I kissed goodbye to a diet and finally lost 20 pounds. Here's why.

My turn? I eat only the foods I like - including vegetables!


It was December 31, 2018 and I was officially the heaviest I had ever been, and I was completely disconcerted. I worked every day after the diet after a diet, and I still could not lose weight. I started taking probiotics thinking that it may have been my intestine or my metabolism simply does not work properly. But when I finally sucked my pride and I had the help I needed, I realized what was the real problem: a diet.

I left the governance culture behind

kiersten hickman with a plate of bbq in texas
Kiersten enjoys a plate of barbecue in Texas.Kiersten Hickman / Eat this, not that!

Our world has been completely hypnotized by the culture of food. The cultivation of the diets took senerage of this idea that to lose weight, you must limit yourself to a particular diet. This is where flourish, especially becauseThe weight loss market has reached a record-height of $ 72 billion a year.

Just because it wins money does not mean that it's healthy for people, but we have become in one way or another that we have grown to believe that if we try this regime - whatever Maybe that's, it will finally tell us. We therefore take more money in the industry and we swear our favorite foods, but only to slip on these foods you have missed and start again on Monday.

It was constantly my life. I tried all possible diet regimes: Keto, Paleo, Vegan, Weight Watchers, and whatever the random diet plans that sounded on Pinterest. I even tried the special system k, which yes, you must consume mainly K products. We can only have too many K bowls before going to absolutely crazy.

When I started to follow a diet, I could lose weight quickly, but I still came back with revenge. Soon, I was not even able to lose weight at all. It was a vicious circle and my body carried him fully. I worked every day to try to simply stay where I was inside, and if I had to spend a day, I would be consumed with guilt. Even when I was sick in bed, I forced to get up and train. I felt completely enslaved to everything.

I decided to learn my body

before and after photo without dieting of kiersten hickman
Kiersten Hickman / Eat this, not that!

I was tired of having to try to understand all this alone. The world is full of incredible resources on learning your body, but I knew I had to connect to a dietician about all that. Yet with the small budget I had, I could not afford a personal nutritionist at the time. So I registered for a course held by Rachel Paul, RDN and founder ofThe college nutritionist.

His online program Allows you to learn to watch and feel fantastic in your body. "I followed Rachel on Instagram for a few months at that time and I was intrigued by his online program. When I finally joined and took his classes, I felt a sudden change in my understanding of the food I ate.

Rachel taught me that no food should never be out of bounds. She taught me how I should eat the foods I love and learn how they will adapt to the nutritional plan in a plan that will work for the needs of my body.

"This is not true for anyone, but if something seems out of bounds and" you can not have it ", it becomes this drawing of this drawing to eat it because it's this food" Forbidden "and we want to deliver," said Paul in an interview. "We are doing so much to eat too big part of this food and we feel guilty of that, then eating more of these bad food or out of bounds, which can often lead to binge type behavior."

This concept is from the bookIntuitive, which is part of the Reading Curriculum for Rachel's course. Overall, this book teaches you to eat intuitively. To eat intuitively, you really have to agree with the benchmarks of the satiety of their body and never deny a certain type of food. It helps you to have this final "It's not you, it's me" moment with the culture of governance and break for good.

My point of view on the food has completely changed, so instead of denying me the foods I absolutely loved for so long, I found myself in my car and led to the store.

I went out and bought ice cream

I'm sure I was quite the view in the frozen food section at the target. I was Giddy with pleasure and I had no idea of ​​ice cream to buy. Have a bowl ofice cream The night is one of my favorite childhood memories, so I was beyond the ecstatic to put the ice cream back into my daily routine.

"What I think is the most important thing is that you, or a person, really loves their lives in all aspects," Paul said. "Every meal and each snack should be really nice. So, if you like the taste of chocolate, keep this in the meal plan because you really go enjoy it."

Even if we want to deny it, science behind nutrition is clear. Learning on calories and good nutrition is good because it helps us to know what our body really needs. For me, I feel fully satisfied when I eat about 1,450 calories a day. I know it's very precise, but that's what I learned about myself. So when I hold about 150 calories for a spoon of ice cream every night, it helps me feel fully satisfied and content. I no longer deprives my body of foods that I love, but instead, filling only my meals with things that I really appreciate eating. And in no case I never had the impression of depriving myself, like all the other diet regimes I tried.

Please remember that everyone is the body, even theirTaste buds, are incredibly different. I am exactly 5 feet high, so a calorie budget of 1,450 is quite accurate for my size (and, more importantly, works well for my satiety needs). It's different for everyone, so the last thing I want you to do is prevent you from thinking that it must also be your number. Instead, you have to find theSuitable calorie number For you, one that makes you feel fully satisfied and separates you from the need to deprive you of diet.

RELATED: Easy, healthy,Recipe ideas of 350 calories You can do at home.

I eat only the foods I love

eating ice cream outside in the city during summer
Kiersten Hickman / Eat this, not that!

The ice cream is my favorite food of all time, followed closely by bagels, then of course, they are part of what I eat regularly. However, delicious desserts and carbohydrates are not the only foods I love. MyIntuitive The trip taught me to enumerate all the foods I like - including vegetables!

