bad for my classmate. I really do. She has been on and off many diets in her life, and she’s only 25 years old! As you can see, I tried discussing intuitive eating with her, but she doesn’t understand it. She really believes that she needs to restrict her food and deny her hunger as the way to “change her body”. I texted her your website, DietFreeRadiantMe.com, and gently suggested she read some of your blogs and watch your videos. I hope she does.

Thank you for all you do, Bonnie.

________________________

Wow, emails like this pull at my heart strings for 2 reasons:

  1. My heart is warm and fuzzy that I have helped Susan stay true to herself and maintain the trust in her body and her food choices. The fact that I have put myself out there online and am able to reach people that I might not have been able to reach with my important message makes my heart sing.

 

  1. My heart aches for those who are still struggling with diets, still struggling with loving their bodies, and not yet trusting that if they listen to their body, it won’t let them down.

 

So, where do we go from here?

 

I will continue to put myself out there and continue to spread my message that no form of dieting is going to work for losing weight and keeping it off.

 

And as scary as it is to stop dieting, it’s time!

 

I encourage you to be brave and take the leap of faith. You don’t need to go it alone.

 

I’m here to support you every step of the way.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 3 Biggest Crimes of Diet Culture

How many times have you overheard a heated conversation about food or the latest diet?

When I meet up with friends or family, the talk often ends up routed into diet gossip. This makes sense considering I’m a Registered Dietitian, yet my intuitive eating clients share similar stories.

I’ve spent the last 7 years of my career helping clients bury the diet mentality for good, yet I’m reminded how much work there is to do when people ask me questions like, “What do you think about that new diet that [insert celebrity name here] just published a book about?”

The worst part of Diet Culture (or more aptly, Diet Cult) is the potential harm to everyone involved. Diet culture is a system of beliefs that focuses on and values weight, shape and size over health, and it equate thinness with higher status and worthiness. The negative effects it has on both adults and children are criminal. Many times, these so called “healthy” diets are considered disordered eating or even full-blown eating disorders.

I am here today to call out the CRIMES OF DIET CULTURE.

Crime #1: Dishonesty

“Don’t eat carbs. They make you fat.”

“Dairy will keep you from losing weight.”

“Avoid gluten! It’s bad, bad, bad.”

When you look back at the history of food, Diet Culture has spent a great deal of time and money into criminalizing one food or another. This food is “good” for your health and weight, this food is “bad”.

When saturated fat was the offender, we saw an influx of fat-free, chemically altered foods. When sugar became the offender, we were bombarded with products containing sugar alcohols and messages to avoid sugar at all costs. Food fads are encouraged by Diet Culture with the support of the food industry. When scientific research is published, Diet Culture cherry-picks the information that best supports their agenda and launches campaigns to herd consumers to jump on their bandwagon, spending money on their products, lining their pockets.

Diet Culture never has your best interest in mind and it’s betting on the fact you don’t realize it. So they call their foods “healthier” than the others and has you thinking it’s better for you.

Crime #2: Disregard

Any eating pattern that emphasizes how you look over your mental and physical well-being is detrimental. Diet Culture thrives on black-and-white thinking. Eat foods on the “good” list and you’ll lose weight (“good”); eat foods on the “bad” list and you’ll get fat (“bad”). Thin = win!

Here’s the thing – people are literally dying to be thin and Diet Culture completely disregards this. Your body does so many amazing things for you every day, but Diet Culture has you focusing on how many calories you’re eating, pounds you lost or dress size you wear.

There is peace in accepting your body as it is at this very moment. But Diet Culture doesn’t want you to have this peace. So it influences you to keep striving for that “perfect” body, comparing yourself to celebrities, models and reality stars.

I remind my clients that what they see online and in magazines are not real. They are photoshopped images and even more, they are just the highlight reels of peoples’ lives. What they decide to post and publish are just snippets of their reality, particularly the snippets they want everyone to see. They edit out nearly a lifetime of moments, yet you use those carefully selected highlights as a comparison to your own life. This is exactly what Diet Culture wants – to keep you running back for more.

