I remember when I used to try to make sure every food I ate was the lowest calories possible.

60 calorie yogurt. 180 calorie Luna Bars. 80 calorie ezekiel bread. Dry turkey meat. 60 calorie cheese stick.

How can I eat as much as possible, while consuming as little calories as possible??

And since I was never really feeding myself enough, of course, I remained starving, all the time. And completely pissed off at myself that I couldn’t just freaking eat an appropriate amount of food. Which I thought was a sensible 1200 calories. (1200 calories is probably not even enough for half the amount of calories).

It came down to my belief, (that I was told over and over by every diet book and magazine I ever read), that I should be eating less food than I was eating. That less was better. That my hunger was the problem. That if I could just freaking do it right, that I would finally be fixed and normal with food. (Normal meaning, like, not really needing to eat ever.)

Once I realized, 10 years after all this, that I had been messing up my metabolism and normal hunger cues by trying to consume less calories, it all clicked.

Oh… so MORE calories will actually heal my body? So we need lots of calories to keep our systems running optimally? Whaaaaaaaaa?

So I began trying to make sure that my meals and snacks were more than enough. 

I turned it all on its head.

I started realizing that my ideas about calories were all wrong.

The reason we get starving in between meals -ding ding ding ding- is because we aren’t eating enough food. Not because you’re broken or addicted to food, but because you just aren’t eating enough food. If you are hungry between meals, you haven’t eaten enough at the last meal, and you need a snack. Not a little 50 calorie fat free snack, but like… a small meal. Or a big meal. What do I care.

If you are hungry in between meals, and you don’t want to have to eat a snack, or don’t have time to eat a snack, you need to eat bigger meals god damnit.

And let’s just say, LET’S JUST SAY, that for the sake of this post, we are talking about a day when your body needs 2500 calories a day – which is pretty normal for a woman. (Please don’t let yourself be triggered by this, most people need a different amount every day. I don’t condone counting calories, but I am trying to use a measuring system that will show you how wrong we have been about our energy needs and a normal sized meal. And you may need way, way more than this some days while learning to eat normally. Do NOT let this be a marker for what you “should” be doing. The only should you should be doing is stopping listening to shoulds.)

Say you need 2500, and you eat three meals and some snacks… That’s like 700 calories for each meal, and then 400+ in snacks on top of that. Do you see what this means?

Those 210 calorie lean cuisines are bullshit. WTF IS THAT. THAT IS BARELY A SNACK.

Am I telling you that you now need to make sure you eat 700 calories per meal and a 400 calorie snack? GOD NO, PLEASE do not let that be the takeaway of this post. Please. This is an incredibly arbitrary measurement.

What I AM saying, is that you need so much more than you think you do. A NORMAL amount of food is significantly higher than what diets have conditioned you to believe.

Now will you go and get a second helping of pasta for god’s sake? Thanks.

(DO NOT READ THIS AND START THINKING THAT COUNTING CALORIES IS A HELPFUL WAY TO LIVE YOUR LIFE. I used calories as an example that most of us could wrap our heads around. K thx.)

I used to think sugar was the reason I was addicted to food. Sugar was the reason my hormones were out of whack. Sugar was the reason I wasn’t skinny.

It was all sugar’s fault.

And depending on the diet I was on, this included all carbs too. Because all carbs turn into sugar. Haven’t you heard???

And occasionally fruit, too. Depending on my diet, fruit became a horrible, unhealthy menace, ruining my life and my skin and my ability to fall in love and become successful and happy and healthy.

And, of course, the more I cut out sugar, the more it all became a self fulfilling prophecy. The less I ate sugar, or the more I tried to cut it out, the more I craved it and the harder time my body had processing it when I would inevitably eat some. My body’s impaired reaction to carbs and sugar just seemed to prove my beliefs about sugar even more.

But 4 years ago I decided to give up giving up sugar. I started eating sugar again, full force. I was over my futile attempts to find the perfect diet. I was over the yo-yo. I was over obsessing over my weight. I was over bingeing. I was over it all.

I knew there had to be a better way. And now, 4 years later, my relationship to sugar is… awesome.

I did not spiral into a 4 year sugar binge. It was more like a 3 month sugar binge, then, it normalized.

And guess what? Now that I eat carbs, I can handle carbs. My weight is now stable and consistent. I eat lots of carbs every day, but I can tell when my body has enough. Not only that, but I can tell, mid-dessert, when I’m ready to stop.

Eating sugar does not make me a bottomless sugar pit, instead, eating sugar actually ended my dysfunctional relationship to it.

I fed my body sugar, and finally, my body started speaking to me and telling me what it needed.

And while I am certainly not saying that eating candy and only candy – or poptarts and only poptarts – for the rest of your life is a good idea, I now know that sugar is not my worst enemy. And chances are, it is not your worst enemy either.

Here is the truth: we need sugar. Our brain runs on sugar. We also need way more than just sugar (fat, protein, minerals, vitamins, sunshine, sleep, connection, oxygen). But we need carbs and sugar, too. And the less you eat it, the more you’ll crave it, and the harder your body will work to break down protein and muscle into sugar for your brain to use (to keep you alive!). The less you eat carbs, the slower your body will burn fuel, in order to conserve energy. Meaning, the less you eat carbs, the slower your metabolism.

Hey, if you are someone who has completely healed your life and your health by cutting out sugar, by all means, please keep doing what you are doing. I mean it.

But if you are most people, odds are, things aren’t better. You still feel addicted to food. You’re still bingeing. You’re still cold, and tired, and reactive to food.

Maybe, just maybe, your issues aren’t from sugar, but from the assumption that cutting out sugar is the answer.

For me, cutting out sugar was not the answer. And you had better fucking believe I tried over and over again for 10 years.

Let me ask you something… how confused do you get every time someone suggests Honey as a health food? Yea. I know. I did the same thing.

B-b-b-but how can honey be healthy… when it is SUGAR. And lots of it?

Even on the GAPS diet (the most restrictive gut healing protocol I’ve ever tried) she recommends honey. (I am not saying you should do that GAPS diet, I am saying… sugar is NOT the evil we have pinned it as.)

Sugar is not your problem. Your problem is your fucked up relationship with food. Your problem is the famine you keep putting your body on. Your problem is the judgement, fear, and misery you are experiencing and putting your body through again and again. Your problem is listening to everyone else except your body.