How Has Dieting Diminished Your Life?

While traveling in Morocco a few years ago, I befriended some young folks while staying at their family’s riad (guesthouse).

After asking them about their favorite local foods, they eagerly offered to take me to a roadside café located on the outskirts of their small town to experience “Berber Pizza.”

Made with a double crust, the pizza is typically stuffed with meat and veggies heavily seasoned with ras el hanout, a mixture of numerous spices like cumin, coriander, cardamom, clove, ginger, paprika, turmeric and more.

I opted for the veggie version while my new friends went for the traditional lamb one.

Bursting with flavor, the pizza, along with my affable dining companions and endless cups of sweet mint tea, made for one of my most memorable experiences in Morocco.

Wouldn’t Have Happened
This moment, however, wouldn’t have happened if I had still been entrenched in diet culture.

I likely would have rejected my friends’ generous offer if I were counting calories, shunning gluten or afraid of carbs.

I would have struck out on my own to find something “safe” to eat, something that didn’t break any of my food rules and leave me feeling overindulgent and guilty.

Or, if I had accepted, I probably would have been distracted throughout lunch thinking about how I was going to make up for eating something “off plan,” perhaps by eating less for dinner or going for a run later.

I’m so grateful I worked hard to make peace with food so I could have such an enjoyable, unforgettable experience, and many more like it.

It’s so freeing to be able to share food with others without my inner Food Police trying to spoil the fun—without all the diet culture noise and the unnecessary anxiety, stress and guilt it causes.

Diminished My Life
Sadly, I spent many years skipping social gatherings, special celebrations and once-in-a-lifetime experiences because I feared there wouldn’t be any of my allowed foods or that I would lose control once I started eating.

On the rare occasion I would attend an event involving food, I was often preoccupied thinking about the food I wanted but wasn’t letting myself have, perhaps even devising a plan for how I could sneak some of it to eat in secret later.

Natural Response to Deprivation
Looking back, I have so much compassion for my younger self as I now understand that my thoughts and behaviors were a natural response to food restriction and deprivation. 

Once I stopped dieting and started trusting my body's needs and desires and giving myself unconditional permission to eat, I discovered I could have a relaxed, flexible, peaceful and pleasurable relationship with food—one that truly enriches my life rather than diminishing it.

A Few Things to Reflect On...
In what ways has dieting diminished your life?

How has it stopped you from living fully, especially in pre-pandemic times? Here's what some of my clients have shared.

How would your life expand if you made peace with food? What "Berber Pizza" moments would you get to experience?

What are Your Attunement Disruptors?

People are often surprised that I don’t tell my clients what to eat, when to eat, or how much to eat. I don't because I don’t have a clue what their body needs and wants at any given time. They are the expert of their body, not me!

My role is to help my clients connect with their body’s innate wisdom and trust it to guide them to the most nourishing, satisfying and supportive choices for their unique being. Part of this process includes exploring their attunement disruptors.

Attunement Disruptors
Attunement disruptors are obstacles that interfere with your ability to clearly hear—and appropriately respond to—the messages your body is sending you, including its sensations of hunger, fullness and satisfaction.

Here are a few common attunement disruptors:

• Dieting: When you’re dieting—no matter what the plan or program is called—you prioritize a set of external rules over your internal cues.
  
  For example, ignoring your body’s hunger signals because you’ve reached your calorie, point or macro allotment for the day; disregarding your fullness cues and overeating because you aren’t allowing yourself to eat again for many hours; or avoiding a desired food because it’s off-limits.
  
  

• Food Rules: Even if you’re not on a diet, you may still have a diet mentality and be adhering to a set of food rules, such as no eating after 7 p.m., no snacking, no seconds or no carbs. Your food rules dictate your eating decisions instead of your body’s needs and desires.
  
  

• Distracted Dining: Eating while multitasking (e.g., TV watching, emailing, texting, gaming, driving, etc.) inhibits your ability to tune into your body’s fullness cues.
  
  Distracted eating can also leave you feeling unsatisfied when your food is gone. Even if you're full, you may find yourself understandably seeking more food in search of satisfaction as satisfaction is an essential component of the eating experience.
  
