The Intuitive Eating Workbook: Ten Principles for Nourishing a Healthy Relationship with Food

It was really interesting to me how a restrictive mentality with food and exercise spills into and affects other areas of life. It points to a self-care and self-trust problem overall, which makes so much sense. It was never only about food.

Ch 2 continued-distinguishing between thoughts and hunger cues, identify each as a mind, body, or self care statement , ask yourself if it is a dieting mentality thought or one that will serve your best interest ? I worked on the self care assessment in the book, where you look at how you treat yourself physically, emotionally, spiritually, your relationships and your boundaries. it’s amazing how frequently some of these dieting mentality thoughts and other harmful actions come up for me, especially “I self silence my thoughts and feelings”, “I don’t know how to relax” , “ I feel guilty if not productive”, “I exercise too much even if injured”, “I’m sleep deprived“, “I go for long periods of time without eating “, “I automatically say yes to requests from others”, “ I feel the need to make others happy” . This exercise has you look at areas of self care that youre lacking in and make a plan to work on them.

also I worked in the hunger scale and that has been the information that has resonated most with me throughout the book so far. I never liked the hunger scale idea because I always wanted to overeat when I was really over exercising even just a few months ago. I didn’t want to admit I was overeating, because I felt that I deserved it because I was stressed from the exercise. For example, at dinner I would think about waking up at 4 am the next day to do a long strength session or run and think “I deserve seconds, I need to fuel this workout” it almost felt like I was trying to soothe myself with the food since it was the only relaxing thing for me. Now that I’m thinking more about hunger cues, I’ve been rating my hunger through the day. I usually eat between a 1 (ravenous and irritable) and 3 (polite hunger) Sometimes at work it’s a 1, I’m totally starving for lunch and unable to eat anything before lunch because it’s so busy. I will literally run to the kitchen when it’s lunch time so that I can be the first to microwave my food! At that time it feels so important. but on the days I eat a bigger snack, my hunger is a 3 and it’s very polite; I have no problem waiting in the microwave line and chatting with coworkers. I also noticed that I usually eat dinner to a 7 (comfortable, satisfied and content) and an 8 (a little too full but not unpleasant). On the weekends, more often an 8 because we’re usually eating different and funner foods like grilling out. Something to work on-I often ignore my hunger when it’s at a level 3, but eating at this time would get ahead of a lot of drama!

I find that eating as soon as I notice the first signs of hunger (thinking about food) pays off on the back end of it when I’m clearly satisfied after eating. Stopping becomes much easier. I truly don’t want any more versus always negotiating some crazy scheme to stop eating.

Thanks for bumping this! i think I’ll do the same and put my thoughts here from the workbook. I am in the 2nd chapter, Honoring Your Hunger. This chapter feels extra important to me, because I constantly question my hunger-how can you be hungry again, you didn't even exercise today, or that’s enough food, try to stop before you’re full so you don’t gain weight. Constant brain chatter and questioning of my hunger cues. I noticed that hunger almost always starts with me side thinking about food, then about 30-60 min later i feel an empty stomach feeling and think about food a little more. After a couple hours if I don’t eat, my hunger goes away and I feel a little nauseous and my brain doeant want food anymore but my body still feels empty, but it’s harder to judge fullness because my hunger cues are weird at that point. some direct notes from the chapter so far :

-learning to honor the first biological signs of hunger sets the stage for rebuilding trust with yourself and food

-Profound hunger is like being under water too long-you dont want your hunger to feel like a Profound gasping for breath but be able to have a polite intake of breath

-When feeling hunger, the mind of a chronic dieter will habitually say “don’t, it’s not time to eat” and use trickery such as drinking water or air foods which makes eating confusing to the body and disrupts hunger cues

I think the last one is something I do a lot-drink water when I’m hungry to avoid eating. I never thought about how that’s likely warping my hunger signals even more. And if you go ahead and just eat the food when you're hungry, instead of trying to control everything so much by waiting, then maybe that shows your body that your hunger signals will be honored, and helps build trust in yourself?

Bump

That was an important shift for me, and fairly recent. If I eat at the first signs of hunger, it's easier to identify and hit total satisfaction. If I start eating at serious stomach growling, I'll likely eat into serious fullness, more food than I really need or want. 

It’s slow, but that’s what makes it so completely different from every failed, temporary diet, well, that and it feels so amazing that you’d do it every day anyway. That pure joy and unwillingness to stop is what makes it stomp restriction in terms of effectiveness and sustainability. After reading the IE workbook and learning more about my own hunger, fullness, and lingering diet thoughts, I dropped another 5-6 pounds in six months. It felt effortless, maybe because I wasn’t trying. I just know that I enjoy my food more and feel more satisfied. I think that has to do with eating what I truly want, and eating with more awareness. That has caused most of the situations where I was eating quickly, mindlessly, or habitual portions to fall away. If I’m listening, sometimes I need considerably more food than I was giving myself before, and sometimes I’m happier with less.

