Mindful Eating Series with The Grounded Therapist (#2)

Mindful Eating can be helpful in so many different aspects of healthy eating: it can help naturally reduce portion sizes (if you tend to over eat due to emotions or mindlessness), it can help reduce emotions that can lead to eating when not hungry and improve confidence in food choices. It does, however, take some practice to truly work. That is why actively taking part in activities that increase mindfulness are integral and is how/why this series came about! 

Here is what Rachel, the Grounded Therapist, had to say about Mindful Eating in Part 2 of our series: 

I really wanted to title this post: Mindful Eating part 2 Electric Boogaloo but that would not have made this post easy to find. I’m not sure about you, but I was hiding from the polar vortex this weekend. Being “trapped” in my home here in CT is one of the worst times for me find myself eating when I am not hungry (aka not being mindful). In general, I am a high energy kind of gal, however (is anyone else an unending contradiction?) I love being at home. While it is not an ideal plan for eating for me (I know I should eat high volume, filling meals) I love to graze! LOVE IT! Little pieces of this, little parts from that and before I know it, a whole package of cheese and a box of crackers are gone. It gets worse when I become bored, want a distraction or just because I see something in my pantry (Red Flag Rachel, you are not being mindful!). It’s tough. When I am home and enjoying some much-needed downtime, it’s actually the worst time for my mindful eating practice. ARGH!

At the end of this post be sure to check out Lisa’s excellent tips and tricks to use mindfulness to catch yourself not being hungry and still eating. My two favorites are: identifying hunger vs cravings and the hunger scale. CHECK IT OUT!

Without further ado, here is Part 2 of our Mindful Eating Series:

In the first installment, we focused on observing what is going on outside our body as well as inside before eating.
• Did you learn anything surprising?
• Are there specific people or environments that influence what or how much you eat?
• Are there any changes you made to your thoughts or environment that may positively impact your eating?
• Are there any patterns to your trouble spots during the day where you may be eating mindlessly or emotionally?

Taking even just a short moment to tune into your thoughts and emotions as well as what is happening around you can help you be more present (at the moment) and better able to hear your hunger and fullness cues. More on that in a moment.

But first, perhaps the MOST important philosophy of mindfulness is being aware of all these things without criticizing or judging yourself. For example, you are feeling stressed at your desk at work and want to eat your lunch but it’s only 10 am and you are not hungry. Rather than judging yourself and thinking: “what is wrong with me? I just had breakfast! How am I supposed to get through the day if all I want to do it eat!?”, try understanding the situation and how it is affecting you- “I am feeling stressed which usually pushes me to eat. Also, my stress is mounting with the constant chiming of emails. What I need to do is decrease my stress and food won’t do that…but a small walk to the bathroom might help me relax”.

Hearing and correctly interpreting hunger signals is integral to becoming your own expert on food. Judging yourself for feeling hungry or too full makes listening and interpreting harder to do. It can be helpful to aim to set the criticizing and judgment of food and weight aside for a few days to understand how freeing it is to live without them.

There are many things you can practice to better hear and interpret hunger and fullness signals. The first place to start is with a simple question before engaging in eating: Am I hungry?
Before reaching for a snack or sitting down to a meal, find a quiet place (ideally away from food) to check in with your body’s hunger level. It may help to write out a list of physical sensations you have when actually hungry (vs experiencing a craving) and use it at this moment of checking in. The more you practice checking in with head hunger (ex. cravings or appetite) vs stomach hunger (actual need for energy), the easier and more intuitive it becomes.

It can be hard to hear subtle hunger cues and if you are anything like me, you may like a step by step guidance through this new eating territory. Practice listening for the cues before eating by following these steps:

1. Move away from the food or do this exercise before coming into contact with food such as before walking into the restaurant, kitchen or party. You can do this in your car, in the bathroom or in another room of your house.
2. Calm down by taking a few deep breaths.
3. Connect with your body and physical sensation. Place a hand on your abdomen and picture your stomach. How
full is it? How empty is it?
4. Ask yourself “Am I hungry?” “What physical hunger/fullness sensations am I feeling?”
5. Observe if there are any other physical signals or sensation? (ex. Edgy, weak, tired, thirsty?).
6. Notice your thoughts in this moment. Are you rationalizing eating? Feeling guilty or ashamed?
7. Beware of any negative thoughts you may have and let them go before eating.

That’s it- just practice noticing the difference between being hungry or wanting to eat for another reason. Wondering what to do if you are not hungry but want to eat? Stay tuned! There is more to come

BONUS! Understanding if you are hungry or not is a big step. If this activity comes easy to you, then try this bonus step #8: if you are truly hungry, start to evaluate how hungry you are using a mindfulness hunger scale. On a scales of 1-10, where 1 means starving or ravenous and 10 means so stuffed you feel sick, try to determine what level your hunger is at before eating. This can be used as a guide for portion size.

You can find Rachel :

On Facebook, Pinterest & Twitter

Mindful Eating Series with The Grounded Therapist (#1)

This time of year you can't glance at any social media feed without being bombarded with (bad) advice on how to lose weight/be healthy/shape up. There IS an alternative to all that diet & clean eating crazy speak: Mindful Eating. I understand that it can be a hard to understand concept- so I have embarked on a project to help you understand what it is and how it can help you and (perhaps more importantly) how you can start practicing it today. This is a collaboration between myself and The Grounded Therapist. 

