Non-Diet New Year’s Resolutions
There are so many more interesting and exciting things we can do with a whole new year than the pursuit of weight loss. So this year let’s make it a point to make some new year’s goals that have nothing to do with dieting.
An Intuitive Eating Holiday Gift Guide
This week we’re excited to share an Intuitive Eating and Anti-Diet Gift Guide! If someone you know is on their own journey to make peace with food and become an Intuitive Eater, or if they’re a weight inclusive, anti-diet provider or dietitian-to-be, these could be some fun and useful gifts to send their way this holiday season!
Seasonal Self-Care: Tips for Relieving Stress and Navigating Difficult Food Situations During the Holiday Season
By setting intentions, honoring boundaries, practicing self-care, and embracing some Intuitive Eating principles, you can foster a positive relationship with food and your body this holiday season.
5 Tips for Enjoying Halloween Candy for You and Your Kids
If you’re a parent with young children, this may also be a stressful time for you as you navigate how to incorporate Halloween candy into your child’s eating. You may worry how that fits in, or fear your child is eating too many sweets and too few nutritious foods. And you may worry about controlling yourself around this sudden influx of candy. Here are 5 tips for navigating Halloween candy this year.
Reclaim Your Right to Enjoy Food
Eating is meant to be nourishing and enjoyable. But if you’re struggling with your relationship with food, view it as the enemy or something to avoid, or feel like it’s a constant battle of willpower, learning how to enjoy eating again can feel very challenging. Discovering the satisfaction factor with intuitive eating is an important step in learning to enjoy food again.
Is it ok to eat sweets every day?
One question that we get often is “Is it really ok to eat sweets or desserts every day?” And the short answer to that is- yes! But if you’re looking for a bit more reasoning, read on.
Is The Food Police Bullying You?
The Food Police voice is like an annoying hall monitor. It keeps track of all the unreasonable rules that diet culture has created, and then makes you feel shameful and guilty for your food choices. Just like you can practice challenging forbidden foods and unconditional permission to eat, you can also practice challenging the Food Police.
Are You Really Giving Yourself Permission to Eat?
When you’ve been told you couldn’t have something, how did it make you feel? If we had to guess, it probably made you want whatever it was even more. This happens all the time with dieting since dieting is all about what you can and can’t eat. This concept of deprivation has real biological and psychological effects. The moment a food is off-limits, it actually makes us crave that food even more!
Why Am I Hungry All The Time?
Do you find yourself constantly questioning or judging your hunger? Asking questions like “How could I be hungry again? I just ate!”. Our hunger cues are a great example of mind-body connection. Unreliable or confusing hunger cues are a common side effect of dieting and disordered eating, which interfere with this innate mind-body connection.
What Is Dieting Making You Miss Out On?
How many times have you had the thought “After I lose the weight I’ll ….” Or “Once this diet is over I’ll …”? Dieting takes up a significant portion of your time, energy, mental space, and even money. Have you ever thought about what dieting might be making you miss out on? What would you do with those extra resources if they weren’t spent on dieting?
How to Spot a Diet
Many who start a new diet or “lifestyle change” just want to live healthier lives and feel better in their bodies. It can get more and more difficult to spot a diet before you’re fully in it, stressing about the next time you’ll get to eat. Here are some big red flags to look for next time you’re tempted to jump on the diet train.
Intuitive Eating Thanksgiving “Swaps”
Many of us are all too familiar with the diet culture-based idea of healthy “swaps” for Thanksgiving food out of fear of weight gain. But depriving yourself of your favorite holiday foods on a day that revolves around food only sets you up for disappointment, dissatisfaction, and increased cravings for those foods. Instead of swapping out your favorite foods for diet-y substitutes, here are some “swaps” you can make to practice intuitive eating this Thanksgiving.
The Sweet Life: 3 Myths About Sugar
Diet culture and the current obsession with “wellness” create fear around “bad” foods, which in turn creates stress and confusion with eating. This undermines our ability to make choices that feel good for us, both mentally and physically. In this post, we’ll be debunking some of the most common myths about sugar and how you can help foster a healthy relationship with sugar.
It’s Okay For You (and your kids) To Eat Halloween Candy
If you had a history of an eating disorder, disordered eating, dieting, or just have a complicated relationship with food, Halloween can be a stressful time. If you’re a parent with young children, this may also be a stressful time for you as you navigate how to incorporate Halloween candy into your child’s eating. The principles of Intuitive Eating can be a useful guide in navigating the holiday.
Breaking Free From The Diet Cycle
The diet cycle is one that can be extremely difficult to break out of. Diets are sneaky because they put the burden of failure on the dieter when it’s the diet itself that is set to fail from the beginning. If you’re reading this, maybe you’ve had experiences with dieting before where you “fell off the wagon”, regained weight, and vowed to start over again, this time for real. Breaking free from the diet cycle starts with letting go of restriction and deprivation- not following more food rules!
Different Types of Hunger
Many times, the Intuitive Eating principle Honor Your Hunger gets mistaken as “only eat when hungry”. But, there are actually 4 different types of hunger outlined in the Intuitive Eating book, and learning to honor your hunger involves honoring each of these different types. Physical hunger, taste hunger, practical hunger, and emotional hunger are all valid reasons to eat.
Body Kindness & Your Intuitive Eating Journey
It is possible to reconnect to your inner caregiver that got clouded by diet culture. Know that your body- as it is right now in this moment- is worthy of respect and compassionate care. No matter what.
Making Meals More Satisfying
Food is just one way we care for ourselves by giving our bodies both nourishment and pleasure. By finding satisfaction in eating, we increase our overall contentment and make peace with food. Here are some tips for finding more satisfaction at mealtimes in your intuitive eating journey.
Self-Care & Intuitive Eating
Intuitive eating is a form of self-care. Intuitive eating reconnects us to our bodies’ needs, both physically and emotionally. Our bodies need adequate, satisfying food every day. When we honor our hunger with satisfying foods, we are practicing self-care.
Hunger Cues & The Hunger-Fullness Scale
A big part of intuitive eating is learning how to trust your innate hunger cues again and respond appropriately to them. Our need for energy (food) is so primal and essential that if we do not give our bodies enough, our bodies find ways to compensate. Your body and brain just want to keep you alive! Diet culture makes hunger seem like the enemy or something to overcome with “willpower”, but the truth is that hunger is your body communicating a vital need- energy (food)!