I Ate Freely on July 4th. Until I Learned I Shouldn't.

With the Fourth of July upon us, I’ve been reflecting on what Independence Day was like for me as a kid.

Naturally, the fireworks were the highlight of the holiday. However, I also have very fond memories of the food.

I recall kicking off the festivities with a pancake breakfast at our local pool. I happily gobbled up syrup-soaked flapjacks topped with strawberries, blueberries and whipped cream in honor of the occasion.

After hours of swimming and playing with my neighborhood friends, the day would end with a big block party. What a thrill it was to be able to ride my banana-seat bike down the middle of our street!

Picnic tables were hauled from backyards and covered with an array of homemade summer dishes, while a couple of grills smoked away on the sidelines.

Food-Fueled Fun
My nighttime fun was fueled by ketchup-covered hot dogs, honey baked beans, buttery corn-on-the-cob, juicy watermelon wedges, salty chips and dip, and very patriotic Jell-O salads. All of this was washed down with thirst-quenching cups of lemonade.

No matter what I ate, I always had room for a fudgy brownie or strawberry shortcake topped with rapidly melting vanilla ice cream.

I ate what looked good, tasted good and felt good in my body. Sometimes I ate it all, and sometimes I left some behind.

I ate freely and intuitively. 

Not Yet Tainted
My young mind hadn’t been tainted yet by diet culture—an oppressive system built on anti-fat bias and unrealistic body ideals, one that’s full of food rules, good/bad food lists, meticulous tracking, (e.g., calories, points, macros, etc.), intentional deprivation, punishing exercise and false promises.

I hadn’t been taught yet that I should be hyper-vigilant with food and micro-manage every morsel.

No one had told me yet that my body couldn’t be trusted and that I needed to rely on a plan or program to tell me how to eat.

I hadn’t learned to abhor my belly, demonize certain foods, feel ashamed about my eating and compensate for my food sins. 

I didn't worry about others judging my choices nor did I sneak food to protect myself from scrutiny.

Do I Want It?
While I loved all that food, I had more exciting and important things to focus on, like water-balloon tosses, sparklers and bottle rockets.

As an Intuitive Eater, I just ate and moved on.

Eating was simply a matter of: I can have it. Do I want it?

Diet Mentality Takes Over
Unfortunately, all of this changed as I entered my teenage years and began adopting a diet mentality powered by salads, rice cakes, diet sodas (hello, Tab!) and Jane Fonda workouts.

My desire to achieve the “thin ideal” led to decades of disordered eating and exercise.

Thankfully, with help from some very wise guides, I eventually broke free from diet culture and made peace with food and my body.

The healing process wasn’t easy or fast. Some days, I feel like I'm still a work-in-progress. But, it’s all been worth it.

Ending the war I was waging against myself enabled me to return to the food freedom and body liberation I experienced as a young girl.   

It’s Still Within You
I’m sharing this story as a reminder that, for the most part, we all came into this world as Intuitive Eaters—that is, we ate based on our instincts, inner cues and desires. As long as our needs were met, we were able to eat without worry, guilt, fear or shame.

Sadly, we’re losing touch with our ability to eat intuitively at a younger and younger age. Shockingly, an estimated 80 percent of 10-year-old girls have been on a diet.

I’m also sharing my experience to assure you that if you’ve become disconnected from the Intuitive Eater within you, you can reconnect with it.

It hasn’t gone away. It’s just buried under layers of diet-culture gunk, which today, is often packaged under the guise of “wellness.”

Magical Powers Not Required
I don’t have any magical powers. My clients don’t either. If we can relearn how to listen to and trust our bodies, it’s quite likely you can, too.

“I’m no longer searching for the ‘answer’ to the perfect way to eat. I don’t stress about how I eat because it isn’t that big of a deal anymore. I no longer believe those food guilt thoughts and that is F-R-E-E-D-O-M!” 
–Client Molly

I Used to Track Hit Songs. Before Calories Came Along.

Yesterday, I was reflecting on how when I was a kid, New Year’s Eve meant lying for hours on the brown shag carpet in our family room in front of our large stereo credenza.  

Every year, I would excitedly attempt to write down every song on our local radio station’s countdown of the top 100 songs of the year. 

This was the early 80s, so a list wasn’t available online. I had to create my own.

I tried to stay glued to the radio as much as possible so I could track each song when it was announced and played. I remember anxiously scrambling back to my spot after a bathroom break to ensure I didn’t miss anything. 