For me, it was revolutionary. I do not have to love all food "health" there simply because the world tells me they are healthy. So I stopped buying quinoa, lentils andcoconut oil Because I did not like them as I do other foods. I had a long list of foods I like and planned my meals around that. Brussels sprouts, peppers and green beans are almost always on the weekly range. The rice and I finally had a goodbye needed a lot.

"You become a kind of snoby food," said Paul. "Then you really only eat foods you love and do not lose it on foods that do not bring you joy. Your happiness is the most important thing."

I love watching my list and plan meals around him. It's excited to eat foods that I really eat, instead of filling my stomach with food that I only like little (or worse, eating food that people tell me that I should eat, but I hate absolutely). I only take cookies if I really want to have one, because I know I would prefer a lot of ice later. I choose wine on cocktails, flour tortillas on corn and real butter on margarine. Not because I think they are healthier, but simply because I like to eat them.

When Istopped depriving my bodyFrom my favorite foods, I no longer had the desire to reach these "guilty" foods of my life. In fact, these foods no longer had a sinful label. Instead, they are labeled under my own opinion. I am officially back in control, and that's exhilarating.

I listen to the benchmarks of the satiety of my body

taking a bite of tacos in texas not dieting
Kiersten Hickman / Eat this, not that!

I do not punished me to feel hungry, but listen what my hunger really says instead. It was a huge essay and a huge mistake for me, because I started learning to eat intuitively, and it's always something I'm learning so far. During this process, I learned that if I naturally stop eating something, I'm usually full. I should not force me to continue eating simply to "clean my plate" or because it is a waste of food. Or even because it tastes well! Because honestly, if I rushing, I feel incredibly ill to my stomach and it's a feeling that I try to avoid at all costs.

"If you eat slowly, if you take a good minute to eat your food, you will begin to experience hunger and fullness of your body," Paul said. "Ontimes, these marks of fullness means that your stomach feels full, but you do not go to the point where you are stuffed and sleepy. You will probably have a sense of nothingness, many people speak of nothingness - neither hungry nor hungry nor Fatched or weakened or full - and it's a kind of sense that you are on the road that you are complete with your meal. Once again, give yourself a trial and error period. You do not have a To do it perfectly the first one is time to determine what are your benchmarks of hunger and fullness. "

I also learned that I feel my best when I eat four meals a day: breakfast, lunch, afternoon snack and dinner. This previously forecast afternoon helped me prevent any binging as I did when I returned from work, which would usually happen as I cooking dinner. But now that I have some sort of snack in the afternoon - usually a beautiful healthy fat, like peanut butter with banana, I feel satisfied until dinner.

"I think it's a good idea to have some time between meals to allow your body to be hungry again," Paul said. "I think a lot of people are afraid of being hungry, but you do not need to be afraid. It should be a normal part of the day. You can eat again, [because] Nothing is Out of bounds. You can eat the food you love again. Eating should be a nice experience. "

I'm on the daily scale

Like any other normal human whip by the diet culture, I was afraid to go up. All this was due to the fact that I wrapped my identity in what the number says. If I was down, I got well "and I felt proud of myself. If I get up, I was fighting mentally and I would probably want to skip my next meal. In reality, weight fluctuations are incredibly normal.

"[Weight fluctuations] are completely normal," Paul said. "The weight gain could mean that you have eaten later in the day as usual. You have not gone to the bathroom. You have your rules or you have two weeks and you have ovulated. You had Something salty, so maybe you "Book a little extra water. Or it's just your body, is not it? It happens."

When I finally understood that the weight is not always the same, I started climbing up every day to look at the fluctuations. I tell you right away, it changes every day. This changes every hour. Between all the functions of the internal body - digestion of foods, menstruation, even stress, your weight fluctuates normally. When it would no longer lose weight, I could finally understand my fluctuations and what foods have caused an extra flask or not. For example, one night to have beer and fried fries cause swelling, so there is no reason to fight the next morning. I'm just going to sit in the glorosity of enjoying such a delicious meal.

When I started listening to my body's satiety clues, and when I stopped wrapping my identity in the scale numbers, I finally lost the extra weight.

Let me be clear: become an intuitive eatery does not mean weight loss. It happened to me only because I learned to the food and how much I was doing too much, and how much food I really need to feel satisfied and complete.

My health is not my identity

kiersten hickman on the streets of nyc
Kiersten Hickman / Eat this, not that!

I am in no way considered a slim stick. I am a curvylicielle diva and even if I could cut calories and skip immediately in the diet culture to reach the weight "appropriate" for my size, I just do not want. Where I became natural and good, and I do not have the desire to try to adhere to the idea of ​​our culture of "skinny" and "healthy". Instead, I feel tonic, strong and beautiful. I am now participating in training sessions I like instead of constantly working sessions to lose weight, and if I jump for a workout, I do not feel guilty. I train well, not to look good.

Now that I understand what my body needs to feel satisfied, I eat like that regularly. My plates are stuffed with roasted vegetables, cheese and protein, all of my list of "favorites" that make me full and satisfied. I eat a carburetor a day (usually a bagel, if I can), simply because I eaten ever more than it does not make me sick to my stomach. But do you know what? I do not deprive myself when I go out. Because if my husband takes me for a hamburger, you know I get a hamburger with garlic fries and a nice cold beer glass. And I do not feel an ounce of guilty the next day, because I do not come from the number on the scale or what I eat.


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