Tag Archive for: make peace with food

3 Truths About What Happens When You Stop Dieting

Are you thinking about giving up dieting, but you don’t know what to expect when you make this life-changing decision?

Have you already made the decision to stop dieting, but you’re not so confident in this decision?

It makes sense! You’ve been on the diet roller coaster for a LONG time. It feels weird not to be following a set of food rules, even though deep down you know they’ve never worked. But what happens once you give up the food rules?

Let’s look at what your thoughts and fears might be. Then, let’s tackle what you really need to know.

 

Typical Thoughts When You Give Up Dieting

It’s common to have some uncomfortable thoughts and fears when you think of no longer dieting. Here are some common thoughts:

  • “I will gain weight!”
  • “I will eat out of control!”
  • “I won’t know what to eat.”
  • “What do I do without rules?”
  • “What if it doesn’t work for me?”

It’s important to be realistic in your expectations when you decide to not diet and to begin your journey towards Intuitive Eating.

What You Need to Know

1. You will want food all the time – and that’s normal!

When you first decide to get off the diet roller coaster and you begin throwing away your food rules, you will want to eat all those foods that were forbidden. And you will want to eat them a lot, and often. This happens because for months, years or even decades you’ve been restricting these foods. So, this reaction is totally “normal”.

Your mind and body are sort of saying “hey, what’s up?” It’s not used to you eating these foods, and it’s thinking “I’m never going to get these foods again! I better stock up while I can because these won’t be around forever!”

This will continue to happen as you continue to test the process of Intuitive Eating. “Can I really eat what I want?”

Yes you can.

2. It is a long process.

Please have realistic expectations. You cannot expect your body to adapt to giving up dieting and shifting to Intuitive Eating overnight. The communication between your mind and body has been suppressed for quite a while. Hunger, fullness, and satisfaction have been ignored—so you must rebuild this communication!

You might be feeling that it’s difficult to stay motivated and invested in the journey, especially if progress isn’t immediate. But that’s your diet mentality speaking. You are programmed to want immediate results but it’s important to build your patience muscle as you work on changing your relationship with food for the rest of your life.

Focus on the long game!

3. No two journeys are the same.

Working at your own pace is totally okay.

As a dieter, you likely have an “all or nothing” mentality—”going all in with something full force, or not doing it at all”. Having this mentality can hold you back.

Instead of diving headfirst, trying to rush the process and being “good”, take one step that you feel confident in and let it be that—just a first step. Once you feel ready, take another step forward and so on.

Take the journey at your own pace, be true to yourself. Don’t compare your journey to anyone else’s journey because you don’t know their story!

There is no race to any finish line! Intuitive Eating is a practice. It’s not something that ends when you get to a goal.

Want to know more about the 3 phases you will go through when you stop dieting?

Join me today for a LIVE training on this topic, right in my Facebook Group.

 

Overcoming Your Fear of Bread

Food fear, it’s a real thing. If you’ve been on and off diets over the years, losing and gaining the same weight repeatedly, you probably have some food fear. And this fear is driven by diet culture messages. Most restrictive weight loss diets ban bread, or severely restrict bread. This sets you up to believing that if you eat bread, you’re going to gain weight.

I recently met a lovely woman at a party. I didn’t know her, she’s my friend’s friend but we got along quickly, almost as if we knew each other for years. Where do you think the conversation went?

“Oh, I hear you’re a nutritionist. I’ve recently lost 20 pounds. I’m trying so hard not to gain it back, and to lose even more weight.”

This conversation is not new to me. Oftentimes, when I am introduced to someone and they ask what I do for a living, they move right into telling me how they eat, what they eat, what they don’t eat and the different diets they’ve tried.

I don’t want to be rude, but I am really done with having every social conversation revolve around diets do’s and don’ts.

Anyway, back to this woman. She was asking my advice on some lunch ideas because she’s getting tired of salad and tuna (can you relate?). I suggested a sandwich of some kind, using whole wheat pita bread, tortilla or a really nice stone ground bread. Her reaction?

“Oh, no I don’t eat bread. I’m afraid of bread. I don’t want to regain the weight.”

I really felt sorry for her. And if this is your reaction too, I am so sorry. No one should be afraid of any food. Here’s what I shared with her , and what I’m sharing with you…

No one food has the power to make you fat or skinny!

That’s right, diet culture has caused you to believe that if you eat bread, you will gain weight and that is absolutely false! Whole grain breads are rich in nutrients such as thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, folate, iron, magnesium and dietary fiber to name a few. You will not gain weight by eating any one singular food. When you incorporate bread into an overall healthy well-balanced eating regimen, you will provide your body with the nutrients you need for good health.

What does this look like in real life?

Perhaps that means having whole grain toast with scrambled eggs for breakfast, a stuffed whole wheat pita with chicken and avocado for lunch and a whole grain Quesadilla filled with beans and veggies for dinner.

Diets are not sustainable for life. Avoiding bread for life is not a realistic expectation for most people. I know, you don’t even want to avoid bread. You do enjoy it, but the fear holds you back.

Making Peace with Bread

The first step to making peace with bread is to eat bread. So, decide when and how you want to reintroduce bread into your eating life. Then sit down and mindfully enjoy, savoring the taste and texture of your meal.

Then do it again the next day, and the day after that. You will see that nothing changed, you didn’t miraculously gain 5 pounds over night.

The more you expose yourself to bread, eating it mindfully and will full attention, the less fear you will have over it.

Bon Appetit! Let me know what types of bread are your favorite.

And if you need help making peace with other foods, just head on over to www.TalkWithBonnie.com and schedule a complementary call.