Getting rid of the internal calorie counter & finding food peace with my client Jennifer

I remember most nights in my teenage & early adult years, before I healed my relationship with food, I’d lay in my bed and tally up how many calories I’d had that day. And whatever that number was determined how I could feel about myself. If I was “over”, I’d shame myself and immediately come up with a plan to try and compensate for my “sins” the next day. And if I was “under”, I’d feel ok about myself… but still living walking this line of just trying to not screw up.

Something I often work on with my clients is helping them get rid of what we call the “internal calculator”… the always needing to count every calorie you eat and the anxiety and stress that comes with that. They’re tired of feeling like they can’t just eat something without knowing exactly how it’s going to fit in their plan or how they’ll have to make up for the “damage”. They just want to be able to eat the darn piece of cake at their kid’s birthday and not feel guilty.

This was where my client, Jennifer, was when we first started working together. And in this week’s podcast episode you’ll get to hear her incredible story of how, in our work together, she was able to quiet that internal calorie calculator, heal her relationship with food so that all she feels now with it is peace, and re-learn how to listen to & trust her body with food.

Here’s how we did this together:

We explored her MINDSET.

We explored her mindset and the basis for feeling like she needed to track every calorie. At the root of it is always FEAR. Fear that she’d lose control and go back to her history of binge eating. Fear that she’d gain weight. Fear that she couldn’t learn this skill of listening to her body, that she’d stay stuck where she was forever.

These are super common fears, by the way. And are just that… fears. Often there’s some truth to these fears… maybe you, like Jennifer, have a history of binge eating or just overeating and there’s that fear that you’ll go back to that. And listen, we don’t have to be afraid of the fear. We do want to explore it though. And what Jennifer learned was that her fear was trying to keep her safe from binging again. But also, because we had been working on her re-learning how to listen to her body, that fear wasn’t necessary anymore. She had gained that skill of being able to listen to and trust her body and wasn’t going to go back to binging.

She re-learned how to listen to her body.

Simultaneously, we also worked on the skill of simply listening to her body with eating. Eating when she was hungry and feeling confident knowing what her hunger cues were. Stopping when she was full. We practiced this together and eventually eating intuitively because so second nature that the calorie calculator that once existed didn’t need to be there anymore. It was unnecessary. And what was left was someone who felt confident and empowered around food.

Jennifer shares so much more in our conversation on this week’s podcast. I can’t wait for you to listen. You can find it wherever you listen to podcasts on Apple, Spotify, or Google.

And if you relate with Jennifer’s story and want to learn more about working together inside my program Stop Dieting Start Living, click HERE and join.