GUIDELINES FOR INTUITIVE EATING

1 RECOGNISE YOUR HUNGER CUES

‘People think getting hungry is a bad thing,’ says Laura. ‘But it’s your body sending you a message.’ Imagine a fuel gauge, where zero is empty and 10 is full to bursting. Five is neutral, neither hungry nor full. As a suggestion (not a rule!), try to eat when you’re at three.

2 FEEL YOUR FULLNESS

People often stop eating when they’re at around a five, for example no longer hungry, but not yet full. Then, an hour or two later, they’re hungry again. There’s nothing wrong with the feeling of fullness. The job of your stomach is to be a reservoir for food. Try to eat until you’re a seven.

3 NEUTRALISE YOUR INNER FOOD CRITIC

There’s usually a niggling part of your brain still saying, ‘You can’t have that,’ or, ‘That’s not healthy.’ It thinks in all-or-nothing terms: for example, if you eat sugar, you will get fat. But each time you judge a food, reframe it. If your food critic says you can’t have a biscuit, then think, ‘If I’m eating a variety of foods, one cookie is not worth stressing over.’

4 THINK BEFORE DIETING

How much time do you spend thinking about what to eat, when to eat, how much to eat? If you have any off-limit foods or rules about how much, what or when to eat, counting or tracking, then it’s a diet, and diets can have side-effects: bingeing, slowed metabolism, loss of muscle mass, rebound weight gain, food obsession, disordered eating, shame, guilt and anxiety when they fail.

5 IMPLEMENT GENTLE NUTRITION

Gentle nutrition is thinking about how different combinations of food feel in your body. In each meal and snack try to have a fruit/vegetable, a higher protein/fat food (such as eggs, fish, meat, pulses, nuts) and a grain (such as bread, pasta, rice). And remember: you don’t have to eat perfectly.