Food Freedom, Mindful Eating

I am calling on all women and men who are always on a diet, consistently giving up foods they love worrying about overeating or even some of you who struggle everyday with food choices to put aside all of that craziness for ONE DAY and just eat what you want on Tuesday, June 7th.  On that day, no dieting, no counting calories, no food anxiety and absolutely no fear that you are eating what our society calls off limit foods. Just a day to eat what you want, when you want to but most of all enjoy it. A day when all foods are on the table. I call this a day of FOOD FREEDOM. Now, before you jump for joy, I am not suggesting that anyone eat hundreds of calories or binge eat all day long. I did not say eat as much as you want, just eat what you want, SENSIBLY. This will be a day of not only eating what you want but it gives you a chance to begin to practice MINDFUL EATING  so you can make choices that you can live with. YOU want pizza, have a slice or two not the whole pie. YOU want ice cream, have a scoop or cone with sprinkles and enjoy it, you do not have to eat the whole half-gallon. While I understand that these foods have high sugars and carbs in them, the reality is, these are foods most of us love and WE need to learn how to eat and enjoy them SENSIBLY.  If we do not learn how to eat sensibly, these foods eventually work their way back into our lives and the outcome most certainly will be eating till you cannot breath, then feeling horrible that you did something wrong. Why not learn that you can eat all foods even the one's that we consider off limits, OCCASIONALLY. Yes, you can sit and enjoy your choice by not depriving yourself. How about this thought, just bypass it and have the it later or whenever you want it. Again, this will be your choice but I BELEIVE that you can do this with time and practice. There is no GUILT here only MINDFUL choices. For most who binge or eat out of emotions it is time to look closely at change and what you are trying to change. I can almost guarantee you that most of us have some usually deeply-rooted habits that have become ingrained over a long time which require awareness to change. And that’s what mindfulness is all about. For those of you who feel you cannot just have one bite for fear of devouring it all, let me remind you that by learning this way of eating you will stop being a slave to food because food slavery is emotional death for anyone. While I am calling this day Eat what you want day, the goal is to begin to understand that you can eat mindfully. Mindful behavior is thinking about your choice before you react. THING FIRST, REACT LATER! This is the new and responsible way to eat especially for your sanity. I can almost guarantee you that when you eat what you want you will focus as to what is going in your mouth. When you are dieting, starving, or are restricting yourself the choice is mute. We both know that gets old quickly, then the wanting and craving begin, after that the next step is that you want everything in sight and lots of it. That is what is called on or off eating.  What I am trying to get across to some of you that is does not have to be this way. YES, it will take time but in the end you will have more control over your eating and your life.

How do I know this? BEEN THERE/DONE THAT. I was a slave to food and a binge eater for many years and this was a very unhealthy lifestyle.Those were the days I thought of nothing else but my next meal. Restrictive eating for weeks and then boom one day I had enough of that and then my brain as well as emotions went haywire and I would eat until I could not breath. Once I slowly began to learn that I could eat what I wanted it was like REALLY. I learned that I could say NO, have it later and  then take a sigh of relief, I could slowly breathe again.  Today, while I practice being mindful I still have my days of wanting to eat everything that I smell and see but I know I can make choices and that I am responsible for those choices. For some of you who are used to eating on or off this sounds crazy but I can be confident in telling you give yourself one day of freedom. I can honestly say that  basically I eat what I want in a sensible way. It works almost every time because I think about it MINDFULLY. I began to eat this way after many years of dieting, feeling depressed, losing/gaining weight constantly and feeling like I could never feel good about myself. Most of you know what I mean by this, letting food control our every move almost daily.  While I was on those crazy diets, (I have been on all of them) I would stay on program but when I went off I would eat everything in sight. Today while I can have ice cream whenever I want it, I only think about having it rarely because I can have it any time I want it. This is is how powerful our minds once we decide to start to change our way of thinking. Today, I very rarely have battles in my head fighting my daily choices and that is a GREAT place to be.