The key for me is to be happy with the way I feel and eat, independent of any number. By prioritizing feeling my best and taking great care of myself, I made the scale irrelevant. That actually resulted in fat loss for me because it ended the thing where I eat (or restrict) reactively based on a random number. Every day, I eat to enjoy my food and feel amazing. I eat in line with my values, which include flexibility and fun in addition to fitness and health. I feel good before, during, and after I eat. I socialize freely. I eat to satisfaction every time, not just on rare occasions when I let my guard down or feel I’ve earned it. I had to work toward all of that. I still work toward it, but it’s such a worthwhile pursuit.

That mindset shift changed everything for me. The scale doesn’t matter. A number can’t tell me how I look or feel. It can’t determine self-worth. If I’m taking care of the inside, the outside begins to reflect that. Small weight fluctuations mean nothing unless I’m attaching to crazy stories. If that’s the case, questioning the stories and turning them around will produce far better mental and physical results than attempting to manage degrees of crazy. Or, there is always staying off the scale. That works too. :-)

So, here we are about six months from when I read the IE workbook. It's amazing how all of that information slowly sank in and changed things for the better when I thought I was done changing. 

The biggest change is that, with practice, I learned to recognize levels of fullness while I'm still eating. I thought that was a fairytale but it totally works! Two of the biggest factors are slowing down and eating with fewer distractions. I think not having any judgment about it is pretty big too. I either notice my changing fullness or I don't, and I'm free to stop at any level of fullness I choose. It's not possible to do it wrong. Most of the time I notice. Most of the time I stop in a comfortable place, which may be more or less than I normally eat. The reverse engineering and flexible template methods of constructing meals has fallen away. I'm really eating what I want when I'm hungry. It may be a familiar favorite or it may be something zany. Either way, I trust that I'll know when to stop, and that I can eat again whenever I want. 

I quit weighing myself so often. I was doing it maybe once a month for awhile and found that this gave me so much more food freedom. I was no longer worrying about what carbs and sodium might do to the scale every day/week, which I didn't even realize I was still worrying about, but I was! 

The weirdest part is that once I let go of the last of my weight management tools, I lost weight. I enjoy my food more and weight is a complete non-issue when I'm not worrying about the scale, or calories, or protein grams, or meal timing, or not snacking. My appetite tells me very clearly what and how much will satisfy, I just didn't know how to hear it before. 

It was pretty important for me to know that I could eat again soon. That kept me from chipmunking to make it however many hours. It's safe to stop now, because if I find myself hungry I can always eat. Of course I can! I still prefer three meals most days, but I'm not mindlessly overdoing it to be sure, sure I'm not going to get hungry too soon. I'm also not arriving at most meals really stomach-growling hungry. I finally caught on that thinking about food is my first sign of hunger. If I'm not hungry, food doesn't even occur to me. But the progression goes: thinking about food, feeling like I could eat, feeling a really subtle hollow sensation in my abdomen, the beginning of a growl, legit stomach rumbling, gnawing urgent hunger, people start looking like steaks, so hungry I would eat office furniture. Most of the time I eat somewhere between feeling like I could and the hollow sensation. No growling. 

The levels of fullness are interesting too: not physically hungry anymore, feeling the food in my stomach but don't want to stop, getting satisfied, I could stop now, totally satisfied, this is so good I'm going to have some more anyway, wow I'm really full, physical pain, dear god what have I done. There, I'm usually stopping at totally satisfied. I nail it most of the time. It's ok though if I stop a little short, maybe because I know I'm going to have more or better food soon. I also sometimes keep eating just because the food is really good. That's fun too sometimes. I actively avoid eating until I'm uncomfortable or in pain though. 

For me, the idea that, "If I stop at neutral I can have dessert." pushes all of my crazy buttons. I definitely don't think of it like that, but if you read that whole quoted paragraph in context, neither do they. You can do whatever you want! You'll just enjoy both the meal and the dessert more if you don't stuff yourself to the gills. For me, that usually means stopping the main meal at a late six or early seven on the scale, somewhere between emerging fullness and the beginnings of satisfaction. If I'm already totally satisfied, dessert doesn't taste as good and isn't as much fun. I like to leave room for dessert. It has nothing to do with weight control and everything to do with enjoying dessert. After a meal plus dessert (or even without it) I like to end at a solid seven, totally satisfied, or an early eight, which is a, "that might have been a little much but it was totally worth it" level of satisfaction. It's still neutral as opposed to unpleasant. Remember that neutral isn't specifically a level of fullness but a level of satisfaction. There's pleasant, neutral, and unpleasant. The extremes of hunger and fullness are unpleasant, but everything in between is pleasant or neutral.

