Intuitive Eating.....eat when you're hungry. stop when satisfied
 

Since we are a week into Dec. I thought I'd go back to a general thread.

I used to number the IE threads but I don't know where we left off. I notice every month people are posting in last months threads so maybe a monthly thread isn't the best.

We used to go to five hundred posts and start a new one because that's what this site requires.

Sounds good to me.

I'm going to jump back in here on the Dec thread. I've been researching info on diabetes because I wasn't doing any good. I just don't think I can follow an actual diet. I like to eat more of a low carb way of eating, but not strict. But I just can't follow diet rules of eat ever so many hours because sometime when it is time to eat, I'm not hungry. I know that Intuitive eating is how I ate as a child growing up and got out of that routine when I gained weight in college and everyone started pushing me to eat 3 meals a day. What came with the 3 meals a day came hunger that led to binges and then yo-yo dieting.

I realized today that DH used to eat just when he was hungry until he married me and now he has problems. We have doctor's appts tomorrow and then we have 3 mos before our next appt. Now I'm trying to teach my hubby and myself to eat Intuitively again. I kind of use a combo of IF and IE because that is actually the way I ate growing up. Plus I just read that they are finding that eating with an 8 hr window not only helps with weight loss and reversing/preventing diabetes. The research has been with mice for now and they think it is going to help humans too and hope to do some research testing to find out.

The main thing I have learned from all my reading on different ways to treat diabetes is that however you can do it for yourself will work including IE. So now I'm going to work at getting rid of the "diet" mentality this next year and learn to eat like I did as a child.

Funny thing is I called my 92 yr old Daddy today and asked him "Daddy, remember how you and I used to eat? We didn't eat breakfast and we ate later in the day when we got hungry?" And then I shared with him what I've been learning. I had the key to living thin most of my life, but I've been trying to fit all those "diet" healthy rules into my lifestyle which caused me to fight a weight problem for about 50 yrs and I'm tired of it.

I love how this thread has become so active and I would love to join y'all.

Trish I feel the same way. Until I was a senior, my mom tried everthing to get me to eat breakfast. Finally she let me have nonbreakfast foods like soup or tuna gravy and I ate. But we always had our supper meal at five thirty and didn't eat after that. Dh always ate before bed. His dad was a farmer. At haying season, they had an afternoon meal and a later one. His poor mom was always very heavy. But she joined WW and Tops and tried everything.

Had my doctor's appt. Didn't talk to him about IE, but I did talk to him about IF. Carolr I don't consider IF or IE as diets. I guess because that was just "normal" eating for me. I had printed two articles about IF and gave him a copy of them for him to read. I shared with him about this being the way that I ate when I was growing up and every time I was thin over the years.

I talked to the doctor about this because I can't take the Metformin any more because of the horrible side effects of diarrhea. I told him I was not going to take it any more because I couldn't function or go any where. I'm so thankful for a sweet hubby who once worked in a hospital and had to deal with doctors and knows how to communicate with them and he understood the medical jargon of the medical report on one of the papers I gave the doctor so that the doctor finally agreed to let me spend the next 3 months try IF and see how it affects the diabetes etc. Of course, I am also doing this with IE.

I had a great IE/IF day. We went out to eat and I was free to eat what I wanted. We went for DH favorite meal at Long John Silvers. This a rare meal out because it is so far away from us. We get one meal and we half it. I think DH and I both fest so free. We usually buy one fish meal plus one fish fillet. He asked me if I wanted to do that this time and did I think we could eat 1 1/2 fillets. I told him, "we always get the extra one and then wish we hadn't". So we decided not to get the extra fillet. It was so nice because we ate exactly what we wanted and ate only as much as we wanted and we both were satisfied. Strange how that little bit of freedom helped us to make a good decision that we might not have made before. I love how IE sets you free.

I shared with him today how I always ate my first meal whenever my lunch time was at school and then Mama always had supper ready for us to eat at 5:30 when Daddy got home from work. I seldom ate anything after supper. I would have a cold drink when I went out on a date, but never ate. Back then I would never have eaten "Just because someone was eating or because the clock said it was time". I only ate if I was hungry. All that changed when I went to college and of course the weight came on and then the "diets" merry-go-round started that I've been on off and on for 50 yrs.
Well, I am totally off of that now.

I told DH today that I think his weight problem etc is my fault. I've taught him to eat "healthy" just like I was doing and you know what? It didn't work. So I told him that I think he needs to start eating like he ate before we married because I'm thoroughly convinced that the way he ate when he was thin was the way that worked for him. It Instinctively or Intuitively worked for him. If we both learn to eat that way again, I believe we will see a big change in our health.

