What Does Ditching Diet Mentality Mean?
What Does Ditching the Diet Mentality Mean?
Samina Qureshi is the Registered Dietitian Nutritionist and owner of Wholesome Start. Her nutrition counseling practice is based in Houston, Texas and she provides virtual nutrition counseling sessions to clients across the country. Schedule your FREE 15-minute nutrition session today!
If you follow me on social media, browsed through my site, or have had a conversation with me you've probably heard the phrase, "ditch diet culture" or "ditch the diet mentality." But what does that really mean? Does it mean you should forget about the low-carb diet you've been trying to stick to for the past couple of weeks and eat everything in site? Not quite.
Ditching diet culture and or the diet mentality means you break up with restrictive chronic dieting, fad diets, the idea that you need to be on a diet, or any other type of societal pressures associated with body weight and size to make room for a healthier relationship with food and body image. This might sound new, scary, or difficult to do in a society that benefits from our insecurities but working with a registered dietitian who practices with a non-diet, intuitive eating, and health at every size approach can help you ditch diets for good, manage your health, and feel your best.
Not sure if you're caught up in diet culture? Ask yourself the following questions:
Do you categorize foods as clean, good, or bad?
Do you associate your food choices with your morality?
Do you exercise to compensate for the foods you eat?
Do you feel shameful when eating foods you enjoy?
Have you ever been on a diet or tracked calories?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, you've likely been exposed to diet culture. The purpose of this post is not to make you feel bad but to open your eyes to the way we are constantly being exposed to diet culture and fat phobia through mainstream media. With the constant diet messaging on TV, radio ads, social media, and everything around us, it has become normal to be on a diet or talk about dieting and weight loss. I'd like to go to a social gathering and for once not hear people say, "You look amazing, congratulations on your weight loss!" Kudos to you if that's what you are working towards, but for some people weight loss may be unintended but we'll save that conversation for another day. It's time to reject our weight-obsessed culture and heal your relationship with your body image and food. You are much more than your weight, body size, and image!
How You Can Reduce Toxic Diet Culture Exposure?
It may seem overwhelming at first, but the first step to ditching diets for good is to disentangle yourself from weight-loss and body-shaming messages around you. Removing your external sources of diet culture from the magazines you read, to the television shows you watch and even the "fitspo" (fitness-inspiration) accounts you follow on social media can help you enter a more weight neutral realm and embrace your body with more kindness. This is just one step in getting closer to rediscovering your body's natural response to food and ditching diet culture. Work with me to dive in deeper and take the next steps in healing your relationship with food.
In an effort to ditch diet culture I'm always looking for more like minded people on social media! Share your favorite intuitive eating, health at every size, or weight inclusive social media accounts in the comment section below.
I'd love to help you break up with diet culture! Sign-up for your FREE 15-minute consult today to learn how to ditch diets for good, get back to enjoying your favorite foods, and reclaim your health!