Trust your body
Intuitive eating means following internal cues, not external rules
“Intuitive eating,” a term California dietitians Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch coined in 1995, refers to using internal cues, not external rules, to guide decisions about what, when and how much to eat. It sounds simple, but for many eager to get off the diet roller-coaster, their efforts can falter when they realize it’s not as simple — nor “intuitive” — as it appears. They wonder if they consider a food appealing, or unappealing, because of their true preferences or because they’ve labelled it as “good” or “bad” for years.
Here’s how to navigate the grey areas and stumbling blocks:
DON’T TRY TO FOLLOW A ‘HUNGER-FULLNESS’ DIET
New York dietitian Christy Harrison, host of the Food Psych Podcast and author of the forthcoming book Anti-Diet, said the discussion in popular culture tends to boil down to the concept of eating when you’re hungry, stopping when you’re full and avoiding emotional eating.
“Most people are so used to looking at things in a black-andwhite sense,” said New York dietitian and certified intuitive eating counsellor Alissa Rumsey. “With intuitive eating, you need to learn to embrace the grey area. Only eating when you’re hungry is not feasible.” For example, having cake at a birthday party usually isn’t about hunger, and sometimes we need to eat before we’re hungry because we won’t have time later.
“Honour your hunger” and “feel your fullness” are only two of the 10 principles Tribole and Resch created for their 1995 book, Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works. “You can’t cherry-pick the principles,” Rumsey said.
The others are “make peace with food,” “challenge the food police,” “discover the satisfaction factor,” “cope with emotions without using food,” “respect your body,” “exercise — feel the difference,” “honour your health with gentle nutrition,” and notably the first principle is “reject the diet mentality.”
Harrison said rejecting the diet mentality is more significant than simply ceasing to diet. “It’s about changing your mindset and recognizing, then stepping away from, the internalized beliefs that come from diet culture,” she said.
BE OPEN TO FEELING A LITTLE CHAOTIC
One common fear people have is if they allow themselves to eat formerly off-limits foods, they’ll never be able to stop. “When someone fears that they’re never going to stop eating their favourite food, it’s probably because they’ve been deprived of it for so long,” Tribole said. “If you come to intuitive eating really hungry, it’s easy to be afraid that you’re never going to stop eating.”
Rumsey said another common misperception is that it means eating whatever you want, any time you want. “With intuitive eating, you have permission to eat what you want, anytime you want, but that doesn’t mean you always do that. Hunger, fullness, satisfaction, how food makes us feel — those are all important, but intuitive eating also means using your brain and life experience.”
Rather than being “one big cheat day,” intuitive eating is about developing an awareness of internal body sensations, Tribole said. “When you know what your needs are physically, you have a treasure trove of information to help guide you.”
After years of dieting, it can be hard to tune back into the body’s signals, Harrison said. “Unconditional permission to eat is a gentle way back into that,” she said.
She suggested thinking about “what sounds good, what tastes good, what brings me pleasure and joy. Then, come back to how foods are sitting with you. It’s important to let yourself get enough food, and enough varieties of food, first.”
UNTANGLE NUTRITION FROM DIETING
One of the principles is “honour your health with gentle nutrition.” But people often worry they’re doing it wrong, or that “diet mind” is creeping back in when they want broccoli, salmon and quinoa instead of a cheeseburger and fries.
“Intuitive eaters don’t apologize for eating a doughnut or a salad,” Tribole said. People should ask, “What’s the intention behind the desire to eat a healthy food? If the intention is to shrink your body, then that’s a clue that
diet mind is at play,” she said. Other clues are the presence of guilt or fear. “If there’s any of that feeling of, ‘If I don’t eat that broccoli, I’m going to ruin my health, or I’m going to gain weight,’ those are clues that diet mentality is creeping in,” Harrison said. Choosing the broccoli can be an act of self-care. “Maybe you’ve noticed that when you include a few servings of vegetables, you feel more energetic and your digestion works better,” she said. “A truly peaceful relationship with food is about self-care, not self-control.”
GIVE INTUITIVE EATING TIME TO FEEL INTUITIVE
The principles are not absolute rules. “There’s no such thing as pass or fail. There’s learning and discovering,” Tribole said. “So, you overate at lunch. Let’s see what happens. Maybe you don’t feel hungry for an afternoon snack; maybe you aren’t as hungry at dinner. Ultimately, it’s not satisfying to undereat, and it’s usually not satisfying to overeat. But you get to decide.”
Rumsey said dieting is usually easy at first because there’s a plan to follow and clear rules. But it gets harder over time because the rules aren’t sustainable in real life, and our bodies often push back against the ongoing restriction. “Intuitive eating is the opposite: It’s really hard at first because for most people, it’s totally different than what they’ve been doing,” she said. “But over time, intuitive eating gets easier and easier.”
Ultimately, said Tribole, “it’s about putting the pleasure back in food and about healing your relationship with food, mind and body so you can live your best life.”