I love whoever pointed out that being overly full isn't a greater degree of satisfaction but the opposite of satisfaction. Maybe that was Jill Coleman. Makes sense though!

Reverse engineering was a game changer for me a few years ago.  How do you find this working now, Skwigg?   I'm most curious about things like packed/work meals.  I pack a lunch for work, and I've got a few standard lunches that I rotate through that really work for me.  Generally, all is well.  However, now and then, there are days when I'm more hungry and days when I'm less hungry.  How do you handle that moving target with meals you've packed when you find the portion that was right yesterday is inadequate today?  Do you pack extra just in case?

I think less about reverse engineering and more about satisfaction in the moment. Reverse engineering felt super important when I was eating predecided meals with no snacks. Now, if I under or overshoot the amount I need, I just eat more sooner or less later and it's all good.

I don't often pack extra food from home unless it's something seasonal or fun like candy or cookies. For hunger purposes, my workplace is a wonderland of food options. There is basically a small grocery store with things like cheese, grapes, Greek yogurt, hummus, oats, bagels, salads, sandwiches, hard boiled eggs, peanut butter, beef jerky, protein bars, and convenience store goodies. If I'm too hungry, I can always get more of whatever I want. We also have a lot of catering, party food, and meeting food happening. I wing it with what's available.

Your mom is a great example. My husband is the same way. He doesn't like to overeat. It would never occur to him to do it for fun, or because he had a bad day. If every meal is emotionally and physically satisfying, overeating becomes so much less appealing. If you're feeling restricted, hungry, guilty, or not especially enjoying your food choices, the release of overeating becomes incredibly appealing. It's funny how that works. 

Intuitive eating as a trick to eat less and lose weight. That's such an interesting topic that I want to bring it over here to the workbook thread. That is definitely a common assumption. I made it. I also, on an earlier attempt, found myself overeating in a rebellious way. Oh, I'm an intuitive eater now. I can eat whatever I want! I want all these cookies! I want a bag of Doritos! I want cheese fries! If you ignore fullness and satisfaction, that becomes just as disconnected and unpleasant as dieting. 

What I've found the last few weeks is that there are those instances where I was mindlessly eating too much of a food I didn't really care about just because it's what I always serve myself, or it was time, or it was there. There have also been instances of needing to make meals bigger, eat sooner, or add a snack when I wouldn't have. Satisfaction is a moving target. That's what I've learned. The portion or food choice that was "right" yesterday may be really inadequate today. That flexibility is scary to a dieter mind, but also super liberating. I can eat to satisfaction every time. No need to stuff myself with bland diet food or deny myself tasty favorites. 

Ok, that's fascinating about the lack of chairs and comfy sofas in traditional Japanese homes. Makes sense though. Meanwhile, all of Western civilization is over here in recliners with cup holders. :-)

Chapter 10, Gentle Nutrition

Some of my highlights:

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Remember that Intuitive Eating is a dynamic interplay of instinct, emotion, and thought. If necessary, from time to time, use your rational thinking to help you overcome any glitches in your eating, such as changes in hunger signals or your food choices due to illness or emotions. But also remember to approach this goal with a "for the most part" mentality. (All of this sailed right over my head in earlier brushes with intuitive eating, both that you could use logic to make sure your needs were met and "for the most part." I was trying to obey mysterious hunger unicorns perfectly. No wonder that was futile and frustrating.)

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A healthy eater is one who not only strives for a healthy balance of foods but also has a healthy relationship with food. Your food choices do not elicit a sense of moral superiority or inferiority. In fact, you make no connection between your eating and the essence of who you are as an individual. You simply take a neutral approach to receiving messages from all appropriate sources and integrating them to feel a healthy balance in your life. This process brings you to authentic health.

(So a "healthy eater" is not the stereotypical healthy living blogger, or the food/body shaming clean eaters on Instagram, or celebrities in magazines who describe having a kale smoothie for breakfast, a salad for lunch, and steamed fish for dinner. That was honestly my impression of healthy eating. I was going by the pop culture presentation of it, which is basically an eating disorder. Authentic health is about the physical and emotional wellbeing of the whole person, not what they weigh, not what they do or don't eat.) --

It is important to note that we have included no portion sizes in this book. Portion size is an issue if you’re a distracted, restrictive, or unconscious eater, but it is not a concern for Intuitive Eaters, because they are in touch with fullness and satisfaction. (This was the only passage in the whole book I highlighted in bright pink. It hit me right in the face! All of the counting and tracking I did, the portion sizes, the rules, the predeciding, even Gillian Riley's "times and plans" were only "necessary" because I was so disconnected from my appetite. Connected, they become completely irrelevant. This makes me giddy!)

