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Julie Duffy Dillon (00:00)

Great news, the Find Your Food Voice book is ready for pre-order. You can get to it at julieduffydillon.com slash book. Again, the Find Your Food Voice book, the book you need to help you reconnect to your own innate eating wisdom and help you break free from diet culture. I have written this book for you and I’m so excited to bring it to you. Get to it at julieduffydillon.com slash book.

Julie Duffy Dillon (00:26)

Welcome to episode 407 of the Find Your Food Voice podcast. Let’s talk about how to get you out of the diet trap. Let’s get started.

Hey there, voice finder. I am Julie Duffy Dillon, registered dietitian and your host. Thank you for joining me today. And this is a very special episode because not only is it a letter episode, it is also a letter from the Find Your Food Voice book. So I’m really just so excited to share this episode with you because it has been a while since I’ve done a letter episode and.

If you were listening back in the first hundred episodes, really, that’s all I used to do. I relied on letters from listeners just like you to write in and write a letter to food and unpack everything that was complicated. And me and sometimes a guest would sift through it and give you some pointers that we thought may be helpful. Well, when I decided to write the Find Your Food Voice book,

I knew I had to have letters. And so this episode is dedicated to those who submitted letters for the book. and also for those of you who have submitted letters to be included in the podcast. And if you’re listening and you have,

a letter in mind that you have never submitted, let me just tell you, this is the time. I would love, love, love to include your letter in an upcoming episode. So I would love to have your letter featured in an upcoming episode. If you’ve already submitted a letter and you have another one, yes, yes, bring it. My team and I would love.

to handle this letter with care and sift through it and use it in an upcoming episode. So you can send those letter directly to me, Julie at juliedillonrd.com. Those will go right to my inbox. Again, I will handle it with care and I’m excited to be able to read it and share it with the audience if that’s something that you are willing to do. So like I said, this episode is a letter from the Find Your Food Voice book, which is in pre-order.

just one more week until you will have this book in your hand or in your Kindle or however you’re going to read it. And you can get to it so you can have it right then at juleyduffydillon.com slash book. And today’s episode is featuring one of the tools that I share in the book. And it’s actually a combination of three tools, but it’s the big overview of them. And it includes

how you can better understand what’s keeping you trapped in the cycle of dieting. Now, most people that I talk to, and I think for most listeners too, they’ve either heard of intuitive eating or read the book, or they have been trying for a long time to recover from an eating disorder. Maybe they’ve even worked with a clinician, but they still like feel like they need more. And there’s something about how the diet industry traps us in this cycle.

where we get kind of like sucked in and sometimes feel like we’re on our way out, but then just we get going around and around like a roundabout, right? And this episode is full of tools, practical tools to help you get out of the diet trap. So I’m excited to get to it. And again, just remember the Find Your Food Voicebook is going to be here very, very soon.

So pre-ordering it is one of the best things you can do to help support me and my team. And you can get to it, of course, at JulieDuffyDillon slash book.

All right, we are gonna take a very quick sponsor break and then you’re going to hear this episode’s letter to food.

Julie Duffy Dillon (04:25)

Dear food, when I was around 13, my mother told me that I needed to watch out because too much of you would take me to the misses Sizes, which in that day was more like plus size. If I ate more of you than she felt happy with, she would give me a look of disappointment. I would sometimes whip up a bowl of cookie dough while she was out of the house, wolf you down and then clean up as fast as possible.

Anyway, so from there I restricted and binged you. I went from diet fad to diet fad. Of course, I would get so many compliments from people when they observed my eating less of you, even when I was nearly starving myself. But those diets never lasted. I’d always come back to you, eat so much of you that you would make me sick. I’d swear never to binge on you again, but I always did.

My ups and downs with you have cost me so much money food. Between all the diets, special ingredients and clothing, my, I cannot imagine how much money I’ve wasted over these years trying to get to that size where I would be acceptable to my mother and therefore myself and others. I was once again failing at keeping weight off during my most recent diet when I was introduced to intuitive eating, diet culture and peace with food for the first time. Wow.

totally new concepts for me. I love them and I wanna incorporate them into my life. I so want peace with you and with myself. I want to accept where I am right now, at this moment. However, I am discouraged and feeling confused. I have given myself freedom with all foods and I’ve tried to eat only when I’m hungry and to stop when I’m full. But I have just gotten fatter and that scares me. What is the normal process?