I met Rachel Dougherty, The Grounded Therapist, through a bloggers group. Since I write & talk a lot about the psychology behind eating, I am always eager to collaborate (and learn from) psychologists who are experts in mindfulness. After some exciting exchanges, we decided to collaborate on a Mindful Eating series! 

Here is what Rachel had to say about Mindful Eating: 

"This is the time of year when people try to make healthy goals for themselves. Diets and weight loss tricks are everywhere. It’s unavoidable. However, there are few real sustainable plans out there. Since we know most diets fail, what can you do if you want to lose weight, be more healthy or set a new fitness/wellness goal? What about starting to eat more mindfully? I know mindful eating is something I consider each new year after eating way too many cookies and cake. My birthday is on thanksgiving. It’s just cake and sweets from November to January 2nd. When you eat well and get some exercise you body and mind feel great. You will have more energy which means you will do good work, be able to accomplish more goals which make you want to continue to eat better. It’s an amazing cycle which I still manage to derail at times. I ... consider mindful eating a self care priority. "

Without further ado, here is our first post:

You’ve probably heard that mindful eating can help you manage your weight, reduce any disordered eating and help repair your relationship with food. Understanding what mindful eating is and how to practice it is the challenging part. This is mainly because it requires inner reflection, paying attention and lots of practice.

Being a mindful eater means much more than just eating when you are hungry and stopping when you are full. Most people have heard the advice to “stop when you are full” and roll their eyes because, let’s be honest, you’ve probably tried it, and without the proper support, it may not have worked for you. For a greater chance of actually stopping when you are full, there are many things to practice and that is what this series is all about! In fact, the goal for many people is to use mindful eating as a way to reduce emotional and mindless eating. This means practicing being able to recognize when you are full, estimating how much food you need, letting go of judgement about your body & food and learning to trust your instincts.

Going beyond the “eat when hungry and stop when full”, mindful eating includes noticing the colors, smells, flavors, and textures of your food; eating more slowly; getting rid of distractions like TV or reading; hearing hunger and fullness cues and learning to eliminate guilt and anxiety about food. Noticing these things means deliberately paying attention and being fully aware of what is happening both inside and outside yourself.

Inside yourself includes what is going through your mind such as any emotions or thoughts you may be having- "I am stressed" or "I feel fat". Mindfulness includes paying attention to the experience in our body. Where in the body do we feel hunger? (in the head or in the stomach?) What does half-full feel like, or three quarters full?

Outside yourself means your surroundings:

• Where are you physically?
• sitting or standing? 
• at your desk with emails coming in every 2 minutes? 
• or alone in the kitchen with everyone gone to bed?

• Who are you with? 
• Compassionate people who make you feel confident?
• Or people who judge your eating and weight. 

The idea is to eventually learn in what way these thoughts, emotions and environment affects what, how and how much we eat. But, before we get ahead of ourselves, lets stick to practicing observing.

Eating mindfully can sound a bit abstract and practicing concrete activities to increase mindfulness can help you get started. To start becoming more mindful of when, how and what you eat as well as what influences you to eat, there are hands on exercises you can practice. Let’s start with this exercise:

Before eating, take a minute to observe your environment (outside your body) and your thoughts, emotions and how you physically feel (inside your body):

• are you stressed? Anxious? Happy? Sad? Tired?

• at the table and discussing stressful news? Standing up at the counter? Sitting in front of the tv?

• are you at your desk? In a stressful meeting? Rushing around in the car and feel you have no time to eat?

The goal is only to observe. Take notice. Pay attention more to your surrounding and your body and mind. This is invaluable for later, when trying to find patterns or barriers to eating mindfully. 

Click to tweet this! 

You can find Rachel :

On Facebook, Pinterest & Twitter

Why I won't be modifying any of my holiday recipes to be cleaner, lighter or healthier.

There is one surefire way to reduce the stress of holiday cooking: stick to what you know.
However, in this world of "clean eating" and never-ending hacks on how to lighten recipes, it can be hard to feel comfortable preparing traditional recipes.
Here is the secret: there IS a way to get through the holidays without being fearful of holiday weight gain or overeating even if you eat special holiday foods (hint: it has nothing to do with skipping meals, switching out sugar for agave syrup or passing up your favorite foods and feeling deprived)- it is called mindful or intuitive eating.

Let me be clear- I am not against changing up a recipe to better suit modern tastes and ingredients. I am, however, against cutting calories or using specialty ingredient to the detriment of recipes, your budget and meal satisfaction. So, before you go out and buy expensive or hard to find ingredients that won't even change the healthiness of the recipe; before you lighten-up a recipe and feel compelled to eat too much of it because it just doesn't taste good, hear me out.

You could lighten up your recipes if you really wanted to... or you could eat more according to your hunger levels. I know that "eat when you are hungry and stop when you are full" has been thrown around a lot these days and is usually met with an eye roll and sigh of exasperation. HOWEVER- this is not the full story. There are 3 things you can do to help yourself use your hunger (rather than emotions or appetite) to guide your eating:

1. Allow yourself to make the recipe again, later in the year.
2. Refuse to jump into a crazy diet in January.
3. Listen to your thoughts and emotions before eating.

Let's be realistic, you probably won't all of a sudden learn how to eat mindfully over the holidays. It takes practice and time to understand why you are eating. But starting to see food and eating in a different light and feeling less doomed to over eat can make the holidays a lot more enjoyable.

