How To Respond To Diet Talk
Seeing people in person again can be a bit of an adjustment. How to cope, navigate and respond to diet talk when it arises.
We are still very much in the midst of a global pandemic…
As we go into a time where we are seeing more of our friends and family there can be a lot of diet talk. If you are trying to recover from an eating disorder or seeking the path of a non-diet life, how do you navigate these comments and questions?
First I just want to say that it is a weird time right now in general. Here in the US and especially in California, life is starting to “open up” again. We are starting to come out of our houses, go back to the office, see groups of friends and family, and go to events. This can be nerve-wracking and an adjustment just like when we were going into lockdown (and all the changes that happened inside of that.) As part of this adjustment, we might be seeing people in person that we haven’t in a long time and we might be more self-conscious because we have gotten used to being on video from the comfort of our homes.
How do I respond to diet talk?
Since we all have varying comfort levels depending on our mood, personality and context I have included categories of “soft” and “bold” responses, but one is not better than the other. You need to protect your energy first and foremost.
Comment: Wow, you look great! Did you lose weight??
Soft: Thanks, I’m not sure, I don’t track that.
Bold: I’m actually healing my relationship with food and my body that doesn’t include monitoring my weight so maybe that is what you are noticing!
Wow, you are eating so healthy, good for you.
Soft: I try to eat a little bit of everything!
Bold: Actually when I changed my mindset in knowing no good or bad foods it opened me up to so much variety! I’m craving a salad right now and definitely going for dessert later because it looks delicious.
Do you work out? If I ate like you I would gain so much weight.
Soft: Mmm. [changes subject] So how has the new dog been?
Bold: I’ve healed my relationship with my body and food so I enjoy joyful movement when I want. I’m not afraid of weight gain because I trust my body will figure out what weight it needs to be. I also know fear of weight gain is ingrained in us but I’ve been working on un-learning fat-phobia instead.
My friend just lost a bunch of weight on this new diet! Let me send you the book title, I think it could be good for you.
Soft: I’ve actually stopped dieting for a bit, thanks though.
Bold: I know that I tried a bunch of diets in the past that didn’t work but it turns out I actually needed to heal my eating disorder instead!
Someone looks hungry, what a big plate!
Soft: Yep.
Bold: Funny, I didn’t feel the need to comment on your plate of food.
Come-on, finish off the mashed potatoes! I don’t want them to go to waste.
Soft: Thank you but like I said I’m really full.
Bold: Definitely won’t go to waste, I’ll take them home with me because I am too full right now.
Ugh my thighs are so big, diet starts on Monday for sure.
Soft: I had parts of myself that I haven’t liked either but I’m choosing to send them some love instead!
Bold: We are some smart, passionate and funny ladies, isn’t there something else we could talk about besides what we hate about our bodies and dieting?
Navigating diet talk might seem like a never-ending battle. But like I said always put your energy first and see what you have the energy for. You are also not alone <3.
Katy Gaston Nutrition
Katy is a registered dietitian nutritionist and owner of Katy Gaston Nutrition based in San Francisco, CA. Katy is passionate about her work in eating disorders and disordered eating (AKA dieting) and wants to help people heal their relationship with food and body. If you would like to work with Katy in counseling sessions, she is available virtually via her services page below. If you are unable to be a client at this time but would like learn more, click here for a free introduction into intuitive eating workbook!
Organic vs. Conventional Produce, Is Organic Healthier?
What does it actually mean for something to be organic, and is that healthier?
Some food myth busting with organic vs. conventional foods.
The first myth I would like to bust is no, as a dietitian, I do not ‘only eat organic foods’. I am not going to knock eating organic, I just want you to know the truth sans the marketing. I also have some great resources on this topic that I will link below and cite throughout this post.
What is does organic mean?
