To ask if you have a normal relationship with food?

[Miajk]

And if so, what is your weight like, have you ever dieted? How often do you think about food, do you only eat when hungry and stop when full?

By normal I mean: no counting/tracking, no excluding food groups (unless for allergy or other health reasons), etc.

I eat a lot. I've never been on a diet. I eat three meals a day plus snacks. Chocolate every night, biscuits/cake every day, wine a couple of times a week. I never think I shouldn't be eating something, it just all evens out. There was a thread on here the other day about lunch where someone said they only eat a cheese and ham toastie at the weekend as it's too calorific and my mind was blown a bit. If I wanted that for lunch, I'd have it. Despite username, I'm not overweight. I do exercise, less now than when I was younger and I suppose I have put a few, maybe half a dozen pounds on since late 30s/40s. But I can't see my habits changing or me becoming really fat.

I love this. I've been working on my relationship with food and eating mindfully, slowly, and without distractions has been a big part of it.

Struggling with some comfort eating lately though 😭

I think I have a pretty normal relationship with food. Im a pretty healthy eater, not really into sweet stuff, but Im happy to eat cake, sweets and other sweet items but I will only have a small amount. Ive never really eaten a whole pack of biscuits or a family pack of mars bars. I do love cheese and crisps they would be my downfall but I dont buy a lot. My now adult DD is the same , I assume its because we didnt buy a lot of sweet foods.

I have IBS like the earlier poster and can bloat very quickly if I eat the wrong foods. I also love running and boxing so I am careful, if I bloat up I cant exercise as it hurts too much.

Normal now, had an ED as a teen

I have a horrible relationship with food.

My stepmother was abusive towards me and food was often used as a weapon. She used to force me to finish my plate and would often hold my nose until I opened my mouth and she would force feed me then clamp my mouth closed until I finished it.

When my mum finally got custody of me again, I used to steal chocolate bars and eat them in my room. I remember holding my hands over pockets filled with breakaways and kitkats so my parents wouldn't hear the rustling and I would go and practically inhale them.

I rarely try anything new and I barely eat fruit or veg. If anyone tries to encourage me it's like a voice in my head shouts 'NO! They're forcing you to eat something' and I will point blank refuse and my mouth closes.
I couldn't tell you how much I weigh because I daren't check.

Slimming world works for a time and then it all goes back on.
I'm the biggest I've ever been and I'm miserable but just can't seem to get into the mindset to try and change.

I don't think I have food issues. I love cooking and love veg and love exercise. I also love baking and cake. I would say I tend to eat 3 meals and 2 snacks a day. I could easily binge eat every day (particularly cake) because it's really tempting! Every day I resist temptation probably ten times, and cave one time. I resist because I really really like being a healthy weight and I want that more than I want to binge, so I only do it occasionally. (By binge I mean maybe a 100g bar of chocolate in a sitting, or equivalent). I don't feel guilt when I overeat. I just accept it - I made the choice to eat more than I needed so why feel guilty? I know I'm going to do it again in the future, and at the same time I know I'll eat well mostly, so overall it's fine.
I tend to eat a diet where I put on weight very slowly (maybe four to six pounds a year) and then once a year I tone it down on the cake and lose the extra chub.
I have pcos, so do find it more difficult to lose weight/maintain than if I didn't have it. But you just have to eat for the body you have.

I think I’d say similar to the above. I grew up with a mother who was always dieting - lots of comments along the lines of ‘Ooh I can’t eat this, shouldn’t eat that, that’s naughty, this is fattening, don’t buy those because I like them, and I mustn’t eat them, I’m going to go back to Weightwatchers/try the F Plan diet/try slimming world, gosh I’m fat, oh I shouldn’t eat that, I’m a glutton, a glutton, I’m a big fat pig, oh gosh what can I eat, what can I eat, what can I eat?’

That was the soundtrack to my childhood and I often say to my DM that she is very lucky that DSis and I did not end up with severe eating disorders as a result.

