Ditch the diet mentality

So what is your reason for dieting?

To lose a little weight for upcoming event or to lose weight on a more permanent basis?

• Maybe you want to be healthier and feel better in your skin?

• Maybe you want more energy, better sleep and improved mood?
  
  Why do you want to start intuitive eating?

• Is it just another diet fad to you?

• Or are you ready to ditch the diet and start fresh

Reasons come first - Results come second

Reject the Diet Mentality- Recognize and acknowledge the damage that diets can cause us:

Think about this: Have previous diets helped your lose and keep the weight off long term.. or as you look back fondly on the last diet are we just remembering the temporary weight loss that it provided?

What has it done to your body? Dieting physiologically changes us: While in the short term they can help move the needle on your scale, they’ll likely make you feel sluggish, moody, nauseated and achy. Plus, in the long term, they can set you up for metabolism problems, rebound weight gain and life-threatening medical conditions.

Your mind? Some people diet because they have a poor body image, rather than because they want to eat nutritionally well, or be in a healthy weight range. While it is important to maintain healthy eating behaviours, dieting can lead to physical illness and depression, especially if your weight goes up and down after dieting.

If you have tried a diet and even had success but have gained the weight back remember:
It’s not about your lack of willpower or about you being a failure.

It’s the system of dieting that is the problem – diets and focusing on body size are a set up for failure. Why? Because they don’t work and if you are thinking yes they do I’ve lost weight before, then why are you still looking for a diet or still on one? It’s not because you can’t do it but because the diet does not work

Reject the idea that there are any good diets out there. Stop with the lose 10lbs in 10 day or any quick weight loss trick.. have they ever worked for us before?

Also go Unfollow social media accounts that push diets (especially those that make you feel bad about yourself) and instead follow accounts that share positive food and body image messaging.

https://www.instagram.com/playeatlivewell/

Also remember to give yourself grace & self-compassion- I recently had a client who really struggled with this. She was so affected by diet culture, that when she would eat what they call “comfort foods” she would cry and say I am so bad and I failed… With intuitive eating there are NO food rules and NO judgment. That means self judgment also. So be patient and empathetic with yourself as you let go of diet culture.

Be aware of the deeply ingrained diet mentality traits that you may need to uproot : Things like this food is good or bad : that has too many carbs : I do not have enough calories for that.

Deconstructing & unlearning this mindset takes time, patience, & intention. So be patient and remember You are not alone.⁣

Also allow yourself to get angry at the lies that have led you to feel as if you were a failure every time a new diet stopped working and you gained back all of the weight. It is not you that failed it is the diet

Have you been on so many diets you cannot remember them all?

You are not alone. It is very common for people to have tried numerous diets throughout their lifetime, generally more than they can remember. Many of these diets have very strict rules to follow.

A diet can be initiated with the hopes of changing our body size or for improvement of health and oftentimes it can be a subtle way to take control over something in our lives. Dieting offers some hope, a solution to your “problem”. It is no wonder that the excitement and motivation at the beginning of a diet are so tempting, the feel-good neurotransmitters are released just thinking about starting a new diet. But this is unfortunately short lived because again diets do not work.

It is worth mentioning that you don’t have to be on a formal diet (like a named diet ie: Keto, Macros, etc) to be fully participating in a diet mentality. We often aren’t “dieting” but have thoughts that some foods are morally superior to others or we follow rigid rules about how and what we eat. This is diet mentality, so even if you think you are not dieting if you view any food as a cheat… you are still being influenced by diet culture.

The first principle of Intuitive Eating: Reject the Diet Mentality, is everything.

What are some signs of diet mentality
• Do you feel as though you have to pay penance (i have to exercise) to “earn” a favorite food or food in general?

• Do you track food intake or counting calories and macronutrients?

• Do you restrict things such as carbs, fat or any other type of food that you fear is unhealthy or may cause a change in body size?

• Do you reduce your portion sizes or food intake for an upcoming event or to fit into a certain style or clothing size?

• Do you choose foods that are labeled “diet”, “health foods” or “clean”?

• Do you judge or compare your meal or food choices to others or eat a certain way in order to impress someone else?

RECOGNIZING DIET MENTALITY IN YOUR LIFE AND NOTICING WHEN IT COMES UP FOR YOU IS THE FIRST STEP TO REJECTING DIET CULTURE. IT WILL TAKE TIME, LOTS OF TIME, TO BEGIN TO CORRECT THESE OLD THOUGHT PATTERNS AND BEHAVIORS.

So what can you do?
1- A powerful way to nurture a new way of thinking is to remove the junk in your environment that is not serving you such as the scale, “skinny” clothes, diet books, food tracking apps, and diet pills or diet program foods and shakes.

2- consider starting to follow anti-diet accounts and body positive folks on social media.

Rejecting the diet mentality is no easy feat. You may revisit these ideas and this principle time after time and then again. When we’ve lived with a lifetime of influence of diet culture we must have compassion for ourselves as we work through the unlearning, relearning, and as we take the steps toward leaving the diet mentality in our rear view mirror.