Can you guess what it is? Coffee, dairy, gluten, sugar?

I tricked you! The answer is none of the above! I will not be eliminating any of these foods from my diet as there is no medical or physical reason for me to do so. However, I know the media messaging telling me to detox and cut out specific foods will be everywhere! The only detox I will be signing up for this season is a detox from dieting and diet culture. I am honestly so fed up with the $72 billion dollar diet industry. Yes, you heard me right $72 billion dollar industry!

This time of year, the diet industry really starts to rear its ugly head. With the new year on the horizon, we can expect the sneaky and very smart marketing of cleanses, diets, detoxes and magic pills to be all around us. I encourage you (more this year than any other), to say NO to this industry. This year has been difficult enough and the last thing we need is to add food and body image issues to our list of concerns. Diet culture tells us that we are not good enough and that is just not true! Diet culture wants us to believe that we will have a better life if we are smaller. This is also not true. Diet culture equates health with thinness. Also not true!

If diets, cleanses and 30 day resets worked, wouldn’t we all be feeling great now?

As much as this messaging will be all everywhere and sold as a “lifestyle change”, I want you to be careful and remember that no matter what it is called, it is all the same BS. Let this be the year you say NO to it. Be mindful of the programs that are telling you they are a “lifestyle change,” yet they are asking you to restrict foods (without knowing anything about you as an individual) and track everything you put into your mouth. This is definitely not a lifestyle I would be able to sustain. How about you?

Diets are all about rules and restriction. People like rules and feel better if they can follow a list and check things off as they go. The problem is that a few weeks into a diet, the rules becomes overwhelming and when you break one, you feel like a failure. You did not fail. The diet failed you. If you remember anything from this post, please remember that you are not the problem here. At some point, we break down and “cheat” which often ends in bingeing on the foods we restricted. Now, we feel like a failure for bingeing which leads to guilt and shame. However, the reason you binged is likely due to restriction not a lack of willpower or failure. If your body is restricting (through dieting, or other types of disordered eating), a normal response is to eat everything in site once the food once is available. Your body does this because it doesn’t know when it will be able to get basic nourishment from food again.

I know weight gain is scary for many people. I get it as I was there for a long time. I was so concerned about gaining weight and bought into the messaging that I would be happier if I was smaller. The more I restricted and exercised, the more people commented on how good I looked. The problem was that this only fed my disordered behaviours even more.

Before starting a new diet next year, I want you to ask yourself these questions:

1. Did the last diet I was on work? (Likely no if you are thinking of starting another one)

2. How was my mental health when I was on this diet?

3. Is this diet sustainable?

Please dig deep and think about whether or not it is time to try something new. Is it time to work on healing your relationship to food and your body? Is it time to ditch diets (no matter how scary)? I know the idea of healing your relationship with food and your body seems impossible, but please believe me when I tell you it is truly worth it. Imagine all the time and joy you will get back when you are not counting calories, tracking meals or movement, skipping social events and the list goes on.

Isn’t is time to go inward? Isn’t it time to do the work and ignore the external messages that diet culture is screaming in your face.

I am here to help you. Not only during the holiday season but all year long. The more we make peace with food, the more we can be present with loved ones, enjoy our food and continue to remove the guilt and shame around food.

If you are ready to make peace with food and your body sign-up for your FREE 20 min discovery call today to learn how to ditch diets for good, get back to enjoying your favourite foods, and reclaiming your health with sustainable behaviours!

If you want the support of other women who are ready live on THEIR terms, please check out my 6 week group program. This will be a group of like minded women who are fed up with dieting and restriction. Together, we will support one another to start living life on our terms and no one else’s.

Are you in?