Intuitive Eating Isn’t for Everyone: What’s Being Overlooked
Welcome back to the blog! My name is Sydney Carroll and I am a registered dietitian here at Sunrise Nutrition. Today’s topic is Intuitive Eating (abbreviated IE from here on out). Often held up as the gold standard in the realm of healing one’s relationship with food, there is a lot of buzz about IE. Eating intuitively certainly does offer benefits, and many people find it healing. However, dialogues on IE often gloss over or completely leave out important contextual nuances that might impact a person’s desire or ability to engage with IE. Today we will examine the benefits IE brings to the table, as well as who and what is often overlooked in the IE space.
Benefits of Intuitive Eating
Intuitive Eating is an eating framework created by two dietitians. Its 10 principles are designed as a way for people to counter diet culture, reconnect to their body, and build a more peaceful relationship with food. For many, it offers a refreshing and healing alcove in our fatphobic and diet riddled world. In addition to the emotional healing that may occur, IE has been widely studied and shown to have the following physiological and psychological benefits 1,2,3;
Improved total, LDL and HDL cholesterol levels
Positive effects on blood pressure
Improved body image and higher self esteem
Decrease in eating disorder behaviors
Decrease in depression
Resilience towards diet messaging
Reduction of stress levels
Increase in headspace to think about things other than food and body
Increased life satisfaction
Given these benefits, it is not hard to see why people are excited to experience and share about IE. It certainly has its place as a tool to support healing with food and body. However, as with any tool, it is appropriate and helpful in some scenarios, but not all.
What’s Being Left Out of the Conversation
Colonialism & Capitalism
To build context, we must first look to history. Eating three meals a day is often seen as “normal” or “natural”, but it has not always been this way. Throughout history, different cultures have approached eating in many ways. The concept of eating breakfast, lunch and dinner was actually an eating structure imposed upon indigenous people by European colonizers. In a 2015 interview, author of the book Three Squares: The Invention of the American Meal Abigail Carroll shares, “The eating schedule of the native tribes was less rigid… the Europeans took this as ‘evidence that natives were uncivilized.” 4 She expands on the colonizers’ perspective that, “Civilized people ate properly and boundaried their eating, thus differentiating themselves from the animal kingdom, where grazing is the norm.” Though viewed as uncivilized by colonizers, the eating patterns of indigenous peoples were incredibly intuitive, and deeply connected to the needs of the body, cultural traditions, and cycles of nature. Instead of the body being an unruly creature to tame with rigid external structure, the body guided the way.
The three meal a day structure was further propelled by the advent of capitalism. In an article written for BBC, Denise Winterman elucidates this connection. She shares, “The Industrial Revolution in the mid-19th Century regularised working hours, with labourers needing an early meal to sustain them at work. Many were working long hours in factories and to sustain them a noon-time meal was essential.”5 In this regard, eating timing was oriented not to the needs of the body, but instead the demands of the workplace.
In the present day, we can see how the culture of orienting our body’s needs to external structures is alive and well. It starts when we enter school as kids. A child's ability to meet their body’s needs is defined by the structure of the school day, not by the true needs of the body. There are set times for snacks, lunch, rest, play, and bathroom breaks. Diverging from said schedule can result in punishment or being seen as unruly, and being able to work without breaks for the body’s needs may be rewarded. This rigid structure is carried on when we enter the workforce as teens or adults. Our ability to meet our basic needs of eating, hydrating, sleeping, and using the bathroom are all affected by the demand of capitalist structures.
The addition of diet culture adds in yet another external input about what we should be eating and when. We have culturally entered a space where being disconnected from the body and its internal cues is normalized and sometimes glorified. For the most part, we are not taught how to hear our bodies or live from them. Within this context of culturally mandated separation from the body, it is no wonder that IE is so refreshing. It questions the way we orient ourselves to the external (work schedules, diets), and offers tools to reorient ourselves around our internal experience (hunger and fullness, pleasure, emotional experiences with food and body).
Amplification of embodiment through IE is a wonderful thing, however indigenous people have been eating intuitively long before IE was trademarked in 1995. To many, the intellectual ownership and marketing of IE as a new concept does not sit well. Indigenous peoples endured the harm of having traditions stripped away, and are now having this information sold back in a trademarked framework.