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So, relax. Remember that the concept "for the most part" is central. For the most part, strive for variety, moderation, and balance in your eating. For the most part, enjoy both nutritious foods and some play foods. For the most part, eat satisfying meals. The calm and trust that you feel about food, based on your inner wisdom and refusal to strive for perfection, will carry you through a lifetime of freedom and joy in your eating!

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I'm sad to be finished reading. :-( I got so much out of this workbook even though I thought I was basically "done" and had nothing left to learn or work on with my eating. Ha! Maybe I'll go back and read the Intuitive Eating book again now to really solidify the concepts. I get something different every time I'm exposed to intuitive eating because I'm different every time.

I finished the workbook today. Here are a few of my thoughts and highlights:

Chapter 7, Emotional Eating. I think the distinction they make between emotional eating and lack of self-care is huge. Like I said in Mott's journal, I thought I was a crazy emotional eater during the years I was dieting, but I was really just hungry, sleep deprived, overtrained, and failing to meet my basic comfort needs. That makes overeating sugary, bready, numb-out foods seem so irresistible, but it wouldn't have if I'd been taking better care of myself in general. 

I loved the suggestion of taking a 5 minute time out when you want to eat when not hungry, or you want to continue to eat when you're already full. Get away from the food. Ask yourself: What am I feeling? What do I really need? If after five minutes you still want to eat, go ahead. Taking the time out will have turned a totally zoned-out eating experience into one that is mindful. 

I liked the idea that just as you must build physical muscles to become an athlete, you must develop your emotional muscles to be able to tolerate feelings. It's ok if you're not awesome at it immediately. Feeling the feelz is something that requires practice. 

Chapter 8, Body Respect. I was struck by the part about how most cases of starvation are caused by poverty, war, and abuse, but we can experience the same damaging results through dieting. 

You don't often read something groundbreaking about how to buy new clothes. I loved the suggestion to take several pairs of jeans into the dressing room, face AWAY from the mirror, and try them on, bend over, sit down. If they fit well, THEN you turn around and look at yourself to see if you like the style. If they're too tight, too short, don't button, or you can't breathe, you never even see that.

I liked the "and" practice. If you're feeling fat and horrible and uncomfortable in your body, you dial it down and use a nonjudgmental description of how you are physically feeling. Instead of describing yourself as "fat" "flabby" or "puffy," you say, "I'm having a difficult body day" or "I feel uneasy in my body today," but you don't leave it at that. You add three things you admire about yourself. So it goes, "I'm having a challenging body day, AND I'm a good listener, a great teacher, and a hard worker." 

I also thought it was a cool idea to shut down negative thoughts and body bashing by narrating your surroundings. Like when your puppy chews on the coffee table, you give it a chew toy instead. When your mind is ripping your appearance to shreds or telling horrible stories about what it all means, you busy it with describing your immediate surroundings. What do you see and hear right now? "It's a sunny day. I see a silver car. I hear birds. There's a person on a bicycle." It's like training wheels for getting your mind to refocus. Eventually, you won't need it. 

Chapter 9, Exercise. I was totally enthralled by the research showing that we don't necessarily need to exercise more, we need to sit less. The average person spends more time sitting than sleeping, which increases the risk of chronic diseases, especially heart disease and type 2 diabetes. When the body sits for an hour or more, your metabolic health is affected. Studies show that many people who exercise regularly still sit too much and are actually considered sedentary. If you're out of shape, the initial effort should be focused on less sitting, not necessarily starting a new fitness regimen. 

When I looked at the Sitting Time worksheet, I realized that I've already converted most of the activities I used to do sitting to activities that I do while standing or walking. I have a standing desk at work. I text, talk on the phone, read email, play games, watch videos, and listen to podcasts while standing and moving. I do like to sit and relax, but that has dropped from about 14 hours per day (?!) a couple years ago to just a few now. 

They talk about the importance of noticing how your body feels during and after exercise. Mindful exercise:

- Rejuvenates rather than exhausts or depletes.

- Enhances the mind-body connection.

- Alleviates stress rather than amplifying it.

- Provides genuine enjoyment and pleasure.

There is also a Warning Signs worksheet to asses if you're exercising too much or for the wrong reasons. I would have massively flunked this just a few years ago. 

I'm eager to talk about Chapter 10, Gentle Nutrition but I have to leave now. Back in a bit! 

Chapter 5 on Fullness and 6 on Satisfaction were interesting. I enjoyed reading them and I'm being more mindful about both. I'm not feeling the need to delve deep into either. Georgie kind of got me nailing both of those with Lean Habits. I already know what and how much food satisfies and for how long. It's identifying the subtleties of fullness during the meal itself that eludes me. Part of me feels like I don't even need that. If I'm already rocking hunger mastery and eating to satisfaction, and I have plenty of energy, and my weight is stable, and I enjoy the way I eat, why mess with it? Well, because I want to understand, dammit. :-) What are these people talking about when they notice degrees of fullness while eating? Or this bite not tasting as good as the last? Are they all crazy? Maybe. I'm going to investigate. LOL

My method will be to keep eating the way I already eat but to pay more attention to how my usual fullness *feels* during and after. Now that I'm not trembling with rage at the hunger and fullness scale (?!), I might be able to use it to learn something. I'm definitely going to keep it casual though. I'm not feeling the need to print and fill out worksheets, but I will be more mindful about checking in on fullness and satisfaction while it's happening.