However, by some miracle I think both DSis and I have a reasonably sensible attitude to food. We both eat a variety of foods and enjoy the healthy stuff as well as the treats. i could not tell you what my weight was but I’m 5ft 7 and a size 12 at 50, having had three full term babies. I was somewhere between a 10 and 12 at 30 before having DC. I refuse to obsess over, track or limit what I eat and the only time I restricted my food/drink intake was when pregnant (ie to avoid alcohol and any foods you are not supposed to eat when pregnant). I eat what I feel like eating and have never felt guilty about it.

Normal I think.

I eat what I want but stop when I am full. I feel full quite quickly.

I am less hungry if I have been less active.

I have been a size 8 my entire adult life apart from when pregnant. Never put on weight.

I think I'd fit the description you're giving.

My BMI is 24 but I think I look a healthy size. I don't calorie count. I eat lunch and dinner, for breakfast usually have a coffee and eat for the first time around 11 - some days I'm hungry and I eat toast or cereal.

For lunch I normally have a big salad (ha mn classic) with chickpeas, spinach, feta, courgette, tomato etc. Dinner might be salmon and rice, noodles, usually a protein and 2-3 veg and a carb. Might have a little bit of chocolate (3/4 squares) and a satsuma for after, or a few jelly sweets. I don't tend to snack but I do get calories from lattes I drink.

I have a fairly normal relationship with food and this was brought home to me because for a fairly brief period, following the breakdown of my marriage, I flirted with having an eating disorder.

I didn't deliberately starve myself but I ate almost nothing during the "acute" period of my marriage collapsing and when things began to stabilise but I was still very depressed and low I got a weird kick out of the weight loss I had inadvertently undergone and the strange feeling of control it gave me. For about two years I ate less thn £1,000 calories a day, not in a deliberate way but in a kind of "this is working, let's go with it" way.

Since then my life has stabilised, I'm in a happy relationship and feel pretty good about life and my eating has returned to normal (ie eat what I like, no calorie counting, basically not really thinking about food intake, aside from how it tastes and its nutritional value) I now look back on that period with a sense of bemusement. It was an aberration and very odd because it gave me a window on what it was like to have an eating disorder, something I'd never previously experienced before.

I've been lucky enough never to have issues with food, never to count calories or worry about food intake and never really understood why people would impose these sorts of privations on themselves. And hopefully I never will again. Going through it myself was an eye-opener. It was a pretty grim period of my life but the only positive which it did bring to me was a sense of control. I had no control over my moods, the behaviour of my ex husband or my boss, but I could control my weight and the one thing I had going for me was that I was really really thin and (and this makes me really uncomfortable in retrospec) some of my friends envied me.

it made me realise that being thin and being aware of your weight, something I'd never bothered with before, goes with hideous self-esteem issues and lack of confidence and I never want to be in that place again. Give me slightly overweight over calorie and portion counting any day.

I don't think about food much, but love it when I'm eating, I dont like feeling really full, have always been quite slim

@poormanspombears jesus I'm so sorry how horrendous you poor thing 💐

I think I do. I’ve genuinely never dieted or restricted and have always been a healthy weight (at 42 am now slowly putting on weight but that would be cured by doing a moderate amount of exercise rather than none). I just eat what I want, when I want. I’m an awful snacker, objectively, and should probably eat more veg but I don’t think about it too much.

Yes, I think I have a normal relationship with food.

I've never been on a diet or counted calories or tracked what I eat. I've never skipped meals or cut things out of my diet.

what is your weight like
I was skinny as a child, slim as a young adult, and indeed up to the menopause really, including after having all my dc.

have you ever dieted?
No

How often do you think about food

Only when I'm deciding what to have

do you only eat when hungry and stop when full?

No, I eat at meal times.
Yes, I stop if I am full.