Make that recipe again and again
A table full of foods that come around only once a year is just begging you to eat too much. How easy is it to stop eating when full if you won't get another chance for another 364 days? Practically impossible. On top of the scarcity of these dishes, if you throw in feeling guilty for eating foods you've labelled as fattening or forbidden then your odds of walking away feeling full but not stuffed is almost zero. Allowing your favorite dishes to be enjoyed more often can take away the glamour of them. The more we eat a food, the less we put it up on a pedestal and the better we can judge it's true flavors. You may be surprised at how less tasty it is the more you allow yourself to eat it slowly without guilt.

Ditch the diet resolutions
Knowing that you are going to pass through January in a daze of hunger in the hopes that your self esteem will miraculously improve when you lose weight (ahem...it doesn't), only fuels cravings and appetite during the holidays. Often people think of it as the "last supper" or "last chance to eat what I want" before starting an ineffective diet.  With this frame of mind how can you NOT eat to bursting with the thought of physical and mental starvation looming ahead. Take dieting, deprivation and hunger out of the equation for January and just see how you eat.

Pause to listen to your body before eating
Before sitting down to a meal or entering a party, take 30 seconds to check into your body and mind. How hungry are you before you see and smell the food? Are there any emotions that may push you to eat more than you want (stress, anxiety, sadness)? Are there any thoughts running through your head that may lead you to eat when you are not hungry ("Get it now while you still can, the diet starts tomorrow!", "there is no point in trying to eat healthy, you always screw it up and stuff your face" or "So-and-so is not here to get on my back about eating this. I better eat it while I can!"). Simply understanding why you are eating when no longer hungry can help you eat less. The goal is not to eat only healthy foods or walk away hungry- the goal is to better understand why you continued to eat when already stuffed so that next time you can eat AND feel comfortable leaving the party.

You could set yourself up for a night of painful over eating by skipping lunch to make room for a feast at supper. You could make food that tastes like cardboard and is disappointing. You could go out and buy a host of expensive or hard to find ingredients that don't improve the nutrition of your dish. Or you could eat a delicious lunch and head into supper hungry (but not starving), eat the foods you really love and leave the table feeling satisfied and full.

Baking is a science and there is only so many changes you can make to a recipe before it becomes something entirely different. Of course, there is no harm in trying to make a dish contain less bad fat or more veggies, but if it leaves you in tears, or worse, encourages you to over eat just because it is healthy, than the point is lost.

Understanding the difference between true hunger and appetite, acknowledging when emotions are dictating what, when and how much you eat and removing guilt and judgement about food are all helpful ways to eat healthier over the holidays. Rather than scouring Pinterest for hacks to make your favorite dishes (so called) healthier and hoping for the best when these hacks are put to the test- try following the traditional recipe and embracing mindful eating.

Download this reminder card and keep it handy over the holidays!

How mindful eating is like a trip to the beach

Have you ever swam in the ocean?

I remember the first time I did. I grew up around lakes and rivers so you can imagine how vast and intimidating the ocean is compared to, well, anything else. Forget the blow up mattress and quiet lounging in the water- I was in for a surprise. Did I mention this was the east coast of Australia? Not Cape Cod or Cuba. The waves were about 4 feet high- on a calm day.

I was told that the best way to avoid being hit by the crashing waves, in order to get into the calmer water beyond, was to swim through the area where they are breaking. You have two choices: curl into a ball and duck under the crashing wave or dive through it. I was kind of in shock about the size of the waves, let alone being told I should dive into a breaking wave. Well, I survived (to no one's surprise but my own) and learned a valuable lesson- sometimes you just have to take a deep breath and dive right into the thing that is the most terrifying.

This got me thinking of other scary events in life that need this sort of strong approach. A thought came to me as I was reading Beyond a Shadow of a Diet by Judith Matz. She reminds the reader that in order to break the diet cycling & emotional eating and to start eating more mindfully, it is important to truly immerse yourself in mindful eating. Dabbling in it or "trying it out" for a while before going back to dieting only sets you up for failure. It is important to give it a real go and believe it may work for it to help anyone.

So, getting into mindful eating is similar to dealing with large ocean waves. You have to take a deep breath and a leap of faith and dive through the very thing that scares you. This leap of faith includes leaving all you know about dieting and restricting food back on the beach. Abandoning all the rules that allow you to feel temporarily comfortable and reduce the need to think about what/when/how much to eat is scary. Most people who have dieted a lot have lost their confidence in choosing the right foods for themselves. If they have ever binged or felt out of control with their eating, then they likely feel very incapable of eating foods they like and stopping when they feel full. Let me tell you- there is HOPE and MANY solutions for anyone who may be dealing with emotional eating or binge eating. You do not have to feel alone, ashamed or hopeless.

Leaping into mindful eating is important because if you believe that this eating is only temporary, you can't give up the diet mentality and this is key! Following external advice (like a diet) rather than your internal wisdom, does not allow you to learn to read your body's signals of how hungry you are, how much you need to feel full & satisfied and what you feel like eating. These are all things that are important to learn in order to eat well for life.

If you are interested in learning more about the the author of Beyond a Shadow of a Diet click here.

Waste of ressources: Who has the time for dieting?

Dieting is a waste of energy, time and money.

I don't know about you, but I certainly have none of those to spare!

