body love Archives - Page 2 of 2 - Diet Free Radiant Me | Intuitive Eating | Emotional Eating

How to Treat Yourself without Food

You’ve had a long day. Heck, it’s been a long week. You need a treat. You head to the _______ and get yourself some ______________.

How would you fill in these blanks?

When I pose this question to the women who reach out to me for help with their weight, they fill in the blanks with the words ‘kitchen” and ‘ice cream’. Or, ‘store’ and ‘chocolate’. Or ‘freezer’ and ‘cake’.

Sound familiar?

The first thought that most likely pops into your mind when you are looking for a treat is food! Why is that? Why do you associate a treat with food?

An emotional connection with food is created from the moment we are born and placed on our mom’s chest to bond. And then, as you get older and need comfort, you are given some milk and cookies. Of, if you fall down and hurt yourself, you are consoled with a lollypop. There are numerous examples of how the emotional connection to food continues to be reinforced around you.

But how has this served you now into adulthood? Not very well I’m guessing. It has led to your struggle with emotional eating and your never-ending ride on the yo-yo diet roller coaster.

It’s time to treat yourself with something other than food. It’s time to treat yourself like a queen and to take good care of yourself so you don’t need to find comfort in food.

Let me share a story with you.

The last few months have been very busy and well, quite stressful. So yesterday I decided to treat myself like a queen. One of my dreams has always been to have a personal shopper come into my home and go through my clothes closet with me. Toss what is no good, keep what is, and create new outfits with what I have. Then head to the store with my personal shopper in tow and buy some new clothes.

Well, I didn’t exactly get that full dream….no, a personal shopper did not come to my house. But I did make an appointment with a personal shopper at Lord and Taylor and meet with her yesterday. This is a complementary service for shoppers…I never knew that! She set me up in her exclusive office fitting room and brought me clothes to try on based on what I told her I was looking for.

Wow, what an experience. I felt like a celebrity. This was the best experience ever! I bought some really great new clothes and felt really amazing.

I treated myself like a queen. I felt the stress lift off my shoulders, just like that. Doing something for yourself really feels good! You don’t need food to comfort or console yourself. Taking care of your needs on all levels and nurturing yourself will help you cope with your feelings without turning to food.

Try it…and let me know how it works out for you. If you want to talk, just contact me here!

Dieting Information Overload – When To Start Taking Action

I’ve been a registered dietitian nutritionist in private practice for over 28 years now. Wow, hard to believe. And a lot has changed in the industry in the last 28 years. When I first got out of school and opened my business, I was mostly treating patients for medical conditions using nutrition therapy. These conditions included uncontrolled diabetes, cardiovascular disease, high cholesterol, hypertension, gastrointestinal conditions, to name a few.

In most of these cases, except for some of the gastrointestinal conditions, weight loss was always a part of the treatment plan. I created a nutrition plan that included a meal plan tailored to the patients’ medical condition and weight loss goals. My patients were getting better and losing weight. It all seemed so perfect.

At some point, I asked myself what can I do to help prevent these illnesses or the complications from occurring due to their diseases. Again, weight loss was usually part of the prevention plan and my patients wanted a meal plan to follow, which I obliged to.

Yet, at some point about 5-6 years ago, I realized that these meal plans are actually doing a disservice to many of these patients. The meal plan turned into a diet for them to follow and they just didn’t know how to navigate certain situations in their lives when they couldn’t “follow” the meal plan I created. These included vacations, weddings, deaths, job loss and other events and circumstances. They then felt guilty, ashamed and upset that they just couldn’t “do it”. They lost total confidence and trust in themselves.

Can you relate?

This is when I turned my attention to helping people break free of dieting to learn how to re-trust themselves and their bodies again to make the food choices that feel right for them. Yes, this is where my intuitive eating work comes in.

But here is what I have found.

As I started talking about and spreading my message about giving up dieting, all of a sudden the internet was swarming with coaches doing the same thing. It caught on like wildfire! It seems like every other day there is another summit with ‘expert interviews’ telling you how to give up dieting.