Ooh! I just remembered the other part that stood out about the Food Police chapter. I love what they say about "for the most part." They encourage adding that line to any of your intentions. "For the most part, I will eat only when hungry." That leaves room to also eat for convenience or pleasure once in awhile and not feel bad about it. Your intention is to do something more often than not. There's no expectation that you'll do it perfectly all the time like with diet rules.

I ended up eating quite a big lunch yesterday because I needed and wanted it even though my appetite had gone missing earlier. Then today I noticed that even though I was more clearly hungry earlier, I was also satisfied sooner with less. It's fun to think of yourself as a detective or scientist investigating these things. That gets you just detached enough to be objective about your observations rather than emotionally or morally invested.

The more I observe, the more I realize that my body knows exactly what it's doing. I just had to get out of the way with all of my drama and control freakery.

I have no stomach growling at level 4, just a slightly hollow, empty sensation. The first subtle hints of growling at 3, and growling the person standing next to me can hear at 2, but 2 is still pleasant. It's obvious that I'm hungry but it hasn't become urgent or uncomfortable. I could still wait awhile if I had to. That's me though. You may find that you would describe your levels differently.

I noticed something interesting now that I'm observing hunger more closely. Yesterday and today I ate the exact same breakfast at 7:00am. I would normally get hungry and eat again around noon. Yesterday, I did a hard kettlebell workout at 11:00am and had zero physical hunger until almost 2:00pm, which is ok because I had no time to eat until then, by which point it was suddenly at a level 2 (very hungry, very ready to eat, still pleasant). Today, I ate the same breakfast at the same time, but I only did some gentle foam rolling at 11:00am. I was at a level 3 (clear, polite hunger, no urgency) by 11:30 am. 

This is the kind of thing that causes us to doubt our hunger if we're wrapped up in calorie math. You'd think you should be hungrier on the day with the intense workout, but an intense workout totally kills appetite for hours. Then we're all surprised when we're clearly hungry sooner on a day we barely exercised, but that's only because nothing blunted the hunger signals. 

I'm finding all of this fascinating now. I can't wait to read the fullness chapter.

Those are fascinating observations. I think maybe if we (through dieting) ignore hunger for enough years, our hunger signals aren't so obvious. Or maybe we're not so good at recognizing the subtleties and only pick up on physical hunger when we're completely ravenous. 

For me, it definitely got better as I fed myself more predictably and paid more attention.

Water only kills my grumbling temporarily, for the few minutes until my stomach empties. Then it's right back. 

What I notice now is that I eat the majority of my meals starting at about a 3 (hungry and ready to eat, but without urgency, polite hunger, pleasant), or sometimes a 4 (subtly hungry, slightly empty, neutral). I don't really deal in "gnawing" hunger anymore. I'm also surprised that 2 (very hungry, looking forward to a hearty meal, pleasant) not only isn't the norm but it doesn't come up that often. I eat before then, and it's fine.

I hope to delve into the Feel Your Fullness chapter later today. I will report back. 

I'm enjoying reading slowly and really processing, taking the thoughts and exercises out into the world for a few days rather than just skimming. Here's what I wrote in my journal about chapter 3 on Honoring Hunger:

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It was nice to stop for a few days and reflect on the Honoring Hunger chapter. I took a screen capture of the hunger and fullness scale. I'm not writing anything down, but I keep the hunger scale photo handy on my phone. I check in multiple times through the day. It helps me notice the subtleties of my hunger and fullness. Nothing stressful or threatening about it at all. Why was I so crazy and defensive about this practice?! It really had me tweaked out before. I guess I don't judge now. I'm not trying to do hunger and fullness "right" so I don't get frustrated. If anything, it makes me more mindful and makes it easier to eat a feel-good amount in all different situations. I don't have to guess, eat what I've served myself, and then make note of it for future meals. I can decide I feel like stopping now, knowing that if change my mind (or stomach) I can always have more in ten seconds, or an hour, or tomorrow. It's like something else has clicked! I can do whatever I want! No worries about getting hungry too soon, because if I do get hungry I can eat. Also, no worries about eating too much. I can still eat (or not eat) again whenever I want or whenever I get hungry. It's not possible to do it wrong or ruin anything. I still tend to prefer satisfying meals but I'm tuning in better to what and how much *really* satisfies as opposed to eating what and how much I always do without checking in on how that feels. Weird! But fun and enlightening.

