In today’s post, I’m sharing a round-up of some of my favorite posts when it comes to having a healthy relationship with food. 💫

Having a healthy relationship with food looks like not obsessing over what you’re going to eat today.

It looks like eating a variety of foods without feeling like a bad person or like you’re doing something wrong when you have something “less healthy.”

It looks like genuinely caring for your body, letting health and satisfaction be the main drivers of your eating choices.

For when you’re struggling with body image or honoring your hunger cues, bookmark this mega-post as the ultimate resource to have on hand for your food freedom journey!

The Ultimate Guide to a Healthy Relationship with Food

How to Rebuild Your Relationship with Food After Disordered Eating

This post is a great place to start for a high-level summary of what it might look like to go from obsession and overwhelm to peace with food.

I share 5 practical steps to feeling calmer and more centered with food:

• Let go of diet culture rules
• Honor your hunger and fullness cues
• Reframe food guilt with positive self-talk
• Build a support system for recovery
• Celebrate small wins

You can experience healing and freedom with food, no matter how long you’ve been battling disordered eating.

How to Nourish Your Body Well with the 5 Layers of Eating

In this post, I walk you through what I refer to as the “5 layers of eating” — consistency, balance, portions, variety, and enjoyment. ☕️

In my work as an eating disorder dietitian, clients are often (mostly informally) working through these 5 layers over time. Just like with frosting a cake, there are different layers that we add in gradually as we decorate / move forward in healing. 🎂

When it comes to growing in nourishing your body well, a great place to start can be building consistency. If you aren’t eating regularly, oftentimes it doesn’t make sense to focus as much on eating a variety of foods yet, for example.

True health is rooted in enjoyment. Developing a way of eating that is satisfying and full of meals and snacks that you actually look forward to is a key foundation for health in the holistic sense — mental, emotional, and physical.

Making Peace with Your Healthy Body Size

Struggling to feel neutral toward your healthy body size? Who doesn’t from time to time!

This post goes beyond surface level tips you’ve probably heard a million times, inviting you to dig deeper as to what’s underneath your body image struggles. Where is your hyper-fixation on body size coming from?

What have you learned or told yourself over time that being a certain weight or body size means?

What memories or experiences come up for you when you consider what being a certain weight or body size means?

Head to the post to explore more. ✨

Reasons to Eat Even When You’re Not Hungry

For many people (especially younger women!) to meet their nutrition needs, it entails eating BEYOND just when you are feeling hungry.

Many of my clients end up eating only when they are hungry, leading them to under-eat and not nourish their bodies adequately.

I can even struggle with this from time to time! Read more about my recent challenges with this here. 💫

Personal examples of how I regularly apply eating when I might not be hungry:

• Having an early-morning snack before I exercise
• Having an evening snack / dessert after dinner
• Going out for ice cream with my husband
• Having a snack before an appointment or meeting when it would be harder to eat
• Having an extra snack because I walked more that day

Eating intuitively is more than “just listening to your hunger cues.”

It also involves the wisdom to know generally how much you should eat in a day to meet your nutrition needs (I’m not talking counting calories). It allows for the freedom to eat when you’re not hungry to celebrate, unwind, or just because!

Benefits of Eating Regularly (3 meals + several snacks)

I’m a huge advocate of eating regularly throughout the day. Generally every 3 hours or so (give or take).

From mental and emotional benefits (such as reducing food noise) to physiological benefits (such as keeping your blood sugar more stable), there are a number of reasons why I recommend this style of eating for most people. Read more why here!

It is a normal, hardwired human physiological and psychological response to feel obsessive about food if you aren’t eating regularly enough! 🤯

3 Ideas to Consider When Making Food Choices

Very rarely (hardly ever) are there clear, black-and-white answers as to what, when, and how much you *should* eat.

If you are wrestling with disordered eating, maybe you can relate to feeling pressure from yourself to figure out the “one right choice” with every food decision you face, from what you eat to when to how much. 

Instead of obsessing over having a salad or a sandwich for lunch, consider your motivation, values, and the trade-offs. 💫

• Motivation: WHY am I choosing what I am choosing?
• Values: How is my food choice impacting my core values?
• Trade-offs: What am I leaning into with this food decision? No food choice is “perfect in all areas,” and we are constantly making trade-offs. 🌟 Read more for what I mean by this. 

7 Reasons to Eat More / Enough Dietary Fat

I am ALL about a diet high in healthy dietary fat! Head to this post for 7 reasons why.

