Recently I ran across a series of three articles about the basic Intutive Eating Concepts by UK addiction counselor, Gillain Riley, who appears to share my point of view about the general ineffectiveness of this Diet. Ms. Riley states her professional knowledge about these concepts in a thoughtful and precise manner, and I am sharing this series here at DietHobby. 

Advocates of Intutitive Eating insist that this diet / manner-of-eating / way-of-eating / lifestyle is "not a diet". My belief is that every diet works for someone, and this includes Intutive Eating.

The first of the three articles can be found at: "Does Our Body Tell Us WHAT to eat - Intutive Eating 1"

Are You Hungry? 
      by Gillian Riley, Author of Ditching Diets (Revised edition of Eating Less)

The assumption behind this advice is that hunger means you are depleted of energy or nutrients, and therefore in need of food. But it's considerably more complicated than that. For example, when people fast or follow extremely low calorie diets, their hunger doesn't become increasingly more intense as time goes on and nutrient stores dwindle. Any anorexic will tell you that after a short time without food, their hunger fades away. If hunger accurately reflected nutritional status, this wouldn't happen. The reverse would happen, and hunger would intensify day by day.

To make the same point in a different way, if hunger expresses genuine nutritional need, it would begin to subside after the first few mouthfuls of a meal. But this doesn't necessarily happen either, and most people have at least some experience of the reverse occurring. Many people can begin a meal not feeling especially hungry, and then, after just a few bites of tasty food, feel a strong sense of hunger suddenly arrive. It doesn't make sense that your body would signal depletion after those bites but not before. (1)

We often think of those first few bites as a way to stimulate hunger, to awaken it. After all, the whole point of the 'starter' course is supposed to be to awaken our appetite and get our 'gastric juices flowing'. But how can we rely on this hunger signal if it needs to be stimulated to appear in the first place?

Rather than a signal of nutritional need, hunger is, to a great extent, a response to cues, at least some of which will be learned. The cue prompts an expectation of eating, and it's this expectation that sets off all those hungry sensations in our stomach. The cue could be the time of day, or the sudden availability of food along with the sights and smells of its arrival. There may well be no problem at all in responding to this by eating.

The problem arises for those who have overeaten so much that the cues triggering feelings of hunger happen much too frequently. It's okay for the expectation of eating to prod...

 
Intuitive Eating is a Diet which claims it is not a diet.
I've shared about the IE concepts here on DietHobby before, and I personally believe they are ineffective for almost everyone. However, it is NOT a one-size-fits-all world, and I am certain, that ... just like every other diet ... Intuitive Eating works for someone.

One of the primary eating concepts of Intutive Eating is:

 "eat whatever you want - because your body has natural wisdom about what it needs, and it will provide you with that information."

Unfortunately, this is an Untrue Statement,... merely a crock of magical, wishful thinking with no basis in reality,... not through Basic Science, Research Studies, or documented Real Life Experiences of People. I find it amazing that Nutritionists and other Medical Professionals continue to adopt and broadly disperse that totally flawed concept.

Recently I ran across a series of articles about the basic Intutive Eating Concepts by UK addiction counselor, Gillain Riley, who appears to share my own point of view on this matter. She states her professional knowledge about these concepts in a thoughtful and precise manner.

HOW DO YOU KNOW WHAT TO EAT?
                  by Gillian Riley, Author of Ditching Diets (Revised edition of Eating Less)

'Intuitive Eating' promotes eating when hungry, stopping when full, and eating whatever you want. I've heard people say that this makes so much sense, they don't understand why they can't manage to do it. Well, this advice doesn't make any sense to me at all, so maybe you'll let me know what it is that I'm not understanding!

These ideas are widespread, having been promoted by Susie Orbach for years, among many others. Just google 'intuitive eating' and you'll see it's all over the place. This will take a while to cover, so I'll start with the suggestion to 'eat whatever you want' (because the innate wisdom of your body lets you know what it needs) and continue with the other aspects of this advice in my next newsletter.

The experience of 'wanting to eat' something is going to feel very different to each person, and even for each person from occasion to occasion. It's feeling attracted towards some food, certainly, and most likely thinking you would enjoy eating it, that you fancy it. This attraction could be barely conscious, but when we are aware of it, it often gets called a craving. (I think of attraction, desire, urge and craving as the same thing, with varying degrees of intensity, just as irritation is a less intense form of rage.)

I have heard people say that they crave greens sometimes, and perhaps that's true for you. But if you had some raw spinach leaves in a bowl in the kitchen and a slice of cake on a plate next to it, we surely know which one would be more likely to grab your attention and not let go. A 'craving for greens' may be no more than the awareness that you haven't had any for a whi...

The women in this picture are different shapes and sizes, but all are professional athletes at the peak.

It’s not a one-size-fits-all world. Every Diet works for Somebody, but not Every Diet works for Everybody. 

Also, the evidence seems to suggest that Some people can’t lose AND MAINTAIN WEIGHT-LOSS LONG-TERM on Any Diet.

Although as Human Beings, all people share certain physical characteristics, we have genetic variations which make us different from each other.  There are tall people and short people, males and females.  People can have different hair and eye and skin colors. Our facial features differ. 

There are also natural differences in body types. Some people tend to be a pear-shape, - naturally carrying more weight in their bottom half.  Others tend toward an apple-shape, naturally carrying more weight around the middle of their bodies.  Some bodies are shaped like an hour-glass, with a larger top and bottom divided by a small middle. Some bodies are rather straight with bodies that tend to be the same size from top to bottom.  Some are more triangular, having a smaller bottom half and carrying most of their weight in their upper half, chest, shoulders, arms. Some people are naturally more muscular. Some people have a stocky build, while others are naturally lean.

All of these differences are based on differences in Genetics, and mostly people understand and accept these differences. So why is it so hard for our society to Understand, Believe, and Accept that …..just like those other differences,….. the bodies of some people naturally work to collect fat, while the bodies of other people naturally work to stay thin. And, that just like some people are supposed to have blue eyes and others to have brown eyes, some people are supposed to be fat, while other people are supposed to be thin. 

Yet, …as is stated in the compelling article posted below,… our Society’s belief is that a Fat Body is Evidence that a person is Doing Life Wrong.

Or Maybe Fat People
Aren’t Doing It All Wrong
         .....excerpt from article....
         by Ragen Chastain - danceswithfat

Every day we are lied to about dieting, weight loss, weight, and health by people who profit from the lies. We are told that anyone who tries hard enough can lose weight and maintain that weight loss.  This d...