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I finished chapter 4 last night on Challenging the Food Police. For me, the big takeaway on that one is the realization that:

Beliefs create thoughts. Thoughts affect feelings. Feelings affect behavior.

With eating, we try to deal in behavior only. Eat this. Don't eat that. These portions. These rules. But behavior doesn't happen in isolation. If you don't deal with the whole cascade, you just stumble around wondering why you keep doing that. 

So, for example, you hold the belief that you need to be thin in order to be successful. This creates the thought that eating too many cookies makes you a hopeless failure. That thought creates feelings of guilt, shame, and rebellion. Those uncomfortable feelings then cause you to go ahead and overeat the rest of the cookies, because f%$k it, that's what hopeless failures do.

See how it's all tangled together and not exactly helpful? 

So, instead of just dealing in cookie limits, they give you tools for identifying your beliefs. Then challenging, changing, or dismissing unhelpful thoughts. This shifts your feelings about yourself and food, which results in more positive, mindful behavior and less reactive nonsense. 

Cool!

I'm moving really slowly through this. It seems like every chapter is so packed with thought-provoking information that I need time to process. Last night I finished chapter 3 on making peace with food. I've done that already, so I don't really have anything to work with in terms of doing the exercises myself. There is so much good information here though! It will definitely help me explain the process to others. If you have fear foods, trigger foods, think you can't be trusted around certain foods, or believe you're a food addict, this chapter is GOLD. 

I really liked the discussion of habituation. It's what dieters lack, having those high-reward foods around, being able to eat them whenever, and being indifferent about it. The more we try to restrict certain foods, the weirder we get about them. Restriction is the cause of the bingey out of control behavior, so more restriction isn't going to somehow solve it.

They walk you through the process of legalizing all foods. Something I hadn't considered is the part where they explain that variety makes habituation harder. So, if your intention is to normalize ice cream, you should do the practice with one brand and flavor. Having lots of different flavors and brands available makes habituation take longer because we don't get bored. The ice cream stays overly exciting. But if you're only eating Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough (or whatever), after a few weeks of eating it regularly, even daily, you're going to be able to take it or leave it. It's still tasty, but it no longer holds any special powers. Maybe you find yourself wanting something else instead. 

I also thought it was interesting that you don't need to repeat this weeks-long process for every single food and flavor. After you've done it a few times with a few different foods, the new thought patterns stick. You learn that you can be trusted. You can enjoy some and stop. You can have high-reward foods in your house. You've seen proof with these foods, so when you introduce that food, your experience and confidence carries over. Fascinating! That was definitely my experience. I baby-stepped it with a few different foods, ice cream in particular, and then it all started getting easier. 

Some quotes and more thoughts:

Making peace with food is a critical component of Intuitive Eating, which involves eating the food you desire with attunement to your hunger and fullness levels. It is the process of making your food choices emotionally equal, without placing shame or judgment on them, whether you are eating green jelly beans or a piece of broccoli. Your dignity remains intact, regardless of your food choices. You are not a bad or good person based on what you eat!

Books and programs that preach certain foods will hurt me, kill me, or give me diabesity really messed with my head. Paleo and bread, The China Study and cheese. Sugar Busters! God, I'd blocked that one out. If you keep identifying "bad" foods over the years, of course you're going to feel like a bad person when you eat them, or at least like a cheater/junky/criminal/reckless moron. Not helpful. 

Living and eating by the rules seems to work just fine, until something goes awry. That something could be an event, an emotion, a thought, a craving, or just sheer hunger that triggers the violation of a sacred food rule. Just a bite of the wrong food at the wrong time, and all bets are off. Bye-bye food rules. All restraint is broken, and an all-or-none food feast ensues—for tomorrow a new day begins, and the forbidden foods will be off-limits, once again. Better hurry and eat it now, before you change your mind.

Yep, there you go. That! Which is why you have to be careful setting up happy eating "guidelines" if you're still in a rules mindset. Maybe you decide it's ok to eat chocolate now, but you will only have two squares on the first Tuesday after a full moon, which is fine until you eat three squares on a random Wednesday and then all the shame, guilt, and what-the-hell eating flare up.

Which reminds me of the part where they were talking about the problem with "I can eat whatever I want" when pursued in a rebellious way and not aligned with body's cues. It becomes an excuse to disconnect and overeat without regard to hunger and fullness, which is how intuitive eating went so wrong for me the first few times I tried it. I expected that it would go wrong, not work for me, and I would have to return to dieting at some point. That mindset is poison. The threat of a future diet ensures that intuitive eating won't work for you because it keeps restriction alive, which fuels the rebound eating.

I liked being reminded of the research showing that restrained eaters don't actually eat less food. They simply feel guiltier about what they do eat.  

