I loved this interview with Gin Stephens. In it we talked about Intermittent Fasting and how it is very intuitive for her. Gin’s approach to Intermittent Fasting is so accessible and I love the community of support she’s building for folks who want to explore it.
Have you ever had a recurring thought that just keeps coming up? Something that has to get out of your brain and out into the world? That’s where I’ve been for a while now.
This thought, unfortunately, is this amorphous blob though. Its shape is constantly changing. It’s color. It’s texture. Everything about it is in flux. All. The. Time. The process of holding it in though is becoming more “painful” than releasing it. The amorphous thought blob just wants a chance to be known and understood. Don’t we all?
I live in suburban Philadelphia. We are FINALLY having temperatures that make sense for fall and the daylight hours are decreasing.
The approach to winter is a challenging one for me because I do think that the lack of sunlight and the cold weather affect my mood pretty significantly. My coworkers were surprised to hear me complain because I’m from Minnesota. Minnesota has a reputation for its winters. I’ve actually been able to convince more than one person, without too much effort, that it snows all year there.
You do know that’s not true, right?
The point here is that being from Minnesota, the Philadelphia winters should be a piece of cake to survive. The fact of the matter is that they are if you just look at the temperature.
Identifying the Problem – It Wasn’t Sugar Addiction
Transitioning from my last diet to intuitive eating required me to take a long, hard look at a highly debated topic: sugar addiction.
I really was convinced that I was a sugar addict. I went so far as to give up sugar, all sweeteners, and flour of any kind for over 6 months.
If I’m honest with myself, I have to say that I absolutely felt better. My constant cravings and my insatiable hunger basically disappeared. As a scientist though, I know that correlation and causation are not the same thing. The absence of those symptoms as a result of removing those ingredients from my life doesn’t mean they were the cause.
One of the things that I find most challenging about transitioning to a non-diet, intuitive eating approach to my eating, is that that the practical implications of what that means aren’t spelled out.
When I’m in the middle of an opportunity though, if I can recognize it, it pretty much slaps me across the face. They tend to be really small things I find myself thinking or doing that I realize are diet thoughts trying to have their way with me (again).
Unlearning diet culture and tuning into what hunger and fullness feel like takes practice. I’ve developed a 7 step process that helps me tap into those sensations. In this episode, I share the 7 steps and how you can use the hunger scale in your life.
Just over a week ago, I decided to record the first of what I hope will be many podcast episodes. Linked here are episodes 1 and 2.
I’m really looking forward to seeing where this path leads and to sharing the personal stories of folks that are combining intuitive eating and intermittent fasting.
When I started Bright Line Eating back in August 2017, I wanted what the tagline promised – “Happy, Thin, and Free” (http://brightlineeating.com). I worked the program and got to my goal weight in January 2018. For two months, I maintained my weight. If anything, I was continuing to slowly lose more weight! Unfortunately, even after my weight-loss success, freedom was eluding me. It was time for me to figure out why!