This week we are unpacking the 10 Principles of Intuitive Eating. Yesterday we ditched the diet mentality and revved up your anger towards the dieting industry. Now that you're on board with this, let's look at an alternative approach to dieting.  

Intuitive Eating involves connecting with your body's internal cues.  We call this Principle #2 – Honor Your Hunger.

Eat when you're hungry. Stop when you're full. Sounds simple, doesn't it? But it's not. Because we're confused.  Somewhere along the way we stopped trusting our bodies. What a tragedy.  

You were born an intuitive eater. You cried when you were hungry, and you're caregiver fed you. You stopped drinking the milk when you were satisfied.  And you repeated this process when you got hungry again.  

It's more complicated as we get older and have more control and choices over what and when we eat.  Your body needs consistent fuel, including carbohydrates, proteins and fats.  When you undereat it sets off your body's survival instinct and sets you up to overeat in response to deprivation.  Your body stops trusting that you're going to feed it enough, so it overrides your decisions to keep you alive.  By eating a lot when the food is available, you can survive longer when there is no food available (or when you're dieting).  

You can re-train your body to trust you by offering consistent, predictable opportunities to eat.  This will allow you to connect with your hunger signals which is at the core of intuitive eating. 

Tomorrow we'll talk more about WHAT to eat when you're hungry.