I love IE.

Trish, sounds like a plan.

I've been having a hard time lately with the "rules" of IE. Is it so wrong that sometimes even if I'm satisfied I have a cookie? Why? I wanted the cookie.

Is it so wrong that sometimes I like to wait until I'm past whatever number they decide to put on hunger because I love delayed gratification? Why?

Why put rules on food at all? It stresses me out thinking about eating while I'm eating. Why can't I just not think about it?

So..with that..Why is food and how I feel even a thing? Isn't that the point? For it to not even be an issue?

End rant.

"Is it so wrong that sometimes even if I'm satisfied I have a cookie? Why? I wanted the cookie." - No, it's not wrong. I've learned to forgive myself for eating when I'm not hungry. But when I do this excessively then I become very unhappy. Firstly because whatever reason I'm eating for it's not working - cookies, as it turns out,, do not make me happy after all! Not only that but when I continuously eat for reasons other than hunger I gain weight, which makes me feel uncomfortable in my clothing, is a burden to my joints, and results in heartburn. So as much as I'd like to "not think about it" I have to. So is it wrong to have a cookie just cause you want it? Nope. Is it wrong to have a lot of cookies every day just cause I want them without checking in on that behavior? The answer is yes (for me).

"Is it so wrong that sometimes I like to wait until I'm past whatever number they decide to put on hunger because I love delayed gratification? Why?" No it's not wrong... unless doing this causes you to make poor food choices and overeat. As long as you're ok with that then of course that's fine.

"Why put rules on food at all? It stresses me out thinking about eating while I'm eating. Why can't I just not think about it?" If you're referring to rules like "eat slowly" and "pay attention to your level of fullness" then those are not rules at all. They're mindful eating. And if it feels stressful maybe it's time to examine where that stress if coming from. I admit this does feel uncomfortable at first because it puts you out of that comfortable zoning out that eating used to represent. But mindful eating becomes second nature after a while, and it's well worth it imo.

"So..with that..Why is food and how I feel even a thing? Isn't that the point? For it to not even be an issue?" I can only answer this for myself - the point of IE is not so that food is not an issue. On the contrary those who practice IE get a lot of enjoyment out of eating, more so than we ever did when we were full time bingers. The whole point of IE is to learn how to not use food to deal with stress, frustration, anger, anxiety, etc which ultimately does not work and causes weight gain. In order to do that we have to learn a set of skills on how to enjoy food like a normal human while learning how to deal with our emotions in a constructive and effective way.

I'll be the first to admit that the beginning of IE with its hunger scale, focus on mindful eating and constant assessment of our body and hunger level is an explosion of confusion for the mind and a complete overload! But so is anything that requires learning a new skill. After you've messed around with the hunger scale for a while you'll find that you don't need it anymore. IE just becomes who you are, not a set of rules. I'm ok with learning a few rules, I've regained my sanity with them.

I agree. The less you think about it the better.

I used to be on other IE board and I quit them because noone ever disagreed. It helps to get everyones ideas.

There is life beyond IE! IE is not my final destination, it's just the first leg of the trip. Letting go and not caring completely is a nice idea but where will it get me? I've sort a lifetime eating carelessly and not caring. Fr this first time I'm paying attention to my body's real physical needs and learning how to communicate with it. Eventually I hope that eating will be no big deal and it's already working! I have to ask myself "am I hungry?" less and less.

You have to pay attention to what you want to change. And once it becomes second nature you can get on with your life.

I've been finding a do a lot better with myself and with choices when I don't think about it.

I lost weight. I know how to eat. I know what foods make me feel good, and what foods make me feel icky.

But the whole hunger scale and "am I satisfied" is enough to send me into a spiral of restriction I guess? I would rather just eat, enjoy my food and not wonder about "how I feel" and worry that I overate constantly.

Isabel Foxen Duke I'm discovering is more my speed than the IE route, though I still practice IE for the most part.

Hi, ladies...Thank you for your message, Carol. It's nice to see you too.

I poke my head in here off and on to keep up with the IE threads, but don't post often.

I'm another one who believes it's better for me the less I think about food, weight, and all that stuff.

I can identify with what Trish talks about regarding how we ate when we were growing up. I grew up on a farm, so we always had our own fruits, veggies, meat, milk, eggs, and butter. My mother was an excellent cook and made many delicious meals, but eating wasn't an all day thing.

We ate our meals then went out to school, to play, or to do farm chores. I don't recall us snacking between meals, and there wasn't a dessert every night.

