How to make peace with your food and stop dieting. (Part 1)

Let me start by saying I’m one of those hormonally unlucky women. You know, the kind that smells fatty food and immediately packs on the pounds? Yeah, that kind!

There’s been no greater evidence of this than now (I’m 8 months postpartum and nursing actively) As I write this post, my burp currently smells like rotten eggs, I’m extremely bloated and all-round irritable.

I decided to go for a brisk walk in hopes that I’d feel better. It helped, a little.

Then I decided that an intense workout would do the trick, but I immediately caught myself and remembered today was my active rest day.

It’s been eons since my burps smelled like rotten eggs and I felt so shitty.

What could the problem be? I reviewed my diet the past two days and realized the root of my problem: Beans, Corn, Dairy and No exercise.

Did I mention I was hormonally unlucky?

Anyway, this post isn’t about how unlucky I am in the hormone department. It’s about how easy it is to fall into a pattern of disordered eating and how to find food freedom…. at last! So let’s get to it shall we?

What exactly is disordered eating?

If you were following my story, you’ll recall where I almost considered an intense exercise because I felt horrible as a result of my dietary choices.

The truth is, eating a small amount of beans, corn or dairy won’t hurt me on a good day, but when I consume all three together in one day, in not-so-small amounts, that’s a disaster waiting to happen. Yet, I do it anyway and anticipate the awful feeling that follows shortly.

In the past, I’d fast two days after my meal to “detox” or simply over-exercise to make up for my dietary excesses. These behaviors would be accompanied by feelings of guilt, shame and disappointment…. All because I ate something I really enjoyed eating!

So I ask you...

How many times have you found yourself performing a weeks workout in a day to make up for the weekend excesses, or gone on weekly cleanses to make up for sugar loading over the holidays?

How many times have you hidden in your secret place to binge on embarrassing junk food concoctions so nobody would discover your secret eating habits?

How many times have you posted photos of healthy food or gym pictures on social media to show the world that you’re concerned about your health, when in fact, you really treat your body like a refuse dump?

How much have you spent on weight loss pills and teas that promise overnight weight loss to make up for eating too much, or drank some potion before or after meals?

I could go on and on but I think you get where I’m going with this.

Now, don’t confuse a genuine intent to get healthy with disordered eating patterns.

A genuine intent to get healthy isn’t obsessively focused on looking a certain way, neither does it entail engaging in certain behaviors to achieve that goal whether detrimental to health or not. Genuine intent is healthy, open, embraces occasional setbacks and makes you feel good about your efforts.

The main features of disordered eating are intense feelings of shame and guilt surrounding eating and food choices, an obsessive preoccupation with body size and harsh self-judgments. Sound familiar?

I have a habit of silently checking on my present and past clients daily activities in a bid to understand them more, outside of the client-coach relationship and I can tell from this activity that disordered eating is the biggest challenge women have.

The funny thing is, they don’t know they have this problem.

Take my former client Adaeze (not her real name).

Ada is a major foodie. That’s not a bad thing. Before our time together, Ada had a habit of going on restrictive diets to lose weight, which she did, but then afterwards she’d feel deprived and then have one cheat day. On that cheat day, she’d binge on everything.. and I mean every junk food imaginable. She simply couldn’t stop herself.

By the end of the day, she’d start to feel extremely depressed and ashamed. These feelings of guilt would result in her fasting for 3 days to atone for her “dietary sins”. After three days, she’d attend a work party and come face-to-face with her weakness: Junk food.

She’d talk herself into having a tiny piece and then another tiny piece and another… till she found herself packing some home to eat later. She’d end up eating the extras on her way home while stuck in traffic.

Now she gets home and climbs the scale (a daily habit) and she’s 2 kilos heavier than she was when she left the house. She’s so depressed and ashamed and starts searching the web for a magic pill to help manage hunger and burn fat.

This was before we worked together. Now that we’re done, Ada is in a better place with food but has she made peace with it?

In all honesty, the answer is NO.

