Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #957 Diet-Free Families

Transcript

#957 Diet-Free Families · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:03
Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast.
0:05
Speaker 2: It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just answers.
0:10
Speaker 1: Now Today, I'm a Happy Famili's podcast, a really important
0:12
Speaker 1: conversation about our kids and what goes into their bodies,
0:16
Speaker 1: or in all too many cases, what doesn't go into
0:20
Speaker 1: their bodies. We're talking about eating disorders on the podcast today. Hello,
0:24
Speaker 1: my name is doctor Justin Colson'm the parenting expert and
0:26
Speaker 1: co host of channel linees hit TV show Paral Guidance
0:29
Speaker 1: and dad to six daughters. Fortunately, haven't had to deal
0:34
Speaker 1: with too much in the way of eating disorders in
0:36
Speaker 1: my family, but the impact of eating disorders on children's lives, well,
0:40
Speaker 1: they cast a long shadow. It's not just a short
0:42
Speaker 1: term thing, it's a long term thing as well. I'm
0:44
Speaker 1: joined today by a special guest. Meg McClintock is an
0:47
Speaker 1: accredited practicing dietitian and a and z AD credentialed eating
0:52
Speaker 1: disorder clinician and a positive body image advocate with twenty
0:56
Speaker 1: years of experience across both public and private health care sectors.
1:00
Speaker 1: She's founder and principal dietitian at Choose Nutrition and has
1:04
Speaker 1: a special interest in disordered eating and eating disorders. Chronic dieting,
1:08
Speaker 1: weight and body image concerns. Meg is also the co
1:12
Speaker 1: host of the podcast Life's Too Short to Count Almonds
1:16
Speaker 1: and online course The Non Diet Way. I like the
1:19
Speaker 1: sound of that. It makes me feel like I can
1:21
Speaker 1: eat connoisseur ice cream if I really want to. And
1:24
Speaker 1: she does that those podcasts and that online course with
1:26
Speaker 1: fellow non diet dietitian Susan Williams. Meg is passionate about
1:29
Speaker 1: eating disorder prevention and doing no harm when providing nutritional
1:32
Speaker 1: guidance and when addressing eating and weight concerns across the lifespan.
1:35
Speaker 1: She works with individual skills and community groups to push
1:38
Speaker 1: back against half for body ideals and build body positive
1:40
Speaker 1: spaces where people have all shapes and sizes are empowered
1:43
Speaker 1: to look after their bodies and thrive. It's a big introduction,
1:46
Speaker 1: but it's a big topic and I think it's worthy
1:48
Speaker 1: of you, Meg, So thank you so very much for
1:49
Speaker 1: joining me on the podcast today.
1:51
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.
1:53
Speaker 1: So there's a difference between not doing well with food
1:56
Speaker 1: and having an eating disorder. Okay, I mean I've got
1:59
Speaker 1: a bit of a sugar prop I'm working on it cream.
2:02
Speaker 1: I really like the flowerless orange and poppy seed cake,
2:05
Speaker 1: especially with that ice, the icing on it. You know
2:08
Speaker 1: what I'm having and kind of beat ourselves up about food,
2:11
Speaker 1: which surely has a negative effect overall on the way
2:15
Speaker 1: we approach food. Absolutely, let's talk about this issue. Can
2:19
Speaker 1: we talk in general terms? What are we getting wrong
2:21
Speaker 1: as a society when it comes to the way we
2:23
Speaker 1: approach food?
2:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, unfortunately a lot like we're pretty messed up
2:28
Speaker 2: when it comes to food and nutrition and bodies. But
2:32
Speaker 2: in the big, big picture, I sort of put one
2:34
Speaker 2: sort of umbrella, we're really normalized. So this culture of dieting.
2:40
Speaker 2: So if I sort of think along as sort of
2:41
Speaker 2: a spectrum from what might be sort of like natural eating,
2:43
Speaker 2: intuitive eating, healthy eating, we listen to our body, we've
2:46
Speaker 2: got flexibility, we're notding to nutrition and to you know,
2:49
Speaker 2: all that sort of stuff, and down right down the
2:51
Speaker 2: other end, we've got you know, there's really really harmful,
2:56
Speaker 2: really risky eating disorders like diagnosable meet the criteria. It's
3:00
Speaker 2: kind of a spectrum. So one step sort of up
3:02
Speaker 2: from sort of the eating disorder would be that sort
3:05
Speaker 2: of disordered eating. It's impacting some of your staff. It's
3:08
Speaker 2: possibly most mostly impact relationships, but possibly not physically. But
3:12
Speaker 2: it's pretty yark and taking a lot of your headspace.