I’ve been on these summits, and I do believe they can be very helpful. But I also believe that there comes a point where you need to stop collecting information and start taking action. That’s when the real change happens.

So, in theory, yes, giving up dieting is your answer to finally achieving the body and life you want without food restriction, deprivation and feelings of guilt after you eat. But, if you don’t begin to practice this, you will continue to struggle.

3 Tips to Help You Start Taking Action

Stop signing up for every “end dieting” summit that pops up in your newsfeed. Choose 1 or 2 experts that you resonate most with and follow them (hint…I hope I’m one of them).

Pick one action step and focus on that for one week. Self-assess each evening to see how you feel with your progress. When you are ready, add a second action step and so on. Don’t take on too many changes at once.

See support to help you on your journey. These changes are tough! Anyone who tells you otherwise is not being truthful! There is no reason to go this alone. An RDN coach can walk the journey with you and support you. If you’d like to see how I can help you, just contact me here.

I am excited for you that you have made the commitment to give up dieting forever. I also know how scary that thought is. Please don’t let that fear keep you in the “gathering information” phase. Start taking action today. I am here to support you.

National Eating Disorder Awareness Week

This past Sunday marked the start of National Eating Disorder Awareness Week. Eating disorders come in many different forms, and people with an eating disorder often don’t recognize that they have one. Like other “awareness” weeks, the objective is to get the message out there.

The message that you don’t need to suffer, there is always someone there to help.

Here is some more information about different kinds of eating disorders that you may not even know about. I hope to shed some light on how to recognize an eating disorder.

The two commonly talked about eating disorders are anorexia and bulimia.

Bulimia is the act of bingeing and purging. A person with bulimia will often consume more calories in one sitting than they would in a normal day. This bingeing leads to guilt and self-shaming which turns into purging. The act of purging has a number of consequential effects that compromise your health. People with bulimia are often a healthy weight but are struggling on the inside.

Anorexia nervosa is disease that tricks your mind into seeing a distorted, often larger, version of yourself. It is the act of starvation that is a bit easier to identify because a person with anorexia nervosa typically appears thin and fragile. People with anorexia forfeit calories as well as many vitamins and minerals that are necessary to keep their body running.

While these may be two terms that you are familiar with, there are other disordered eating habits that exist. There is binge-eating disorder which is very similar to bulimia but without the purging. Binge-eating is uncontrollable, continuous eating past the point of fullness. Gymorexia, which is the act of over-exercising and pushing your body past its healthy limits. Orthorexia which is the act of obsessive “healthy eating”. And many more.

Regardless of which eating disorder is employed, those who struggle with eating disorders seek ways to change their body. It’s hard to avoid the media and the inevitable messages that come from the diet industry. But despite our cultures best efforts, it’s important to find happiness and peace in your own body.

In order to break free from the daunting stress and pressure that comes from dieting, I encourage my clients to embrace intuitive eating where they can begin to trust their inner body wisdom to guide their eating. This takes time, patience and support.

If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, please share this information and seek help immediately. The sooner you do, the sooner you or your loved one will find peace with their body.

If I can help, please email me at Bonnie@DietFreeRadiantMe.com .

Taking the Next Step on Your Intuitive Eating Journey

Anyone who works with me knows that self-care is a major part of my work. Between taking an extra few minutes for yourself each day, fueling your body with nourishing foods, and knowing when to ask others for support, there are many ways you can put your self-care in the forefront of your life.

The process of improving your self-care may be slow starting and its okay to take baby steps to help yourself. You may have started by giving yourself a few minutes to de-stress each day and eventually moved to learning how to prioritize your activities so you are doing what you enjoy most.

I have seen a lot of great turnarounds over the last year; people like yourself who have taken their self-care from the back burner to the front and center of their life. Making this shift is a major step on your intuitive eating journey.

Yet, what I am finding is that many of you are stopping there. You are not taking the process to the next level. You are seeking out free resources to help you become an intuitive eater, yet you are still spinning your wheels. You are taking 3 steps forward, 2 steps backward.

Sure, if you continue at this pace, you will eventually get to where you want to be (an intuitive eater) but why wait that long?