You see, Ada repeatedly posts pictures of junk food that she’s about to eat and then unconsciously punishes herself for her choices by tagging the pictures with judgments like “fatty” or “junkie”.

Maybe she does this because she feels that’s what the world would think of her (it’s not) and so she decides to punish herself first. That way, whatever judgments we have of her won’t hurt her so much.

Basically, Ada moved from having an eating disorder to disordered eating.

Eating disorder? Disordered Eating? Isn’t that the same thing?

No, it’s not (Believe me, I was confused too).

Eating disorders occur on a spectrum. On one end of the spectrum, we have Normal Eating, and on the other end, we have Eating disorders.

Somewhere between Normal Eating and Eating disorders lie Disordered Eating and Mindful Eating.

So the catch is, disordered eating is a less severe form of an eating disorder.

In disordered eating, there are no extreme behaviors like starving for days or misusing laxatives or self-inducing vomit to compensate for the calories consumed.

This doesn’t mean disordered eating does not have a negative impact on ones health and well-being. Disordered eating patterns affects your emotions, social and physical well-being to a large extent.

I’ll share with you some of the signs that you just might be leaving the disordered eating ship and developing an eating disorder. But before then, let’s talk about why people, especially women, engage in disordered eating.

Did you know over 90% of Women are dissatisfied with theirs bodies? And who can blame them? the society, media and popular culture all say that a woman has to look a certain way before she’s acceptable and attractive.

Body shaming has become the order of the day with women, men and even individuals shaming their own bodies and the bodies of others whether consciously or unconsciously.

Having a positive body image and championing self-love are seen as uncool and downright insane. It’s almost like hating or being dissatisfied with our bodies is the new cool and fosters a sense of belonging.

“Gosh! I hate my hips”.

“Really? I hate my boobs too”

“Oh great! Let’s be friends!”

There starts the beginning of a friendship characterized by body shame and a negative body image. These friends then go on to spread the body hate/body shaming gospel around (not deliberately of course!) till you have a community of women who think that hips and boobs have to be small before you’re acceptable to society.

Then the beauty industry gets a whiff of this and makes a fortune off women hating themselves or wanting to change something. Every. Single. Time.

And then there’s me, in my little corner blogging about health and wellness, trying to make a living selling the truth. Alas! Nobody wants none of that, not for too long at least, it’s too hard and too slow.

Oh well!

Here are some of the signs that you may have developed or may be developing an eating disorder:

1. Severe Calorie Restriction

2. Chronic Dieting

3. Obsession with the scale

4. Good vs. Bad Mentality

5. Feeling out of control around food especially at night or over the weekend.

6. Irregular periods

7. Compensating for calories consumed or workouts missed

8. Mental Fog (inability to concentrate)

9. Use of diet teas/pills

10. Middle of the night eating

11. Wearing baggy, concealing clothing

12. Secretive food concocting and embarrassing food mixtures. (E.g topping pizza with chocolate and ice cream.

In part two, I’ll be explaining what mindful eating is and teaching some mindful eating techniques to help find a balance between eating foods you love, staying fit, healthy and happy.

Meanwhile, do you frequently find yourself engaging in these behaviors? Don’t worry, we’re here to help.

Something may have struck a nerve after reading this article, and you may be thinking ..."Sheesh! could I really be developing an eating disorder?"

If you'd like to speak with someone about your relationship with food, consider the Food Freedom Nutrition Coaching Program. Our next group kicks off shortly.

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In part two, I’ll be explaining what mindful eating is and teaching some mindful eating techniques to help find a balance between eating foods you love, staying fit, healthy and happy.

Rather than telling you what to eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner, we'll help you build skills and habits required to eat well, every day, no matter what happens.

We'll also teach you to discover what works for you you, in the context of your own unique life. This is why our coaching system guarantees sustainable results.

Give us 1 year and we will transform your life.

We will introduce you to a new habit every 2 weeks so that you can gradually build transferable skills to build healthy habits that stick with you for life.

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