The research is now showing us that mindful eating is the new way to eat. YOU will be making choices that you can think about and live with and not just eat out of emotions setting yourself up for a binge leading to feeling like a failure and just feeling horrible. I know so many women who have told me that once they allowed themselves to just eat they lost weight because they could have any foods any time and where not restricted to some crazy food program making themselves crazy. So, while you may think it is not that simple, it really is, make a DECISION and stick to it, the choice is YOURS!!!! Let me know how you did once you get through one day! Remember, YOU CAN DO THIS!

Why do we sabotage ourselves?

QUESTION:
I have been doing great with my eating for a little over a month. I have not binged and have eaten foods that really made me feel better. Then after getting weighed I realized that I lost over 10 pounds and had a melt down, after that I felt myself slipping back to my old ways and it really has taken a toll on me emotionally.  I realize that every time I begin to get healthy I get overwhelmed, scared and resort back to my old self. Is this normal and do others experience this? Susan

 First, let me say that YES this reaction is normal and YES other women including myself  have experienced this in our lives. The good news is that women can overcome this as I did and so have many others.

Answer:
In the thirty plus years that I have been training, coaching, mentoring, running groups and counseling women this is the question that comes up in conversation most of the time. Why do women loathe themselves and set themselves up for failure and set backs while on the road to getting healthy as well as feeling better? This is a very deep rooted as well as complicated matter so let's really look at this issue.

For many women who grew up as overweight children the issue of negative body image, body weight and self esteem begins at a very early age. For a lot of these young girls dieting, being thin and pretty is the message that their hear over and over and eventually that voice begins to control their lives. They are unconsciously told to shed those pounds or you are doomed into a life of hating your body and yourself.  For some, life then becomes a daily regime of self hated and self loathing while trying to achieve this utopia. Magazine articles that portray the latest diet, fitness regime to acquire six pack abs or even the latest Hollywood celebrity's diet regime for weight loss leaves an overweight women with a doom or gloom future. This sets her up an emotional roller coaster ride of negativity because this message embedded from childhood  has now become a way of life and their reality. As someone who heard those messages over and over as a young girl and then as a teenager I learned that what we see and hear in our early lives will eventually resonate in our adulthood and in turn makes us look at how we look and think about ourselves. Growing up in a society that sends a message that any excess weight is not acceptable so get rid of it NOW is damaging! Turn on the TV to hear about the latest diet or many fitness DVD's  promising you long term success, 99% of the so called Fitness celebrities have no clue over the emotional damage they do promising these simple and easy weight loss routine that are short on long term success. Yet we continue to buy it hoping for a better life. These bombardments of cerebral messages leave us with a sense  that we no longer know what we need for our lives. Years of years of these messages and the race to another diet, hating food and not knowing how to really understand what we need will leave anyone banging their heads against the wall for relief. While I totally understand that some need this kick start to get motivated let me remind you that motivation needs to come from within to achieve any long term success.  Looking to the world for answers, fighting with food,  starvation and feeling like a failure sets us up for emptiness. All of those years of negative voices and looking at who you are as less than worthy leaves us in a pile of pain. So, when you begin to try to get healthy, lose some weight and get fit to feel better what you only know is how to sabotage yourself with setting yourself up for failure. Once this happens one feels emotionally, physically and mentally drained and hence runs back to what is familiar. In my own life I have had to fight this battle early on as I lost and gained weight more times that I can count on both hands. I never really addressed the emotions that were holding me back till I began to really understand that my early years where filled with emotions that dragged me down. So, you can now get a glimpse that when the road to recovery begins to take place it takes more than changing your eating habits.  It takes a change of heart and how we look at ourselves and that YES we are worth it, we can achieve it long term and YES it will take time, love and patience from within Today, after many years of tears, groups, writing and listening I realize that unless we address the issue we will never totally come to a point of understanding ourselves and finding peace.

Hugs, Debra



.