You’ve done it – you’ve reached your ideal body weight – yay, congratulations! 🎉 But what happens once that initial euphoria wears off, once the congratulations stop. What, apart from the size of your body and the number on the scale has changed? Do you really feel more fulfilled, more satisfied in your life? Does the fact you are a certain body size change your value to the people who really matter in your life? You’ve put in an amazing effort to reach that number - now what?

So why you really don’t want to diet - dieting and restriction don’t work.  At least not in the long term.  For a while most of us seem able to follow a meal plan, cut out certain foods, limit other foods, count macros, count calories – until we can’t anymore and give up.

It may be that in this time of isolation & stay at home you are finding yourself reverting to old habits as regards eating. First off this is fine and not uncommon at times of uncertainty which we are facing at the moment world-wide.

re there things you’re waiting to do until certain conditions are met? Are you waiting to be happy? I was reading a Chrissy King article talking about how we often say I’ll be happy when, when I lose X pounds, I can wear a size x, I’m smaller etc

The effect of the words we use, on our sub-conscious, can have a significant effect on how we feel about us. I love words, I love reading, I love word-games and recognise how they can be a powerful tool in many situations.

Cor, you’d think by the time I got to my age I’d be sorted! But I still get myself confused & tied in knots about things. I moved away from dieting and towards intuitive eating which was fine – but then I started to think I wasn’t doing that right either!

So if I don’t diet, what do I do? I have stopped dieting and adopted a more intuitive and moderation approach to food. Does this mean I don’t think at all about what I eat? In short, the answer is no.

One of the hardest things about leaving the diet mindset behind was to stop dieting.

It was something I had been doing for so many years: – Weight Watchers, Slimming World, Atkins, calorie counting, You Are What You Eat, eating clean, even Slimfast (YUCK!) not giving a stuff!

Life can become busy & hectic. Therefore, anything I can do to reduce this I do. The principles of nourishment, self, consistency and simplicity lend themselves to a much less stressful and more chilled living experience.

Part of moving away from a diet mindset is recognising/learning that we are so much more than what we weigh. The aim is to escape the influence the scales and this number have over your emotions.

It’s all very well talking about food freedom and moving away from food restriction but some foods I still struggle to eat in a mindful way. The dictionary definition of moderation is the avoidance of excess or extremes.

Oh, are you being good?” I was asked on turning down dessert when out for dinner. One of my pet peeves – I just didn’t want any – no biggie! It got me thinking about all the rules that we are bombarded with about what foods we should and shouldn’t eat.

I have actively been moving away from a diet mindset to one focused on moderation or intuitive eating. Recently I made the decision that having maintained my weight for a while I wanted to get a bit leaner ( must admit a few pounds have gone - comfort eating – still learning!).

I was horrified when I saw last week Kim Kardashian promoting an appetite suppressing lollipop – as many others were.

Like with any skill eating “normally” for your goals requires practice, particularly if you have a history of disordered eating. We don’t try anything else and expect to get it right straight away and think we’ve failed if we don’t. We expect to have to learn and practice.

So, we’ve just been away for a few days and my plan had been to write a post on the tactics I’d employed to survive a vacation eating wise. And while I wouldn’t say the few days had been a disaster it wasn’t a resounding success either.

So, Weight Watchers has been in the press recently due to the announcement that they are going to offer 6-week free memberships to teenagers aged 13-17 firstly in the US and Australia. Ah, that’s kind of them may be your first reaction, but is it really?

#wakeupweightwatchers