do i have a Natural Weight?
A natural healthy weight is the weight your body will maintain with normal eating and normal exercise. Over years of dieting, people rarely have a normal, healthy relationship with food.
Thanks to society many feel as if they have to workout multiple times a day, or think I want to look like this influencer, or I want to be this size and weight.
Honestly answer the following:
One way to know if you are pursuing a healthier body in a compassionate way is to ask yourself these questions:
How long can I continue to live this way?
What am I missing out on?
Am I truly taking care of myself?
Am I happy?
Do I feel good?
Let us take a moment and start to explore how to make peace with your body and accept your genetic blueprint. Just like someone who wears a size 7 shoe can not expect, nor would we want them to, to squeeze into a size 5 shoe, it is equally futile to have a similar experience about body size.
Have you ever stop and considered that we have a natural weight? Or perhaps like me you dieted for so long the thought seems obscure.
Consider this: Have you dieted and had great success only to shortly after gain your weight back? This is a sign you were pushing your body past its natural weight. So let’s take a step back. If we have to restrict our calories or get this much activity in to get to a certain weight, and it is not sustainable it is probably time to make a change.
For years I would see the scale go up and down. I even hit at a low 126lbs… but at what cost? My sanity! I was physically beating myself down to burnout at the gym and eating very little. In truth I would post how great I felt and selfies… but I was not happy. My body stopped getting stronger, I was always hungry, food was on my mind constantly. I was fed up!
So I started thinking I am just going to give up. I work hard but still do not look like this person or that person. But I also knew the importance of whole foods and being active. So I kept going.
One day while researching calories I stumbled on something called intuitive eating. I thought well what is this.. a new diet I have not tried? As I kept reading I was intrigued! Understand I would count calories but there would also be a day or 2 or, well come on let’s be real.. 3 each week I would binge eat. So this idea of learning to deal with emotions behind binge eating was very personal for me. So the first thing was no food off limits! Umm hello that sounds amazing and scary at the same time. But what I was doing already was not working so why not try something new? So let’s do this thing.
The first couple weeks were very hard. Even though I was not technically logging I’ve been logging for over 20 years so I did not really need an app. So I came to realize I had a diet addiction which is an eating disorder. I saw that not my eating habits but my mindset needed adjusting. This was going to be a lot harder of a journey than I originally thought.
Now after putting these tools into practice I can finally say - I am happy! I finally have a healthy relationship with food, and without tracking and worrying I have stayed at my healthy natural weight.
If you can relate on any level, learn from me and allow yourself to enjoy food.