I am a HUGE advocate of intuitive and mindful eating to manage health. It encourages a way of eating that fits with your "eating personality" & food preferences, it is easy to integrate regardless of where you are geographically (on vacation, on a business trip or enjoying breakfast bed) and perhaps most importantly, has nothing to do with starvation or deprivation.

A recent article touches on this subject with great insight. It is from the latest Scientific American MIND magazine:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-diets-don-t-work-and-what-does/

It is so eloquently written and it mentions all the important aspects of weight management. If you have 5 minutes to read it, DO IT, you won't regret it.

So, getting back to my initial thought that dieting is a time suck. The funny thing is that many people have told me that they just don't have the time to learn how to eat mindfully. They believe that they need some strict guidance on what to eat and what not to eat in order to fix their eating problems and that somehow these strict rules will be easier to follow than a more natural way of eating. For many people, it is easier to blindly follow a diet- there is no need to think or second guess your decisions so it may feel like you are saving energy. It can also feel safer to follow a traditional way to lose weight since it has been marketed to death for decades. 

However, over time the strain and drain of having to resist eating the foods you enjoy and avoiding those that are handy starts to take its toll. Not to mention the terrible track record diets have with unsustainable weight loss and even weight gain

There is a finite amount of energy we have at our disposal every day. Wasting it on doing things that just don't work (ahem, diets!) is insane and frustrating.

When talking about diets, gurus and celebrities come to mind. I still can’t understand why people think that a celebrity could possibly know their body better than they do. Sure, dietitians have (science based) knowledge about nutrition and know of what has worked for other people who have successfully made health changes, but ultimately, you are the expert on your body. Re-discovering the confidence that you can make healthy choices takes time and practice, and it the only sustaining way to manage weight and health. I say re-discover because we were all born with the innate ability to hear and listen to our hunger and fullness cues. Understanding what influences things like mindless eating and large portion sizes is one step to eating healthier. Unfortunately, no diet will help with these issues, the answers have to come from listening to your mind and body.

No one would stand being instructed on how to feel or, perhaps more bluntly, what kind of underwear to wear. So why are so many of us allowing other people to tell us what, how much and when to eat? Listening and worrying over these instructions is a waste of time and energy.

The jobs of dietitians and other health professionals has evolved from providing knowledge and barking orders to listening to what the client wants and needs as well as motivating & supporting them to take action on making changes. So if you find yourself in a relationship with a health advocate who is telling you what to do rather than listening to you, move on and find someone who will be more of a partner in change rather than a know-it-all.

Feeling inadequate because you can’t follow a crazy diet to the letter is a waste of energy. Remember, you deserve to be confident with what you eat and diets do not give us confidence, they only take it away.

Social Media Snafu: How unliking, unfriending and unfollowing can help you manage your weight

There is an expression in french: "trop, c'est comme pas assez". Roughly translated, it means "too much is like not enough" or more eloquently put "less is more". In the nutrition world, this can mean trying to follow lots of complex information all at once (ie. gluten free, dairy free, low carb diet) when simple is sometimes best.

This confusion happens all the time. Since the internet first crossed paths with curious, weight-loss driven people, dietitians have been hearing the same old story- although their clients know alot about nutrition, they feel lost in this sea of information. Scouring the internet for hours to find all the tips and tricks needed to guarantee weight loss and eternal health happens too often. The problem with all this so-called "research" is that it usually is accompanied by anxiety, confusion and feelings of desperation. The best solution to this information overload is to take a nutrition "research" hiatus.

This used to mean stopping the weight loss chit chat, putting down the diet book or avoiding buying the latest fitness magazine. But now, since the birth of the internet, it should also include our Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram and Facebook feeds.

Take a break from talking about food and weight loss with partners, friends and coworkers. Say au-revoir to reading the endless list of how-tos and diet guides. Unlike, unfollow and unfriend social media beings that are all about dieting/clean eating/burning calories all the time. This gives our brain a much needed break to decompress. This timeout is important for getting back to basics and to better hear our own intuition about food and eating. We have the answers to our own food questions. It takes some time and practice, but understanding hunger and fullness cues and our triggers to eat when not hungry is the simplest way to eat well.

Most people who are life-long dieters already have too much food and diet information packed in their brains so reading and talking about dieting only leads to more confusion. Talking with an expert (ie. registered dietitian) who specializes in mindful eating can do wonders for the brain, well being and anxiety related to eating. This is because sessions with a dietitian go much deeper than just conversations surrounding food and nutrition. Talking about what influences us to eat when we are not hungry as well as what fuel cravings and anxiety around food choices are the most interesting and connecting conversations we can have with professionals.


When everyone chimes in with their opinion on what we should eat or the latest miracle diet they heard about, it is stressful and does more harm than good. It often makes us second guess the best eating expert - ourselves. It is especially toxic if it is coming from our social media feed since we tend to check our feeds all day long.

Sometimes the best way friends and family and the internet can help us make lifestyle changes is to leave these conversations to the experts.

How to avoid dieting in 5 steps

Diets don't work. They are especially toxic for your relationship with food and your body. So what is left to do if you want to improve your eating or manage your weight? Try these tips to avoid falling back on dieting this year.

