Intuitive Eating.

What is it?

First of all it is a BOOK that was written by nutritionists. And it teaches this magical little concept… where the body knows exactly what it wants to eat. And the idea for us, is to redevelop that skill to tap into what the body wants to eat.

Tapping in will allow us to eat exactly what will nourish us in that exact moment. Our minds can’t always know the nutrients and macronutrients our body needs. Luckily, our bodies do. And they are right here… to tell us. If we listen. How lovely.

So how do we listen?

The thing is…. its not concrete. Its a feeling thing. It is not A Science as much as it is An Art. And closer to a spiritual practice than a math skill.

The surest way to eat the right thing, is to Trust What You Desire.

Seriously. It is this simple. What do you want to eat?

If you have been denying yourself for a long time, you will maybe desire higher calorie, and previously forbidden foods first for a while. But if you allow them, and trust yourself, those cravings will continue to morph, as what you need morphs and changes.

If you are stumped– Get Quiet and Ask- If you know you are hungry but are unsure of what to eat, ask, “What do I want to eat?”. It works. Ask what will nourish you and satisfy you.

The answer might pop into your head, or become a general craving, or the food might appear right in front of you in thin air as if by magic. The third one has never happened to me, but one can wish.

What If You Don’t Trust Your Cravings Yet?

Do This Exercise: 

Make 3 columns

• In the first write a list of all the Foods from the past and present you have felt are “Bad”* or “fattening” or “unhealthy” that you stay away from. And circle all the foods that you would eat right now if there were no “consequences”
• In the 2nd column, write a list of all the food from the past and present that are decadent but “acceptable” and that you enjoy eating. Circle the ones that you wish you could eat more of without “consequences”.
• Write a list of all the Foods from the past and present that are “virtuous” and “healthy”. And cross the ones out that you hate eating

Look at your lists and read them over. Pay special attention to the circled items. It may just be the denial talking, and maybe when you start to eat them more they will lose their pull over you, but your body craves what it needs. Sometimes what it needs is salt, sometimes what it needs is dense calories (if it feels it is starving and wants nourishment), and sometimes what it needs is ______ and _______ that is found in the perfect combination in the food you are craving.

Look at all the foods in your “bad” column. Find one separate reason that each of the foods you are afraid of might have a beneficial side. On my list I have bagels and cake circled in the “bad” column. So the benefits of cake might be: Concentrated carbs for metabolism, or butter- a healthy saturated fat. Or for bagels: concentrated carbs. No food is “worthless”. I would only argue that the fakest of the fake ingredients are bad, and even then I am sure you could come up with a reason it is ok. And, though I tend to avoid fake foods. Never fear them. The body can handle anything.

Use these foods as a good place to start. Allow yourself these foods. But what the hell do I know.

Also, look at your “virtuous” column. And stop stocking the foods you crossed out. If you ever want, need or crave them in the future, you will find a way to eat them. If they don’t taste good to you, you don’t need them now.

(*I don’t believe any food is bad, but this exercise was for the purpose of finding the food you subconsciously feel is bad. After years of hearing guru’s dogmatic fear-mongering, I am sure there are some food phobias that need to be BUSTED!)

Stick with me on this one…

A few weeks ago I came to a big big life altering decision:

I need to let go of my painful desire to be Healthy. 

And I need to be ok with the idea, and possibility, of never reaching my dream of ultimate health perfection.

It may seem like a harmful thing to do, after all, it is not too bad to want to be healthy… But when I realized how much of my own life drama and misery has been caused by my attachment to and fear of bad health, this decision started looking like the most liberating way to live.

Past Intuitive Eating Attempts

Before now, I have only ever half-heartedly let myself eat intuitively. It was so ingrained in me that my body specifically wasn’t able to handle things like other people- that thinking I could ever be like someone else eating normally seemed like a fantasy. Add to that all the things I had ‘learned’ about food from diet-fear-mongers, my beliefs about my health were so limiting that there was only so good it could ever get (not very good).

I thought true normal eating was irresponsible. It was so afraid that if I made a wrong move or ate a wrong food I would never be healthy. And so much of my identity for the past 10 years (since I was a teenager) has been through the lens of 1) being unhealthy 2) being desperate to find the cure.

How unhealthy, you say?

Well, my health problems are sort of abstract, so in a way that makes a “cure” even harder. They deal with hormonal balance which is an intricate and complicated process in the body. And I wanted to do it holistically. I really believed my body could heal. But I wanted it so badly. Too Badly.

Yet, symptom-wise it has been mostly just bad skin, amenorrhea, and recently some bad sleep. And then always…. weight fluctuations…. mostly because of erratic eating which messes with your metabolism.

It all just became clear to me. Since my “health problems” are really only… cosmetic and not all that life hindering…. and I have wasted sooooo much time and happiness trying to fix them…..what if I just let go? It is not like I got a diagnosis and never cared at all. I cared! I cared too much.

So maybe the next evolution in my self-care is just to… not care anymore.

Transition Time

During the past 4 months, I have been coming off paleo, gaining weight, dealing with deep-seated body issues, but all the while learning the reasons that sugarandfriends really weren’t going to ruin my life. While I was trying to let go of my deep-seated need to be thin, that was when I realized there was something even more debilitating that I needed to let go of. The health part.

And ironically, during this whole period where I was deciding not to care about health, I was going to a natural doctor for the first time in 5 years. Turns out I was resistant to doctors too, since they had proved so unhelpful before. He prescribed me natural progesterone because my levels were so low. And in the past I would have not done it, because it is “not letting my body heal on it’s own”. Fuck it. I’m doing it. I have tried a million and one things to naturally balance myself, and nada one thing has worked.

(Oh, one more thing during this whole past 4 months, I decided to take a break from Theatre. Yes, I am was an actress. Compounded stressors, much? Yep. But, really, I don’t want that stress anymore, especially not right now. There are some life stressors you cannot avoid. And there are some life stressors… you can.

Detaching From the Outcome

So, what if, I stopped  being a frightened orthorexic food-nazi and fed my body amply, what if I was to be thankful for 2012 and this access to natural progesterone, and yet still Not Be Attached To The Outcome. Because if it doesn’t work: Eh.

If I always wear a size 6 pants: eh.

If I always have oily skin: eh.

If I need to take fertility drugs to have kids: eh.

If the polyunsaturated fats from my bi-weekly nachos at a restaurant “inflame my body’s tissues”: eh.

If I sleep poorly because of hormonal imbalance for the rest of my life (ok, I don’t particularly like this one….) but: eh.

Fuck It.

Seriously.

Anybody have any similar experiences? Insight? Tales to tell? Am I alone in this drama drama? Talk to me!