Crime #3: Destruction

Diet Culture’s most egregious crime is telling you that you’re not good enough. It doesn’t know you at all, but it’s making you question yourself, often calling attention to things you never considered flaws.

“Got a muffin top? Never eat these 5 foods again to get rid of it!”

“Do your thighs touch? Do this cleanse to fix that problem!”

Messages like these are toxic to women of all ages. It’s teaching them from a young age that they are nothing more than a sum of their parts and if those parts don’t add up to an unrealistic ideal, they need to do whatever it takes to get there. This has the potential to lead them into a dangerous relationship with food and exercise, twisting their self-perception. Diet Culture destroys self-esteem.

It’s Time to Defy Diet Culture

The truth is that body size doesn’t always equate with health. There are plenty of people who are in smaller bodies who have a plethora of health issues. On the flip side, there are people in larger bodies that have no medical issues at all. Why is the thin couch potato more culturally acceptable than the larger triathlete?

Diet Culture wants you to be at war with your body because that’s how companies who support it make their billions of dollars every year while young girls are skipping meals, ultimately missing out on nutrients critical to their growth and maturation. What’s even worse is that these diet messages often come from parents who suffer from disordered eating patterns over decades of being at war with their own bodies. It’s a cycle of abuse you are paying dearly for with both your wallets and your well-being.

Tune in next week for Intuitive Eating Wednesday when I share how to blaze a path to defying Diet Culture.

In the meantime, what other crimes of Diet Culture can you identify? Comment below.

 

 

My 2018 Theme Word Revealed

Happy New Year! This is the first blog of 2018. I’m very excited for what’s to come in the New Year as I’ve been speaking to so many women (and a few good men!) who are truly ready to give up dieting. Hard to believe especially on January 3rd when there is so much talk about New Year’s resolutions and the new diets that will finally “help” you get the body you always wanted.

 

You are smarter than that. How do I know that? Because you are reading my blog:)

 

Okay, seriously. No good will come from starting a new diet now that a new year is here. But it’s so darn tempting! Even those of you on the intuitive eating journey might find it a wee bit tempting to just try the new diet you read about, and then come back to intuitive eating.

 

It won’t work. Don’t fall prey to that.

 

I know that giving up dieting and your ‘dream’ body is tough. I get it. But really what you are giving up is disappointment and false hope, which is what every diet gives you. And I’ll take that any day! Can I get an Amen!

 

Every year I reflect on my own life and journey, both personal and professional. And I choose a theme word that will drive all my thoughts, decisions and actions for the next year. I’ve given this a lot of thought and I’m ready to reveal my word for 2018…

 

Self-Care!

 

This is not a new concept to many of you, I’m fully aware of that. And, it’s not a new concept to me either! I teach my clients to move their self-care up the totem pole, from the back burner to the front burner…as part of their intuitive eating journey. As a matter of fact, Building Your Support and Self-Care Plan is Step 2 in my 5 Step Intuitive Eating Program called Freedom to Eat Forever™.

 

But you know what. I am human. And what I reflected on at the end of 2017 is that my own self-care was starting to move back down the totem pole. And, I felt it in many ways, including physically, mentally and emotionally.

 

So, I am committed to moving my own self-care back up to the top so that I can refill my cup and then better serve my family and my clients.

 

I’ll share more about how I’m going to do this on a special Real Talk with Bonnie Facebook Live tomorrow, Thursday January 4th at 6:15 pm EST on my Facebook Business page.

 

Make sure you LIKE my page HERE so you get notified the moment I go live. You don’t want to miss this!

 

In the meantime, comment below and let me know what YOUR theme word is for 2018!

 

Oh, and if you’d like me to help you build your self-care plan, just request to speak with me at www.TalkWithBonnie.com