1. Reconnect with your hunger levels: everyone already has a way to "regulate" their eating and it has nothing to do with other people's diet advice. Listening to your very own hunger signals is the first step to reconnecting with your body's needs. No diet book, diet guru or meal plan will ever know how much or what you need to eat at any particular moment. Only you know what you want to eat, how much of it you need to feel satisfied and if you are truly hungry. It can seem scary at first especially if you have not relied on your own hunger cues in a long time, but chances are you will eat less if you follow your true hunger than if you ignore it. For most people who claim they are never hungry or feel fullness, chances are they have stopped listening to the cues long ago but the good news is that anyone can reconnect with these signals. This does take time and practice to get it right, but its worth the work! Read more about hunger levels and how to reconnect with them here.

2. Recognize when you are eating without being hungry: hearing your hunger (and fullness) cues is important for pointing when you are eating without hunger. Most people have eaten without feeling hungry at least once in their life. However, when this happens often it can lead to unhappiness and not actually fix the problems or emotions that are occurring. If you are not hungry, eating food does not help to relieve any sadness or loneliness or anxiety you may be experiencing. Negative emotions and situations cannot be helped with food and most people feel even worse after comforting themselves with food (especially true with people who are not intuitive eaters). First step is to acknowledge when you are eating without being hungry. After that, you can decide if you want to eat anyway, distract yourself from the craving or deal with the emotions that may be influencing you to eat.

3. Start peeling off those food labels ("good" food or "bad"): the more a food is forbidden, the more it is tempting to eat. Labeling foods as bad often does not lead to eating less of it. In fact, it often leads to binges if they are after avoided for a long time and if they are some of your favourite foods. Whats the point of avoiding, say ice cream, if you are going to binge on a pint of it at the end of the month. Just like in life, foods and nutrition are rarely just black and white. There is a lot of gray area- which can be harder to navigate than good vs bad. Again, the payoff of learning to live in a world of grays is worth the hard work. Taking the labels of foods can be scary and difficult. Some people are worried they may binge or over eat if foods are no longer off limits. However, with time the "I want what I can't have" does wear off. Often these forbidden foods taste better with a "bad" label and when that label is removed, they aren't as tasty or tempting.


4. Include all foods into your diet. This tip goes hand in hand with #3. This may mean re-introducing forbidden foods- especially if you find yourself binging on them. At first you may feel vulnerable and tempted to overindulge on these foods. However the more you practice enjoying these foods without guilt the easier it will become to eat them in moderation. When the foods become less forbidden, the need or desire to eat more than we want to, slowly goes away. Trust me- everyone thinks that this is impossible- but it will happen if you give it a chance. If you binge eat on a regular basis, you may want to enlist the help of a dietitian who specializes in eating disorders to help you with this step.

5. Write down exactly what changes you want to make. Most people know what they want to change, it's finding the way to make those changes that is the hard part. You don't need to be told to eat more fruit and veg or go to bed earlier but finding ways to carry out these changes takes effort. Focusing on actual things to change rather than "wanting to lose weight" gives you something tangible to do. Goals or changes you want to make should be action based- and wanting to lose weight or improve your relationship with food is not an action. What are you going to do to make these desires come true? Eat one fruit every day? Record your 10pm show so you can get to bed earlier? Try tracking the actions you want to take in order to remind yourself of your progress and successes.

Mindful eating- step two!

I've previously blogged about the general concept of mindful eating along with one way to practice eating more in the moment. The next step you can take involves learning the difference between eating due to hunger versus other influences.

So so so many clients struggle with eating when they are not hungry which can trigger feelings of guilt and shame. Understanding whether you are eating due to hunger or other reasons begins with being mindful before taking the first bite.

Before you take a bite of food, take a minute to listen to your body. Ask yourself- "am I truly hungry?" The task at hand is not to resist the urge to eat or be a "good person" for not eating- but to simply listen or check in with your body. 

It is important that you do this in a non-judgemental way. If you are scared of how you might feel if you are not hungry but want to eat anyways, you may eat out of rebellion or anger. Allowing yourself the option to eat anyways and congratulate yourself on taking the time to listen to your body's hunger and fullness levels will help you avoid feeling guilty.

Step one would be to step away from the food. Go to a quiet place free from the smells and influence of food. This could be in  your car before heading into the house or in the bathroom before eating dinner. You can close your eyes or focus on an object while evaluating your physical signs of hunger. 

Some people find it useful to write down a list of physical signs of hunger- tummy rumbling, gnawing feeling, etc. Refer to that list while you are trying to judge if you are hungry. 

Step two: Once you've determined if you are actually hungry- try to figure out how hungry you are. A lot? a little? Hunger is not all or nothing- there is a scale or progression that will help determine how much food you need. You can use a scale from 1-5 or 1-10 to help you evaluate it. 



Step three: once you know how hungry you really are- decide how much food you need to eat to fill the gap BEFORE starting to eat. You can always decide to eat more or less once you are eating, but letting your hunger decide how much you need versus the food can help you be more mindful. 

If you feel confident in listening to your hunger signals and determining how hungry you are- there is a fourth step. Once you have eaten about half the plate of food- take a mini break. Reconnect with your body to reevaluate your hunger levels. Check in to see how much more you need to eat to feel satisfied. 

Practicing listening to your hunger cues and evaluating your level of hunger or fullness is a big concept to master. It is not that difficult with practice and is INVALUABLE for weight management.

Tackling the triggers that influence you to eat when not actually hungry is another exercise to increase mindfulness. This one is a bit more difficult to do on your own and can stir up some emotions. Triggers can be in your environment (donuts in the breakroom), feelings (like stress or sadness) even old habits (snacking while watching tv). But that's for another post!

