Intuitive Eating in Las Vegas

I’m back from Las Vegas. It was a very interesting trip for me in regards to conscious eating. I was there for a bachelorette party with seven other women who appear to range in size from two to six. I spent the months leading up to this getaway freaking out about hanging out at the pool with a large group of size four women. It turns out that wasn’t such a big deal. Oddly enough, I was not so self-conscious.

What ended up being interesting is watching how they eat. While I heard a lot of, “Does this make me look fat?” and “This shirt makes me look like a sausage,” I saw a lot of intuitive eating. I don’t know why, but I expected them all to pick at salads. Instead there were a lot of nachos, burgers, and some salads, too. It was clear that these women ordered exactly what they wanted to order, and then they stopped eating when they were finished.

Another thing I found interesting is that they seemed to know nothing about intuitive eating on a conscious level. I have known all of them long enough to know that they have all always been slim. I guess they have never given how they eat much thought. A few times when I wasn’t hungry and chose not to eat, I was told, “Sometimes you have to eat when you aren’t hungry.”

Overall I ate less than the women I was with, which really surprised me. I have thought about why that is, and I suspect that maybe my body must know that it needs less food because I have extra weight on me. That seems like a logical explanation, doesn’t it? My husband suggested that maybe they were eating more than they usually do because they were on vacation. I suppose that’s just as possible. I can accept that naturally thin people experience what I call “vacation eating,” too.

Spending this last week with a group of natural intuitive eaters was a fascinating experience. It also helped me lighten up about intuitive eating. I still find myself questioning myself about whether or not I am doing this “right” from time to time. Watching these naturally thin women eat what they want and enjoy themselves has helped me to feel more relaxed about this process.

Every Woman Has an Eating Disorder

I wanted to write a post about this blog because it is what first introduced me to intuitive eating. Last July I was struggling with Weight Watchers. I had been in a diet/binge cycle for several months. I was desperate to lose weight, and I just didn’t know what to do. I posted about my struggle on the Weight Watchers message board. One very wise poster suggested that I check out everywomanhasaneatingdisorder.blogspot.com. I did, and I was mesmerized. I read every post in one sitting. I would like to highlight two of them that really spoke to me.

Controversy
In this post, the blogger points out that when we don’t allow ourselves to eat the foods we want; we are saying that we don’t trust ourselves. I had never thought about it that way before. I thought I was avoiding french fries because I needed to lose weight. The truth is, I was avoiding french fries because I didn’t trust myself with french fries. I thought that if I allowed myself to have them, I would eat too many of them. That I would eat them every day, maybe even several times a day. How could I be a confident, happy person if I didn’t trust myself?

Choices
This post highlights ten appearance assumptions that lead to body image issues. I was especially struck by number ten. “The only way I could ever like my looks would be to change them.” This is the whole reason I was dieting in the first place. I thought I needed to lose weight before I could be happy with the way I looked. Isn’t this one of the main reasons why everyone diets?

The blogger went on to say, “If you're dissatisfied with your body, which would be easier--to lose weight or to work on your dissatisfaction?” What a revelation! It had never occurred to me that I could actually learn to accept my body as it is now. Considering I had been dieting on and off for a decade and only getting heavier, it seemed that it might just be easier to work on body acceptance.

On a side note, I have since discovered that learning to accept my body is a key component to learning how to eat intuitively. It’s really hard to be a conscious eater when you are focused first and foremost on weight loss. I have found that intuitive eating has become easier as I have stopped worrying about losing weight and started focusing my attention on wanting to have a normal relationship with food.