I Wanted to Toss All the Christmas Cookies

Over the holidays, I recalled a Christmas many years ago when I was visiting my parents at my childhood home.

Every year, my mom would attend a cookie exchange and return home with a giant platter full of a variety of holiday cookies.

I vividly remember standing alone over that red platter and quickly eating one cookie after another after another. Even though most of them didn’t taste very good to me, I kept eating them.

It felt like I was in a trance.

When I finally snapped to, I was so mad at myself for eating so many cookies. I felt crappy, out of control and powerless.

I certainly didn’t feel I could trust myself with those cookies.

I wanted to toss the entire platter into the trash to prevent myself from eating more but that wasn’t possible given they were meant to be shared among all my family members. I wasn’t sure how I would explain the missing cookies without a lot of lying, embarrassment and shame.

The only thing that helped was reassuring myself that I would get back on track with my eating as soon as the holidays were over.

The Cookies Weren’t the Problem
I haven’t had an eating episode like this one in years.

As I worked on healing my relationship with food and my body, I came to understand that my cookie experience and hundreds of others like it were not due to a lack of willpower or self-discipline. They were due to dieting.

Once I stopped all the restriction and rule-following and started eating unconditionally with guidance from my body’s cues, like hunger, fullness, desire and satisfaction, food lost its power over me.

Without the threat of future deprivation, I no longer had the urge to eat cookies or anything else as if it was my last supper.

Breaking up with diet culture and making peace with food and my body was one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever given myself.

Resolve to Make Peace Instead
Given the world we live in, the desire to diet is completely understandable.

It’s more tempting than ever this time of year as we’re bombarded by weight-loss company ads promising that their method is better than all the others and guaranteed to result in everlasting thinness, health and happiness—even though they don’t have any substantial, including long-term, research to back up their claims.

If you have a history of dieting (or whatever the food-restriction plan is called), you likely know all too well how this game eventually ends: weight regain, feeling like a failure, an even more messed up relationship with food and your body, and so many other undesired outcomes the diet companies don't warn you about.

What if this year, instead of hopping on the diet train, you resolve to make peace with food and your body?

How would doing so change your life?

The last two years have taught us many things, especially how precious life is.

How would you spend your one precious life if you were no longer wasting so much time, energy and headspace obsessing about what you’re eating and your weight?

What if you signed up for peace instead?

Did You Catch These Episodes?

I’m back with a fresh roundup of not-to-be-missed content.

This time, I’m shining the spotlight on some recent podcast episodes. Topics include fat positivity, weight stigma, weight science, Intuitive Eating and more.

Informative, insightful and engaging, these shows are bound to make your next cleaning session, road trip or flight fly by.

Ten Percent Happier: Anti-Diet Series
In this two-part series, host Dan Harris explores our often complex relationship with food and our bodies, including his own struggles, with actress and activist Jameela Jamil and anti-diet dietitian and author Christy Harrison.

Part 1: Jameela Jamil on Mental Self-Defense

Part 2: How to Embrace the Anti-Diet with Christy Harrison

I also encourage you to listen to Dan’s life-changing episode with Evelyn Tribole, one of the co-creators of Intuitive Eating.

Maintenance Phase: Is Being Fat Bad for You? [Spotify | iTunes]
Hosts Aubrey Gordon and Michael Hobbes dive deep into the research to challenge the simple and harmful narrative we’ve been fed regarding health, longevity and weight.

Burnt Toast: Healthcare for Fat People is Based on the Premise that it's Acceptable to Kill Us to Make Us Thin
Author Virginia Sole-Smith chats with activist Ragen Chastain about fighting weight stigma on behalf of our bodies.

I also highly recommend checking out Ragen’s whip-smart newsletter Weight & Healthcare.

Full Bloom: Why Should I Give Fat Positivity a Try?
Host Zoë Bisbing talks to therapist and activist Dr. Rachel Millner about what it means to be fat positive, including how to raise fat-positive children and break the cycle of intergenerational weight-related trauma.

As always, I hope this content helps support you on your journey toward a peaceful relationship with food and your body.

5 Thanksgiving Don'ts

Along with all the yummy food, the Thanksgiving holiday often comes with an unsavory serving of diet culture.

For a satisfying, peaceful eating experience, keep in mind these Thanksgiving don’ts:

1. You don’t have to earn it.
Despite what diet culture wants you to believe, you don’t have to do anything to earn your Thanksgiving meal. You don’t have to do an intense workout or not eat all day to deserve a spot at the table.

2. You don’t have to make up for it.
Just like you don’t have to earn the right to eat, you don’t have to make up for your eating after the holiday by working out extra hard, skipping meals or starting a cleanse or diet.

3. You don’t have to justify.
Whether it’s having seconds or thirds, filling your plate with mostly mashed potatoes, or eating pie for breakfast, you don’t have to justify your choices to anyone. You have the right to eat whatever you want, whenever you want.

(For tips on handling the Food Police in your life, head on over to here.)

4. You don’t have to feel bad.
Diet culture wants you to feel bad, out of control, weak, guilty and ashamed for eating a lot. You don’t.

It’s normal to sometimes eat simply for pure pleasure and to sometimes eat until you're stuffed, especially when enjoying foods that are novel and only around for a brief period

5. You don’t have to participate.
Just like people who avoid discussing religion, politics and money, you don’t have to participate in diet and weight talk.

The easiest way to navigate it, especially when you’re dining with a wide range of people, is to nonchalantly change the subject.

For example, if your uncle starts raving about his latest diet or your mom comments on someone's weight, steer the conversation toward a different topic, such as “I’d love to know what shows everyone is into right now” or “What’s your favorite holiday memory?”

Of course, these five don’ts are helpful to practice not just on Thanksgiving, but every day of the year.

P.S. Consider taking a moment this Thanksgiving holiday to reflect on everything you appreciate about your body, whether it's your arms for enabling you to hug loved ones, your nose and tongue for helping you savor all the yummy food, or your eyes for witnessing the change of seasons.