Find Your Food Voice

Do you notice how much bonding happens over diet talk and body bashing? Do you already feel different and rejecting diets makes you feel even more out of place? Guest expert Rachel Millner says, "Community is important" and reminds us to "keep focusing on what we are pursuing: freedom." Listen to more on the latest Love Food Podcast episode. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Use the coupon code 'lovefood' at checkout for 30% off during February 2020. I want to more about you! I would love if you could take the 2020 Love Food survey: access it here: JulieDillonRD.com/Survey. This episode's Dear Food letter: Dear food,      Hello! I’m so glad we’ve spent some time over the past few years working on our relationship. I grew up in a household with a severly anorexic sister and an eating disordered mom, where you were considered dangerous, addictive, and a symbol of weakness. Though I love my family deeply and in so many ways, before I went to college, I became very fed up with two ideas in particular they used to police me: first, that I must appear feminine, and second, that I must be thin so I can be “healthy” and attractive. Before I left home, and even more after, I experimented with violating both these rules. Years later, I am learning that they are related in ways I never realized.      From my family and society in general, I learned that being thin, talking about restriction, and obsessing over appearances are cornerstones of conventional femininity. So much of what the women in my extended family do together revolves around appearances. On vacation, we go on hikes where we don’t even talk because we don’t want to slow our heart rates for the exercise-tracking watches (I’m the only one without one), and connect and catch up doing hair, makeup, or going to the nail salon, where inevitably boyfriends or the pursuit of them are the thing everyone from the extended family considers common ground for conversation. I don’t relate to so much of this. I consider myself pretty femine, but being gay and avoiding diet culture seem to isolate me. Doing both of them at the same time just compounds this effect: not only am I not traditionally feminine because I’m not straight, I try not to compensate for it by constantly maintaining the southern-charm appearance that my family values so much.      It’s hard, though, food. I feel like such an outsider, and dating women who are thinner than me just makes it harder. My last girlfriend and my current girlfriend are both naturally very thin, and the inner voice that wants to compare my weight and looks to others’ is even louder when the person I’m looking at is a romatic partner. I’m very open about this with women I date, and my girlfriend says she loves me at my exact size (I’m so lucky), but I can’t help but feel jealous. One thing that helped was having sex with women of my own size. I think being queer gives me the unique opportunity to value my own body because I can see a woman who looks like me and think, “she’s about my weight, and I think she’s gorgeous!” Lately, this just isn’t enough for me though. It’s exhausting having to prove my femininity to myself and my family all the time. It’s exhausting having to prove that my weight is okay to myself and my family all the time. I’m a woman with a body that I use to feed, move, and connect - shouldn’t that be enough? I know it should be, but I can’t help but feel shame every time I eat a dessert, and I know it’s damaging our relationship, food. I love my girlfriend so much, but her thinness and genuine innate love of vegetables make me feel comparatively shitty to the point where I am emotionally eating, which just makes me feel worse. I really want to continue along the path to peace with you, food, and I hope someday I can eat and love without fear. Love,      Here, queer, and full of food fear Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to subscribe to the Love Food’s Food Peace Syllabus. Rachel Millner Instagram mentions: @Shooglet, @The_Queer_Counselor, @SamDylanFinch, @DecolonizingFitness Intuitive Eating book (aff) and website Find an Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

