DIET
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Limiting carbohydrates due to fear of gaining weight. Whether it's refined sugar, pasta, bread,
and more complex carbohydrates, or all carbs including most fruits (this is really dangerous), people continue to restrict carbs despite claiming to know how important this form of fuel is.
Eating only ‘clean’ foods because these are seen as the only safe foods. This usually entails
sticking to low calorie foods: high water foods such as vegetables and fruit, and protein foods.
3 4
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Eating only at certain times of the day, whether or not you are physically hungry. This includes
rules like, ‘I must not eat after 6pm or all the food will turn into fat’, or some other unfriendly magical-sounding thing.
Eating only when you're REALLY f'ing hungry. Many people who have chronically
restricted their food and have been under-eating for months or years can no longer recognise their early cues for hunger, only labelling themselves as hungry when it has reached an extreme feeling-dizzy, stomach-about-to-cave- in-on-itself, hangry-and-gonna-eat-your- head level. Some people don't think they're worthy of food unless they reach this extreme level of hunger.
Paying penance for eating ‘bad’ foods by skipping the next meal, eating less, or doing even
more exercise.
Cutting back on food in the lead-up to a special event like a wedding. This often turns into
unconscious under-eating and the distortion of hunger cues (see #4) that goes with this.
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Suppressing hunger by drinking caffeinated drinks or diet soft drinks or by keeping busy by
exercising, working, or even by smoking. I've seen ‘health-conscious’ people
60 JULY | AUGUST 2017
WHAT'S THE ALTERNATIVE? The message that ‘diets don't work’ is threatening to some people, especially if they're in that early phase where the diet IS working. If this is you, you're probably not ready to hear this yet. But if you're fed up with dieting in any
form and you don't know that there's an alternative to the diet mentality, you might be asking, ‘What do I do instead?’ Because dieting comes with its attendant rigidity and clearcut rules, NOT dieting can feel like chaos. And it
take up smoking cigarettes again in the misguided belief that smoking isn't as ‘bad’ as eating too much!
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Judging what you deserve to eat based on what you've eaten or how much you've exercised
earlier that day, instead of relying on hunger cues.
Going vegetarian, paleo, or gluten-free for the sole purpose of losing or controlling your weight,
and in the case of vegetarianism, using the ethical and environmental reasons to justify your decision, even if these are not your primary reasons.
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Skipping meals and replacing them with a ‘healthy’ alternative – I'm
looking at you, bulletproof coffee! When people consume bulletproof coffee in place of a proper balanced nourishing breakfast, things tend to backfire after an average of three weeks.
Trying ‘natural’ weight loss aids such as Garcinia Cambogia (which doesn't work,
by the way...) or ketogenic supplements (‘better than coconut oil’) that are meant to switch you to ‘fat-burning mode’ (GGGAAAAAHHHH!!!) Just because a product comes from a plant and can therefore be labelled ‘natural’, ‘herbal’, ‘organic’, or ‘healthy’, you are attempting to mess with your appetite or metabolism in order to control weight. This is not healthy, this is dieting.
might initially feel chaotic when you let go of diets, but this won't last forever. So here's the alternative: • Focussing on health, not weight, is the alternative.
• Changing damaging thoughts and behaviours as part of working towards long term, sustainable health and letting your weight naturally fall where it will is the alternative (scary, I know).
• Intuitive eating is the alternative. This means finding a place of balance where internal cues guide you as to when, what, and how much to eat (also scary, I know!). Initially this can feel chaotic and frightening. Keep working on it – it will get better.
• Building a relationship with food that honours and supports your body is the alternative.
• Moving your body in a way that generates joy and pleasure, while building or maintaining fitness or strength, is the alternative to compulsively exercising as a means of controlling your weight, burning calories, and/or trying to conform to the ‘fit is the new skinny’ ideal. If weight loss happens as a side effect
of improving health behaviours, that's not a bad thing. It's the pursuit of weight loss that's the problem. So together let's call bullshit on
all these modern forms of dieting. Because there IS an alternative, and it's far healthier physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually, than dieting ever could be, even in it's greenest, cleanest, leanest disguise. n
Connect with other readers & comment on this article at
www.livingnow.com.au
Casey Conroy is an Accredited Practising Dietitian, nutritionist, yoga and AcroYoga teacher, and naturopath-in-training who
loves raw chocolate and schisandra berries in her green smoothies. She is the founder of Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing on the Gold Coast, and advocates a practical, fun, and pleasurable approach to nutrition.
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