New Year’s Day, the first of the weight loss advertisements arrived: a press release for a new diet plan. Then came a flood of emailed anti-fat strategies; coupons for local health clubs; Google ads flashing “Lose 30 pounds in Weeks – No Diet.” And I haven’t even turned on the TV yet, where commercials for elliptical trainers, diet pills, and low-carb shake schemes will hold me hostage until I press the remote.
Forget weight loss and body sculpting. My New Year’s resolution is to learn how to eat normally. I’m not sure what exactly that is. Along with everyone else, I’ve been so indoctrinated with dieting and exercise tips, I’ve lost sight of health. But I'm not to be deterred.
In the search for normal and therefore health, I’ve come across some statistics. According to the National Association for Eating Disorders:
•46% of 9-11 year-olds are “sometimes” or “very often” on diets, as are 82 percent of their families.
•91 percent of girls on a college campus had dieted.
•95 percent of all dieters will regain their lost weight in 1-5 years and those who diet frequently are 12 times as likely to binge as those who don’t diet.
Dieting is not normal eating. And because I am recovering from anorexia nervosa, dieting certainly is unhealthy for me.
What is Normal Eating?
Dietician Ellen Satter takes a stab at the question in her book, "Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family."
Normal eating is:
•Being able to eat when hungry and continue eating until satisfied. .
•Leaving some cookies on the plate because you know you can have them again tomorrow.
•Aiming for happiness rather than thinness.
For me, normal means making tapioca pudding because I like it and I haven’t allowed myself to eat it in 12 years. Normal is eating three meals every day, because I usually eat only one, dinner, thinking I should save my calorie quota just like, when a preteen, I used to save a my chocolate candy bar, nibbling a bit each day, making it last two weeks.
This year, I’ve eaten until I feel stuffed, just to know that I can tolerate that feeling. I’ve let my daughter cook me macaroni and cheese, and eaten it with relish -- because her meal making is an act of love that I am now choosing to receive. I’ve refused to accept entertain the self-destructive idea that the number on the scale measures my worth.
For you, "normal" will be just as personal. You know your habits. Terry Bravender, M.D., director of Duke University’s Eating Disorders program, tells me that, at it’s core, eating normally means breaking a moral code as in: I should eat only “good” foods like spinach and stop eating “bad” foods like Haagen Dazs Double Chocolate. All foods are good, sometimes, in the right proportions for you.
We know how to do this. As toddlers, we never thought to say, “I was so bad today,” because we ate two chocolate brownies. We knew instinctively how to eat, based on our body’s cues for hunger and fullness. But then, we grew up into a culture of “Losing 10 Pounds: the Gateway to a New You.” Most of us tried the diet and exercise schemes. Some of us went overboard. And we lost the best relationship, the one between our plates and ourselves.
But we can find normal again, like an old friend. A good start is to tune out the advertisements and tune into our own bodies. They will bring us true happiness. But only if we’re willing to listen.