To think that Deliciously Ella is unbearably smug?

[Jane1789]

Just that really. I used to be a fan. However recent pregnancy updates are incredibly smug and found her podcast awful - constantly interrupting guests. Am I being mean? Not sure why it annoys me so much!

LimeKiwi I agree. Some of posters on here shock and disturb me!

I'm allowed to find the whole concept of IG being used to promote individuals and products annoying and even quite damaging to certain sensitive people - and I'm allowed to say so on Mumsnet. Great isn't it!? .

Apparently they are hereditary and if you get them it’s unavoidable. I have none at all after 3 children and only a cursory bit of Nivea ( first time baby a long time ago I was 7 stone so there was a lot of stretching and last baby I was over 40 with dry old skin!!) I do however have other ‘lovely’ bodily reminders if that’s any consolation!!

Stretch marks are confusing. I have them on my lower back and hips from adolescence. I was convinced I’d be screwed when I got pregnant with twins (I was enormous). I have two, tiny stretch marks above my belly button, because I’ve had seven surgeries through my belly button so it struggled to cope with the increase in size. I have friends who had a tiny beautiful baby bump and have such severe stretch marks and they always ask what I did to prevent them - nothing. And I got new ones on my hips too, just not many. I’m far from smug though - I would happily swap the serious health issues and hormonal issues for some stretch marks at this point!

There’s an entire industry around making women feel bad about their bodies post babies, and the entirely natural fear of childbirth. This woman has profited enormously from women’s fear of being fat, unattractive, unhealthy - by peddling dangerous, binary ideas about food that are absolute hokum. The link upthread sums it up nicely.

I have a few friends who were very into hypnobirthing - one had a lovely birth, exactly as she wanted. The rest had really traumatic birth experiences, and a couple needed c sections and were too ashamed to tell their hypnobirthing friends that they had failed (their words, not mine).

In a breastfeeding group when I was desperately trying to feed and pump for my tiny preemie twins and on the brink of a nervous breakdown, I had people tell me that I wouldn’t have needed an emcs if I had trusted my body more, and because I didn’t have a GA it wasn’t really an emergency and could have been avoided. One of my sons had stopped moving, he had a static heart rate, I wasn’t anywhere near being in labour. If I hadn’t listened to my midwife and gone to get checked out right away and just gone to bed as I planned, he would have been dead.

Maybe it’s because I have endometriosis and adenomyosis and my reproductive system has been nothing but trouble, the idea of trusting it to get things right gives me a bitter laugh.

Please don’t tell me these seemingly lovely ideas aren’t dangerous or used to make money out of women.

She's cute and her food makes me hungry

"Binary ideas about food" what the hell does that mean?!

It means:
Good / bad
Clean / dirty
Healthy / unhealthy
Acid / alkaline (the biggest pile of balls known to pseudoscience)

And by extension:
Those who eat good food are good / clean / healthy
Those who eat bad food are bad / dirty / unhealthy

As someone recovering from an eating disorder, I can see exactly how dangerous this is. And that’s not even getting into the “peanuts contribute to insanity” or the “sugar is a health food if it comes from natural sources” insanity.

Sorry, “peanuts contribute to lung cancer” insanity

I don’t think she’s ever claimed that peanuts cause insanity - that would be insane even for someone who uses the word insane every few sentences

must be a male poster

nah didn't have a penis last time I checked but I do see a lot of bitchiness to successful or happy or beautiful women, from other women. There's just that contingent, we all know the type I mean and I think there's a few of them on this thread, including OP. The key is working on your own self worth!

@MoodieFoodie This place makes me laugh sometimes lol

Why should she be immune to criticism though? She is saying quite dangerous stuff. Do you think her followers think 'Oh she's just talking about her own experiences and it doesn't make me a failure if I can't eat clean enough or breathe through the pain of childbirth enough or do you think there is a chance those people would punish themselves and their bodies because they weren't' committed or dedicated enough or they accidentally ate cancer inducing peanuts 10 years ago? Many people who have body confidence issues and disordered eating probably do need to work on their self esteem and it would be far easier without people peddling dangerous pseudoscience as fact.

Wow! I read this and felt terribly sad. I have used Mumsnet throughout my journey into motherhood. I have found all you lovely ladies so informative, helpful and more importantly part of a community of other mother's going through a similar journey, knowing I'm not alone or crazy 😄. But to see this attacking thread about another woman finding her way through motherhood and we'll quite frankly attacking her personally and professionally is just so disappointing. I thought this platform was to help one another not tear each other down. With everything going on in the press at the moment we should be building each other, standing together. Social Media is a small gap in the door of someone's life and certainly not true to real life. I believe Ella herself has expressed this. Please stop being mean about people. If you don't like what you see simply stop following her and get on with your day.

She deserves to be attacked professionally - she peddles dangerous lies as facts to people who are often already vulnerable and suffering. Pseudoscience needs to be questioned.

That doesn’t mean she deserves to be attacked personally, but at the same time she is her brand, so if her brand is peddling dangerous bullshit and profiting from it, that reflects on her personally. I would never say the things she says in order to make money.

