Thank you for putting this together and honored to have my words included here! There is so much nuance to Intuitive Eating and it's so important to describe it as the complex and good-for-some-people and good-in-parts method that it is.
This is the kind of critique-with-much-nuance I really could have used as a younger non-diet dietitian! I appreciate you putting this together in the way you did, and yet and yet not making it "this or that". Claps!
All hail nuance! I hadn't thought much about the inherent priveledge in intuitive eating (hello, my own priveledge), so this was a really interesting read.
This brought up an old memory of mine when I was single, raising a young son who went between 2 homes, struggling w/ housing, working multiple part time service jobs and on EBT. I often relied on emergency childcare from a married couple who lived in a house owned by their in laws. It always bothered me the way they didn’t set boundaries around food w/ their children - allowing snacks right before dinner, then children not eating dinner they had spent all this time preparing etc. or my friend who thought leftovers were energetically inferior - while I tried to plan for leftovers to take for lunches/save on labor. I also didn’t have the same time/space to cater to my child like many of my married friends did. I’ve never fixed separate meals for him. He ate what I made or he didn’t eat. All my friends would rave about what a good eater he was when invited over. Though their children, on the rare occasion I could host (due to money/housing/time/mental health restrictions) them, refused foods I offered- once to the point of pitching a fit so had I had to call the parent. Meanwhile my friend gaslit me about my insistence that children w/ certain privileges be raised to act as guests in other peoples homes. To me this means eating the food prepared and shared with you, which is the way I was brought up.
I know I’ve strayed a bit from the intersection of intuitive eating/privilege but this sense of how we eat as guests also feels somehow related. Especially when I factor in class, race, access. I also wonder how adjacent intuitive eating might come to be to orthorexia, especially in the new age/white “wellness” /organic/hyper local food communities I’ve known on the west coast.
Thank you for putting this together and honored to have my words included here! There is so much nuance to Intuitive Eating and it's so important to describe it as the complex and good-for-some-people and good-in-parts method that it is.
Appreciate you bringing this up to me! I'm excited to see where this conversation goes.
This is the kind of critique-with-much-nuance I really could have used as a younger non-diet dietitian! I appreciate you putting this together in the way you did, and yet and yet not making it "this or that". Claps!
We need less "this or that" for sure.
I learn so much from your newsletters and really enjoy your perspectives. They are a highlight to my week!
Thanks so much, Fallon! This kind comment came at a much-needed moment for me.
All hail nuance! I hadn't thought much about the inherent priveledge in intuitive eating (hello, my own priveledge), so this was a really interesting read.
Appreciate you making space for more nuance in this conversation friend!
Thanks for your gentle pushback!
This brought up an old memory of mine when I was single, raising a young son who went between 2 homes, struggling w/ housing, working multiple part time service jobs and on EBT. I often relied on emergency childcare from a married couple who lived in a house owned by their in laws. It always bothered me the way they didn’t set boundaries around food w/ their children - allowing snacks right before dinner, then children not eating dinner they had spent all this time preparing etc. or my friend who thought leftovers were energetically inferior - while I tried to plan for leftovers to take for lunches/save on labor. I also didn’t have the same time/space to cater to my child like many of my married friends did. I’ve never fixed separate meals for him. He ate what I made or he didn’t eat. All my friends would rave about what a good eater he was when invited over. Though their children, on the rare occasion I could host (due to money/housing/time/mental health restrictions) them, refused foods I offered- once to the point of pitching a fit so had I had to call the parent. Meanwhile my friend gaslit me about my insistence that children w/ certain privileges be raised to act as guests in other peoples homes. To me this means eating the food prepared and shared with you, which is the way I was brought up.
I know I’ve strayed a bit from the intersection of intuitive eating/privilege but this sense of how we eat as guests also feels somehow related. Especially when I factor in class, race, access. I also wonder how adjacent intuitive eating might come to be to orthorexia, especially in the new age/white “wellness” /organic/hyper local food communities I’ve known on the west coast.