What is mindful eating?

I talk a lot about mindful eating and how it can help you manage your weight, reduce any disordered eating and help repair your relationship with food. Understanding what mindful eating is and how to practice it is the challenging part. Not because it is hard to do but because it takes time, inner reflection and lots of practice.

Being a mindful eater means noticing the colors, smells, flavors, and textures of your food; chewing slowly; getting rid of distractions like TV or reading; and learning to cope with guilt and anxiety about food.
Noticing these things means deliberately paying attention, being fully aware of what is happening both inside and outside yourself. In your body means in your heart and mind such as any emotions or thoughts you may be having- "I am stressed" or "I feel fat". As well as outside yourself, in your surroundings- like at your desk with emails coming in every 2 minutes or alone in the kitchen with everyone gone to bed.

Noticing how eating affects our mood and how our emotions like anxiety influence our eating is important. Mindfulness includes paying attention to the experience in our body. Where in the body do we feel hunger? (in the head or in the stomach?) What does half-full feel like, or three quarters full?

One other very important aspect of mindfulness is being aware of all these things without criticising or judging yourself. For example, you are feeling stressed at your desk at work and want to eat your lunch but it's only 10am and you are not hungry. Rather than judging yourself and thinking:"what is wrong with me? I just had breakfast! How am I supposed to get through the day if all I want to do it eat!?", try being more aware of the situation- "I am feeling stressed which usually pushes me to eat. Also, my stress is mounting with the constant chiming of emails. What I need to do is decrease my stress and food won't do that...but a small walk to the bathrooms might help me relax".

Eating mindfully can sound a bit abstract and practicing concrete activities to increase mindfulness can help you get started. Gradually start to become more mindful of when, how and what you eat as well as what influences you to eat. Start by dedicating one meal a week or a day to eating more slowly and more attentively. Try these tips:

-Set a timer to 20 minutes and take the whole time to eat a normal sized meal.
-Try eating the meal with your non dominant hand to slow you down. You can also use chopsticks to do this.
-Eat in silence for 5 minutes and think about how your food was grown, produced, prepared and cooked.
-Take small bites and chew well.
-Try to guess all the spices and herbs used in the dish.
-Notice how the crunchy food feels between your teeth or the silky food feels on your tongue.
-Is the food as good or tasty as you expected?

The next few steps to take is to become more aware of your hunger signals (Am I hungry? and if so, how hungry?), fullness signals and triggers that may influence your appetite or desire to eat.

Reading through a book, using a workbook or talking to a registered dietitian about mindful eating can be very helpful in getting started or to help maintain mindfulness. You can read more about mindful eat and intuitive eating in past blogs here, here, here  and here (you can also search my blog for posts related to mindful and intuitive eating).

Can losing weight lead to gaining weight??!!

If there is one major negative thing that has emerged from recent research on weight loss is that it often leads to weight regain. If done in an unhealthy, unbalanced way, regaining the weight along with a few extra pounds is also a big possibility. This weight regain is not only frustrating but makes any subsequent attempts at weight loss even harder.

So, if losing weight often leads to weight regain, wouldn't weight maintenance be perhaps the better option for some people? Yes. Also, it is important to note, that if you are gaining weight over time, stabilizing your weight (or stopping the gain) is, in itself, weight loss. To read more on maintaining weight, read my last post.

Another consideration is the idea of preventing weight gain rather than actively trying to lose weight (especially in an unhealthy way). Preventing weight gain has been the focus of much research recently. One reason is because it is easier for people to prevent gaining weight then to try to lose it.

Keeping the weight off after losing it requires most people to be vigilant with their eating and exercise- more so then they did before they lost the weight. Consider that for a moment- to keep off the weight, you cannot merely return to your "usual" way of living. You have to have learnt about healthy eating, made sustainable changes to food and exercise AND found a way to continue this new lifestyle for life. No wonder most people put weight back on especially if short term solutions are used. If done in a healthy way, "watching" what you eat can be an easy thing (if you have practiced mindful eating). It could also be a constant struggle if you have just followed a diet plan and never reconnected with hunger and fullness cues.

One study in particular that focused on weight gain prevention is the "Strategies to prevent weight gain in adults". I think the name of the review says it all! Their main conclusions were that (although the strength of evidence is low for all the strategies) effective approaches may be: low fat diets (where 20% of calories is coming from fat. So if you eat 2000cal per day, 400cal are from fat or 44g per day), eating fewer meals prepared away from home, eating more fruits and vegetables, monitoring heart rate during exercise and participating in group sessions that deal with lifestyle change  (that includes text message reminders). Some of these approaches sound more fun and interesting than others. It's also important to note that other strategies may work but have not been studied (such as mindful or intuitive eating).

One interesting quote from this systematic review paper is :

"The lack of rigorously conducted long term trials to inform those who aim to prevent weight gain may be indirectly contributing to the obesity epidemic"

Interesting. If we are relying on old-school techniques to prevent weight gain we may in fact be pushing people in the wrong direction?! I feel this is another reason why "losing weight at any cost" or "losing weight any way possible" are both bad ideas.

So, be prudent when deciding what strategies to use for losing weight. Consider the possibility of maintaining your weight, at least for a little while before taking on weight loss.

