Be Nourished

How light is too light?

A few weeks ago I went to heat up an Amy’s frozen meal for lunch – roasted polenta with swiss chard.  “Yum,” I thought.  Then I realized when I opened the box that this was an “Amy’s light & lean” frozen meal, which translated to 140 calories with 4 grams of fat.   “Yikes,” I thought, “I’m going to be hungry in an hour!”

I love Amy’s frozen meals for the occasional day when I don’t have anything else to take for lunch.  They taste good and when you look at the ingredient list, you don’t have to get out a chemical dictionary to understand what it is that you are eating. This one had sweet yellow cornmeal polenta topped with an organic summer stew of squash, sun-ripened tomatoes, mushrooms and a side of fragrant slow-cooked chard. (Take a look at the ingredient list of a Lean Cuisine or Weight Watchers frozen meal – you might be surprised.)  When you open the box and look at the food, it looks like something that I would have cooked and put in the freezer for a quick meal.

Now, I bought this meal because it sounded good, not because it was ‘light and lean.’  After discovering the nutrition facts, I wondered how many people would eat just this for lunch or dinner and think they are being ‘so good.’  Paired with a lean protein, this could be a very satisfying meal.  But on it’s own, it is not enough to eat.

When I got home, I looked at the “Southern Dinner” that I usually get – cornbread and beans with greens and sweet potatoes to see how this meal compared to the ‘light and lean’ one.  This meal has 310 calories and 7 grams of fat.  What’s wrong with this?  Why isn’t this one considered ‘light and lean?’

The mentality of many people in this culture is the lower or lighter the food is, the better.  My clients who severely restrict their eating because they are dieting or have an eating disorder eat ‘light’ like this all day long.  And they complain of being hungry all the time.  They also report craving carbohydrates like pretzels, bread or muffins.  And if they tend to ignore cues to eat and live with extreme hunger, they crave simpler carbohydrates like jellybeans and candy corn.  Sound familiar?

“Becoming familiar with your physiological hunger and working with vs. against it is helpful in avoiding overeating and/or feeling out of control” says Amy Tuttle of Nourishing Connections.   At Be Nourished, we work with clients to improving their meal mix by eating a combination of protein, fat and carbohydrate and they discover they are not hungry ALL the time.

Eating foods, meals, or snacks that provide us with a combination of carbohydrate, protein and fat helps keep our energy level up and our mood more manageable.  And it enables us think more clearly because our body and brain are receiving better fuel and we are not distracted by hunger. 

So the next time you are thinking about what to eat, consider composing your meals and snacks differently.  We’d love to hear what you discover along the way!

 

The Fat Trap

By Hilary Kinavey, MS, LPC

An important article was published in the New York Times magazine on 12/8/11. In her article titled  “The Fat Trap”, Tara Parker-Pope asks if we have to be “superhuman to lose weight.” I urge you to take some time to read it, but then come back here. There is more to the story.

You see, I think the common response when we hear or read about the true metabolic realities of weight loss, is to feel pretty let down. You might feel worried about being stuck in your uncomfortable “fat” feeling forever. You might even be entertaining thoughts of self-blame about the size of your body. Or feeling more body shame, wishing so much that you could find a plan that would really work this time so you don’t have to feel these things again.

The good news is that you are not stuck just because dieting doesn’t actually work. It is so very important to remember that you manage to stay skeptical of most marketing ventures that are directed your way (of which there are many!) The dieting and weight loss industries, in all their various forms, make up a $60 billion dollar industry that is highly dependent on repeat customers. They know it doesn’t work either. They blame you, shame you and tell you that you aren’t trying hard enough instead. This tactic tends to trump our efforts at remaining skeptical of them. Doesn’t that make you angry? Allow yourself a moment of that. The fact that dieting does not work for your physical bodies is not new news. Linda Bacon Ph.D, the author of Health at Every Size, has researched weight loss extensively and has reported similar findings.