I would like to start with the definition of organic. I think we have come to have it be a catch-all for this “clean eating” movement (which is another email for another time - lots of thoughts on this) but what are the actual parameters around something being organic? Because yes, there are parameters set by the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture), which has some pros and cons. Some farmers are producing crops via “organic” methods but may choose to not be labeled as such because it needs to be certified and therefore costs extra money, time and energy. Some farmers may also choose to not be certified because then it creates parameters for the “bare minimum” instead of being able to focus time and money towards practices that could be above even the USDA’s standard of what “organic” means.
All of this lead up to say is that organic is a term set by the USDA, not actually a term meaning any increase in nutrition, quality or safety of the item. From this point I will label anything not organic as conventional, meaning the “regular” stuff.
Myth #1: Organic means no pesticides
This actually is not the case, and in some cases the same pesticides with the same amount of residue on the produce can show up in organic and conventional produce. How does this happen? There are pesticides that are approved for use by the USDA and EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and like I said earlier some conventional produce farmers may not want to spend the time and money to get organic certified, even though they would meet the qualifications. “…the vast majority of conventionally grown produce tested by United States Department of Agriculture could qualify to be labeled “organic,” specific to their residue levels”¹. Conventional also doesn’t mean that the farmer doesn’t care about their produce and many only use pesticides as a last resort just like organic farmers.
Myth #2: You should pay attention to the “Dirty Dozen”
If I am being completely honest this was a myth that I myself did not know needed to be busted. I even learned in my nutrition courses about the Dirty Dozen and had to memorize what they were - meaning they were meant to be taken seriously as something I would counsel future clients and patients on. To those that don’t know, the Dirty Dozen is a list of 12 fruits and vegetables released by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) each year that is said to be the highest in residues and therefore should be avoided or bought organic. First, there has been research to show that the residues that show up on these fruits and vegetables are still negligible and that the methods that the EWG uses to come up with these are not accurate. In a statement by Dr. Carl Winter he clarifies this point: “To accurately assess consumer risks from pesticides, one needs to consider three major factors – 1) the amount of residue on the foods, 2) the amount of food consumed, and 3) the toxicity of the pesticides. The methodology used by EWG ignores all three.”¹ To see what this means I used a calculator available on the website SafeFruitsandVeggies.com to go through a real life scenario. I took one of the fruits listed on this year’s dirty dozen list - apples. I put into the calculator of how many servings you would have to eat in a day to consume unsafe levels of residue and here are my results:
If you are a….
Man = 1,190 apples/day
Woman = 850 apples/day
Child = 340 apples/day
Case and point, the amount or residue matters, not the fact that it exists. So why does this matter so much? The Dirty Dozen list is not produced by any credible entity, it is not like when the USDA or FDA issues a food recall on something that has been deemed unsafe to consume but it likes to come across as such. It uses fear-mongering to make people think that these products are dirty and therefore un-healthy.
Imagine if you are a conventional strawberry farmer that cannot afford to get the organic label and jump through all these bureaucratic hoops and then some random group releases a list saying the crop that you have poured your life into is “dirty” and will therefore negatively impact consumption rates.
I think everyone can agree that it is good to have fruits and vegetables in your diet and that many people do not get enough. This list has been shown to lower people’s consumption of fruits and vegetables because of the fear and/or inability to afford organic. Imagine the negative impact and shame that something like this can create if you cannot afford to feed yourself or your family with only organic versions of the Dirty Dozen so you either don’t eat them or eat the conventional versions thinking that you are poisoning your family.
So what is the takeaway here?
I am not against buying organic if you can afford it and it is your way of consuming produce. What I do want to do is take away the shame and fear if you DON’T buy organic. If you buy conventional it does not mean the foods have any less nutrition, quality or safety. It does not mean that the farmers do not have sustainability practices in place like crop rotations and soil enhancers. You are not “dirty” if you buy conventional, you are not consuming unsafe levels of pesticide residue (you can email me if you are consuming 1,200 apples in a day and we can talk more) and you are not dumping toxins into your body.