When every cell in your body screams EAT CARBS NOW--that is PCOS cravings. So how do you cut them out? I am here to say: Don't. You don't have to suffer through the cravings. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Use the coupon code 'lovefood' at check out for 30% off. Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to get latest Food Peace Syllabus. Intuitive Eating (aff) by Tribole and Resch 6 Keys To Food Peace Julie on Instagram: Instagram.com/FoodPeaceDietitian Find Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Do you have an awareness on why you have a complicated relationship with food yet can't seem to make it right? Do you eat to feel comfort and can't seem to find another way? Do you eat to escape responsibility or reality and worry that you will never stop bingeing? How and why eat is more complicated than it appears. Pull up a chair and listen to our guest expert Christyna Johnson from @EncouragingNutrition. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Use the coupon code 'lovefood' at checkout for 30% off during the month of February 2020. Dear Food, This is a much needed conversation... I know exactly when our story started to get a little... complicated. It all started a little bit more than a year ago, I was only 14 (yes, right now I am just 15 and a half ). I know exactly why it started: I compared myself to one girl in my class... She was a gymnast, and really muscular. I was just getting to high school and I admired her body. I've always been considered as a "skinny girl", but at the time I started hating my thighs (by the way, I still do...). That same year, I started being more active and I thought that my thighs needed to be slimmer.  Then, I started to do some research on my own by listening to podcasts, watching youtube videos, reading... I did abs every mornings.  I also decided that I wanted to eat "healthy" and I thought that I had to reduce you Food a little bit... I didn't starve myself, I was too scared and too aware for this, but I had some "rules": no bread, no dairy, no dessert everyday, no snacks. At the same period of time, I lost my period, to this day we (doctors, my mother and I) still don't know what caused it because I didn't lose a lot of weight, just X kilos. I didn't restrict but something else started: bingeing. And here is my problem, sweetie. I found, and I still do, get so much comfort through you. I was thinking about you all the time, even in holidays, in school, wherever. It gets a little better when I am busy but I still love you so much... Now, I am much more aware about nutrition, especially gentle nutrition... I eat when I am hungry but sometimes, and it is still very often, I just don't want to stop eating. And I know exactly why: when I am with you, this is my break from school, or a moment with a friend and family and I don't want to get back to reality and to face my "responsibilities" (as a 15 years old teenager, of course). That's why I binge on you. To be honest, I have only felt a few times the real feeling of "I cannot stop eating": I couldn't do anything and I would eat and eat and eat (processed sweet food that I usually don't eat) and then feel so bloated, having heart palpitations and being mentally down. I really don't know how to heal from bingeing on you... The most stupid thing in all of that is that I know why I binge on you and I am aware a lot of things about nutrition but I feel so trapped.. I know you don't want to hurt me but I don't know how to behave with you. With love, hope it will get better between us (I apologize by advance if there are some mistakes: I am french :))  Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to subscribe to the Love Food’s Food Peace Syllabus. Anti-Diet book (aff) Intuitive Eating book (aff) and website Christyna Johnson on Instagram: @EncouragingNutrition Christyna Johnson's podcast: Intuitive Eating for the Culture <--her episode on Gentle Nutrition is OUTSTANDING. Christyna Johnson's website: EncouragingDietitian.com French speaking Intuitive Eating information: https://www.instagram.com/elyanec_/ Find an Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Ever wonder why you have to keep going on another diet to treat your PCOS yet they don't seem to help you feel better long term? Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Use the coupon code 'lovefood' at check out for 30% off. Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to get latest Food Peace Syllabus. Intuitive Eating (aff) by Tribole and Resch 6 Keys To Food Peace Julie on Instagram: Instagram.com/FoodPeaceDietitian Find Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

So you want to make peace with food while dieting and you hear I am against you because of it. I am against not diet culture, not you. Please listen to my letter to you, Dieter. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Use the coupon code 'lovefood' at checkout for 30% off during the month of February 2020. Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to subscribe to the Love Food’s Food Peace Syllabus. Anti-Diet book (aff) Intuitive Eating book (aff) and website Find an Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

What if what you've learned about PCOS and weight loss is not true? What if the pursuit of weight loss is not a good solution to promoting health? What if you don't have be smaller to feel better with PCOS? Let's chat about PCOS and weight. I hope it helps you have more informed consent along your PCOS and Food Peace journey. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Use the coupon code 'lovefood' at check out for 30% off. Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to get latest Food Peace Syllabus. Intuitive Eating (aff) by Tribole and Resch 6 Keys To Food Peace Jeanes, Y. M., Reeves, S., Gibson, E. L., Piggott, C., May, V. A., & Hart, K. H. (2017). Binge eating behaviours and food cravings in women with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome. Appetite, 109(Supplement C), 24–32. Julie on Instagram: Instagram.com/FoodPeaceDietitian Find Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Have you been told your body is wrong? Recovering into a body that looks different from those you see in your profession? This week's letter features a higher weight person with aspirations to be on stage, TV, or film. How do you recover while navigating rejection? Listen up as we chat with therapist Shira Rosenbluth about ways to keep moving forward. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. This episode's Dear Food letter: Dear Food, After being at war with you for as long as I can remember I feel like I'm finally starting to make peace with you. Sometimes my relationship with you is friendly but distant and you're not really on my mind which is honestly something I never thought would happen. After being bulimic for 10 years I must say I'm impressed. When I was 16 years old I had a doctor who diagnosed me with PCOS and who didn't believe me when I said I was bulimic and just told me to stop eating carbs. He blamed you for my problem, food. I now realize that you are not the reason I have PCOS and weight loss to cure this condition is basically an exercise in futility.  I don't find myself binging on carbs anymore as a form of protest. I no longer find myself turning to you to spite that doctor. I have a loving partner after being convinced nobody would love me because of my body size and I've been with this person for 3 years. He has helped me really become comfortable with my sexuality especially when we are told that people in larger bodies do not deserve to have sex or even be sexy in general. This is huge to me.  However, Food, there is one hangup I still have that I feel like you're stopping me from being able to truly make peace with you. I have wanted to be a model and an actress since I was a little girl. Most of the people who know me will tell you that I talked of little else and that I enjoy being in the limelight and I enjoy being the center of attention. Although the entertainment industry has gotten a lot better in the last 10 years especially as the body positive movement has gotten more mainstream, it is still very difficult being a larger woman in this industry. I have had terrible interactions with photographers while I've been trying to build up my portfolio and I was rejected from a fashion show I really wanted to do because my waist size was too big. I ended up making XXX for the first time in years after I got rejected from this show. I am no fool, Food. If you don't fit the clothes or the costumes, you don't work. How can I still make peace with you and make peace with my body and still hold on to my dream of being a star? Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to subscribe to the Love Food’s Food Peace Syllabus. Shira Rosenbluth's therapy website Shira's Body Positive Fashion blog Shira's Instagram handle: @TheShiraRose Broadway Body Positivity Project on Instagram: @BroadwayBoPo Intuitive Eating book (aff) and website Find an Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

