Your Body Is Not Your Enemy, It Is Your Life Partner: Pt. 1

TW: This post includes body image, weight, and eating disorders. If these topics may be triggering for you, please read with care or skip this post if needed. <3  

There are also instagram accounts/links included at the bottom of this blog that helped immensely for me.

To preface, I don’t want this to seem like a guilt trip or to make anyone feel bad in any way because I know we are already bombarded everyday with what that new discovery is on what's secretly killing us and what new life changing wellness habits we have to start. It is overwhelming, trust me I get it. Therefore, this series of learning to love the body you are in is going to be very plain, simple, and straightforward, as that is how your health and relationship with your body should be in the first place. I struggled with my weight and body image for many, many years, from logging every single calorie to fasting for 20 hours a day. Unfortunately, at the time my goal was to lose weight, not prioritize my health. Funnily enough it was doing the opposite of helping me lose weight, and on top of that I felt like absolute trash, I was a bundle of nerves and would jump at the sound of a pin drop. As time went on, I knew I couldn’t live like that anymore so I decided to look further into nutrition, and actually nutrition, not what would make me lose weight or look the best. Whether you have struggled with disordered eating, or you are just trying to focus more on your health and what you put into your body, this one's for you. 

When you struggle with your weight and your body image, it takes a long time to fully move past it, so of course it was still a lingering fear of mine to gain any weight. But the more I learned about the body (more importantly in regards to this, the women’s body), the nervous system, hormones, vitamins and nutrients, the gut, and most of all, how all of this connects to your mental health, the less I ever wanted to fall back into that. I knew at the time, even with the constant internal battle going on in my head, that my mental health and getting my happiness back, was more important than how I looked. 

I can so confidently and SO happily say, the only thoughts going through my mind now when grocery shopping and cooking and eating out is making sure I have got enough protein, fibre, vegetables and fruits and carbs, and making sure I am eating whole foods. Instead of checking the calories, I am checking the ingredients to make sure they are clean. I care about nourishing my body. I strictly only care about how I feel and making sure my body has the correct nutrients now, and fortunately I am not looking too bad either (one might say it’s because I listen to my body, instead of ignoring it/hating it). I know that if someone around my weight would have told me this four to five years ago I wouldn’t have believed them; I now eat for breakfast alone (and I have barely changed this around in two years), two to three eggs with chives and black pepper soaked in (honestly should probably cut down on the butter but let a girl live) two tablespoons of butter, a mixed berry smoothie with three big scoops of icelandic yogurt, a green juice, bone broth, and two pieces of sourdough toast WITH butter. That is just my breakfast. I learned throughout my research over time that it is much less about how much you are eating, and so much more about what you are eating. 

First and foremost, if you are a woman fasting (for over 12 hours and not including the hour before bed, your time of sleep, and the hour after you get up) please consider stopping or do some serious research on it before continuing, such as how long you should be doing it for, what times you should be doing it between, and being mindful of the first thing you are eating when you break your fast. We are all different, and I understand that, however I do have a strong feeling that fasting is not sustainable and there are different options to what you want to achieve from it. 

From personal experience, the reason I chose to fast was because at the time I didn’t care as much about what was being put into my body compared to how much was being put in my body,  it was the “easiest” option. I would tell myself I could go on for a significant amount of time, which would then minimize the amount of food entered. This was all in my head to be clear, this was how I viewed fasting, and certainly not the reality. I would “feel great” (this was all mind games) right up until I ate; the second it was time for me to eat I would almost have an out of body experience, I couldn’t recognize any hunger cues, I would care very little about what I was eating, and I couldn’t stop, and if I did manage to stop I would never ever feel like it was enough. This led to numerous different outcomes, all negative ones might I add. 

The guaranteed outcome was that I would be bloated all the way up until the next day when it was time to eat. Another was that if I did stop and cut myself off before I felt sick, I would feel incredibly depressed and angry because I was lacking so many nutrients, I wasn’t satisfied, and I had no energy. If I was unable to cut myself off and overeat for hours, I would feel incredibly depressed and angry, because I had no self control, because I knew I would be sick, because I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep.

Clearly, the only outcomes from this was sickness, a fierce depression and uncontrollable anger. This cycle led me to extreme mood swings, self-hatred, inflammation, unbearable periods mentally and physically, chronic anxiety, and I was also just simply uncomfortable all of the time. The reason I highly recommend stopping or re-evaluating your situation (mainly if you are a woman) is because, well first off look at my experience, and second, I know that I put my body through great trauma when I didn’t need to, some of which took a considerable amount of time to reverse, such as my gut and my digestive system. However, this goes for under eating in any way, whether you are restricting throughout the whole day or fasting, or however your struggle with food takes form. It is putting your poor body through the ringer.

Disordered eating comes in many different shapes and forms. I would never in a million years have admitted to having an issue with food or eating until I started to heal from it. Therefore, the way I would look at disordered eating now (again, NOT a doctor, my personal experience only) is if you are focused more on how it will make you look instead of how it will make you feel, there is a concern. Food has made me feel absolutely awful and ruled my life, and food has brought out love and passion and peace and excitement, the difference being how I viewed it.

In terms of neglecting your body's needs all around, whether that be not giving it the correct nutrients, filling it with processed foods more than unprocessed, or not giving your body enough of anything; you need to remind yourself that your body is your life partner, your best friend. It is like a plant you are trying to grow except for you go everywhere with it and it has a lot more feelings. You wouldn’t step on it and let it starve and pour alcohol in it instead of water, you put it in a place with sunshine, you water it when it needs watering, you chop off the dead ends, you speak kind words to it (at least I do). However, you are much more important and require much more care than a plant, and the reward is how you flourish because of it, how good you feel because of the care you have taken of yourself. There is no better feeling than taking the best care of your permanent home (your body), and then feeling the rewards of it. It is worth it, trust me.  

You can listen to a further conversation (with myself) on this topic here:

https://static.wixstatic.com/mp3/adabd0_1ff5718b4a754b8f8c7c441aa7d1ee60.m4a

Instagram accounts that have taught me a lot/reinforced what is important/ supported a lifestyle of healthy and balanced eating:

@wellnesswjensen (extremely knowledgable (it is also her job) and has had her own experience with food/body image - also has a podcast with her health and wellness team "The Wellness Effect" which I would highly recommend!)

@skyreyfit (moving past body image and disordered eating with a new mindset)

@emthenutritionist (incredible recipes focused on whole foods and getting all your nutrients in!)

I am also of course very in to self help books, however I do not want to over do it here so I will recommend my favourite one: More Than a Body by Lindsay Kite and Lexie Kite (redirecting your brain to care less about beauty standards and more about reconnecting with yourself and what matters.)