Are you honestly saying that a women who endangers other women should be immune from criticism because she is a woman? The fact she’s becoming a mother is irrelevant.

I don’t follow her, never have, I avoid Instagram like I avoid kids with chicken pox. Unfortunately I still get to hear about the nonsense she peddles.

She deserves to be attacked professionally - she peddles dangerous lies as facts to people who are often already vulnerable and suffering. Pseudoscience needs to be questioned

Quite.

You don’t get a free pass to spout harmful bullshit at vulnerable people just because you’ve gone and got pregnant. Her atrocious ‘clean eating’ dogma predates her pg.

I’m not about to give anyone who is a dick a free pass just because they have the same reproductive organs as me.

I've met her a few times over the years and Matt. Always been lovely and very much express how much support their families have given them.

I don't deny for one minute that she's from a privileged background, but money doesn't make losing your Mum any easier or having it exposed that your Dad is gay in the national press.

Should people from a wealthy/privileged background not start businesses or work? Aren't they then seen as lazy?

No one's saying she can't work because she is priveleged, but quackery needs to be challenged. She is very influential. She should not be allowed to just blindly get away with saying what she likes just because she says it in a way that makes her sound like a sweet little innocent rather than a very successful businesswoman with a huge team of marketing and pr people behind her. If I said Innocent Smoothies has more sugar in them than Coke, would people jump to defend poor little whoever makes Innocent Smoothies because it might hurt their feeling for this to be pointed out?

You could challenge her on it though, she took her nut ball things off an airline because people complained.

There's lots of 'healthy' food bloggers who spout pseudoscience, most of whom are wealthy. It doesn't excuse it but if you are going to criticise Ella then one should also criticise Natasha Corrett, Helmsley sisters, Madeline Shaw etc.

Personally, I just like her recipes and get my nutritional advice from my Doctor or dietician.

But then- I know it was a different time but look at the total spite that was spouted at Gillian mckeith back in the day. Don’t recall anyone defending her

It's actually very irresponsible of her to send someone detailed information about food allergies. She isn't qualified to do that.

I don’t have much of a view on her other than my post below but I don’t think people have to just unfollow and ‘get on with their day’ nothing wrong with talking about brands even if they are based around a person.

I thought she did well to highlight ‘clean eating’ why do people dislike it? Is it the amount of sugar?

Must be better than hugely processed diets I reckon

The problem with clean eating is that it encourages people to think about food as 'clean' and 'dirty' depending on what she (and the other wellness food guru's say with little evidence. It encourages food anxiety. Normally the 'clean' foods are expensive and leads to them selling products based on them. It normally does involve talking a lot of nonsense about sugar. Sugar is sugar, whether it comes from dried fruit, molasses, honey, maple syrup or whatever.

*I thought she did well to highlight ‘clean eating’ why do people dislike it? Is it the amount of sugar?

Must be better than hugely processed diets I reckon*

I rest my case.

What do you think the processed products she sells in Waitrose etc are?

I have only seen this lady's cookbooks and her food looks nice (if it is a side dish to something more substantial) and the deserts look nice, but I'm under no illusions that they are not as fattening as other deserts.

She does come across as little miss perfect, and I'm still carrying a lot of pregnancy weight, so I just avoid her stuff as I could really do without feeling inferior to someone else.

This post made me chuckle though:

I’ve avoided her like the plague ever since she announced it took her a whole ‘week’ to conceive. People like that are ridiculous! It’s not enough to say they fell pregnant first month of trying it has to be reduced down to weeks as she’s so great at pregnancy. Must be the Goji berries and Matcha tea.....we must tell those IVF guys......

So is she in the "natural" birth brigade too? I agree it's dangerous when these bloggers pick up a theory like hypnobirthing (which I must say, really helped me through both one birth that some would perceive as a traumatic assisted birth and another that was a normal waterbirth - both bloody hurt like hell!) and then get very militant about its approach and turn it in to a cult. Is this her first baby? I might understand then as she's naïve, but if it her second baby she should bloody know better. If you manage to get through a traumatic birth and baby is well, then I think you've succeeded far more than someone who supposedly "breathes" the baby out. No amount of lentils, yoga and breathing will get a baby out pain free without your fanny being in tatters for a while. It also won't stop something tragic happening if you avoid intervention when you need it. You can balance natural and medicalised birthing and still have a good birth like I did. It's pretty irresponsible and cruel to pedal this stuff and not inform people if the risks and make people feel like they've failed because they want pain relief after being in labour for days.

And yes, all wellness clean eating gurus or however they style themselves should be criticised, not just her, but the thread is about her, and she started the explosion of all the hemsleys etc. and yes, Gillian McKeith talked a lot of rubbish too, but she doesnt deserve defending, presumably because shes not a beautiful shiny person.

Sinkhole I don’t think about them at all

I only know of her superficially but people don’t have to buy them if they’re as shite as you say

Read the back of the pack if you care about unprocessed food

Buy single food items it’s not hard