This is the time of year when the desire to make changes in the name of weight loss is the loudest and the marketing is the heaviest. It is incredibly easy to find yourself lost in the dominant thought process about weight loss. This thought process is something like “weight loss is important for health”, “the changes I make to my health behaviors must result in weight loss to be productive”, “ I have to change who I am from the outside in to be better” or simply, “Thin = health.”

This is where we find that traditional weight loss is not sustainable psychologically as well. We do not change from the outside in, but from the inside out. It’s tough to make big changes when we are afraid we are not good enough, even though we desperately might want to. These efforts also do not tend to be sustainable. We can
not shame ourselves into change. It doesn’t work. If it did, it would have already happened.

Carl Rogers reminds us, ““The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.” It is inevitably true. If traditional weight loss doesn’t work, then we are left to deal with what is really happening in us, the real stuff that Brene Brown says “gets in the way.” We frequently know when making food choices what works for us and what doesn’t, but that isn’t what we rely on in that moment of choice. Other psychological factors come into play. We also know that a lifetime (no matter how long) of body dissatisfaction and dieting really skews our beliefs about food and self-care. We almost have to de-program that “dieting mind” to reconnect to our bodies again. It’s true…and it’s possible.

Hope is not lost. There’s a whole world out there that can support you in real and sustainable health practices. Our resources page can introduce to some of our favorites. And let us know about what you find on your journey.

So tell us, what did you think about “The Fat Trap” article?

The Honeymoon Phase

By Dana Sturtevant, MA, RD

I spent last week in Gainesville, Florida and had the great honor of meeting with Karin Kratina, author of Moving Away from Diets, a must read for any helping professional working with people to resolve their obsession with food, body and weight. I didn’t know about Karin’s work when I went to graduate school at the University of Florida in the late 1990s. I’ve always wanted to meet with her, and this trip turned out to be the perfect time.

We talked about all of the people who have influenced our work - Evelyn Tribole, Elyse Resch, Linda Bacon, Deb Burgard, Glenn Gaesser , Kristin Neff, and Brene Brown to name a few. When we got to Geneen Roth, Karin asked what I thought about Geneen’s recommendation to stop eating when you are at a 5 on the hunger scale. For those of you who are not familiar with our hunger scale (Hilary and I use Karin’s hunger scale), it is a 0 to 10 point scale with 0 being starving and 10 being stuffed. So eating until a 5 means you eat until you are at a neutral place (not hungry, not full). We both stated how surprised we were when we heard about this. Five doesn’t seem to be a very satisfying place to be at the end of a meal and we wondered how long people could really do this. She made the comment that anyone can undereat for a few weeks during the honeymoon phase, but after that, it has to get difficult for most of us.

Ah yes, the honeymoon phase. You might recognize that phase – the one when the diet is off to a great start, life seems grand, and we have renewed faith in our ability to lose the weight. Modern Family recently had a hilarious episode about the various phases Cameron goes through while on a juice fast to lose weight (watch the two minute clip). With any weight loss plan or program, there is the wedding, a honeymoon and then the real work begins – the marriage. And the farther we get from the wedding date (diet start date), the harder it is to keep the marriage (diet) going. People eventually cave and old behaviors and patterns are resumed. Sound familiar?  

Karin went on to say that in doing hunger work with clients for over 20 years, she’s found that everyone needs to eat until an 8 sometimes. For her, she’s noticed that she needs to eat until an 8 at least four times a week to feel satisfied and maintain a healthy relationship with food. A colleague of hers says she needs to eat until an 8 on the hunger scale once a day. This was interesting to me because most of our clients think eating until an 8 is something they should rarely, if ever, do. This information might encourage you to get curious about the hunger scale again. Maybe you’ll notice a pattern that seems to work for you too. After all, every body is different!

"Freedom's just another word"

Janice Joplin immortalized the line "Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose". How does that apply when we're talking about being thin? Dr. Deah Schwartz discusses freedom and being thin in America.

http://www.leftoverstogo.com/2011/08/17/what-would-janice-do/

Orthorexia: The Road to Health is Paved with Good Intentions

By Hilary Kinavey, MA, LPC

"Many of the most unbalanced people I have ever met are those who have devoted themselves to healthy eating."
- Dr. Steven Bratman

We all know someone like this -- someone who obsessively eats so healthfully that you find yourself unable to relax in her presence at the dinner table. Perhaps you know several people like this, but in a few examples, you actually worry about whether or not someone is getting enough to eat to be healthy.