A huge treat for us would be the once-in-awhile night when my mother would make homemade chocolate fudge from scratch for us. Another treat would be a bag of chips and a block of cream cheese made into dip, then we'd all take very small portions and eat it while we watched a family tv program like Ed Sullivan or something like that. Snacking between meals wasn't a habit for anybody.

When I was in school, stores would take coupons and give you the money value on ANY item, not just the item pictured on the coupon, so my girlfriends and I would get together for a sleepover, go through a bunch of magazines tearing out the coupons, then we'd go to the corner store and buy a bag of candy with it. This was when you could still buy penny candy, and chocolate bars were five cents for a decent-sized one, if I remember right.

We were all thin then. That's just the way it was. I think we had one overweight boy in our elementary school class, and he wasn't even way overweight, just a few pounds bigger than the rest of us.

I started dieting back in the late 70s, when Atkins was "the" thing to do. I felt so rotten on the diet, that I then switched to another one, then another one, then another one...I lived on the diet merry-go-round for over 35 years, but feel like I'm pretty much off it now.

Once in awhile, I still get the urge to visit a low carb board, or I'll read the posts on this site, or on Spark People, but that's about it. I know I can't stick to diets, and I know now that I do much better doing my own thing, which is not having rules or tips or suggestions from anybody else on how or what I should eat.

I tried doing IE rigidly when I first discovered it, and turned it into the "stomach hunger" diet, which so many people do without even realizing it. I've even seen it happen on earlier versions of this thread.

I don't follow IE now. I do my own thing (I also like Isabel Foxen Duke), and there isn't even a name for it. I just eat and live.

I've lost 20lbs so far. It took a little over a year to do it, so it goes extremely slowly, but I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing and see if I can continue to get lighter.

As I've said before here, the hardest time for me is when one or more of my sisters starts a new weight loss plan. One sister gets especially gung-ho when she starts, and I feel competitive, so that makes me wonder if I'd lose faster if I'd get on a specific plan too, so that she doesn't get way ahead of me, but I know better. They don't work for me--and they actually don't work for my sister either, but she keeps trying.

Right now she's dieting and going to a personal trainer, and is losing some weight, but I don't think it's sustainable for her.

I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing. I notice that it's been more of a challenge the last few weeks though, because the days have gotten shorter and darker, and I find myself craving "comfort foods" all the time--not to mention we got a foot or so of snow this past week, so I can't really do much walking outdoors at the moment either.

For right now, until after the holidays are over, and the days start getting lighter and longer again, I'm just going to work on maintaining so that I don't end up with a lot of pounds to re-lose later.

Truffle do you share your thoughts and approach to eating and dieting with your sister or do you keep it to yourself?

Whenever I've explained the process to people I always get food feedback especially from "normal" eaters. Dieters say something like "I with I could do that but if I are like that is get as big as a house."

They should try it. I wish I would never have dieted.

There's room for all non-dieters on this thread. Let's not get caught up with one method over the other. I really enjoy Isabel Foxen Duke myself, I do wonder though why she is so adamantly against IE - the only thing I can think of is to steer people away from it so that she can further her own career? You don't have to be exclusively on one side versus the other, IE toots the same message as Isabel imo which is to trust your body, let go of your hang ups and enjoy your food.

It's just that IE provides the structure that some of us really need. Believe me, the final purpose of why I follow IE is so that I eventually NEVER have to think about food and why I eat it.

We've talked about it in the past, but back then it was just one method among many, and we both went back to "diets".

I just got fed up with starting new diets, not being able to stick with them, and ending up bigger than I started out, so I just quietly stopped dieting. My sisters all know that I'm working on losing weight, but we really don't talk about *how* anymore. I think we all assume that we're doing similar plans, even though we aren't.

I wish I had never dieted either, Carol. When I began my first diet, it was because I had 20 pounds to lose after giving birth to my daughter. If I had just not dieted, the pounds would have naturally come off because I had been naturally thin up to that point, but at the time I was married to a skinny rail of a man that hated "fat women". He acted as food police to me also. That's where a lot of my body issues came from.

I understand what you're saying.

I'm not against IE as a method. It's just that I've been reading non-diet literature ever since Geneen Roth started writing years ago, so IE was just another spin on it when it came along.

Because it's so easy to make IE into the "stomach hunger diet" (for me anyway), I simply prefer to describe myself as non-dieting because I don't really follow any one method, but take ideas from several writers, as well as just plain figuring out what works for myself.

I've been reading this thread ever since Carol first started it, I think. I don't stay constantly active on it, but it IS the one I like to participate on the most because everybody on it has either given up dieting, or is in the process of giving it up.