You can accelerate the process by partnering with the right person who will guide you using an organized proven system.

I am that person for you. And I have the system for you. It’s the Freedom to Eat Forever™ Program, a 5 step intuitive eating process that will enable you to enjoy guilt-free eating and a life free of dieting.

But you know what? You have to step up to the plate and invest in yourself and your future. It’s when you invest in yourself that you see the results. I did it, and so can you.

Check out this cool video. Then email me or Facebook message me if you want to see if it’s your time for Freedom to Eat Forever™.

Hurry. Class starts February 3, 2016. I don’t want you to be left out. Take your intuitive eating to the next level.

How to Love Your Body Even if You Are Not “Skinny”

There is so much emphasis on being “skinny” or “thin” in today’s society. You are often judged based on your appearance and your body, not based on your inner qualities and abilities.

Don’t tell me it isn’t so. There are countless stories that can be told of 2 women who go for a job interview, one overweight, maybe even obese, the other thin and model-like. Who gets the job? More often than not, the thin woman.

The above scenario is what keeps you dieting, over and over again, berating yourself every time you “go off the diet” and bashing your body with comments such as “I hate my body, I hate my thighs, I’ll never have the body I want”.

Let’s take a different approach.

Let’s start to learn to love yourself and love your body RIGHT NOW as it is. Yes, I mean right now at whatever body size you are at. Appreciate all that your body has done for you, and continues to do for you. By giving and showing respect to your body and accepting it, you will let go of the body hatred and body bashing and allow yourself to move away from yo-yo dieting and move forward on your intuitive eating journey.

To help you do this, I have gathered together 20 fabulous experts who are who are giving away, for free, high-quality gifts on the topics of:

Self-Love
Body Love
Intuitive Eating
Meditation
Abundance
Mindfulness
Nutrition
Exercise
and many more!

The event is called Love Yourself, Love Your Body!

I am committed to helping women around the globe learn to love themselves and their bodies as they are RIGHT NOW in order to move away from the cycle of yo-yo dieting. So, that means you will not find any fad diets, crazy exercise regimens, detox programs, etc….in this giveaway. What you will find are gifts designed to help you get in touch with yourself, learn to love yourself, accept yourself and trust your inner guidance system when it comes to taking care of yourself and your body.

Click here and grab your free gifts before the event ends on November 23^rd.

Celebrate International No Diet Day with Me!

Today is a very special day… it is International No Diet Day!

This day is very near and dear to my heart as it celebrates body acceptance, diversity, and of course saying “no” to diets. International No Diet Day was initiated by British author Mary Evans Young, a feminist who led an anti-diet movement in 1992 called “Diet Breakers”.
This day of banning diets began in the United Kingdom as a day to encourage accepting your body and loving yourself and it has spread internationally. It brings attention to the widespread body discrimination in the media, those who have suffered through eating disorders and extreme weight loss plans, and the faux results that diet plans and pills promote.
The truth is that fad diets, diet products, and the way body image is portrayed in the media are detrimental to forming healthy eating and lifestyle habits. Body discrimination can be seen all around, from advertisements showing off thin models to the current “fat acceptance” movement which is quite the opposite and celebrates curves while shaming smaller physiques.
Celebrating and loving your body and yourself is the drive behind much of the work I do. Rather than restricting yourself, focus on nourishing yourself. I stress this to all my clients. Self-care and loving yourself go hand in hand. Please stop comparing yourself to others! Embrace your uniqueness and celebrate your body by treating it with nourishing foods and mindfulness.
I realize this might be really tough for you, especially if you’ve been dieting for a long time. Diets feel safe to you and you might be afraid to stop dieting. It’s okay to let go….let’s do it together. Today is the day we can all come together a say NO MORE DIETING!

Take the “International No Diet Day Pledge”.

Repeat the following as many times as you need to:

“I will accept myself just as I am.
I will feed myself if hungry.
I will feel no shame or guilt about my size or eating.
…and I will LOVE MYSELF for who I am, not who I feel pressure to be!”

Please know that I am here for you if you need support. Just send me an email at bonnie@brghealth.com and let me know what you are struggling with.

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