A perspective on eating what you want...

As someone who has experienced the restriction of diets, I truly feel that part of finding freedom from them has to come from allowing yourself to eat what you want, while you are learning to think about food in a different way. But I think we owe it to ourselves to ultimately learn to eat, overall, a nutritious diet.

I believe that there is a diet that is right for our bodies and which can enable us to banish a number of health problems, and that doesn’t involve (in my humble opinion) crap like fizzy drinks, additive-loaded chicken nuggets, or pot noodles (and really, around two thirds of what is on the supermarket aisles).

Diet has a huge impact on both your physical and mental health, much more than many people often realise. A couple of years ago I wrote an article on food and mood for a slimming magazine, Boost!, and spoke to nutritional expert Amanda Greary on the topic.

Greary had suffered for years with depression, had serious mental health problems and had tried a number of medications that weren’t really helping, and it was only when she changed her diet (by chance) and cut out a whole host of foods, as well as included others she hadn’t previously bothered to eat, that her symptoms started to improve.

Armed with the evidence on how diet had virtually cured her depression, Greary trained in nutrition and wrote the Food and Mood Handbook (I’ve reviewed it here). My own personal experience of how diet affects health is of yeast infection, and I’ve found that since I’ve substantially cut out a lot of foods (such as sugar) that contribute to feeling the yeast, my sinusitis problem has much improved.

While I was eating purely ‘what I wanted’ I didn’t feel my health was that great - and I learned that if you have yeast overload in your body as I did, you will naturally crave and want to eat sugary foods and those that easily convert to sugar in the blood (refined carbohydrates). I ate what I wanted, which ended up being something sweet with most meals – and that was actually what the yeast wanted.

So, I believe we need to take care with the idea of eating 'what we want’.

And yes, while we have to ditch the deprivation mentality that dieting brings about from the process of allowing ALL foods into our diet (if we choose them), at some point, respect for our bodies also needs to come. We deserve to eat what is right for us, and shouldn’t see missing out the crap as deprivation but as a choice to give ourselves the best health we can.

But I’m not into extremes, personally, and a bit of the stuff I know does me no good every now and then, when I really feel like it, keeps me happy about the way I eat. And ironically, then does me some good.

Comments

[Tree Lover]

A few months into my intuitive eating journey I realized that I had never given myself permission to truly eat anything I want. I wanted to be someone who ate healthy food, so I was forcing it onto myself. I decided to allow myself to eat anything I want without exception. Not surprisingly, my diet consisted of a lot of fried food and not so many vegetables for a while.

But then an amazing thing happened. I startd to crave salad and vegetables. Now my diet is super healthy because those are the foods I crave. I honestly crave broccoli more than I crave french fries. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever expect that to happen. But vegetables taste good, and they make my body feel good. And trusting myself and my body has led me to want to fill it with healthy food.

So I agree with you that this isn't about filling ourselves up with junk and that part of treating ourselves with kindness is to eat nourishing food. But for me, I had to allow myself to eat the junk before I was able to get to this place. And I'm sure that isn't true for everyone. This journey unfolds differently for everyone. I just wanted to add my experience.

[Jomay]

It is becoming the same for me - just a few months in and I am now starting to really want vegetables and fresh fruit salads etc. I used to eat these all the time in my 'diet days' and when I first started ditching the diet, I went for quite unhealthy foods simply because I hadn't had them for so long. It just goes to show that left to their own devices, our bodies will start to crave foods that are more nutritious and the junk starts to lose it's appeal - fantastic!

[Linda]

Hi Andrea,

Well inspired by you, I have finally bitten the bullet and started a blog about trying to get healthy. I'd love it if you or any of your readers could drop by and give me some encouragement. This is a very personal blog and I really, really hope I can stick at it, I have a long way to go. For now it's at http://passionatemedia.typepad.com/breakingthechain but I'll possibly change that!
Any feedback/advice would be greatly appreciated.
I see your blog as an inspiration and excellent resource from someone who is where I would love to be.

Sometimes I think I could probably kill to get in a pair of jeans! If I can imagine going to those lengths then sticking at healthy eating and exercise shouldn't be too hard, should it?

Thanks so much Andrea and take care,

Linda
x

[Andrea Wren]

Tree Lover - I agree that in order to reach the place of nourishing your body and treating it with respect, you have to dump the restriction mentality and allow all food, even the junkiest. I had to do this - I survived on egg custards much of the time when I began this journey! And what I was saying is that sometimes we might think it us making the choice, but in my case, it was my yeast infection leading to cravings! Candida can massively impact on how much you crave sugary foods, and the more I ate them, the more I craved them - even though I'd mentally shed the idea that I couldn't have them. So for people who are unsure, it might be worth checking to see if there are any underlying health problems when it comes to cravings, I think.

Jomay, yeah - junk does start to lose its appeal when you know you can have it! Anytime you want! It's fab to be free of this hey?!

Linda - another blog?! You are dynamite, lady! I am so glad you've been inspired by my blog, though - so wonderful to know! I would say to think of it in a holistic way, rather than getting healthy by just incorporating foods you think are healthy - you might need to go through the process of allowing yourself all the junk to first because although you may be eating junk now, from what I gathered on your twins blog, you're doing it because you think you're not supposed to, and that drives the desire further! Good luck.

xxx

[lisa jane]

I think eating intuitively is about more than listening to your taste buds, your body and the way it feels deserves a say too.

I also think people start learning to eat intuitively and stop/get stuck at the 'legalising' part, particularly and often quit if they are gaining weight.

Glad to hear that you have found a way to honour your body that is right for you.

Learning how your very own body runs at it's best is very important, though i don't think that there is one 'diet' for want of a better word that is right for everyone.

Regardless of how well something works for someone else, we all need to learn to love,respect and nurture our own bodies in our own way.

For me personally, there is noone that knows what's best for my body better than me.I don't believe in good and bad foods anymore I believe there is nutritionally dense and nutritionally void with a whole heap of grey matter in between.

Absolutes have no place in my life anymore, I gave them up for freedom.

[Andrea Wren]

Lisa - wise words and I love the fact that this post has generated so many worthy comments. I think 'nutritionally dense and nutritionally void' is a good way of describing food, and I would also say that regardless of how my diet has to be because of health, there are still no absolutes for me.

I think I shall have to write another post to comment on the comments!

[Not hungry but...]

Sorry to join the debate so late, but I, too, came to that conclusion, so I couldn't resist writing a comment, even though that post is quite 'old' in blog terms!
Best of all, it coincides with deciding to write a blog of my own about intuitive eating, so I feel even more compelled to send youo a comment!
I've been on the intuitive eating path for a good few years, but it's only in the past 2 years that I have been trying very hard to follow the principles laid out by the likes of Geneen Roth.
Still, a few months ago, after experimenting with food and ex-forbidden foods, I came to the same conclusion: respecting ourselves and our bodies is what this is all about, really. Our issues are not about food but about ourselves. The day we decide we deserve to be treated well 'by ourselves' is the day we decide to treat OUR BODIES well, with respect, and therefore it is the day we can finally eat normally - 90% good, nutritious food, and 10% 'fun food'.

Thanks for a great post.