Does Intuitive Eating Work & is it Considered "Healthy"?
Takeaway: In a world inundated with diets and food rules, the concept of intuitive eating emerges as a refreshing and liberating approach to nourishment. In this post, we’ll delve into the essence of intuitive eating, shedding light on its effectiveness and the health benefits it offers. Discover the path to a more balanced, sustainable, and joyful relationship with food as we explore the science and principles behind this transformative practice.
Our culture is so cluttered with noise around 'what to eat' vs 'what not to eat', 'what is healthy' vs 'what is unhealthy', and so on that trusting your body to know what it needs can seem like a mystical, elusive idea. This is why we are going to take a look at the practice of intuitive eating together; allowing you to walk away with some facts and a better picture of how this could look in your life. Let's start by introducing the essence of intuitive eating, explore how it offers an alternative to the traditional diet mentality and food rules, and discover its ability to rekindle a trusting relationship with food and the body's natural signals.
Understanding Intuitive Eating
Intuitive eating is not just another diet trend, it is a holistic approach to nourishment that emphasizes listening to your body's cues and honoring its needs without judgement. At its core, intuitive eating is about returning to our innate, internal wisdom regarding food and rejecting the external pressures and restrictions imposed by diet culture. We might as well start with a few of the key principles within intuitive eating!
6 of The Intuitive Eating Principles
Reject the Diet Mentality: The first step is to acknowledge how the restriction and deprivation that comes with chronic dieting is harmful and not sustainable long term. This begins the process of unlearning the internalized messages from diet culture.
Honor Your Hunger: Unlike diets that often encourage ignoring hunger cues or adhering to arbitrary rules around when to eat, intuitive eating teaches us how to listen and respond to the body's natural signals of hunger and make satisfying food choices in response.
Make Peace with Food: Assigning moral value to food with labels like "good" vs "bad" causes some of us to feel as though certain foods have power to impact our sense of self worth. (like if we eat the 'bad' food, then we, ourselves, must be 'bad') . Making peace with food means leveling the playing field so all foods are allowed and no one food has the power to cause guilt or shame.
Challenge the Food Police: It is exhausting to keep up with all of the rules and 'shoulds' or 'shouldn'ts' that diets assign. Break free from the rules by challenging and unlearning the internalized beliefs from diet culture and embrace a more flexible, compassionate, and nurturing internal dialogue.
Respect Your Fullness: Just as we honor signals of hunger, intuitive eating teaches us to tune in to fullness cues and satisfaction. This allows for more enjoyment and optimized nutrition while respecting the body's needs.
Discover the Satisfaction Factor: This principle is considered to be the core of eating intuitively. By finding pleasure in eating through thoughtful food choices and combinations, intuitive eaters are able to move on from thinking about food and use their brain power for other important areas of life!
After reading through 6 of the 10 principles of intuitive eating, you are getting a better understanding of what this is all about. Now compare this to the traditional diet culture mentality:
The Diet Mentality:
Gives a set of rules and restrictions to follow which inevitably leave you feeling guilty (and hungry), while believing that you have failed, when you end up 'breaking the rules;
Upholds endless external markers for 'how to eat' such as calorie counting, measuring foods, strict timings, or foods that are 'not allowed'
Categorizes foods in black or white boxes such as 'good' or 'bad', 'healthy' or 'unhealthy', which fosters feelings of guilt and shame if you make the 'wrong choice'
Encourages rigid adherence to dietary guidelines, ignoring individual needs, preferences, backgrounds, cultures, etc.
Focuses on weight loss as the primary measure of success, often neglecting overall well-being and satisfaction.
Misconceptions about intuitive eating abound, often fueled by misinformation and societal pressure to adhere to a widely accepted diet culture. Some of us may think, if we didn't have our body size to complain about, diet tips and tricks to share, or food rules to bring us together, what else would we connect on?! By acknowledging how pervasive this is, we can get curious about what our life could look like if we peel back this toxic layer of the dieting mindset.
Myths of Intuitive Eating
Intuitive eating promotes being unhealthy
Reality: Research has found intuitive eating to be associated with improved nutrient intake, better psychological wellbeing, better body image, and decreased disordered eating.
Intuitive eating is only for people recovering from disordered eating or an eating disorder.