Where to turn when extreme dieting (ultimately) fails

Although I help people every day manage their weight, I also work with people with eating disorders. My counseling techniques do change depending on my client but one thing always remains the same: extreme dieting is bad. Understanding the difference between normal, everyday improvements with eating and extreme dieting can be tricky. Explaining this difference to anyone who does not have a skewed relationship with food (and even to those with this problem) can be a challenge.

Extreme dieting is a problem for so many reasons since both physical and mental health is compromised. Unfortunately, a new trend is emerging where dieting is called "lifestyle change" or "healthy eating", but the rigid rules of dieting are the same. Here are a few key points to help you decided if you are following an extreme diet:

Does your diet or "lifestyle change" involve delaying eating? this could mean fasting, delaying eating as long as possible during the day or many hours between meals.

Are you restricting the overall amount you eat? this likely means you are tracking calories and trying to eat under a certain amount. Generally, if you do not have an eating disorder, this can be done safely as long as you aim for a realistic amount- at least 1500 calories per day. Anything under 1200 is considered extreme.

Are you avoiding certain types of food? maybe this is due to their high fat or sugar content, or for some so-called "proven" reason that claims it leads to weight gain. In general this is not an issue if you are cutting down on certain foods and savouring them once a week rather than 7 days a week. However, when these foods become outright banned or forbidden, then the diet becomes extreme. The slippery slope to "yo-yo dieting" or developing an eating disorder may not be far away when this banned food list grows.

So what are the alternatives to extreme dieting? Try a mindful eating or intuitive eating approach. They have been proven to be just as successful (if not more successful) as other traditional weight management techniques. These approaches are more gentle and zen and allow you to develop skills that will help you for many years to come to manage your weight versus a diet plan that tells you what to eat and only works when you follow the strict plan.

Check out my suggested readings for some great books on mindful eating!

when is YOUR vulnerable hour?

So many people get frustrated with their latest "cheat" or guilt trip. After hearing many stories from my clients, it started to become clear to me that there are times during the day in which we are more likely to make unwise food decisions.
This "vulnerable" time may be influenced by a number of different factors: low energy levels, high stress levels, the feeling of being over worked and the need for recompensing, the feeling of deprivation after a very low calorie day, etc. If you can identify your most vulnerable time during the day and understand what influences the strength of the cravings, then you are one step close to being able to handle even the toughest of temptations.

One of the best tools for helping you to ID what emotion or situation is influencing your eating and food decisions is a food journal. Tracking not only what and how much you eat, but including information about how you are feeling (emotions like stress, sadness and boredom) or whats happening around you (getting dinner together while helping the kids do their homework, or sitting at desk working on a late report) can give you valuable insight as how they influence your eating. Patterns may emerge and by understanding what to do to avoid being in a potential trouble situation can make things a lot easier.
Being aware of when you are most likely to overeat, eat when you are not hungry, or make unhealthy choices can help you better prepare a counter attack. Surrounding yourself with healthier choices or giving yourself options during this time is a good first start. For example, if you tend to eat a snack the minute you walk in the door after work (even though dinner is only 30 minutes away), perhaps planning to take a walk or do the laundry rather than heading to the kitchen would help. Another solution could be to prepare a healthy snack ahead of time so you don't have to go rummaging through the kitchen.
Sometimes ignorance it not bliss, and understanding when your vulnerable time is, can help you manage your weight.

Embrace your inner foodie

So many of my clients consider themselves to be foodies and often this love for food is conflicted because it is both enjoyed and hated. Enjoyed because food tastes good and brings them pleasure but hated because they feel it gets in the way of their goals (whether they it weight management, lowering cholesterol or managing blood sugars). I, on the other hand, feel that this title should be embraced to enhance ones health. Foodies love to experience new foods, explore flavor combinations, and don't want to waste a bite on foods that don’t meet their high expectations. Quality, not quantity, is the attitude for foodies.

Studies have proven that our satisfaction levels during and after a meal rely more on the flavor intensity and time we took to enjoy the food rather than the quantity eaten. If we merely took more than the average 18 minutes to enjoy a family meal, we could naturally cut down on how much we eat. Setting a time in which everyone must stay seated at the table, serving food over multiple courses (ex. salad first, then main meal) or even eating with chop sticks can help you and your family enjoy more time together and more time savoring the food.

Also, respecting taste thresholds can help us to naturally eat less. There are only so many bites we can take of a food before it starts to lose its appeal. This does take some effort to open the lines of communication between the body and the brain in order to “hear” our body’s signals. In order to get around this problem of taste bud fatigue, we tend to alternate between salty and sweet food. A good example of this is having dessert at the end of a big meal- we aren’t hungry but somehow the sweet ending still tastes good. So, if we avoid cycling between the two at meals or snacks, we may ultimately help ourselves eat less.

Practicing leaving a little food on the plate can also help to avoid overeating when we eat just because the food is sitting there. Stop feeling guilty about not finishing the plate and turn up the volume on what your stomach determines as “enough”. Rating your hunger on a scale of 1-10 halfway between the meal can slow down the meal and help you determine how much more food you need.

So, next time you are served a less than desirable piece of complementary cake with your lunch combo or notice last week's stale croissant sitting on the counter- listen to your inner food critic to determine if it’s really worth your time (and taste).

