Blog post written by Lindzie O’Reilly, Registered Dietitian, MAN, University of Guelph
Every year on May 6th, individuals and organizations around the world recognize International No Diet Day (INDD). The objectives of INDD are to challenge the idea that there is one ‘right’ or ‘ideal’ body, to push back against the industries that sustain diet culture, to raise awareness about the prevalence of weight discrimination and fatphobia, and to reinforce the harms of dieting among people across age, gender, culture, and body size.
Dieting can be defined as any intentional change to our lifestyle (modifying food habits, exercise routine, supplements) for the sole purpose of changing our weight or shape. The common belief in our society is that decreasing our weight is beneficial for our health when that is often not true. In fact, weight is an outcome that we have a lot less control over than we think. According to Set Point Theory, our bodies have a genetically programmed weight range that they like to hang out in, where each individual will feel their best physically and mentally, and where their risk of disease is lowest. When we engage in behaviours that support our wellbeing, our weight tends to naturally settle in the range it likes to be in. The range of natural human set points is much broader than society leads us to believe. Unfortunately, many individuals and health professionals still refer to the Body Mass Index (BMI) as a marker of health. BMI was developed by a statistician with the intention of being applied to a population as a whole, not to individuals. If you’ve ever taken a stats class, you might remember learning about a Normal Distribution. It means that, naturally, within a population, 68% of individuals will fall within the ‘normal’ range on the curve. This means that the remaining 32% of the population will naturally have a BMI that labels them as ‘underweight’ or ‘overweight’. It would be statistically impossible for everyone in society to achieve a ‘normal’ BMI.
INDD in particular and the Health At Every Size (HAES) movement in general are not arguing that every individual is currently at their natural set point. INDD is not encouraging us to use May 6th as a once a year “cheat day” (I hate that phrase, but that’s a topic for a whole other post…) and eat more than what feels good for their body. Instead, it’s encouraging folks to develop a relationship with food that they can feel good about every day. It’s saying that targeting our weight as the measure we would like to change is not helpful and often leads us to engage in very extreme habits that can have risks and side effects for both physical and mental wellbeing. Instead, it’s encouraging folks to experiment with different habits to discover what make you feel best. Everyone is an expert in their own body, and everybody is different – there’s no one ‘ideal’ size and there’s no one size fits all approach to food. In a weight-obsessed society, it can be really hard to tell the difference between what truly makes us feel good as individuals and what makes us feel good because we’re following the ‘rules’ and doing what we feel we ‘should’ be doing. Here are some suggestions to help you spot the difference.
Some things that may be helpful:
Experimenting to find a way to move your body that you enjoy
Experimenting with new foods to discover what you like the taste of
Eating when your body tells you it needs fuel. This doesn’t mean only eating when your stomach grumbles. There are all sorts of other ways our body can tell us it needs fuel, such as feeling sleepy, feeling irritable, having trouble concentrating or focusing, having a headache. Sometimes we need to eat even if our body isn’t giving us cues as it may be our only break in the day, or it may be important prevention for feeling really hungry later.
Experimenting to discover what portion size feels good for your body. Did you know that portion size and serving size are two different things?? Serving size is listed on a package or box in order to give us information about macro and micronutrients. Portion size is the amount that YOU choose to eat of a food because it’s what satisfies your hunger, energizes you, or tastes good to you. In most cases, that portion size is larger than the serving size.
Eating for a wide range of reasons including to meet your energy and nutrient needs, for social reasons, for pleasure or for comfort (that’s right, it’s okay to eat for comfort!).
Some warning signs that a behaviour may be risky:
Exercising to change your body, because you think you ‘should’, or as a way to punish your body
Labelling foods as “good”, “bad”, “healthy” or “unhealthy”
Restricting yourself to only eating foods you define as “good” or “healthy” and feeling guilty if you eat a food you define as “bad” or “unhealthy”
Only allowing yourself to eat at certain times of the day, even if your body gives you cues that it would like fuel at other times
Limiting yourself to certain portion sizes, even if your body gives you cues that it would like more
While it is very much okay to eat for comfort, we can get ourselves into trouble if eating more than your body would like or less than your body would like is one of your only coping strategies when emotions are high. It’s helpful to get support and build additional tools in your toolbox.
As we enter the fourteenth month of a global pandemic, so much unhelpful emphasis has been placed on appearance and weight. Weight is so much more than calories in and calories out. It’s a reflection of where we are at, and the past fourteen months have been truly challenging for most folks. INDD encourages us to pause and reflect on habits that we can engage in that support our physical and mental wellbeing and that help us care for ourselves, rather than engaging in restrictive or weight-focused behaviours that only make it more challenging to care for ourselves and feel well.
If you’re used to seeing positive affirmations in the windows of Waterloo-Wellington businesses during the first week of May, fear not, the Waterloo Wellington Eating Disorders Coalition is adapting the campaign to go virtual again this year. Check us out on Facebook and Instagram to see positive INDD messages on May 6th. Follow and support your local businesses that will be sharing our virtual window signs on May 6th. Spread the word in your own networks and make a difference today!