Like @Swissnotswiss I grew up always eating meals together as a family, round the table. There was rarely any times when we ate between meals.
Since moving out, I've continued to eat at fairly regular mealtimes and eat at the table. Since having my own family, we have always eaten meals together at the table - no TV etc. Meals are times to connect as a family.

Since Covid I have got into bad habits of eating chocolate in front of the TV.

I think I have a normal relationship with food. It isn't problematic. I eat when I'm hungry (if there's something available that I want, otherwise I won't eat. I'd rather be hungry than eat something I'm not in the mood for). I have a massive sweet tooth and love after dinner pudding, but I don't eat outside of meal times. Don't usually eat breakfast either because I'm just not hungry that early. I don't think about food that much unless I'm starving or need to meal plan.

I'm a size 8 and have been 9 stone pretty much consistently for the last ten years.

Fine. Healthy. Weight a bit over what I'd like but put it on during an illness and it's coming off slowly. I go to the gym (but not specifically to lose weight). I tried Weightwatchers a long time ago after I had my babies, didn't lose much weight, didn't really enjoy the meetings. Prefer to just be quite healthy in my eating and activity levels. I eat when I am hungry and occasionally because I just fancy something which could be a bar of choc or an apple. I haven't counted a calorie in 2 decades and I don't exclude food groups except the one that I am allergic to. One thing we do which helps is we order a big shop and don't get anything in between, except for buying food to eat out when we are out, although we often take along some food on trips too. So as long as there is a range of foods in the big shop, including healthy snacks (and chocolate etc. but not too much) it forces good eating habits across the weeks. I do buy multipacks of small chocolate bars and crisps so as not to eat a whole slab or share bag at one sitting because it's too nice, though, and for the same reason I don't buy much wine or spirits in at once. 😙

Definitely NOT normal. It's the only area of my life where I'm a total screw-up.

I have an awful relationship with food. I am overweight and have been since my last year of university. I love all the bad foods. I secretly eat bread based snacks when no one is looking. I buy scotch eggs and snaffle them on the way home from the supermarket.

Every few years I have a mad diet, lose a shit ton of weight in a very short period and then spend a year piling it all back on again

It sometimes feels as though I would do anything to be thin… except eat healthily, in a sustained way and exercise sensibly.

I hate myself for it. On my death bed, I will look back on my life and just lament that I spend most of it looking fat, feeling ugly, being unhealthy and not doing enough about it.

At my fattest, I almost couldn’t get a belt around myself on an airplane. After take off, I refused to move at all to avoid doing the seatbelt dance again as I felt so embarrassed. I spent 4 hours, bolt upright, waiting to be able to breathe normally again.

Sometimes I joke about my weight. Oftentimes I ignore it and pretend I’m just like everyone else, even though I feel like a monster on the hill.

People that do not struggle with their weight have no idea what it is like to be fat, miserable, ashamed and STILL HUNGRY.

My children are all normal weights, thank heavens. I do not want to pass this shit show onto them.

I have never said a single word of this out loud to anyone ever. I just pretend I’m fine.

Awful relationship with food.

Always slightly tubby as a child. 5.5" and a size 14 when I was 15. My DM would use food for everything...bad day? Have some cake! Good day? Have some sweets! If I didn't finish a plate of food I would get the look of disappointment and she'd say something like "but I made that especially for you..." (in other words, if you loved me you'd eat it)

I piled weight on after leaving school so joined a slimming group at 19 and lost 4 stone in 6 months. Weighed 9ish stone but wasn't easy to maintain. Kept 3 stone off until I had 2nd DC and then its gradually all piled on again! 5.5" and a size 16 now. Perimenopausal but it's not that, that's causing my weight problems. I just love eating. 3 meals a day, 2 snacks plus mocha drink, wine 3 x per week with 1 takeout a week.