Dietitian Carolina Guzar describes her feelings on this topic in a 2020 interview. She states in reference to her Mexican ancestors, “I don't want to romanticize, but a lot of our ancestors ate intuitively. A lot of our parents ate intuitively. And when you come to this country and you start to get all these messages about what food is right, what food is wrong, you start to get confused. And so .. a lot of the work that I am doing is to connect people back to their roots, connect people back to their bodies, and to show them that the intuitive eater was always there, it just got a little lost in the mix.” Guzar expands, describing her passion for, “...connecting people back to their roots, connecting them back to foods that nourishes them emotionally, physically. Food is this way to reclaim autonomy, space, and connection.. No one can ever take that away from you….No one can take away your sense of self, your connection to a culture, [or] your pride in that culture.”6
For all people whose ancestors were colonized and experienced a violent disruption in cultural food and eating traditions, IE may seem like a disingenuous repackaging of embodiment knowledge known culturally and ancestrally for centuries. If you relate to this experience or wish to seek healing by decolonizing food and eating, healing with IE (the trademarked framework version) may not feel right.
Food Insecurity
Baked into experimenting with IE principles is an unspoken requirement that one is financially able to do so. When asked about the financial accessibility of IE in a 2021 interview, Elyse Reich, the co-author of IE shares that in her opinion, the biggest privilege, “lies in one’s ability to prioritize pleasure and satisfaction in food.”7 In this statement is the acknowledgement that engaging with IE is a privilege. The research backs this up. A 2023 study by Cambridge University found that, “food insecurity was associated with lower IE during adolescence and emerging adulthood. They also found that, “Those who remained food-insecure or became food insecure had lower IE in emerging adulthood than those remaining food-secure.”8
Dietitian Jessica Jones lays out the facts in a 2021 article with Self Magazine. She shares that, “food-insecure households don’t have enough food to meet the needs of all their members on a continual basis due to a lack of money and resources. In 2019, 10.5% (13.7 million) of U.S. households were food insecure at some time during the year, affecting a total of 35.2 million people who were living in those homes.”9 Black and Latine households are disproportionately affected by food insecurity, with a rates of 19.1% and 15.6% reporting food insecurity respectively.These stats show that there is a large proportion of our population that is not able to access enough food to have basic needs met, let alone do IE.
Some examples of how food insecurity makes IE inaccessible include;
IE requires that you have consistent access to culturally relevant food, and as described above, this is not possible when experiencing food insecurity.
IE requires the ability to experiment with flavors and new foods as you begin to orient around physical sensation and pleasure. When experiencing food insecurity, food may take on more of a survival role with little room for experimentation or emphasis on pleasure.
Poverty and food insecurity are traumatic and interfere with our ability to be embodied, or connected to signals like hunger and fullness. The body may be a source of discomfort and pain, which interferes with the possibility of body trust.
It is not realistic that hunger and fullness can be honored when experiencing food insecurity. If you have no food or not enough food in a given moment, honoring hunger is not an option. It will likely be challenging to stop eating when full, as this is the body’s response to undernutrition over the short and long term.
If someone is working multiple jobs, or has many responsibilities for survival, there may be no time or resources to access learning about IE.
Poverty and food insecurity may make seeking professional support for IE inaccessible.
The Food Experience of Immigrants
According to research published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, nearly 4 in 10 immigrants experienced food insecurity from 2014-2019.10 This level of food insecurity is 4 times that of the national rate. Research identifies that, “Experiences that may exacerbate the risk of food insecurity among immigrants include financial insufficiency, low education levels, unstable employment, acculturation, culturally restricted food preferences, and limited access to available resources and federal assistance services.”
Ideally, everyone would be food secure and have access to food that is appealing and culturally relevant. This is important because, “having a close attachment to one's community...plays a protective role in preventing food inequality and adverse mental health among immigrants.” However, immigrants living in an area of food apartheid or a region lacking diversity may not be able to find cultural food and ingredients. The idea that an immigrant in this situation could access IE is not realistic, and highlights the unspoken privileges involved in pursuing IE.
Marginalization & Bodily Safety
Search up IE up on Instagram, and you will find a space that is largely occupied by white, straight sized, cis women. In recent years, this has changed to include more diversity, however it is so prevalent, that in the dietitian world, it has become something of a joke to discuss such accounts: the ones that show said women eating a donut, or sitting slouched to accentuate or create stomach rolls. The idea being “If I can eat this, and have permission to love myself looking like this, so can you!” But what is not mentioned is how much easier it is to embrace one's body when said body is already accepted by greater society.