Then there was the research about how the more a parent restricts a child's eating, the bigger the rebound effect, causing the child to eat more of the forbidden foods, eat in the absence of hunger, and overeat. They're more likely to struggle with weight, binge eating, and emotional eating in the future. It made me think about how I haven't always been the best caretaker to myself. My parents didn't restrict my food. I grew up and did it to myself. Face-palm...

Ok, gotta go cook tacos now. It's Taco Tuesday! More thoughts to come, I'm sure. 

"What is the biggest help to stay on track for you?"

For me it was realizing there is no track (or horse, or wagon) to fall off of. The idea that your eating can be on or off, right or wrong causes so many problems. That mindset is what creates the guilt, drama, judgment, and rebellion. We do it in the first place because the diet mentality all around us promotes it as helpful and necessary. It seems normal to restrict and judge, but that's what makes our eating so crazy. We keep trying to address the eating, but it's the mindset that's the real troublemaker.

I'm always free to eat whatever, whenever, and as much as I want. Once that reality sets in, it becomes a case of, "How do I want to eat? How do I want to feel? What do I like?" It's sure not starvation dieting, or binge eating, or a bunch of complicated rules that destroy my social life. I like eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner, something I hadn't allowed myself to do in decades. I like being hungry for my meals, eating until I'm satisfied, and not getting hungry or thinking about again for hours. I like moving for fun instead of fat burn. I like not writing or tracking anything. I like being free to eat any food at all. I like not worrying about what other people think of my choices. Once I was living in line with my values and preferences instead of random diet rules, so many painful thoughts and weird behaviors fell away.

Honoring Hunger

I'm kind of sailing through this chapter without feeling the need to write much. I thought the exercise where you sit and perceive your heartbeat without touching your pulse was fun and interesting. I have a knack for that because it's how I know when my Fitbit is drunk.

I liked the self-care assessment. I've definitely improved at it over the years. I have two attunement disrupters. I watch WAY more than two hours of television per day, 10-12 hours if I'm working, and maybe 4-6 on days I'm at home. This is probably scrambling my brain in some way, but I'm an entertainment geek surrounded by entertainment geeks. This is what we do. LOL

My second disrupter is that I multitask while I eat, and love to do so. I'm still not convinced this is problematic but I'm open to the possibility that it might be. I've done experiments eating with and without distractions multiple times over the years. I find eating without distractions to be sad and boring. Ideally, I prefer human interaction when I eat, if not in person, then humans on TV or online. If I can't have humans then I at least want a view. Eating outside on my deck watching the wildlife is fine. Sitting alone at a table staring at a wall, not fine. Sad. I find myself eating faster so I can get on with something more fun. But if I'm entertained, if the meal feels like an occasion, then I linger and savor and really enjoy the food. This means I finish in 5 minutes if there's nothing going on and more like 20-40 minutes of I'm entertained or socializing and enjoying the eating experience. And that's with the same amount of food. Hmmm.

So then I flip the page and see the hunger and fullness scale. I pretended I'd never seen it before and looked at it with a totally open mind. It's funny how there's nothing threatening there! I like how they've added whether the sensation is pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral. Overeating slightly is neutral, not a calamity. Back in the day, this may have helped me not be such a nut about stopping at exactly the right hint of a sensation. Getting very hungry and looking forward to a meal is neutral too, not an emergency to be headed off.

Since they asked, I usually start eating at a hunger level of 2-4 and I usually stop at a 7-8. I'm at a level 4 hunger when I go to bed at night (subtly hungry, slightly empty) and I wake up at a 5 (neutral, neither hungry or full), but I go ahead and eat, usually within the first half hour I'm awake. If I wait an hour or two, I'm clearly physically hungry again (2-3) and looking forward to a considerably bigger meal than I would have eaten at zero dark thirty.

I like eating 3 substantial meals 5-7 hours apart, or 2 very substantial meals 8-9 hours apart with a snack between them. I nearly always eat 3 times per day, but sometimes 2 or 4. This works much better for me than mini meals and eating more often.

I liked this quote.

"If you do not experience hunger cues, you will need to call upon your rational thought to keep yourself nourished. (Remember, Intuitive Eating is a dynamic interplay of instinct, emotion, and rational thought). This might seem like it goes against the Intuitive Eating protocol of listening to your body, but in situations where your hunger cues are offline, it is really a type of self-care in the form of nourishment."

I'm not hungry first thing in the morning, post workout, or if I'm very stressed. I still eat.

I loved the Nourishment 911 and "I can't be hungry. I just ate." discussions, and then the worksheet to sort out the difference between mind cues and body cues. That may be the greatest thing ever!