The fact is the “organic” label might not mean all that you think it means. I know as consumers there are 1,000 choices we have to make every time we go to the grocery store and we like labels like this because we think it makes the choices easier. “Clean”, “guilt-free”, “lite”, “all-natural” are all there to sell us comfort, peace of mind and the feeling of “being good”. “Organic” is just that, another marketing term that is used by products to make you feel clean and good.
I am here to say eat the fruit and veggies you like whether they are organic or conventional, you’ll still be doing your body good.
Citations: (because that is how serious this blog got)
¹ Facts About the Dirty Dozen List
Website resource: SafeFruitsandVeggies.com
Podcast episode: Sound Bites Podcast Episode 97
Katy Gaston Nutrition
Katy is a registered dietitian nutritionist and owner of Katy Gaston Nutrition based in San Francisco, CA. Katy is passionate about her work in eating disorders and disordered eating (AKA dieting) and wants to help people heal their relationship with food and body. If you would like to work with Katy in counseling sessions, she is available virtually via her services page below. If you are unable to be a client at this time but would like learn more, click here for a free introduction into intuitive eating workbook!
Can Dieting Cause Eating Disorders?
My experience with dieting and an eating disorder.
Dieting, an eating disorder gateway?
TW: dieting thoughts/patterns, weight loss, eating disorders
I have been thinking lately about my own healing journey from an eating disorder and what the start of that really looked like. As anyone knows who has or had an eating disorder, it doesn’t start in one day. You don’t just suddenly think to yourself, “Oh, I would like to have an eating disorder!” It is more of a gradual, slippery slope into eating disorder thoughts and patterns, so much so that you might not even realize it. Today I want to talk about what the start of that slope looked like for me and likely many others.
If I think back, I believe the desire to change my body, lose weight and therefore begin dieting started around 6th grade (12 years old). I was just starting puberty around that time which for me looked like widening hips and butt which was then commented on by family members in ways that made me think this was not okay. To illustrate this point more specifically we live in a society that values thinness and especially during this time the very straight-shaped, very thin model type was “in.” Before puberty my body looked more like that, I had a very straight frame and not many curves as is often the case in girl’s of that age. Therefore when my body was changing this translated in my head that this change was bad, a failing on my part, to control my body. I was eating more (because I was growing) and when this was commented on I made the connection that eating more = growing = bad.
Again, I cannot pinpoint the day where these dieting patterns started coming in, but I can start to see it when I first wanted to become a vegetarian. I know this really was rooted in my desire for better animal treatment, but I also know it was a way for me to start having control over my food intake while still living under my parents’ roof.
I remember my mom would causally diet and around this time I started joining her, it felt like a bonding experience and I can still remember the excitement of new diet and the feeling of sacrifice when we were “good” and only ate the foods that were on the list of approval. This would last for a few weeks, slowly drop off and we would go back to our normal routine, only to start again in many 6 months of so.
I then remember I took these dieting patterns more under the radar, I wanted to lose lots of weight to the point when even then I knew it wasn’t going to be seen as healthy. Bringing in how my body image was at the time I knew it was tied to feelings of wanting to be as small as possible. I very much wanted to be the Manic Pixie Dream Girl that needed to be saved from herself. I wanted to be so broken that people noticed my broken-ness.
In early high school I started on the covert diets like the Special K one (where you eat two bowls of cereal or bars a day instead of meals) and skipping meals. I then tried fasts all while convincing myself that I was “cleansing my body” to the point where my GI tract was so messed up I had to be rushed to the doctor for severe stomach pains only to show that I was so constipated that almost my entire GI tract was full. (At the time I was so happy the doctor didn’t “catch me” but now it makes me so sad to see that this prominent red flag was not addressed.) There were many other “dieting” things that I did around this time but I want to not overload this newsletter with potentially triggering things.