Is this how it works? Is my body holding onto everything, thinking I’ll starve it again? Does it get worse before it gets better? I want my journey towards loving you to be free and peaceful. Thanks for keeping me alive, food. We just need to figure out how this relationship is going to pan out. Love, time to DTR.

Hey there, letter writer. Thank you so much for this note. you and everyone else who submitted letters for the book and the podcast over the years, I am so grateful for you because you have been the way for so many folks to really connect with the concept of moving away from diets and the diet trap. And that’s what I think is going on right now. Reading this letter.

You are in the diet trap. The diet trap is what so many of us get sucked into and can’t find a way out. Even when we’re introduced to things like intuitive eating or other non-diet tools, because we haven’t found a way to unhook ourselves. I kind of picture the diet trap as this kind of roundabout where we are just circling over and over again. Have you ever rented a car before?

and gone to return it. And notice those kind of weird reverse spikes in the parking lot. Basically, you can go over them in a certain direction, but you can’t go back the other way. And of course, the intention there is like, you can return a car, but you can’t take one away and steal it. You know, I guess that’s their like system. And I see the diet trap in a similar way.

including those spikes, right? Because what gets us hooked into the diet trap is this really wonderful, buzzy feeling of hope. These are sparks that get us enticed and convinced that dieting is going to be the solution long-term. It’s gonna be this permanent way to help us have access, acceptance, love, and really like,

dignity and humanity to allow us to have all the things that are really our birthright. And for you, letter writer, you learned this early on. You you mentioned when you were 13, hearing your mother explain to you that if you didn’t eat a certain way, you may get too big and how that would be this horrible thing. What I appreciate about

your caregiver is this is something that was passed down to her, right? And she was passing it down to you as the way that you will experience acceptance and love is through this system, going through this loop, go down this path with spikes only going one way. And that will give you what you want, which you describe in the letter. You just want to feel acceptable.

And that’s a really big core feeling that we all as human beings want, correct? Well, these sparks, this hopeful buzz, I often call it the seduction from diets. They feel so warm and fuzzy and they feel so doable, right? If you just follow this kind of system, here is your set of rules, the rules change, of course, but if you follow them, you will have the outcome you want.

And we do, right? We have the outcome in the short term. There’s weight loss oftentimes, there’s admiration, people give us high fives and like, my gosh, you’re doing such a great job. And you may get like attention from a caregiver or a partner. There’s lots of different things. I know for some of you listening, this is even a way for you to have safety or access and…

What I also know to be true is these are just short term. And sometimes short term is enough. And that’s something for you, letter writer, anyone else, any other voice finder who’s like, I can totally relate to this letter. That’s what you need to decide. Like, is the short term enough? And it may be. I would appreciate it, especially if there’s a safety issue at hand. Having the short term kind of perks of dieting may be enough to keep you in

that cycle and that may be the safest way for you. And at the same time, what I think is important to just acknowledge is the diet trap. Part of its predictable outcome is long-term. There’s going to be a set of outcomes that the diet doesn’t like to own and pushes on to you, the user, which of course is weight regain. And

things like worsening health, like higher blood sugar, higher insulin levels, higher cholesterol, higher triglycerides, and also just the experience of going through the weight cycle again and having to experience how people react to you. And again, blaming yourself for that. This is the diet trap. I’m gonna put a graphic right here of the actual

that I have put together and I talk about in the Find Your Food Voice book. This is something that I think is important to hold all together. And why I think it’s also very important for each individual to come to a place to is have I been in the diet trap long enough to experience the grief, the heartache, the pain from going over those spikes?

and moving out of the diet trap. This is really hard work. It’s been framed, like the body positivity movement has been framed to be like laughter and hanging out with friends. And yeah, maybe there’s some of that. There’s definitely community when you are moving away from diet culture and…

You have to work really hard to connect with that community. But for many folks, a lot of the time is isolating and it feels sad. And there’s like a rollercoaster of emotions that do come up. And it’s really important to acknowledge that this is not going to be easy. But what I encourage you to hold onto is your decision. And only you will know if this is the right time for you to move out.

of the diet trap. We all have a certain number of diets, I think, to be on before we basically come to that place where like, okay, that’s enough. And maybe you want to expedite that. I’m here for that. Let’s expedite this for sure. Because the diet’s not going to work. For most people, it’s just not going to. So maybe you could be that 2%.

that it’s going to work long-term for, but at what cost? You know, like what cost? There may be a way for you long-term to manage a lower weight, but you may have to practice an eating disorder to do that. And again, that’s up to you if that’s something that’s okay. But what I encourage you to do though, to have a catalyst in mind to help you to get out of the diet trap is to do a timeline.

