Intuitive eating: Healing your relationship with food

What if you didn’t have to count calories or cut out your favorite foods? It’s possible through intuitive eating, where how you eat is just as important as what you eat.

Intuitive eating is an approach that helps you learn how to trust your body’s natural hunger and satiety cues rather than food rules, restrictions or emotional cues. It’s about relearning to eat outside of the diet mentality, and returning to the wisdom we had as babies, as we are all born natural intuitive eaters.

Founded by dieticians Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch, intuitive eating follows ten essential principles:

Reject the diet mentality.
Honor your hunger by responding to the early signs of hunger.
Make peace with food by giving yourself unconditional permission to choose. This stops the cycle of deprivation and restriction, which lead to cravings, overeating and guilt.
Challenge the “food police” in your head to allow for eating to become a pleasurable and normal activity.
Discover the satisfaction factor. It’s possible to be physically full but not satisfied. When you eat what you really want, in moderation, the feeling of satisfaction will help you be content.
Cope with your emotions without using food
Respect your body for how it is at the moment.
Feel the difference of exercise when you shift your focus to movements that feel good to you, instead of only using exercise as a way to lose weight or eat more food.
Honor your health. Being healthy does not mean eating perfectly as overall food patterns shape your health, not just one meal or snack.
Respect and listen for comfortable fullness

Intuitive eating is an ongoing process and it takes time. If you are counting calories or have cheat days, that is not intuitive eating. Intuitive eating is forgiving, and it helps you redefine what “healthy” looks and feels like. Most importantly, it is self-empowering as it puts you in charge of your relationship with food. It’s allowing internal cues to guide eating patterns and improve body image and quality of life.

For more valuable advice on staying well throughout the pandemic, and to stay connected to others, we encourage you to join the QuadMed Well-being Facebook group or subscribe to the QuadMed YouTube channel, where you can find exercise videos and more to keep you active, healthy and engaged.