This continued throughout high school and into early college. My primary eating disorder behaviors had started in 8th grade and these common dieting behaviors were just adding fuel to the fire. I then went on to study to become a dietitian and in the course of healing one eating disorder I started to develop new patterns. Finally towards the middle-end of college I was on a course of healing and true recovery.
So, what about others?
According to Intuitive Eating by Tribole and Resch, “35% of so-called “normal” dieters progress to pathological dieting. Of those, 20-25% will progress to partial or full-blown eating disorders.” This prevalence is only increasing and I personally have never worked with a patient or client with eating disorders that didn’t start with some kind of dieting thoughts about food, even if they were not weight-related.
Recovery is so difficult not only because it takes so much devotion to heal yourself but also because we live in a society where dieting is so normalized. I see a lot of shame and guilt in my clients coming for help with that healing because it was a slippery slope that they feel got away from them. A lot of times it is this sense that dieting is okay but then they took it too far. I give so much compassion to clients because dieting it not normal, dieting is disordered eating that society has normalized. You are not broken because you have “failed” at dieting and you are not broken if things have “gotten away from you”.
That is why I like to say that I work with people with eating disorders and disordered eating because I see that line as so blurred. In fact I don’t even see it as a line, but more of a spectrum where people can be going from one end to the other or progressing along it. I see dieting as harmful patterns that can be taken as seriously as those who have then taken those patterns into eating disorder territory. The harm might be there, but then so is the healing.
Sending so much virtual love to everyone because I know what that feels like, I have been there. I have free 15 minute consults if you’re or anyone you know is confused or a little lost on how to get help or who to get it from. Here is the link to my services page and there is also a FAQs page with some more information on these subjects.
Don’t be afraid to take disordered eating and dieting patterns seriously and seek help if you want to break free from them!
Katy Gaston Nutrition
Katy is a registered dietitian nutritionist and owner of Katy Gaston Nutrition based in San Francisco, CA. Katy is passionate about her work in eating disorders and disordered eating (AKA dieting) and wants to help people heal their relationship with food and body. If you would like to work with Katy in counseling sessions, she is available virtually via her services page below. If you are unable to be a client at this time but would like learn more, click here for a free introduction into intuitive eating workbook!
A Dietitian's Take on Collagen and Other Nutrition Trends
Information on what collagen is and how your body processes it. Along with some current and related nutrition trends.
If I am being fully honest staying up with the latest food and nutrition trends is not my, shall we say.. priority?
This is very different than me staying up to date in my field with studies and emerging nutritional science because those are important for me as a practitioner to stay up to date in my field. The reason why I don’t follow food trends as closely is just that, they are trends. They changes with the seasons, tides and which company is the latest push on Instagram. However, I get a lot of questions about trends so I feel that it is good for me to dive into the deep depths of these “made for you supplements” and Goop-blessed morning routines every once in awhile.
First up, collagen. What is it, who needs it, what does it do.
Collagen is a protein that is found in your body. The marketing is true that it has a role in building skin, bones and nails. However, as with everything in your body it is not a simple equation of digest collagen then collagen goes right to your skin cells building elasticity and clearing wrinkles. (Remember when collagen in skin creams was all the rage and dermatologists were looking at us like wtf? On top of skin does not = absorbed into skin to be used.) It just doesn’t work like that. The research on the positive outcomes of collagen supplementation are limited and a little sketchy as supplements do now have to be FDA approved and therefore do not have to prove much in terms of “effectiveness”.
Collagen is a protein that is found in animal proteins but that doesn’t mean that vegetarians and vegans don’t have collagen in their bodies because once again, our bodies don’t follow a simple equation like that. Instead of collagen in = collagen taken to skin, bones, etc, it actually is eat foods, foods get broken down into simpler building blocks, those building blocks are transported to the places they are needed, you body constructs it. This is why I am skeptical of any supplements that over simplify this equation. Do I think taking collagen is harmful? Largely, no. Do I think it is probably a waste of money since it is a current trend? Yes. To me when people see positive benefits to something then it may not be so much because of this one magic supplement but rather because maybe they were not getting enough protein and now they are, (AKA no longer under-nourishing themselves) caring for their bodies is becoming more of a priority, etc. It is also very interesting to me that we keep circling around to proteins are our saviors and “clean” macros when fats can also help your skin, nails and bones too.
