If you had an almond mom (or another dieting caregiver), you will need time, space, and compassion to find your Food Voice.
Here are 8 things I recommend to anyone who had a dieting parent or caregiver to help recover and mend your relationship with food.
- Your eating and weight belief foundation will be rocky–consider adding guardrails. I have more on these here.
- First thought may be diet-y–what would you like your second thought to be? You can repair your relationship with food yet may still find your initial thoughts, feelings, and reactions will be diet focused. For many people, especially if they have been dieting for decades+, these initial reactions may stay. BUT, you can choose what your new improved and recovered thought, feeling, or reaction will be.
- Relearn what eating enough is for you–It’s more than you think! Guardrails will help.
- Play with your food–be a kid again and seek pleasure with food.
- Ok to make a mess–be ok with ice cream dripping down your hand or the popcorn falling as you watch a movie. Be a kid again with this–food can be messy and that’s ok.
- Give yourself time in Donut land. Jes Baker, in her book Landwhale, speaks about her experiences recovering from diet culture (i.e. Diet Land) and the experience of the pendulum swinging in the other direction. This led to craving typical off limit foods like donuts and it lasted a long time. I find this to be true for many people. You need time to recover, repair, and heal.
- Keep this in mind in Donut Land: Prioritizing healing is healthy eating
- Keep the big picture of recovery and finding your Food Voice in mind rather than meal or snack or food group or choice.
If you were raised by an almond mom and trying to recover, you probably don’t want to be an almond mom. Check out part 3 on how to take care of young eaters without spreading diet messages.
