Welcome to the final in a four part series unpacking some common myths or misconceptions that many people have about the Health at Every Size® (HAES) approach to weight and health. In a previous post, we explored the idea that HAES® claims everyone is healthy regardless of their weight. We find this is not the case. Rather HAES® suggests weight is not the most important factor in assessing a person’s health. We also looked at the fear that when practicing HAES®, we no longer consider nutrition when making food choices, or that we don’t think about our need to engage in any kind of physical activity. Again, this is not the case at all. The HAES® approach encourages us to take the best care or ourselves that we can through practicing gentle nutrition with our food choices and moving our body regularly in ways that we enjoy and keep us active.
In today’s post, we will explore a fear that often arises when people learn the HAES® approach to eating is one that encourages us to tune into and respond to our body’s cues for food choices. This approach to eating, known as Intuitive Eating, Mindful Eating or Competent Eating can cause anxiety for because we often believe that if we eat based on cravings (choosing foods our body is asking for), we will eat junk food all the time. And we worry this will have a negative effect on our health and wellbeing and cause us to gain weight.
It is true that when we first embrace eating intuitively and let ourselves be guided by our body, we might eat more of certain foods we have been denying ourselves. But as we learn to trust our body and most importantly, learn to eat without guilt and shame, we will find that we crave a variety of foods. To our surprise, we are not no interested in eating junk food all the time. However, for this to happen, we must first do the work to make all foods ‘legal’ and be able to eat without shame. Even with foods that have been high on our “shouldn’t eat” list. Letting go of shame is a vital element in being able to eat based on cravings. Otherwise we set ourselves up to make food choices from a place of anxiety or self loathing, a recipe for disaster.
It is a strange irony that the fears and rules we have around eating are the biggest contributor to our unhealthy relationship with food. Once we take the diet mind game out of the picture and allow all foods to potentially be part of our diet (as long as we enjoy them), what we find is that our body craves variety. Our body naturally is drawn to both foods that support our health and wellbeing and foods we consider more play foods. And if we take the time to learn how to listen to our body and respond to our feelings of hunger and fullness, our body will guide us in ways that will best support our health and wellbeing.
Ask yourself – if you could choose the food you eat a without the worry of experiencing judgement or shame from others or from yourself, how would that change your relationship with food? If you knew you could have your favourite treat food anytime and truly enjoy it without shame, would it loom so large in your psyche as it does when it is forbidden? Or would you find yourself now in a space where other foods might be able to speak to you? A HAES® approach to weight and health, can help you heal your relationship with food and take better care of your body by helping you to eat from a place of caring and joy, not fear and shame.
Thank you for reading. I hope you have enjoyed this post and the others posts in this series about Health at Every Size®. I believe this approach is a helpful tool in our goal of healing body shame and reclaiming Body Sovereignty
Sydney is a body image therapist providing online counselling through a Health at Every Size® lens. Heal body shame by reclaiming Body Sovereignty and once again experience peace, trust and respect in your body. Learn more about Sydney and her approach here.