To address other trends along the same lines as collagen…
Gelatin. Same as collagen, just boiled down. Apparently this has made a comeback because when I was in high school gelatin was villainized as “that gross thing in gummies made of horse hooves.” Again, this is why trends are both boring and fascinating to me.
Bone Broth. I thought this one had died down about 8 years ago but I guess not. From a nutritional stand point, bone broth is just a soup-like substance that is made from boiling down bones to release the collagen. From a cultural standpoint I want to make clear that bone broth is not new. In many places it has been around for thousands of years as a dish to promote health, community and comfort. Often times I see bone broth has been commandeered by Western society with the idea that it was something that was invented by Los Angeles juice shops when it definitely was not. So what is my opinion of it? Bone broth is great, personally when I have a cold a nice warm hearty bone broth based soup dish is just the ticket. Do I think the bone broth protein power on your Instagram ads is your answer to enteral life? No.
Weight loss/metabolism/clean eating. Because I think that collagen and all of the subsets above also tend to dance in the same circles as weight loss and clean eating I want to also address this aspect of it. I will say of the studies that I found in regards to weight loss and collagen, there are few and even fewer human studies. This is important to note because few studies do not make a solid recommendation. What I will say is that collagen is a protein, just like other proteins. Your body will do with it what it needs to do. So when we fragment certain ingredients to be “fat burners” or “metabolism boosters” I am instantly skeptical and you should be too. Because back to our equation from above, whenever that equation is simplified, question the marketing! Fat burning is purely a marketing term, it does not actually happen in your body like that. Metabolism boosting, again, purely marketing. Our metabolisms vary throughout the day, seasons and our lifetime. So much of this is just genetics with a little bit of wiggle room. It’s like an architect with building plans, sure you can probably have a different stain on the wooden doors but you can’t change the foundational beams around, it just doesn’t work like that. Be the architect when these hot shot advertisers come to you trying to sell you new plans to change the beams around. Laugh and then go about building your building. (Annndd my building analogy ends here.) Collagen for weight loss, metabolism boosting blah blah is just the latest in what they will try to sell you products for. The weight loss industry has billions in revenue every year, of course all food and supplement roads lead back to there, it’s where the money is at baby!
Bottom line…
If you love your daily collagen power added to your smoothie and you have found it has helped you in some way, great. Again, I don’t think there is any harm besides the healthism and orthorexia that can come with any food and diet trend. You are not being “unhealthy” if you don’t consume these collagen supplements because your body is building collagen for you when you eat other proteins. So if you find yourself breaking the bank and chasing the white rabbit down the influencer marketing holes then I would stop and have a convo with yourself. Are you trying to “fix” yourself because there is a deep unhappiness in some other area? Are you seeking perfection like it is obtainable? Do you stress constantly about what you are putting in your body and are consuming these things because they have been deemed “clean”? If so, then I think there are larger things at play.
If you feel like you are struggling to figure out what to eat but also don’t know what is just marketing and what is actually based in nutritional science that is definitely something I can help with! My 1:1 sessions are to answer your specific questions because we all have different circumstances so these sessions are catered to what is needed for you and your body, sans food trends of 2021.
Katy Gaston Nutrition
Katy is a registered dietitian nutritionist and owner of Katy Gaston Nutrition based in San Francisco, CA. Katy is passionate about her work in eating disorders and disordered eating (AKA dieting) and wants to help people heal their relationship with food and body. If you would like to work with Katy in counseling sessions, she is available virtually via her services page below. If you are unable to be a client at this time but would like learn more, click here for a free introduction into intuitive eating workbook!