How many diets have you actually been on since you have been on this earth? And really go through that timeline. I go through how to do that in the book and it’s a hard process. This is something that I’ve done with hundreds of clients and it’s so important. It’s so important to see that number and you may say, well, you know what?

I think I have a few more diets in me. Or you may be like, holy shit, I can’t believe I’ve been on this many This has gone on too long. So in the comments, if you feel willing to share, put the number of how many diets you’ve been on in your whole life. I know for many of you, it’s going to be over 100. And what I would say too, to even go further, if you have found yourself

really stuck in this diet trap is to unpack each diet you’ve been on using that timeline and really honor three things. First, what pulled you in? What was the spark? What was the hope? What was the promise that you were gonna get from that diet? Number two, what were the short-term results? Where did dieting

have its short-term reward. Where did it go well? Did it give you some kind of health outcome? Did you have weight loss? Did you get a promotion? Did you end up hooking up with some really hot person? I don’t know. There could be something that happened in the short term. Side note that I think is important to state with this, when you’re at a higher weight body,

people in higher weight bodies are having fabulous hookups and fabulous sex and relationships. Just need to state that for the record. And I know sometimes that’s just not something that we are told as a truth, but I’m here to let you know. I’ve sat with hundreds and thousands of people now who’ve, our clients of mine who have let me know that that is the case. Anyway, I digress. So like I said,

What are the sparks, the hopeful buzz? Two, what are the short-term results? And number three, with each diet, what were the long-term outcomes? Was there weight regain? Was there increased binging or out of control experiences with food? Was there chaos? Was there shame? Was there sadness? Was there an increase in your mood disorder? Was…

what was it, what happened long-term? And you may have these long-term outcomes attached to your own doing instead of the diet, but that’s where I just want you to pause and just try to do this scientifically with that emotion. I appreciate that’s really hard, but I think it’s really important to try to do that because what you’re gonna do by naming how many diets you’ve been on your whole life

and naming each and every single one and doing this work of like what sucked you in, what were their short-term perks, what were the long-term outcomes, you’re gonna see a pattern. There’s going to be a really predictable pattern for you and that’s what you need to keep in mind each time you wanna start a diet. You need to look at all three.

It’s shitty to say that diets have some positive outcomes, but they’re just short term, but we need to honor them because I think that’s part of the seduction. But then also really look at the repetition of those long-term outcomes. And I’m gonna also bet that these long-term outcomes worsened over time, that the more you dieted, the worse those long-term outcomes were. That’s what I would see with clients. And that’s what I would predict for you as well.

So, letter writer, I see that food has written back. And before I get to that voice finder that’s listening, I wanna give you a big consensual virtual hug. And this is hard work. This work of moving out of the diet trap is very hard work and it’s good work because it’s gonna help you to reclaim what is yours.

your permission to eat enough and to reclaim your own voice along with your food voice. before I read Food’s Letter back, thank you for listening. And remember, the Find Your Food Voice book is coming out next week. Holy crap. So there’s still a few more days to pre-order.

You can pre-order at julieduffydillon.com slash book. It’s available at all the places. And if you are getting to this episode after it’s released, you will find it all the places. And I’m so excited to hear how you are experiencing life outside of the diet trap as you are mending and tending to your own food voice. All right, I’m get to food slutter, but until next time, take care.

Dear Time to DTR, we see you trying to make peace yet at the same time struggle with acceptance. Your relationship with food was founded on the white, cis, thin ideal. As you mend your body image, consider collecting all of your lived experiences with diets. Each diet created a script whispering in your ear. How did they start? What were their promises? Did they deliver?

What did they ultimately bring? We know you are struggling with relying on your body and know you may find a different way that fits for you. Your history will inform your next steps towards peace. We are so proud of the healing work you are doing. We are with you on this journey. Love, food.