Around the block

Dear Reader,

Prepare yourself for another volte face. (I love the expression ‘volte face’ and really wish I had the elan to drop it into general conversation more often, ditto ‘elan’) Yes, sorry to be so inconsistent but I want to talk about food, body issues and dieting. I did say that I wasn’t going to write about weight any more, what with its preoccupation being ant-feminist and such, but then I wrote a blog post about trying to give up sugar and the subtext was very much - I really want this to make me lose weight!
Whilst in the process of writing a diary about living a life without sugar (an ascetic monk’s progress), I read Megan Jayne Crabbe’s book Body Positive Power, and it instigated an instant, inner revolt. I started getting angry; about societal pressure and the patriarchy and stuff. Plus, I didn’t feel any better for having eliminated the white stuff; in fact I had a massive attack of thrush, but that’s another story… Megan talked about Intuitive Eating and recommended a book: Intuitive Eating by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch and so completed my total about-turn.

Firstly, forgive me for repeating myself but here is a bit of
History:
I went on my first diet aged about nine or ten*, I didn’t really call it a diet, I just stopped eating crisps and chocolate and other ‘fattening foods’ and I duly lost weight. As I’ve said before, I found the approval of other people - their congratulating me on my weight loss, utterly intoxicating. And when I say people - I mean the grown-ups, because although other kids delighted on calling me fat, I don’t remember any of them applauding me when I ceased to be so. This early diet was the first of many - Weight Watchers, The Rosemary Conley Hip and Thigh diet, Intermittent Fasting, Slimfast, to name a few! Plus other unhealthy methods such as having nothing but a can of diet coke and a packet of ‘low fat’ crisps for lunch.
*Statistically, the more children are made to feel bad about their weight and encouraged to change their eating habits/diet, the more likely they are to be obese in later life. (Either that or more likely to develop an eating disorder like Anorexia or Bulimia) That’s right folks - body shaming not only doesn’t work, it triggers exactly the thing that the ‘well-meaning’ commentators are trying to halt - it makes you fatter! If you don’t believe me, read the book.

I read The Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf and Fat is a Feminist Issue by Susie Orbach, and I tried to take on board what they were saying. I ditched the diet lingo, the attributing of a moral value to food, I tried to stop saying that I’d been really ‘good’ or ‘bad’ when I’d eaten a lot or not but I didn’t stop trying to reduce. I stopped saying that I was on a diet and started saying that I was trying to ‘be healthy’ instead. And yet, and yet, I still tried to be thin, be various means. The ‘not dieting’ methods included listening to a hypnosis CD, intermittent fasting and calorie counting and they all worked, initially, I lost weight, and then I put it back on again and felt like a massive failure until some other new fad or ethos would come along and I’d think - maybe that will ‘work’.

Going Forward
I’ve known for some time that traditional dieting is bollocks; https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/1999/dec/14/healthandwellbeing.health
I’ve even read a book called Dieting makes you Fat by Geoffrey Cannon. But what is the alternative, I’ve thought, if you don’t want to be gargantuan?  I didn’t trust myself to totally ‘let go’.  None of the books seem to offer a viable alternative.   What would happen when you forgot about restrictions and ate whatever you wanted??
If you follow this blog, you might remember that a couple of years ago I posted about losing weight through calorie counting - logging it all in My Fitness Pal, and doing a lot of walking, monitoring it all with my trusty Fitbit. The thing is, I still do loads of walking, that hasn’t changed, but what has changed is that I got bored with weighing out all my food and meticulously recording it, so that went to the wall, along with all the other diets/’healthy eating’ plans!
You don’t know the  pure joy of rebellion until, on a day when you’re only supposed to be eating 500 measly calories (on the 5:2 plan) you just say Fuck It! I’m going to eat!!
Apparently - it’s just this sort of (inbuilt) mindset that makes all diets doomed to fail.

Intuitive Eating
What they say, in Intuitive Eating, is that all diets fail ultimately because our bodies are programmed to fight starvation. Your body goes into lockdown and starts hoarding any fat you have left. (They say it more scientifically than I do). Also, as soon as you tell yourself that you ‘can’t’ have something, you just want it even more. They cite the fact that many people indulge in ‘last supper’ mentality, binge eating, the night before embarking on a new diet, gorging on all the things they plan to ban. This is also what happens when people ‘cheat’ on their diets; it often triggers a binge.
95% of people regain the weight they’ve lost (and a little bit more usually) but instead of blaming the diet, they blame themselves for being weak-willed.
***Ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong!*** I don’t know about you but this sounds VERY familiar. Just recently I was telling a colleague that I’d lost a lot of weight with calorie counting, only to regain it because I’d got fed up of logging everything. I said all of this with an apologetic/self-deprecating little grimace; the implication being - I am weak willed!

What is intuitive eating?
It’s eating what you want, when you want it. It’s stopping eating when you are full and not feeling that you have to clear your plate. It’s eating a biscuit, if what you want is a biscuit, and not trying to quell your cravings by eating 10 rice cakes, 2 apples, a bowl of spinach and then a biscuit! It’s not banning any type of food - our bodies need carbs and fat, as well as vegetables, fruit and protein. It’s not feeling guilty about eating anything - unless you’ve stolen it (and I guess not even then, if you’re poor and starving). It’s not feeling fearful of any food. It’s eating what you want to eat as opposed to what you think you should eat. It’s respecting your body and being kind to it. It is refusing food when you're not hungry and not just having something to be polite. It is waving goodbye to dieting, for good!

Does it work? (Will I lose weight or become gargantuan?) I don’t know, I’ve only just read the book. Time will tell, I suppose. One thing I have found is that, once you give yourself permission to eat anything you want, you seem to eat less of it. (eventually, once you get used to it) Goodbye scales!