It is no mistake that white women take up the most prominent and visible position in the promotion of IE. White women are positioned in a state of both oppression (gendered oppression by the patriarchy), and privilege (the racial privilege of whiteness) that uniquely allows for recognition of the need for body connection, and the relative safety to act on this. Women at large have been harmed by diet culture and the idea of reclaiming the body and food is radical. But what is not mentioned enough is the positional safety provided by whiteness to push against dieting and body standards. Not to mention potentially taking on new layers of oppression with the possibility of weight gain that may come with forgoing dieting and engaging with IE.
A 2021 study, found that, “The counter-cultural nature of IE was identified as the most challenging barrier to learning to eat more intuitively…Participants perceived significant judgment and lack of understanding from others.”11 If you not a straight sized white woman, the idea of taking on more judgment may not be something you want to do. In fact, the idea of ideologically and physically becoming farther away from societally celebrated food and body standards may not be safe. For example, a nonbinary person might not feel freedom to do IE. Potentially gaining weight when already experiencing body stigmatization, misgendering, and/or threats to safety is not to be overlooked. While the harms of dieting and disordered eating are undeniable, they may be a survival strategy in an unsafe world. Being open to adding on more layers of body based oppression in an unsafe world is a privilege.
Dietitian Anya Habtemamariam describes the nuance of engaging with IE when you exist in a marginalized body. She shares, “We’re [the black community] constantly told.. that we have higher rates of chronic illness like type 2 diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol, and cardiovascular disease. I think that makes it more difficult for people to follow the principles. For example, like unconditional permission to eat. I think a lot of people would be like ‘no I can’t do that…that doesn’t work for us, we have too many health problems.”12
Habtamamariam goes on to state, “The other thing is respecting your body….With a lot of black women especially, our bodies are everything. Our bodies determine how people treat us, and how people see us, and how people judge us. And so telling someone that is so used to being judged by the way they look…to respect their body and just worry about their well being and how it feels… People have laughed at me for that.” The way that people survive our unsafe and oppressive world may include dieting, disordered eating and eating disorders. Nobody is in the position to say that anyone can do IE, particularly not white women.
Interoception & Ableism
IE requires interoceptive awareness, or the ability to sense your internal body experience. In fact, two of the principles of IE relate to being able to feel the physical sensations of hunger and fullness. The reality is that not everyone is able to feel hunger and fullness, or able to stay consistently connected to body experiences. Additionally, there are cases in which accessing pleasure with the taste or texture of food is not possible. To assume that everyone can access interoception is ableist in its erasure of the wide array of body experiences.
Hearing hunger and fullness, experiencing food pleasure, and responding to your body’s needs could be inaccessible if you experience;
Conditions that alter interoceptive awareness such as gastroparesis (which includes they symptom of early sense of fullness), covid related loss of taste (may dampen appetite and deter from experiencing food pleasure), morning sickness in pregnancy (nausea makes hearing hunger or fullness difficult)
You are taking medications that suppress or alter your appetite
You get nourishment through a feeding tube
You had bariatric surgery
You have an ostomy bag
You are neurodivergent and experience sensory processing differences
You experience chronic pain or illness and staying connected to your body may not be desired or comfortable
You have an eating disorder which can cause early satiety, GI distress, and diminished body trust
You have experienced body trauma and/or dissociation. It is hard to access safety enough to feel the body when experiencing unhealed trauma, or still existing in an unsafe situation.
You experience (or have experienced) poverty, food insecurity and marginalization. As described above, there are many ways in which these traumas might disconnect someone from their body
You experience constant stress and/ or anxiety. Both of these states may alter hunger and GI experience.
The Pedestal Effect
Lastly, I want to address IE as just one more food imperative. There are already so many messages that tell us that we aren’t doing food right. While the core of IE is about breaking away from such messages, it also presents the possibility of one more way to fail. This can be especially present if the diet mentality or an eating disorder is still strongly present. As a dietitian, I have worked with people who feel shame for “not being a good enough intuitive eater”. Holding IE up on a pedestal as the food destination to get to opens the door to shame. Additionally the notion that it needs to be executed with perfection adds unnecessary pressure and overwhelm. For one or many of the reasons described above, you may not desire to or be able to engage with IE. And this is perfectly ok. There is nothing superior about being an intuitive eater, and to say as much is harmful.
In summary, some reasons you may not want or be able to engage with IE include;
Wanting to decolonize healing and heal within your culture, rather than a framework created by dietitians.
You are experiencing food insecurity.
You are an immigrant and do not have consistent food access, or access to your culture’s food.