Diet History and Diet Mentality

A brief list of the diets I can remember doing. I'm sure there are many I've blocked out: Atkins, Pritikin, F Factor, Susan Powter, Bob Greene, Ornish, McDougall, vegetarian, Mediterranean, French Women, glycemic index, The Zone, Body for Life, South Beach, macros, Precision Nutrition, Red Carpet Ready, Venus Index, Turbulence Training, Primal Blueprint, Paleo Solution, Eat Stop Eat, Lean Gains, Engine 2.

If I think about what happened to my weight, the answer is nothing much. Mostly I'd lose 5-10 pounds and regain 15. It was an exercise in futility and frustration. I became more desperate and crazy with each round. Many people have a honeymoon phase with the first diet that "worked." It was never easy or effortless for me (probably because I never needed to lose weight!) but it did get progressively harder the more I messed with my food. The longest I can remember maintaining weight lost through dieting was about a week. I'm almost not exaggerating. I always rebound binged after dieting. Contest diets like Body for Life encouraged that. You could live it up for awhile, snap new "before" photos, and then start the next round.

I began dieting around 12 years old. It was the combination of puberty, peer pressure, and diet culture. I was getting bigger. People noticed. It made me very uncomfortable. I remember one horrific science class where we weighed ourselves and I weighed over 100 pounds. Triple digits, when the other girls were weighing 79 or 86 or something. We were studying genetic differences. I had the hairy knuckle mutation too. I wanted to crawl into the floor and die, but I started restricting my food instead. I dabbled and yo-yo dieted for about six years before it became a full-blown eating disorder. Even then, my weight bounced around because it was a cycle of binging and starving. At no point did I lose weight though dieting, then switch to some kind of maintenance and keep it off (the fairytale).

I was always on a quest to lose "the last ten pounds." My quests generally resulted in a bonus twenty. So, yeah, I can't name any diet as having worked.

Oh, wow! That graph of dieting consequences is boggling. I'm not going to write in detail about the consequences because I've already done plenty of that in my journal. I don't need any more convincing. For anyone still tempted by diet thoughts it would be eye-opening.

On the Tools of Dieting chart I didn't check any of them. They're gone! Woohoo! Good riddance. I liked their explanation of the process by which the calorie counter in your head becomes nonfunctional. That mirrors what I experienced. I definitely didn't just turn it off one day.

The Dieting Mentality checklist is pretty awesome. It's mostly gone for me now, but early in the process I would have had check marks all over that. They discuss the importance of identifying these thoughts as "diet mentality" without judgment. Just noticing them is huge. There are also tips on not turning Intuitive Eating into your next diet.

Ok, I'm bleary-eyed. More tomorrow.

The workbook questions are so juicy! I could write forever. I think different aspects of the questions will hit home for different people. Here are some of my thoughts on the self-compassion exercises:

I struggled the most with my eating when my thoughts were the most fear-driven and harsh. The primary focus was appearance, weight, and what I imagined others were thinking about me. It felt very moral. I was on top of the world when I had everything (very temporarily) under control. I felt guilty, ashamed, and worthless when I didn't. I was always comparing my choices and appearance to others. The more emotional and dramatic my thoughts, the crazier my eating became.

When a friend, loved one, or even a random person online is struggling, it's a whole different story (now anyway) for myself and them. I'm all about curiosity, kindness, humor, focusing on the positive, embracing opportunity, and moving forward. What's interesting is that when I was so hard on myself in the past, I suspect I was also a holy terror to others. I would push them through that same moral filter, using "tough love" to "save" them. Gah!

Everything about my eating changed when my thinking changed. We go about it backward, believing that eating a certain way will change our thinking. If we could only bully and shame ourselves into eating perfectly, we'd finally be happy. Ha! No!

Some words and phrases that have replaced my bully talk: Is that true? Treat yourself with curiosity and kindness. Every moment is a fresh start. There is no failure, only feedback. Comparison is the thief of joy. It's not possible to do anything wrong, only to learn. What others think of me is not my business. I'm always free to eat whatever, whenever, and as much as I want. I own my choices. I deserve to feel good.

Weee!!! Let's go!

I've read the Introduction, done the first exercises, and taken the quiz.

A couple of things I highlighted:

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Intuitive Eating is a process of relearning instincts we once knew. We are born Intuitive Eaters, but cultural messages to diet and lose weight often infiltrate our minds and sway us away from listening to our bodies.

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People are weary of dieting and yet terrified of eating. People don’t know how to eat anymore. They are ashamed of their bodies and don’t trust that their bodies “work.” The pleasure of eating has been stolen.

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Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.

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Weight is not a health behavior.

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I loved the first exercise. I won't spoil it for you. It certainly makes a point!

On the intuitive eating quiz, I learned that I'm already a very intuitive eater. The one thing that stood out as something to work on is that I don't stop eating based on fullness. Satisfaction, definitely, but not fullness sensations in my stomach. That again! However, it has just now occurred to me that it's a skill I could still practice and learn. I don't have to write it off as impossible or unnecessary.

Anybody else started reading?