Healthy dietary fat is NOT the enemy mainstream health media may have led you to believe it is! This includes both saturated and unsaturated sources.

If your Disordered Eating Part fears fat, I encourage you to explore this further! 🤔

Healthy sources of dietary fat can include: nuts + nut butters, egg yolks, whole milk dairy, coconut milk / products, grass-fed red meat, bacon, tallow, salmon, fattier cuts of poultry, avocado, coconut oil, olive oil, avocado oil, ghee, dark chocolate, seeds, and regular butter. 🥥🥓🥑

🌟 Try some dark chocolate smeared with peanut butter or some ground beef in tallow on your salad!

Intuitive Eating – 10 Principles in Action

Curious as to what it might look like practically for an eating disorder + intuitive eating dietitian to live out the 10 principles of intuitive eating in her own life? Allow yourself to be a fly on my wall.

While each person’s eating is different, it can be helpful to have examples of what a healthy relationship with food might look like practically.

When we have peace with food (IE principle #3), we can incorporate any and all foods — fun, dessert-type foods included — on a regular basis, without chaos, obsession, and anxiety. 🙌

What Would Make This Better?

A question I love to ask to help clients challenge their disordered eating!

Rather than having salad with no dressing and a baked potato with no butter (because your Disordered Eating Part led you to), seek to challenge your disordered eating instincts by instead really asking yourself: “what would make this better?”

This question pushes against the disordered eating tendency to cut out, minimize, and “go without.”

Head to the post for plenty of practical examples!

Allow the Different “Parts” of You to Have a Voice in Your Eating Choices

As alluded to above, sometimes certain “parts” of us can become too dominant in our eating choices. 😔

In this post, I use the framework of our adult, child, and loving parent parts.

When our disciplined, structured, adult-like part becomes too dominant, we might feel like EVERY food choice has to be the “right” one, and we must be PERFECT in my eating. 

In contrast to being hyper-disciplined or to running wild, the loving parent part wisely considers the input of both your child part and adult part, seeing flexible structure, nutrient-dense foods, and pleasure in eating as important. 👌

I love this framework and invite you to read more to consider it further!

Do you resonate more with feeling too child part or adult part-dominant in your eating patterns?

Why 1200 Calories a Day is Not Enough

Aiming to eat at or around 1200 calories a day is an ABSURDLY low and unhealthy amount to be aiming for — even if you have weight loss or body change goals.

This is a number I often hear thrown out there by clients or friends who may be unhappy with their bodies and trying to lose weight.

Head to this post for more on why eating so little is likely bombing your metabolism, hormones, and relationship with food! 🤯

Trying to eat 1200 calories a day (or less) will likely lead to continued frustration, chaos, and obsession in your relationship with food. If done for long enough, it will also likely lead to a host of health problems.

10 Thought Patterns Perpetuating Your Disordered Eating

From black-and-white to catastrophic thinking, this post outlines 10 thought patterns that may be keeping you stuck in your disordered eating.

I include practical examples and healthy reframes! 💫

Our behaviors with food are often an overflow of our psychology and emotional dynamics around food. Honestly assessing your thought patterns and working to challenge any unhealthy dynamics is key to lasting healing!

Healthy Food Boundaries vs. Unhealthy Restriction

Ever wonder what it might look like to say “no” to a food without it being a form of restriction?

This post considers some of the nuances around what I consider to be a “healthy food boundary” versus “unhealthy restriction”.

Sometimes, clients worry that if they were to allow themselves greater permission with food, then they can never say no to something like ice cream without this being done from a “restricting” or dieting mindset. (An example of black and white thinking — see above!)

This does NOT need to be the case. When we have the freedom to truly say yes to a food with no strings attached, we also have the freedom to truly say no. ✨

Trade-Offs in the Pursuit of “Perfect” Food Choices

One of my most recommended posts when it comes to anyone struggling with feeling like all your food choices need to be “perfect.”

If you feel like…

• You have to eat the “healthiest” food at every opportunity
• You are harming your heath whenever each food choice isn’t “perfect”
• The only or “best” way to make a food decision should always be based purely on nutrition factors

Then I invite you to check out this post further for a new perspective on seeking “perfection” in food choices!

🌟 Drop a comment below to share:

• What is your biggest challenge right now when it comes to your relationship with food?
• If you could change one thing instantly about your relationship with food, what would it be?

Explore More

5 Strategies to Help Prevent Binge Eating Trade-Offs in the Pursuit of “Perfect” Food Choices Navigating Food & Body Image at the Holidays Question to Challenge Your Disordered Eating: What Would Make This Better?