There's one other IE board that I visit sometimes, but it doesn't seem to be very active most of the time.

I hope I didn't give the impression that I was more for one method over another, because I'm not. Each of us has to figure out what works best for us.

I just enjoy talking with others who are dealing with eating in a similar way, which is giving up diets. :)

So true.

My overeating started when I was a kid for emotional reasons but dieting is what made me *huge*. It was the idea that at any moment I was going to start a diet and lose the weight for good that made me do last supper eating for years and years. I can't say I'm at peace with food right now, but I'm better off than I was when I had never heard of IE. I'm seeing my eating disorder therapist tomorrow. The holidays are HARD y'all. I've been restricting, bingeing, and purging in a cycle for weeks now. I'm going to start trying to journal my thoughts and feelings- hopefully that will help me sort out some stuff. On a happy note I've met someone <3 and so at least I've got a little something to take my mind off of food, my eating disorder, and the holidays.

Light & Love

I have felt this way about IE before too. Wannabe has a great logical response to it but sometimes I just don't want ANY of what I perceive to be restrictions. I agree with truffle too. I have to not think about it or I get too obsessive and find myself restricting.

Locke: Im sorry to hear you are having a hard time. The holidays are hard for me too but mostly because Im dealing with lots of family. Im glad to hear you have met someone. :)

Im not really sure where my emotional eating came from. I have tried to figure that out but I haven't really been able to pin it down. I have discovered lately that if I want to eat when Im not hungry, if I just ask myself " what feeling am I trying not to feel right now?". That the feelings will come to me and I usually realize what I am feeling and don't want to eat anymore. That is kind of huge for me.

Have you tried eating a couple small crackers?

It's been a weird couple of weeks. I feel like my stomach is huge right now and I'm sad my weight seems to have climbed after it was the lowest it's been in months last week. I'm experimenting a little with Intermittent Fasting (with loose targets, I felt like I was eating breakfast even if I wasn't hungry). I just feel like I'm retaining water which is frustrating.

Truffle, I know you're not against IE. But I get the sense that Isabel Foxen Duke has beef with IE and not sure why. There's no sense in rallying against IE just because it provides guidelines.

Locke, the best thing to do now is not worry about the holidays, just eat how you need to eat to get through them and remember you're not doing anything wrong. I'm glad to hear you've met someone, that's always fun!!

Pinkhippie, the term "emotional eating" is confusing and gets a bad wrap. It makes us sound like we can't handle our emotions. It makes us sound like we're crying while eating. I hate the term "emotional eating." It doesn't describe what's really going on.

gymrat, remember that "fat" is not a "feeling."

I guess I think of emotional eating as any eating I want to do when Im not physically hungry. When I eat to avoid my emotions I actually don't feel anything at all. So, if I was crying while eating I probably wouldn't be eating. LOL . Im a long time emotion suppressor so for me, emotion avoiding eating really describes it well.

I've been practicing eating just what I really want when I want it and not think of food as good/bad. I've been eating a bit of Christmas candy the past week. Every year, I get this candy when I see it because it brings back happy times when I was a young girl... Daddy always bought it for us. Funny I didn't always want the chocolate fudge Mama made, but I guess because it was only on rare occasions that Daddy bought candy, I liked it. I'll be the same way when Valentine candy comes out. He always bought Mama a big heart of assorted candy and bought us 3 girls smaller versions of the same.

Anyway, tonight I had just a little bit left that I finished and I know that I won't be buying any more of it. That is the way I am normally with things like that whether I'm doing IE or not... if I really want something I buy it and eat what I want and I'm through with it. I have put somethings in the freezer or thrown it out if there wasn't anyone to eat the rest because once I satisfy that desire I may not ever won't it again.

But a very interesting thing happened tonight. When I got through eating the candy, I found myself actually craving protein and veggies. It is strange because I have noticed the last few days that when I ate the candy that I was hungry for something salty afterwards.

My first reaction was shock, but then it really felt so very good because I wasn't hungry for junk/play food, but for some healthier food with substance and nutrition. I don't know if anyone else has ever experienced this or not, but I really feel this is progress.

I am really enjoying eating Intuitive combined with IF.

Pinkhippie I don't think I eat emotionally any more. However, I am not always sure I'm eating just because I'm hungry or not either. However, I am making progress. The main thing I seem to be going through right now is realizing that I can eat whatever I want and I don't have to feel guilty because it is not allowed on most "diets". I suppose when you think about it that is an emotion in itself.

Becky Always glad to see you here.