  

• Eating Habits: Ingrained habits, like distracted dining, breakfast skipping, inflexible meal times and a clean-your-plate mentality, can cause you to override your body’s cues.
  
  

• Chaotic Lifestyle: If your days are intense, chaotic or overscheduled, perhaps due to juggling constant work and/or caregiving demands, your busyness may prevent you from hearing and honoring your body’s needs.
  
  

• Performative Eating: You’re disconnected from your body when you change how you eat when eating with others, such as not eating what or how much you actually want.
  
  You might do this to meet social or cultural expectations, please other people, project a certain image, or avoid potential judgment or criticism, which is completely understandable if you’ve been food policed in the past.
  
  

• Inadequate Self-Care: Not prioritizing foundational self-care practices, such as restorative sleep, joyful movement, stress relief and screen-free time, makes it difficult to hear and respond to messages from your body.

Start Small, Be Flexible
Addressing your obstacles to body attunement can take time, especially if your inner wisdom is clouded by a dieting mentality, food rules, weight stigma, fatphobia and other deeply embedded beliefs and behaviors, such as always putting other people’s needs before your own.

I encourage you to take small steps and to focus on what would feel the most helpful and satisfying to you.

It’s also important to be flexible in your approach otherwise you may find yourself creating a set of rigid rules that make you feel bad and guilty when you break them, such as “I can only eat when I feel hungry” or “I’m not allowed to eat in front of a screen.”

Sometimes, your work schedule may require you to eat at a specific time or while catching up on email. Or, you may want to enjoy a pizza while watching a movie, which can be a really pleasurable experience!

Being mindful of your attunement disruptors most of the time will help you reconnect with your body and become more aware of and responsive to its messages, needs and desires. As a result, you will cultivate a more trusting, intuitive and peaceful relationship with food and your body.

Emily's Story: It's All Downhill from Here

From time to time, I like to share a client experience to illustrate how Intuitive Eating can help you have a more trusting, peaceful and relaxed relationship with food and your body.

Recently, I was catching up with my former client Emily and she shared how different this holiday season already feels for her. With her permission, I’m sharing her story with you.

Emily’s Story: It’s All Downhill from Here
I remember very clearly my thoughts and fears around food that always surfaced at this time of year and talking to you about them when we were working together.

My October birthday had always triggered the “downhill” part of my year.

Starting with my birthday and continuing through New Year’s Eve, I would be diet-free.  

This meant giving myself special permission to eat without any restrictions for three and a half months before beginning a new diet on January 1.

Since I knew deprivation was just around the corner, I experienced a lot of Last Supper bingeing episodes during this time.

This year, I already feel such a major difference.

It no longer feels like this special time of year where I finally have an excuse to eat cake or candy. These things are always available to me now since I’ve stopped dieting and started giving myself unconditional permission to eat no matter what time of year it is.

It is such a freeing experience.

Unlike Any Birthday Before
On my birthday this year, there wasn’t any part of the day or the following weekend that I felt the need to “go for it” with my eating.

In years past, I would always eat until I was uncomfortably full on my birthday and often for a few days after as I polished off the leftover cake and other “special, rare treats.”

This birthday felt like my first big “test” of the season.

Having this new experience under my belt is so rewarding and it’s a testament to the power of Intuitive Eating, especially when paired with your expertise and gentle guidance. 

Peace with All the Pumpkin Things
Also this month, my roommate and I went to Trader Joe’s and bought a bunch of the fall snacks, all the pumpkin things.

It felt like a fall-treat buffet for the first few days. I was having so much fun trying all the new foods that I ended up eating more sweets than I usually do and felt a little sick.

I certainly wasn’t mad at myself for it. Instead, I viewed it as an informative experience.

I realized eating that amount of sweets didn’t feel very satisfying in my body so I may not want to do it again. And, I understood that since they were all new foods, it was normal for me to eat a lot of them right away.

As the days have gone by, unlike past years, I don’t feel out of control with all the fall treats or preoccupied with them. In fact, I forget we have a lot of the snacks we do!

This feels so completely different than when I was stuck in my restrict-binge cycle and it’s a huge relief to know I will not be starting another diet come New Year’s Day.

Every day, there is something new to learn and observe, but there hasn’t been a time in my life that I felt more at peace and at ease with food and my body.