3:15
Speaker 2: But the next step between disordered eating and sort of
3:18
Speaker 2: natural eating, intuitive eating is dieting. And so it's just
3:23
Speaker 2: become really normal to be counting, controlling, restricting, earning. All
3:28
Speaker 2: this sort of language that we have in our culture
3:32
Speaker 2: is unfortunately a supper slope to sernificate eating disorder for
3:36
Speaker 2: people who are vulnerable to that.
3:39
Speaker 1: So what I'm hearing is like, essentially, I'm probably simplifying
3:42
Speaker 1: this too much, but four levels. We've got healthy, natural,
3:45
Speaker 1: intuitive eating, then we've got dieting, Then we've got disordered
3:48
Speaker 1: eating where it's certainly impacting our lives in unhelpful and
3:52
Speaker 1: unproductive ways, and then there's actually eating disorders.
3:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty gray in between those zones.
4:00
Speaker 1: Not just free sess. It's something that I've been thinking
4:02
Speaker 1: a lot about lately because I have unfortunately, I mean,
4:07
Speaker 1: I'm not as healthy as I used to be, I
4:08
Speaker 1: think is probably the easiest way to say it, and
4:10
Speaker 1: I could do with some lifestyle changes that would improve
4:14
Speaker 1: my health. This is what happens when you've got six
4:17
Speaker 1: kids and you travel a lot for thoughts. And there
4:20
Speaker 1: are my excuses. There are my excuses, but you know
4:22
Speaker 1: what the reality is.
4:23
Speaker 2: All the reasons, all the reasons we can be more
4:25
Speaker 2: compassionate than excuses.
4:26
Speaker 1: Well, I've come up with I've come up with a
4:29
Speaker 1: theory and it really works for me, and that is
4:32
Speaker 1: this my brain lies to me. My brain tells me
4:35
Speaker 1: so many lies about the calories that I'm putting in
4:37
Speaker 1: my body and the nutritional quality, what I need to do,
4:39
Speaker 1: what I want, what I don't want. And what I'm
4:41
Speaker 1: finding is that my brain is telling me yes, when
4:44
Speaker 1: my body, if I listen to it, would actually say no,
4:48
Speaker 1: I don't really need I mean, this is an embarrassing story,
4:51
Speaker 1: but a case in point. I was at a hotel
4:54
Speaker 1: in Sydney just recently. They fed me a beautiful pasta dish,
4:59
Speaker 1: which I just love. And one of the great things
5:01
Speaker 1: about all the travel that I do is I do
5:02
Speaker 1: it in a lot of restaurants. That's both good and bad, obviously.
5:05
Speaker 1: But then they brought me the dessert menu and my
5:07
Speaker 1: body said yeah. My body said you've had enough. And
5:10
Speaker 1: then I looked at the prices and my wallet also
5:12
Speaker 1: said you've had enough. The lemon and Rosemary Gatto looked
5:18
Speaker 1: so good, and it was twenty three bucks for dessert,
5:23
Speaker 1: and I just thought, that's obscene, that's excessive. I'm not
5:26
Speaker 1: doing it. And then I thought, you know what, I'm
5:28
Speaker 1: going to do it. I don't do this often. I'm
5:30
Speaker 1: going to do.
5:30
Speaker 2: It scarcy mentality. There it is.
5:34
Speaker 1: I know they brought it a piece of cake. I
5:36
Speaker 1: kid you not, Meg. It was as big as a
5:38
Speaker 1: cake under normal circumstances. I don't know how big the
5:40
Speaker 1: cake must have been. This thing was massive, the biggest
5:43
Speaker 1: piece of cake I've literally ever seen in my life.
5:45
Speaker 1: And then my brain said, well, gee, that's big. Let's
5:48
Speaker 1: see how much you can do. And I hate most
5:50
Speaker 1: of it, and I felt so bad, and I remembered again,
5:53
Speaker 1: my brain says yes, and it lies to me. It
5:55
Speaker 1: says yes, yes, Yes, You're gonna enjoy this so much,
5:57
Speaker 1: and my body says, don't do it. But my brain
5:59
Speaker 1: seems to stronger than my body in that situation. There
6:02
Speaker 1: is a question coming in this very long autobiographical story
6:05
Speaker 1: up sugar addiction, and that is how do we listen
6:10
Speaker 1: better to our bodies? And the follow up to that
6:14
Speaker 1: is how do we teach our kids that when it's
6:16
Speaker 1: so hard for us.
6:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, so as I mean, that's a huge question. But
6:22
Speaker 2: what we see, and this is really really really common
6:25
Speaker 2: with this sort of in that stage down from sort
6:28
Speaker 2: of intuitive on natural in tune eating whatever I want
6:30
Speaker 2: to call it in dieting, is this really well defined cycle,
6:34
Speaker 2: which is the more we put something on a pedestal,
6:37
Speaker 2: the more we think something we shouldn't be having, the
6:39
Speaker 2: more we think, I'll eat it now because diet starts
6:42
Speaker 2: tomorrow and I'm not going to let myself have it tomorrow,
6:44
Speaker 2: or I've opened the packet now, so I'll eat it
6:46
Speaker 2: all so it's gone and then I won't have to
6:47
Speaker 2: worry about eating it tomorrow. All this controlling that we
6:50
Speaker 2: do to try to reduce how much of these foods
6:52
Speaker 2: we eat actually drives us to those very foods and
6:56
Speaker 2: disconnects us from you know, if you a sort of
7:00
Speaker 2: sit down and go that looks great. I don't feel
7:02
Speaker 2: like it right now, but I'm not going to be
7:05
Speaker 2: able to have it again in the future because this
7:07
Speaker 2: is rare. Just know, Oh, there's that scarcity mentality there
7:09
Speaker 2: of oh I've got it here now, I've got these
7:12
Speaker 2: like these experiences of getting in trouble for not eating
7:15
Speaker 2: all the food on my plate, and so the idea
7:17
Speaker 2: of not eating the whole thing now that it's in
7:19
Speaker 2: front of me, Oh, that's really that's really uncomfortable, and
7:22
Speaker 2: so the easiest way to get rid of that discomfort
7:24
Speaker 2: is to just eat it. And so often it's actually
7:28
Speaker 2: sort of zooming out a bit understanding what is driving
7:31
Speaker 2: the behavior. So I get another I love my imagery,
7:34
Speaker 2: but I sort of think of I thort of think
7:36
Speaker 2: of it as like got a tree and the top
7:38
Speaker 2: of the tree, the leaves a bit we see the
7:40
Speaker 2: bits that often we might want to change is that
7:43
Speaker 2: we think of that as behavior. So things we don't
7:44
Speaker 2: like that we do, all the things we do like
7:46
Speaker 2: that we do. That's sort of the top. That's a canopy.
7:48
Speaker 2: Just telling someone, well, don't do it, or just giving
7:50
Speaker 2: someone information. It's kind of like watering the leaves. You
7:53
Speaker 2: want to shiny leaves for a while. You might be
7:54
Speaker 2: able to will power white knuckle it hold on for
7:56
Speaker 2: a while, but it's really not where trees get their nourishment.
8:01
Speaker 2: We need to look down, and so they sort of
8:03
Speaker 2: think about the trunk. That's often where I thoughts and
8:05
Speaker 2: feelings high because there are things that kick our behaviors
8:07
Speaker 2: off most instantly, those sorts of thoughts and feelings. But
8:12
Speaker 2: then we've got to go, well, where have they been
8:13
Speaker 2: informed from? And go under the ground. And that's why
8:16
Speaker 2: we've got things like our values, So our values around
8:18
Speaker 2: money and I've spent the money on it, I don't
8:19
Speaker 2: want to waste it, or our values on our health
8:22
Speaker 2: and nutrition, our beliefs about I'm addicted to this, and
8:24
Speaker 2: so I'm not going to be able to stop, which
8:27
Speaker 2: may be true or may not be true. And you know,
8:29
Speaker 2: things like our experiences like that one I used before.
8:31
Speaker 2: If I get in trouble, if I've grown up getting
8:34
Speaker 2: in trouble when i don't eat everything on my plate,
8:37
Speaker 2: or I've got really strong values around waste and sustainability tree,
8:42
Speaker 2: I feel really uncomfortable at the idea of wasting this
8:44
Speaker 2: food or of missing this opportunity or whatever, and so
8:48
Speaker 2: the automatic behavior is, well, I'm going to deal with
8:50
Speaker 2: that by eating it. We need to sort of zoom
8:53
Speaker 2: out and try different things.