Maybe you've also noticed that she seems to medicate herself with food, believing that a chronic illness or pain is managed by their diet and, not only that, that this friend of yours talks about it quite a bit.

When you've found yourself worrying about this person, you likely reassure yourself by the fact that this person is knowledgeable about nutrition and, if anyone is eating well, it's this person, so you may dismiss your concerns.

Well, you might need to rethink that belief, according to Dr. Steven Bratman, who has coined the term "orthorexia nervosa" recently to refer to what he deems "a pathological fixation on eating proper food."

According to Bratman, orthorexia begins as a desire to overcome chronic illness or to improve general health but, because it depends on an iron will to change habits ingrained in childhood and reinforced by a fast-food-driven culture, some people find themselves obsessing about their dietary choices, ironically, to the detriment of their own health.

Like obsessive-compulsive disorder or, its close relation, anorexia nervosa, orthorexia quickly becomes a vicious cyle. When the orthorexic individual doesn't meet his own high standards of dietary perfection by indulging in ice cream or fettucine alfredo in a "moment of weakness," he will often respond by putting himself on even stricter diets and/or an exhausting exercise regimen, perpetuating the downward spiral.

According to Bratman:

"Orthorexia begins, innocently enough, as a desire to overcome chronic illness or to improve general health. But because it requires considerable willpower to adopt a diet that differs radically from the food habits of childhood and the surrounding culture, few accomplish the change gracefully. Most must resort to an iron self-discipline bolstered by a hefty dose of superiority over those who eat junk food. Over time, what to eat, how much, and the consequences of dietary indiscretion come to occupy a greater and greater proportion of the orthorexic's day."

One study on food preoccupation showed that people with no disorder spend 15-20 percent of their day thinking about food, while dieters, 20-65 percent; people with bulimia, 70-90%; and those who struggle with anorexia, 90-110 percent (Healthy Weight Journal, 1998).

Bratman warns on his website that the motivation behind the disorder "is a health food theory, such as rawfoodism, macrobiotics, veganism (and) that, in most cases, the underlying diet is reasonably healthy (if unreasonably specific). It's in the obsessive approach to diet taken by an orthorexic that the disorder lies." He describes how for the orthorexic eating healthy food is not unlike a religion and "begins to carry pseudospiritual connotations." This dogmatic approach can extend to the processes of planning and purchasing meals, dominating their lives, making their self-esteem dependent on their incredibly high dietary standards, and infusing them with a sense of superiority over others with what they deem unhealthy eating habits. One may question if someone can truly pursue "health" at the expense of their emotional wellness.

Like people with anorexia and bulimia, orthorexics give food a sense of disproportionate priority, and the yard stick by which they measure "healthy" eating habits varies depending on the individual. Bratman says there was a time when he wouldn't eat a vegetable if it had spent more than 15 minutes outside the garden, insisted on chewing each mouthful of food 50 times, would only eat alone and always left his stomach partially empty at the end of a meal. He also habitually lectured his friends and family about the perils of processed foods and the dangers of pesticides and fertilizers.

While their eating habits in and of themselves may not jeopardize their well being, people with orthorexia suffer from their tendency to alienate themselves socially and the stress they inflict on themselves from pursuing impossible eating and, in some cases, exercise regimens. Like other eating-disordered people, moreover, those with orthorexia do, in severe cases, run the risk of depriving themselves of the calories and nutrients required in a given day, endangering the health and their lives.

Even food politics leader Michael Pollan, in his well-regarded book In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto, mentions orthorexia, describing America in general as "becoming a nation of orthorexics." While acknowledging that orthorexia is not yet formally recognized by the DSM IV, Pollan notes that "academic investigation is under way."

More information about this intriguing disorder is available at www.orthorexia.com , and Bratman has written a book on the subject, Health Food Junkies: Orthorexia Nervosa - the Health Food Eating Disorder