Reality: We were all born to be intuitive eaters! Connecting to our internal cues is a return to our natural state before all of the external noise clouded our ability to learn from and trust our bodies. That said, anyone could benefit from this practice.
Intuitive eating will make me gain weight
Reality: It is impossible to predict how the body will respond to eating intuitively. So weight gain, weight loss, or maintaining weight are all possible in this process. It is important to understand that the focus is not on manipulating body weight, rather, by learning to respond to the body's wisdom, the focus will be on changing behaviors to support the body's optimal functioning and wellbeing.
By embracing intuitive eating, we can experience freedom from diet culture, cultivate a better relationship with our bodies, and rediscover the joy of eating. If you are unsure of if you are ready to take this step, we would love to explore this with you- reach out to one of our registered dietitians specialized in intuitive eating today.
Benefits of Intuitive Eating
The positive outcomes for individuals who practice intuitive eating have been extensively proven by research, and as dietitians devoted to the walking alongside individuals in their journey, we have seen first hand how life changing it can be. Below we outline just a few of the many benefits.
Freedom from Food Anxiety
Far too many of us are familiar with feeling distress, shame, or guilt as an inevitable side dish to our eating habits. Ultimately, intuitive eating liberates us from the constant worry and anxiety associated with food choices. By embracing a non-restrictive approach to eating, we can enjoy a sense of freedom and ease around food, no longer feeling burdened by the rigid, guilt-inducing rules that we seem to 'fail' the moment life happens.
Improved Nutritional Health
Opposed to the widespread belief that intuitive eating could cause us to 'only eat junk food' and therefore be 'unhealthy, we actually find that those who are attuned to the body's needs, experience greater variety and improved nutrient intake. By allowing all foods to have a place without judgement, individuals are more likely to have enhanced nutritional value in their meals and enjoy a well-rounded eating pattern.
Reduced Risk of Disordered Eating
One of the most significant benefits of intuitive eating is its potential to reduce the risk of disordered eating behaviors and protect against the development of eating disorders, one of the most deadly mental health concerns. The harm of disordered eating and dieting, including (but not limited to) weight cycling, disrupted metabolic health outcomes, and psychological distress, has been widely uncovered.
Improved Self Esteem and Emotional Wellbeing
Research has also shown that learning to be an intuitive eater improves self esteem along with more body acceptance. It is empowering to discover that your body really can be trusted, and you have the capability to effectively take care of yourself, body, mind, and spirit, without the endless list of diet rules. By fostering a more mindful and compassionate approach to eating, levels of depression and anxiety have been found to improve. A review of interventions that promote eating by internal cues highlighted the potential of intuitive eating to alleviate symptoms of depression and enhance psychological resilience.
This is far from the comprehensive list of all the ways intuitive eating can serve us as it promotes a healthy relationship with food and body. By diving into this non-diet approach to eating, we can cultivate a sustainable practice that can extend across the whole life and into future generations. This is the freedom we want for our children, that they may know their body is inherently good, that they can listen and respond to its needs without judgement, and experience joy, satisfaction, and fulfillment from the food they eat.
How long does it take to work?
Embarking on the path of intuitive eating is not a linear journey with a set timeframe, instead it is an individualized process that unfolds at its own pace. While some may experience significant change quickly, for others, it may take more time to fully embrace the the teaching of this practice.
Timeline of Progress:
Early Awareness (Weeks to Months): In the initial stages, individuals may become more aware of their current eating habits, uncomfortable or challenging experiences, and responses (or lack of) to hunger and fullness cues. This heightened awareness sets the foundation for deeper exploration and change.
Experimentation and Learning (Months to Years): This may begin with identifying and unlearning some internalized beliefs while changing perspective to learn what intuitive eating and its supporting philosophies are all about. As individuals begin to experiment with mindful eating, they will collect data around which choices feel good and supportive and those that do not. Through this trial and error process, they will learn to trust and honor their body, which will take time and patience.
Integration and Sustainability (Years and Lifelong): Over time, intuitive eating becomes more ingrained in daily life, leading to greater freedom, satisfaction, and peace with food. While the journey will have its ups and downs, the ultimate destination is to cultivate a lifelong, healthy relationship with food that is based on self-awareness, self-compassion, and body trust.
Factors that may affect progress:
Individual History: Past experiences with dieting, disordered eating, and/or trauma, can impact the ease of this practice.
