A common lifestyle practice, known as intuitive eating, is highly common these days; and has been for several decades. It is essentially where one eats until they’re full; then stops eating. While this practice bodes adequate for many people, others have tried this, and felt stuck on their health journeys. I’m going to delve into the pros and cons of intuitive eating, when it is useful and when it’s not; especially for those struggling to lose fat and gain muscle.
**DISCLAIMER:
I AM NOT A MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONAL. IF YOU STRUGGLE WITH DISORDERED EATING, CONSULT WITH A MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONAL BEFORE ATTEMPTING A LIFESTYLE PRACTICE.**
When is intuitive eating useful?
It goes without saying that people are trying to learn how to listen to their bodies and respect its signals for feeding and when to stop. In concept, it bodes useful in several ways:
It forms a healthy relationship with food, especially for those with a history of disordered eating.
It teaches mindfulness in increasing connectivity between the mind and body (a rarity these days with the numerous distractions around us daily).
The mindfulness of it can increase awareness as to which foods your body agrees with and which it does not (in terms of digestion and gut health).
When is intuitive eating not useful?
For those on a health journey, wishing to improve body composition (lose fat and increase muscle), there are some cons to this eating approach:
Without data pertaining to calories in versus out, it may be difficult to ascertain if you’re eating / burning the calories needed to achieve this goal. (But Dev, if I listen to my body, it will tell me when to stop eating - would it not be right around the calories I should eat? Give me a second – I will get to that next).
You may have been under-eating or overeating in the last few years. It would be beneficial to establish a baseline because, if you have been (for example) under-eating for an extended period of time, your metabolism slows down to adapt to the minimal energy resources it has. This can reduce your hunger signals (when you may, in fact, need to eat MORE). This can be done by tracking how much you have been eating, assessing if it is less or more than you should be eating to reach your goal, adjusting your calories accordingly, then re-assessing after your body’s signaling re-adjusts.
If you’re inexperienced in the SKILL of healthy living, you need to understand other factors that affect your hunger / satiety signals (ie. stress, period cycle, etc) - and learn when to adhere to these signals, OR, if it may be a “false reading” on the dashboard.
If you have not been following a healthy lifestyle for years in a row, your body’s hunger / satiety signaling hormones (leptin & ghrelin) may not be in balance, deeming their signals unreliable. This also may cause one to undershoot or overshoot their calories. Leptin and ghrelin fall out of balance in cases such as, diabetes, insulin resistance, thyroid dysfunction, gut health dysfunction, chronic dieting, and for people who’ve been eating processed food for an extended period of time. Due to the nutrient BARE qualities of processed foods, your body will signal that it’s still hungry despite the high caloric profile of processed foods. These foods I call “empty calories”.
Different foods with varying caloric profiles may have higher, or lower, calories than you think. For example, a hunk of meat with a whopping side of veggies will fill you up much faster than a dish cooked with several spoonful's of oil, while the former dish has much fewer calories than the latter. These things are important to keep in mind if you have specific goals.
In Conclusion,
While intuitive eating practices are well intended, it may not be the best approach for a novice in the healthy lifestyle world.
Does one have to track food forever? No, not necessarily, it depends on your goal at a given time.
Whether tracking food and learning how the choice of food, or alterations in body function (health comorbidities, stress, menstrual cycle, etc) affects your hunger / satiety signals affects your quality of life positively or negatively may depend entirely on your outlook.
For myself personally, I look at the information as a tool – useful information on my journey to feel good from the inside out.
Tracking food doesn’t mean that I can not eat foods that I enjoy. I have found, personally, that it increases my mindfulness in communicating to my body and its signals when I have more data to work with. It merely means I want to ensure I get the right fuel in the tank to achieve my goals at a given time.
If tracking isn’t for you, that’s ok! Just understand the pros and cons of tracking food versus not tracking it when making an informed decision of your health practices. You do YOU!
In fact, I have just the resource for you for those looking to make healthful changes without tracking.
Check it out here.