You already experience body based marginalization and it does not feel safe to open doors to further judgment and marginalization.
Your body experience does not include being able to rely on interoceptive awareness.
You would feel pressure to do IE “just right”, and experience additional shame if it felt like you weren’t able to.
I encourage you to reflect on how these factors impact you, if at all. This clarification of your food and body values and experiences may be helpful as you consider whether IE is (or is not) a good fit for you.
With care and solidarity,
Sydney
Next time on the blog: We will explore what really matters as you approach food and body healing.
Sydney Carroll, RDN, CD is a dietitian based out of Seattle, WA. She specializes in the treatment of eating disorders, disordered eating and chronic dieting and relationship with food concerns.
References
Hazzard, Vivienne M., et al. Intuitive Eating Longitudinally Predicts Better Psychological Health and Lower Use of Disordered Eating Behaviors: Findings from Eat 2010–2018, vol. 26, no. 1, 2020, pp. 287–294, https://doi.org/10.1007/s40519-020-00852-4.
Van Dyke, Nina, and Eric J Drinkwater. “Review Article Relationships between Intuitive Eating and Health Indicators: Literature Review.” Public Health Nutrition, vol. 17, no. 8, 2013, pp. 1757–1766, https://doi.org/10.1017/s1368980013002139.
Erhardt, Gabrielle A. “Intuitive Eating as a Counter-Cultural Process towards Self-Actualisation: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of Experiences of Learning to Eat Intuitively.” Health Psychology Open, vol. 8, no. 1, 2021, p. 205510292110009, https://doi.org/10.1177/20551029211000957.
Butler, Kiera. “Why You Should Stop Eating Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner.” Mother Jones, 4 Mar. 2015, www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/03/against-meals-breakfast-lunch-dinner/.
Winterman, Denise. “Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner: Have We Always Eaten Them?” BBC News, 15 Nov. 2012, www.bbc.com/news/magazine-20243692.
Harrison, Christy. “Food Psych #229: Emotional Eating, the Effects of Starvation, and Bringing Intuitive Eating to Latinx Communities with Carolina Guízar.” Christy Harrison - Intuitive Eating Dietitian, Anti-Diet Author, & Certified Eating Disorders Specialist, 9 Mar. 2020, christyharrison.com/foodpsych/7/emotional-eating-the-effects-of-starvation-and-bringing-intuitive-eating-to-latinx-communities-with-carolina-guzar.
Harrison, Christy. “Food Psych #267: The Nuances of Hunger and Fullness, the Importance of Satisfaction, and Intuitive Eating in Eating-Disorder Recovery with Elyse Resch.” Christy Harrison - Intuitive Eating Dietitian, Anti-Diet Author, & Certified Eating Disorders Specialist, 25 Jan. 2021, christyharrison.com/foodpsych/8/the-nuances-of-hunger-and-fullness-the-importance-of-satisfaction-and-intuitive-eating-in-eating-disorder-recovery-with-elyse-resch.
Burnette, C Blair, et al. “Is Intuitive Eating a Privileged Approach? Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Associations between Food Insecurity and Intuitive Eating.” Public Health Nutrition, 2023, pp. 1–10, https://doi.org/10.1017/s1368980023000460.
Jessica Jones, M.S. “We Can’t Talk about Healthy Eating without Discussing Who Has Access to ‘healthy’ Foods.” SELF, 18 Mar. 2021, www.self.com/story/healthy-eating-and-food-access.
Dou, Nan, et al. “Food Insecurity and Mental Well-Being in Immigrants: A Global Analysis.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine, vol. 63, no. 2, 2022, pp. 301–311, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2022.02.006.
Erhardt, Gabrielle A. “Intuitive Eating as a Counter-Cultural Process towards Self-Actualisation: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of Experiences of Learning to Eat Intuitively.” Health Psychology Open, vol. 8, no. 1, 2021, p. 205510292110009, https://doi.org/10.1177/20551029211000957.
Harrison, Christy. “Food Psych #227: The Food Environment, Intuitive Eating in Communities of Color, and Diet Culture’s Oppressive Roots with Ayana Habtemariam.” Christy Harrison - Intuitive Eating Dietitian, Anti-Diet Author, & Certified Eating Disorders Specialist, 24 Feb. 2020, christyharrison.com/foodpsych/7/the-food-environment-intuitive-eating-in-communities-of-color-and-diet-cultures-oppressive-roots-with-ayana-habtemariam.