Episode 61: The One About: Challenging the Food Police

“You have to let go of perfection. My philosophy is that there’s no such thing as perfection. I think we are setting ourselves up for failure when we expect to eat perfectly.” - Shana Minei Spence, MS, RDN, CDN

In this week’s episode, Hannah and Ali talk all things Intuitive Eating principle #4: Challenge the Food Police. They are joined by registered dietitian Shana Spence and the self proclaimed “eat anything dietitian”. Shana’s philosophy is that life is complicated enough, and there shouldn’t be a reason to restrict yourself with the food you eat, which made her the perfect guest to help Hannah and Ali answer all your listener questions about challenging food rules.

• How do I manage comments from coworkers while I am working on freedom from food rules?

• How can I eat things that feel good for me and don’t follow any rules, without having all the guilt?

• How do you support someone in your life who eats mostly “junk” and fast food?

• Is there a way to help someone eat more “healthy”?

• How do I stop the nagging rules I have learned from dieting and my fitness pal from occupying my thoughts and influencing my choices?

• Will these food rules ever go away?

When it comes to the choices we make around food, the Food Police and diet culture are never shy to tell us what’s wrong, what's right, what’s good, what’s bad and tells us how to feel about the food we like to eat. Even if those messages are often conflicting, the Food Police adds guilt and shame to food choices and implies that the morality of food has something to do with who we are as people. Well the Food Police has got to go! Join Hannah, Ali and Shana as they take the B.S. out of these food rules and shut the Food Police up once and for all!