Support System: Having a supportive network of friends, family, and professionals such as a registered dietitian nutritionist or a certified intuitive eating counselor, can be so influential to have along the way!
Mindset and Readiness: Openness to change, willingness to challenge old beliefs, and commitment to experimenting with something different (and uncomfortable) are all ingredients needed to sustain this journey.
Practical Tips for Managing Expectations:
Practice Patience: Understand that intuitive eating is not a set of boxes that we can check to accomplish a goal. This is more of a gradual shift that unfolds over time as you make incremental changes rather than a step-by-step process to get to an 'end point'.
Redefine Progress: Take time to notice and call out even the subtle changes or wins, such as feeling more energized, noticing less obsessive thinking around food, or enjoying a meal without thinking about your weight.
Seek Support: Consider working with a nutritionist and a therapist who specialize in intuitive eating to provide guidance, accountability, and encouragement along the way.
Embrace Flexibility: Be open to adapting and adjusting your approach as needed, recognizing that intuitive eating is not a rule book, but it is about finding what works best for you in any given moment.
At Rooted Recovery, we understand that the journey of intuitive eating is unique for each individual. Our compassionate and experienced team is here to provide personalized support and guidance to help you navigate this sometimes overwhelming and uncertain process. Reach out to us if you would like to learn about how we can walk alongside you toward a more peaceful relationship with food and body.
Does Intuitive Eating work for everyone?
Ultimately, aspects of intuitive eating can be accessible and beneficial for any human being at any stage in life. However, seeking to incorporate all of the principles of intuitive eating as created by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch, may not be realistic or effective for certain populations.
Individuals with Eating Disorders:
Intuitive eating can be a valuable tool for individuals recovering from eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, or binge eating disorder. However, it's essential to approach it under the guidance of a treatment team, specifically with providers specialized in eating disorder recovery and intuitive eating. This process may be initially challenging and even contradictory for individuals experiencing suppressed body signals and deeply complex relationships with food and body image.
Those with Chronic Health Conditions:
Yes, it is possible to practice aspects of intuitive eating and still follow a diet that is medically necessary for conditions such as diabetes, celiac disease, high blood pressure, etc. That said, it can be difficult to bridge the gap between the two, so working with an intuitive eating registered dietitian who is specialized in your health condition would be ideal. You will be able to discover how a holistic nutrition approach that still focuses on internal cues can exist in collaboration with dietary recommendations tailored to your health needs.
Children and Adolescents:
Often, kids are as close to being natural intuitive eaters as we can get! This is because as we take in more of the world's information/misinformation, our ability to use our bodies as the trusted source of guidance fades. Intentionally teaching intuitive eating skills early on can help kids maintain their innate ability, prevent the development of disordered eating behaviors, and promote lifelong wellness. However, parents and caregivers play a crucial role in modeling intuitive eating behaviors and providing a supportive environment for children to discover their appetite and preferences.
Financial Limitations and/or Limited Food Accessibility
Trying to eat intuitively can be challenging for individuals facing the barriers of food insecurity. Part of intuitive eating is about being able to make satisfying and physically nourishing choices, but for some there may not be much of a choice in what they are able to eat. Having enough food and simply 'being fed' is the foundation of intuitive eating (and life in general), so this takes ultimate priority above all else.
While intuitive eating holds promise for many, it is good to recognize that following all the principles of intuitive eating may not be suitable for everyone. Factors such as cultural influences, personal beliefs, and past experiences with food can also influence the feasibility and effectiveness of intuitive eating. Ultimately, the journey toward being an intuitive eater is unique for each of us, and it is essential to approach it with patience, self-compassion, and support from qualified professionals.
Rooted Recovery is here to support you on your Intuitive Eating Journey
We believe it is your birthright to eat intuitively, so we are committed to supporting you on this adventure. We totally get how this can be daunting and confusing at times, so we want to empower you with guidance and encouragement every step of the way. Our trauma-informed approach is founded on evidence-based practice and aligned with Health at Every Size®, and you can expect to work with a caring clinician who is mindful of your personal needs and desires. By stepping into this, you can someday experience freedom from the 'food police', cultivate positive embodiment, and improve your total well-being. If you are interested in learning more about intuitive eating, seeking personalized care, or have any questions, we invite you to reach out for a free consultation. Together, we can discuss your hopes and needs, address any concerns you may have, and point you in the direction of your next step - contact us today to learn more.