I eat a fair amount of veg/salad daily, plenty of protein but I enjoy too much ultra processed food. I'm not doing myself any favours, I know but I'm in a horrible routine/habit and I can't seem to get out of it even though I hate how I look. I'm miserable with it all. I've done SW and WW countless times 😔

I think I have a normal relationship with food; apart from first year of university (catered food and too much alcohol) and pregnancy I’ve always been a similar weight. Although I also realise that I have some internal rules around food that keep my weight the same level so I allow myself only one treat a day and that will often consist of a snack chocolate bar etc that’s at most 200 calories. On weekends I have pudding sometimes and I include alcohol in thinking about how much I’ve had in a day.
I do think about food a lot because I love food but I naturally prefer healthier meals over fatty or creamy type dishes and I find too much bread makes me sluggish so naturally keep away

I have a terrible relationship with food as in I'm a complete binge eater and I'm on the verge of having to seek help. I've always been like it ever since I was a child, we were quite poor so there was enough food and we never went without dinner but there weren't any treats and then when we did have them I'd want to eat them all in one go. This is the same now, the only things I binge on are chocolate and crisps. I very rarely eat lunch and dinner because I'm full up from snacking.

I'm heavily overweight (5'6" and 15 stone).

I'm obsessed with making sure we have enough food in the house as well. It's not great.

@Boooooot do you mind me asking how you have managed to get help? Was it through a GP referral or something you have done yourself?

I don't. Never have had. I suffered horribly with ED through my teens & early 20s. I have tried pretty much all the diets, & remain dissatisfied with my weight. But, I recently decided I'm no longer going to try to lose weight, or count calories, or restrict at all. I'm just going to try to eat whrn I'm hungry, stop when I'm no longer hungry, & concentrate on trying to improve my health - physical & mental. It's quite freeing. It's been a couple of weeks & then I weighed myself (expecting to have gained quite a lot) - exactly the same. It was quite a surprise. I have joined a gym, but I had a bit of a cold this week, so I didn't go & I didn't stress about it.

Maybe when I'm in a better place mentally, if I feel like I need to, I'll try to lose some weight. I've also realised that after spending most of my life lusting after chocolate & stuffing myself with it (when I'm not restricting) I'm not actually that keen. I think it's an addiction TBH. When I have a bar I can't stop, even though I consciously know I'm not enjoying it. So I am trying to cut that out, & eat things I actually enjoy instead.

I love food and never restrict what I eat because of concern about weight gain. But I’m lucky enough not to have a sweet tooth and also to enjoy meals which are largely vegetable based like dal, spicy vegetable stews and salads. Working at home I love experimenting with simple interesting lunches along these lines. Evening meals are more boring and repetitive as I have to take everyone else’s tastes into account.
Also I don’t eat meat but do eat fish, but that’s not on health grounds.
I’ve never dieted, the only thing I need to be conscious about is not drinking too much - that and lack of exercise meant I did put on a bit of weight in lockdown.
Sorry, that’s not useful at all for anyone who struggles with finding a healthy relationship with food.

By your definition yes because I never count calories or restrict food groups.
In reality I had an eating disorder as a teenager into my early 20s which is why I don't use those methods, I don't like thinking about food, so when I do need to lose weight I fast for up to 21 hours a day.
I know if I count calories it would be a bad spiral for me, I enjoy being very hungry and I know that's not really healthy although being hungry is a good and natural thing but I push it to the limit as a challenge.
I can force myself to eat foods I don't enjoy and occasionally over eat to the point I need to make myself sick.
Certain foods are no go for sensory reasons, nothing on this earth would compel me to eat a spoon of peas beans or sweetcorn for example, I didnt eat potatoes in any form until I was 18.
I spent nearly a year of my life living on cereal, jam on toast and Bakewell tarts, luckily I don't have a sweet tooth now so I don't need to worry too much about my weight, I do an active job on my feet most of the day, lockdown on furlough was very hard for me.
I'm naturally petite, the heaviest I've ever been is 9st4, at the worst of my illness I was 5st.

I don't own scales because I would be on them everyday obsessing.
So no I don't have a healthy relationship with food but I do as much as I can to mitigate a relapse.