Intuitive Eating Myth #2: Intuitive Eating Means Ice Cream and Pizza All Day Every Day
Mhmm, this is the number one misunderstood idea that I hear about intuitive eating. “If we are eating intuitively, we are going to want all of the “bad” foods all of the time. If we have a choice, we will want to eat brownies and fries all day long!”
Okay, first of all, yes, there may be a phase like this where we allow ourselves all of the foods that we have restricted for so long! However, that is all it is, a phase. When we think about letting go of restriction, we can imagine a child who has forever been forbidden to eat candy, who is set loose for the first time in a candy shop. We can imagine that it is like letting our pet out to play after we have kept them cooped up in the house all day. This phase is a normal reaction for many and may be what our bodies need at that time.
When we first free ourselves from the shackles of dieting we may overeat all of these foods and that is okay! There is no “failing” in intuitive eating. When we are on this cycle of dieting, falling of the bandwagon, and dieting again, we tend to have these binge cycles. When we "fail our diet" we tend to stock up on all the forbidden foods before we feel we have to start our next diet and start restricting these foods again, saying "I will start tomorrow." When dieting, we don't know when that piece of cake is going to be gone and forbidden again. This idea of a forbidden food only makes it all that more crave-worthy. So yes, we may go through that initial phase of eating more of these types of foods and that is normal. Although it may be scary, it is normal and it is temporary. Soon, we start to realize that these foods aren't going anywhere and that we can have them whenever we crave. Our bodies start to eventually understand, “hey, so you aren't going to deny me this food anymore? I can have this food anytime I want? Okay good, because I can not take another bite of this. Can I get a peace of broccoli in me already?” During this initial phase, our bodies just want to make sure we won’t restrict these foods from them like we have in the past. Remember, our bodies crave to feel nice and healthy.