If your New Year resolution did NOT include diets you may be feeling a bit down. Many people tell me that a few weeks after moving away from diets they fear the worst: letting themselves go. I am here to tell you something different. Listen to this latest After the Letters Project episode in your Love Food feed now. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to get latest Food Peace Syllabus. Intuitive Eating (aff) by Tribole and Resch 6 Keys To Food Peace Julie on Instagram: Instagram.com/FoodPeaceDietitian Find Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

How do you navigate a fat phobic world without support? This episode's letter writer just started college and recovering from an eating disorder. And it is hard! College campus can be a hub for overexercise, bad body talk, and diets. Listen as I chat with Ayana Habtemariam from Truly Real Nutrition about ways to navigate this part of your Food Peace journey. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. This episode's Dear Food letter: Dear Food, I have battled with you for almost three years now. This weekend actually marks one year of choosing recovery. Choosing to fight Anorexia Nervosa was the best decision I have made, but I did not realize it was going to be so hard and long. I was a senior in high school when I began recovery, but I knew no matter what I HAD to go to college. My parents talked about me taking a gap year in between high school and college to focus on my relationship with you, but that is not the usual in my small town. Thankfully, I am in college now at a university just down the road from my house. I thought my battle with you would be completely over once I left home, but honestly it has just gotten worse. Living on my own means making my own meals and keeping myself accountable. Diet culture is so loud here; I feel like I find you to be a part of every single conversation. It makes me feel hopeless in such a challenging and lonely environment. The school gym is just steps from my dorm—I usually find myself there after a bad meal with you or a hard exam. Why do you attack specifically college students? College is already difficult and adding fear of food and fatphobia makes it even harder. I know it is not just me too that has this struggle, but no one speaks out about it. I am at a loss of how to keep motivation and pushing forward in such a challenging community.   Sincerely, Confused College Freshman Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to subscribe to the Love Food’s Food Peace Syllabus. Ayana Habtemariam website TrulyRealNutrition.com Ayana's Instagram handle: @TheTrillRD Black HAES aligned collective from Ayana and Veronica Garnett: ReclaimingOutPlate.org Intuitive Eating book (aff) and website Find an Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

New to Intuitive Eating? Welcome. Together we can help you move away from diets, diet culture, body hate, and the myth of the thin ideal. Intuitive eating is exciting AND scary. Avoid these pitfalls while cultivating other concepts described in this latest Love Food podcast episode. Subscribe and leave a review here in just seconds. This episode is brought to you by my courses: PCOS and Food Peace and Dietitians PCOS and Food Peace. You CAN make peace with food even with PCOS and I want to show you how. Show Notes: Julie Dillon RD blog Link to get latest Food Peace Syllabus. Intuitive Eating (aff) by Tribole and Resch 6 Keys To Food Peace Julie on Instagram: Instagram.com/FoodPeaceDietitian Find Eating Disorder Dietitians near you. Do you have a complicated relationship with food? I want to help! Send your Dear Food letter to LoveFoodPodcast@gmail.com.  Click here to leave me a review in iTunes and subscribe. This type of kindness helps the show continue!Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy