Everyone has a very personal relationship with food. No matter how you feel about food, you have to have it to be healthy, to move your body, to use your mind and simply to live. Everyone’s relationship in regards to food is different. Some have a very good and comfortable relationship with eating and on the other end of the spectrum some have a very dangerous and down right destructive relationship with it.
Around every corner is a new fad or eating plan with advertisements that assure you that “This is the one that will work for you” and it will work for whatever your goal is! The “diet” industry often takes a “one size fits all” or, a general plan “works for most” sort of approach. This is for a variety of reasons, the least appealing being that if they can make one plan with a few variations then they can make more money off of you. You can be shoved into this box with the rest of them and then nothing has to actually be personalized and that company rakes in the dough because they didn’t put in the extra work to make it work for you as an individual.
If you’ve ever tried one of these plans or signed up for a program like this you very possibly found that:
– It didn’t work for you long term, if at all
– You felt guilty when you weren’t able to follow this plan or ate something that was not in the plan
– You felt deprived because foods you love are excluded-Your grocery budget went sky high trying to obtain all these foods that are not a staple in your regular grocery trip- You didn’t enjoy the foods that were given to you
– You followed the plan during the week but the weekend became a free for all because you’re craving everything under the sun, you eat everything you’re not “allowed” to and now you’re literally stuck in a cycle of disordered eating – binge, deprive, binge, deprive…
– You exercised to compensate for the food you “shouldn’t” have eaten- You couldn’t keep up with constantly tracking every tiny thing you put in your mouth for months on end
(On the contrary, if you experienced none of these things and enjoy your eating plan, then awesome! Keep going!)
I strongly believe that no matter how you try to change the way you eat it is always personal! It can be emotional, it can be comforting, social and should be enjoyable. No matter what we try, these parts of it will always come into play and they need to be considered. There should never be a food item that is “off limits,” rather if you have a favorite food, it should be strategically fit into how you eat so that you feel satisfied and maintain a positive relationship with that favorite item.
The foods you like to buy and can afford to buy should always be considered and worked with when you’re trying to make changes. Changes should be strategic and maintainable.
I’d love to send you away from this and give you some sort of industry secret that you may have hoped to find but I don’t do “one size fits all” and it should be no secret that most of us need to try and eat healthier while simultaneously enjoying our food and including the foods we love.
This is why I offer something different. If someone comes to me and asks me what they can do to eat better, lose weight, gain muscle, get healthier or improve their relationship with food, I will give the very best personalized advice that I can in that moment or I recommend a nutrition session with myself. This gives me the opportunity to assess everything you enjoy and your feelings behind the choices you make so we can work with it and put together an action plan that fits into your daily life. The amount of food you need is different from someone else, your favorite foods are individual, your budget is individual and your feelings about it are personal and important.
You’re an individual and you may need to try a few different approaches before you find a strategy that works for you. Nutrition can feel a bit complicated with all the information available out there. If you’re looking for a personalized, realistic and long term plan our professional Fittwell Nutrition Specialist is here to help whenever you need.
( feel like we I created the new version of the “woman smiling with salad” stock photo here with my cheese string 
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