Trish, food tastes soooooooo good when you're good and hungry. That's still hard for me to remember.

Good observation Carolr. I need to remember that too.

I wonder. Last night I wasn't hungry until in the night. My dh fixed himself something at ten pm. Later I was hungry but when I woke again it was gone. I ate only breakfast and lunch. I'm not going to get up and eat in the middle of the night when we sleep on the second floor. I'm not particularly hungry this morning.

Carolr I don't know what to do when that happens. I'm afraid to eat because I'm so afraid I'll get in a habit of eating late at night. I stay up until midnight to be with DH. Sometimes when I stay up past midnight, I find I get hungry. I have eaten something when that happens, but I have had other times when I have actually said to him, "I've got to go to bed so that I don't eat anything". It would be nice to see how other Intuitive Eaters handle this situation. How far do you trust if it is real hunger or just the fact that you are up and you think you are hungry.

Have a Merry Christmas Carolr.

Another question. I would like to lose another twenty lb. I lost forty and kept it off for four or so years. I weighed one hundred and fifteen in hs and am five foot four. I way one hundred fifty give or take a few. I just think it would be better health wise, high blood pressure etc.

Pattygirl I do god to bed when I crave snacks at night because it's my body's way of telling me that it either needs rest or fuel to stay awake. I opt to go to sleep.

I was pretty busy yesterday and didn't eat a lot. This morning I was starving but had work to do. I finally ate around 10 but I think I waited too long.

Carol I'm sorry you're having a hard time with the last few pounds. I know it sounds counterintuitive but can you think of some new dietary goals? I don't like to think that IE is only about accommodating our wants when it comes to food. Some of us have real dietary restrictions that we have to adjust to and I know that if I can do that anyone can. I'm learning that it's ok to say no to myself - just because I want something doesn't mean I have to have it. Especially now that I'm super intuitive about how that food makes me feel. It's taking me a long time to reach that level of awareness but as much as I love pizza for example I don't like the indigestion I feel afterwards. So it becomes easy to "not want" pizza. This works to my advantage in losing weight.

When I was in high school I was also five foot four and weighed about 112-115.

After having my daughter, I managed to get back down to 156, and that actually would have been a fine weight, I thought, if I hadn't started dieting.

I think between 140-150 would be an excellent weight for me now.

Do you think it's realistic to think that we could get back to our high school weights?

If I did, I think I'd be way too thin. (There's no way that's happening anyway. If I can just get below 200, I'll feel like a pencil!)

Do you think you might be at a weight that is fine for your body already?

Well, here we go, just one day after Christmas and all the diet plans have ads out full-force.

I see that Weight Watchers has a new coaching service.

No thank you. ;-)

Thanks, Wannabeskinny. I'm a very picky eater now. If I take a dessert and I don't like, I discretely toss it. After eating breakfast when I was really hungry, I barely ate lunch.

Most of my weight is in my belly and I have some trouble with bp and I know that isn't a good thing.

I just started rereading the IE book again today. I read it some years ago on my sister's recommendation and tried it for a few weeks but at the time, I wasn't ready to deal with my emotional eating/binge eating issues so I abandoned it. But I've been doing a lot of work on myself in the past few months and I'm rereading the book slowly and taking notes, getting serious about it this time.

This thread is ironic because I just posted a frustrated post about "rules" of dieting in the "Chicks In Control" board (WannaBeThin responded to the post). That's also one of my issues - this idea of having rigid "rules" of one diet or another (even if they aren't calling it a "diet" nowadays - notice how many diet books now insist they are not diets but "healthy eating plans"?). For someone like me, who is dealing with the wounds of emotional abuse as a child, setting rigid rules and putting guilt on those who don't follow them is about the worst thing I can do, as it takes me back to the extreme control issues that my parents had and how they tried to control everything that I did. I believe that one reason why I have BED is because food was one of the few areas where I could assert my autonomy and independence, no matter how hard my mom tried to control it.

One of the things that I understood from the IE book is that it's natural to be hyper-vigilant in the beginning until IE becomes ingrained into your habits and then it becomes automatic. The way I look at it is that I know I was hyper-obsessive about food and diet before - I spent almost every day thinking about the menu plan I had made for myself, worrying whether it was healthy, tinkering with it to "make it better". I spent hours each weekend coming up with a menu plan, shopping list, going shopping. I wasted a lot of time obsessing about diet and menu. So changing my hyper-vigilance to making my peace with food and healing myself from my binge eating disorder is not going to be much different (except that I hope not to be so obsessed that it takes all my time and energy) and if it leads me to a healthier relationship with food, it's well worth it.

Djuna