I kept those lists for a few years so I could reflect on the hit songs and what was going on in my life at that time, like favorite outfits, crushes, roller-skating parties and sleepovers.

Tracking My Body
Sadly, as I grew older, my list-making changed from recording fun things like popular songs to meticulously tracking calories, good and bad foods consumed, workout days, miles ran, the number on the scale—all the things diet culture tells us we need to vigilantly monitor to achieve our ideal body.

While tracking these things often gave me a sense of accomplishment when I did the “right” thing, they also caused tremendous distress, anxiety and guilt when I didn’t. 

My tracking kept me overly preoccupied with my eating, exercise and body. 

And, it consumed a ton of my time, energy and headspace. (It was especially time-consuming as apps didn’t exist back then to simplify the process; much of my tracking was done on paper and eventually on spreadsheets.)

Disordered and Disconnected
If you have a history of dieting, you are likely quite familiar with tracking things like pounds, calories, points, carbs, macros, workouts, steps, hours between meals, etc. 

And, maybe like me, you eventually started to realize what you thought was helpful was actually harmful, that all your tracking was contributing to an unsatisfying and disordered relationship with food, exercise and your body and preventing you from living a full and fulfilling life.

Once I stopped tracking, I began to see how much it had disconnected me from my body. 

Eating decisions were often made based on what I was allowed to have according to my food tracking rather than what my body needed or wanted. 

Exercise decisions were often made based on what workout I had recorded the day prior or how much I ate the night before not on what my body needed or wanted in that moment. 

If I Did Track…
I don’t track anything these days but if I did, I hope it would be all the ways I treat my body with love, respect, care and tenderness and all the things I do to expand my life rather than shrink it. 

But far more importantly, if I did track anything, I'd like it to be all the meaningful things I hope I'm doing to enrich the lives of others, alleviate suffering and make the world a better place. 

I Don’t Want to Pass My Food Issues on to My Kids

Can you relate to Sandra's story?

For as long as she can remember, Sandra's mom has meticulously counted calories and carefully weighed almost everything she eats. 

When her aunts visit her parent's house, the conversation is often centered on who is doing what diet and how it’s going, together celebrating their wins and commiserating over their struggles. 

Their own mother, Sandra's grandma, is a very restrictive eater who frequently comments on family members’ weight and polices everyone's eating.

Sandra's dad also has a fraught relationship with food. Over the years, he’s swung numerous times from eating everything to restricting something, whether it’s fat, carbs or the hours he’s allowed to eat.

In Sandra’s childhood home, food was feared, moralized and demonized. Almost every eating decision was based on how it would impact one's weight.   

At the pubescent age of 11, when it's normal for kids to gain a lot of weight, Sandra's mom took her to her first weight-loss meeting.

Although she felt a little weird being the only kid in the room, she also felt inspired by the success stories the women in the circle shared, especially when everyone cheered and clapped. 

It felt good to be a part of their club and to be doing something to fix her apparently problematic body.

Ending the Legacy
Stepping into that weight-loss clinic as a young girl launched Sandra on the dieting rollercoaster. Since then, she’s tried every diet under the sun. After more than 20 years of yo-yo dieting, she’s hit rock bottom. 

Even though she doesn’t like her body, she can’t stand the thought of going on one more diet. More than anything, she can’t stand the thought of passing her family’s legacy of body shame and dieting on to her kids.

She doesn’t want them to view food as good or bad, feel guilty about their eating, hate their bodies or obsess over their weight.

Many of my clients who are thinking about starting a family or already have kids express their desire to protect their children from our harmful diet culture. 

They don’t want them to suffer the way they and their family members have and thus are deeply motivated by the idea of not handing down their food and body challenges.

This is also true for many of my clients who don’t have children but have kids in their life, whether it’s their nieces, nephews, friends’ kids, students or team players.

I get really excited when my clients share this desire with me because I know the positive ripple effect that can occur when just one person heals their relationship with food and their body and how doing so can help put an end to a family history of disordered eating and anti-fat bias.

What Kind of Role Model?
For my clients with this goal, we spend time exploring what type of role model they want to be when it comes to food and bodies.

We talk about how they can reclaim their ability to eat intuitively while helping the kids in their life maintain their ability to do so.

Then we do the challenging yet rewarding work that’s required to divest from diet culture and build a peaceful relationship with food and their body, one that they’re excited to pass along.