[ad_1]
Throughout 2021, Good Housekeeping will be exploring how we think about weight, the way we eat, and how we try to control or change our bodies in our quest to be happier and healthier. While GH also publishes weight loss content and endeavors to do so in a responsible, science-backed way, we think it’s important to present a broad perspective that allows for a fuller understanding of the complex thinking about health and body weight. Our goal here is not to tell you how to think, eat, or live — nor is to to pass judgment on how you choose to nourish your body — but rather to start a conversation about diet culture, its impact, and how we might challenge the messages we are given about what makes us attractive, successful and healthy.
Whether you realize it or not, there’s a good chance that you view your body through the lens of diet culture. Besides placing a premium on thinness and “clean eating” (whatever that means), this pervasive but ultimately demoralizing value system equates self-worth, self-discipline and moral virtue with how you eat or the way you look.
“Diet culture teaches us that we are not good enough as we are and that we need to change — we internalize those messages and they become part of our self-talk,” says Rachel Goldman, Ph.D., a clinical assistant professor in the department of psychiatry at the NYU School of Medicine. “Our thoughts impact our emotions, which impact our behavior, so our thoughts can become our reality.”
In other words, if we tell ourselves that we are “bad” for eating cake instead of berries, or that despite eating only berries, our body is still not a “beach body,” that message is strengthened, says Dr. Goldman, leaving us feeling like failures.
Not only are there fatphobic messages in the media and entertainment, but they can also come from family members and friends, Dr. Goldman adds. And even though we know rationally that healthy human bodies come in different shapes and sizes that have nothing to do with our value as people, we internalize these diet-culture messages — and they damage us from the inside out.
The thing is, the diet culture narrative — that certain foods are morally better than others, and so is the person who eats them, because they allegedly lead to a certain body appearance — is not true to begin with, and remembering that is the key to feeling good about yourself and being able to eat to feel your best both physically and emotionally, says Stefani Reinold, M.D., a board-certified psychiatrist in Austin, Texas, and host of the podcast It’s Not About the Food.
The first step is to remind yourself that just because you think something doesn’t make it true. Second, says Dr. Reinold, push back against these nefarious influences — talk back to yourself or flip the script in your head when body-critical thoughts come to mind.
Exactly how to tell body negativity to go away for good
It might not be easy at first, because we’ve all been raised on diet culture, but the basic gist, says Dr. Reinold, is to hit the mental pause button and question the negative thought’s validity, or consider how you could replace it with a more compassionate and empowering one.
Doing this a few times isn’t enough: You’ll need to continue doing it on a regular basis to rewire your brain to be more body-positive and free up head space for more important things, Dr. Reinold says. Even if you don’t initially believe what you’re saying to yourself, you will eventually with repeated exposure, essentially un-brainwashing yourself from diet culture messaging. Here are some examples of how you can flip the script in your mind:
- The thought: My thighs are so big and the cellulite on them is gross!
- Replace it with: My legs are strong and take me where I need to go. Besides, cellulite is perfectly normal!
- The thought: I really need to lose weight.
- Replace it with: Who says? What I need to do is treat my body with respect and take good care of it.
- The thought: I hate this jelly roll on my belly.
- Replace it with: My belly looks the way bellies look after having babies, and the idea that it has to be flat is arbitrary.
- The thought: I feel fat.
- Replace it with: Fat is not a feeling and no one feels great about their body all the time. No one loves their body every second of every day, and that’s okay. I accept mine.
- The thought: I was bad for eating that cookie.
- Replace it with: I wanted something sweet so I listened to what I wanted, which is a good thing. Food isn’t good or bad — food is just food, and I’m entitled to eat it.
- The thought: I’ve gained weight and my ass is now the size of Canada.
- Replace it with: I would never say this to a friend. I’d tell her she looks good and that I love her. That’s what I’m saying to myself.
- The thought: I can’t stand my sagging breasts.
- Replace it with: Few people have perfect breasts, and it’s just not that important. That’s why God invented bras!
- The thought: I’m horrified by how much I weigh.
- Replace it with: The number on the scale doesn’t say anything about me as a person. It’s just a number, like my zip code.
- The thought: I’m never going to have the body I want.
- Replace it with: Bodies aren’t infinitely moldable. Besides, my body doesn’t define who I am; I’m a whole person, not just my body.
- The thought: I’m too curvy; I wish I was thinner.
- Replace it with: There have always been thin people and there have always been heavy people, and this will always be true. Bodies are meant to come in different shapes and sizes.
More From Our Anti Diet Series
This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io
[ad_2]
Source link