The Myth Of Dieting Willpower
When it comes to food, do you feel like you lack willpower? Do you wonder why you feel like you have little to no control when it comes to eating?
We’ve all heard it, felt it, seen it, thought it - if you can’t follow a diet, you lack willpower.
I remember the first time that I heard that this concept of lacking willpower around food was not actually a real thing, I didn’t believe it to be honest. This narrative is so powerful in the dieting space because it always needs to be turned back onto you. For example, if something doesn’t work, it’s because you lack willpower, not because the concept was faulty to begin with.
So why is this concept of willpower faulty?
On a basic biological level, humans need to consume energy to survive. Plants need sunlight and water. We need carbohydrates, protein, fat, water. Because of this, our brains are wired to get us to eat because that is how we get energy. When we consume food our bodies break it down and it eventually ends up being ATP; a fuel source for our cells. In order for this process to happen over and over again, our bodies have a complex network of signals to tell every organ in your body to do its job. For example, when you are low on energy your body signals your brain to start thinking about food, your stomach makes noises and has an “empty” feeling. So then you know it is time to eat, the brain signals “good job!” for eating, and there is another set of communications to say that you have enough energy for now so the body needs to focus on the digestion, breakdown and utilization of this energy.
Now, when your body is in a starved state (restricting, under-eating, too low Calories, etc) then the signals to eat are going to be stronger, more panicked and desperate. To your body, it doesn’t know when the next meal will be. It doesn’t understand the concept of dieting because restriction and weight loss could mean death. So when people say they lack willpower, I see it as their body just really kicks into gear to keep this person alive. It’s not willpower, it’s biology. Do you see why it’s faulty when you turn the concept of willpower around to see it from your body’s point of view? Learning about this realized I had felt so much shame around my “lack of control” around food. I thought it was a moral and physical failing on my part and with working through these concepts I have seen that is not the case at all.
Now I want to answer to some questions to put this is real-life perspective.
“What about overall trying to eat healthier? I do really well for awhile and then I just end up eating junk food again.”
This is about taking away morality of food. Take away the black and white thinking and make it gray. There are no “good” or “bad” foods. You aren’t eating “healthy” or “junk” food. You’re just eating food. Make it as neutral as possible and then you can have a convo with your body about what feels best for you.
“If I keep candy at my desk I’ll just eat it all day.”
This is because you haven’t given yourself permission to eat it whenever, where ever. It becomes enticing when there is deprivation. Normalize it being around then it won’t have so much intrigue.
“My brother dieted and kept the weight off. I tried the same thing, lost the weight and then gained it all back. Why??”
I’ll use the cliche of every body and situation is different. I don’t know the complexities of each of their bodies so I can’t say much more than who knows what really went on with the brother and for the other person’s body that is a pretty clear path of what happens with dieting. With weight loss you body could think you’re starving and slowly dying, so it does what it can to protect you. So that means when the energy is available again it is going to hold on to it in case you go into another starvation mode. You’re not broken, you’re being protected.
To sum it all up…
Your body will always want to eat. Since it can’t force you to eat, it does so in other ways through chemical and hormonal signals to the brain to get you to think about food. Then when you don’t listen it will get louder, it will get you to obsess over it. It’s trying to keep you alive! So heal your relationship with your body, listen to what it is trying to say and “willpower” will no longer need to be in your vocabulary around food. Since this can be difficult and complex to do, a dietitian is a great resource to get to the roots of how you feel about food and your body that cause these feelings of “lack of control.”
Katy Gaston Nutrition
Katy is a registered dietitian nutritionist and owner of Katy Gaston Nutrition based in San Francisco, CA. Katy is passionate about her work in eating disorders and disordered eating (AKA dieting) and wants to help people heal their relationship with food and body. If you would like to work with Katy in counseling sessions, she is available virtually via her services page below. If you are unable to be a client at this time but would like learn more, click here for a free introduction into intuitive eating workbook!