Eat what you love, love what you eat INTERVIEW

I recently had the pleasure of speaking with the author of "Eat What You Love, Love What You Eat: How to Break Your Eat-Repent-Repeat Cycle", a book about eating mindfully and fearlessly. Dr. Michelle May is a physician and a recovered yo-yo dieter who has learned to eat instinctively to help her stay healthy and happy. Her new book has won numerous awards and you can find it both in book stores and online. Look for the link to a sneak peak of Chapter 1 at the end of the interview!

For a 1st timer to your concept, how do you briefly describe it?

We are all born with the instinctive ability to manage our eating. We live in an food abundant environment with lots of pressure surrounding us. Food is convenient way to feel good fast and using food in this way does not work. One of the core concepts is to relearn how to eat instinctively and naturally. Restriction and deprivation are number 1 barrier to realizing these concepts. It goes against our instincts to not deprive ourselves of eating food we like. Sometimes my message can get over simplified- eat when you are hungry and stop when you are full. However, why we eat and how we eat are also very important to our relationship to food.
The focus of my book is less about losing weight and more about why and how you are eating. Weight is a symptom to an internal struggle; improving ones relationship with food and self leads to better health.

It can be hard for chronic dieters to embrace this new approach, how do you convince them?

A lot of people turn to diets for short term results so I like to understand my client's diet history. Often, they blame themselves when those results don't last- "they must not work because of me". My response to that is if people who are successful in other areas in their life aren't able to stick to restrictive diets, then perhaps it is not sustainable for anyone.

I will suggest to my hesitant clients, who have dieted in the past, to take one week to replace dieting with asking themselves "Am I hungry?". Over one week, they are asked to eat as they would normally but to notice the physical signs of hunger and satiety. In one week, we discuss their findings.

Once my clients find something they are good at (i.e. listening to their body's signals), a way to eat that they can manage it on a daily basis and enjoy doing it- then they will flourish. If we look at it in terms of a job, we would not yell at our employees to get a job done, so why are we yelling at ourselves and blaming ourselves when diets don't work.

A lot of the information you provide to your readers is very easy to understand. What is the best way to present this information?

I find that one of the easiest ways to describe the eating cycle is to present to my audience the eating cycle graphic.

Another way I can describe this concept, is using a pendulum. Unlike a yo yo, that is wound up tightly and bounces up and down, a pendulum finds middle ground. A pendulum can swing back and forth between under eating and overeating but it does have the ability to land in between. The balance between over and under eating is kind of like a gray area and this concept can apply to both healthy eating, exercise and work.

Have you encountered any resistance from fellow professionals? If so, how have you dealt with it? any advice?

If my colleagues have attended my presentation, there is not much resistance. There is always 1 or 2 people in the crowd who are negative about the concept. Often time my colleagues have not explored this concept before. When people can hear it in a way they can understand or relate to, then those people are more likely to adopt that concept. A mere 45min can shift the way they perceive the idea. If I speak to other health professionals who have not attended a presentation and do not understand the concept, I tend to get lumped in with other physicians who are in the weight loss business. Too often people do not believe that it can work- there is a profound distrust that people can manage eating what they love and we assume that it is not possible to eat in that way.

You have collaborated with both a dietitian and a psychologist in the past. How do you discern between the roles of a dietitian, psychologist and physician? Where does one role start and the other end?

In an ideal world, we would work as a team in a multi-disciplinary environment with the patient as a coach. The best way for the mindful eating concept to work is if all aspects of the issues are addressed. More physicians need to understand cognitive behavioral therapy and unfortunately physicians have no training with nutrition information so teaming up with people who are experts in these fields helps the client.

You offer Am I Hungry? Facilitator Training to teach people how to integrate mindful eating concepts into their work. What characteristics do you think make a good facilitator?

Some people naturally eat instinctively and have a hard time understanding why others cannot. You don't need to have an illness or disease to be empathetic to a situation. Our facilitators learn to help clients ask the right questions and guide them in a new way of thinking. Using the Mindful Eating Cycle, they are able to easily describe the connection between psychology and eating in a way that it is understandable and practical.

What advice would you give to other entrepreneurs in the nutrition and weight management field?

It is important to have a rosy out look even though sometimes it can feel like swimming up stream. I feel this movement is gaining momentum and that one day the tide will turn.

People trying to manage their weight can feel frustrated and feel discouraged about the process. There is a negative paradigm integrated into our culture. So many people disbelieve in their ability to eat what they love and this process is undermined by negative thoughts. That being said, my work is incredibly rewarding because I see my clients blossom and learn mindful eating techniques.

When you first started writing about this concept, it was called "Am I hungry?" Why did you change the name?

My company name is still Am I Hungry?® but I changed the title of the book to "Eat What You Love, Love What You Eat" because the name Am I Hungry was too simplistic to describe all that mindful eating encompasses. It is not just about being mindful of the physical cues of hunger and satiety, but also includes enjoying what you eat and understanding external cues. Fearless eating and mindful eating are the two concepts captured by the new title "Eat What You Love, Love What You Eat"

What is in the works for you in the upcoming year?

We are in the process of modifying the mindful eating cycle to other conditions such as diabetes as well as a family program on the horizon. Also, there is a lot of interest in pre and post bariatric surgery to help get patients discovering the core issues. I believe the momentum is there to continue to share the message and keeping it understandable and clear is important.

You can learn more about "Eat What You Love, Love What You Eat" here: http://amihungry.com/eat-what-you-love-book.shtml.

Get a sneak peak at the first chapter! Download it here http://amihungry.com/eatwhatyoulovech1.pdf