8:55
Speaker 1: Two things Maing stand out to me as you're sharing this,
8:57
Speaker 1: especially when we get down to the roots and the
8:58
Speaker 1: values them is on this idea of waste. I had
9:02
Speaker 1: my thinking completely revolutionized a little while ago when I
9:05
Speaker 1: was listening to a podcast with the founder of the
9:10
Speaker 1: founder of the US behemoth Whole Foods. Oh wow, Okay, Yeah,
9:14
Speaker 1: this guy back in the seventies hippie sort of living
9:17
Speaker 1: and put together the Whole Foods and now it's a
9:19
Speaker 1: multi billion dollar goliath in terms of helping people to
9:23
Speaker 1: eat food that's good for them and all about sustainability.
9:26
Speaker 1: But the guy actually said he's not so worried about
9:29
Speaker 1: food wasted because food is a renewable resource, like you
9:33
Speaker 1: can always grow more food, especially when we're talking about
9:35
Speaker 1: the kind of whole foods that he's describing and we're
9:37
Speaker 1: not necessarily talking about killing animals and things, right, And
9:40
Speaker 1: I thought that was a really fascinating reframe. And I've
9:43
Speaker 1: loosened up heaps on the idea that all the food
9:46
Speaker 1: on your plate now has to be eaten. There's the
9:47
Speaker 1: financial aspect, but in terms of the renewability of you
9:52
Speaker 1: can always cook more rice or whatever. That's really shifted,
9:55
Speaker 1: and that value has changed the way I look at
9:57
Speaker 1: the way my kids eat what's on their plate. The second,
10:00
Speaker 1: the second value that I just wanted to highlight is
10:03
Speaker 1: kind of the other extreme. My dad probably eats a
10:08
Speaker 1: diet that is has more sometimes food, heat, sometimes food
10:13
Speaker 1: all the time. If you know what I mean, and
10:15
Speaker 1: his value is you know what, I'm nearly seventy years old.
10:19
Speaker 1: I'll eat what I want. Yeah, I just want to
10:21
Speaker 1: enjoy my food. I don't care and to the detriment
10:24
Speaker 1: of your health. But when I think about these, just
10:27
Speaker 1: the pervasive range of deeply entrenched values that drive the
10:31
Speaker 1: thoughts and the emotions that drive the behaviors, that model
10:35
Speaker 1: of the tree and the canopy and the roots. I
10:37
Speaker 1: guess I shared those two to highlight how powerful that
10:40
Speaker 1: can be.
10:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think it helps. By having that sort
10:43
Speaker 2: of framework, we can instead of sort of looking at
10:45
Speaker 2: our behaviors and being like, oh, you're read it. You
10:46
Speaker 2: did that again. Why don't I have any will power?
10:48
Speaker 2: I'm so bad, really negative shame spiral.
10:51
Speaker 1: That's what I said.
10:52
Speaker 2: Hang on a minute, right, Yeah, we can sort of
10:55
Speaker 2: pause and have this sort of compassionate look of people
10:57
Speaker 2: are often trying their best, and people are often doing
10:59
Speaker 2: really automat behaviors without really having a time to even
11:02
Speaker 2: think about doing something differently, and so if we can
11:05
Speaker 2: sort of be curious and have a little look down
11:08
Speaker 2: and sort of understand what's going underneath, that's really where
11:10
Speaker 2: we're going to have an impact. I have a middlefol
11:13
Speaker 2: client I worked with a while ago who she knew
11:16
Speaker 2: that she wasn't hungry when she was driving home from
11:18
Speaker 2: work and she was going home to dinner, and yet
11:21
Speaker 2: she just kept sort of going through the drive through
11:23
Speaker 2: and she didn't understand it, and so we did some digging,
11:25
Speaker 2: did some digging and goes right back to some food
11:28
Speaker 2: insecurity as a child, and the idea of being even
11:31
Speaker 2: tiny bit hungry and not knowing where your next food
11:34
Speaker 2: was coming from was so panic inducing that she would
11:37
Speaker 2: just push it down, push it down, push it down.
11:39
Speaker 2: And so we had to do so much beautiful, calm, slow,
11:41
Speaker 2: compassionate work on Okay, let's acknowledge that, let's learn to
11:46
Speaker 2: be comfortable with that. Let's remind you that you're not
11:49
Speaker 2: food insecure, You've got an option, and how can we
11:53
Speaker 2: work around that. So it's some tile and error and
11:54
Speaker 2: a lot of compassionate looking. Unfortunately, our cultures just like
11:58
Speaker 2: we'll just try harder, just have you will completely ignoring
12:01
Speaker 2: like people's own experiences in life and how diverse that
12:04
Speaker 2: they are, their capacity to you know, financially, their capacity
12:08
Speaker 2: if they've got kids who are really struggling to diversify
12:11
Speaker 2: their intake and they can't afford to be throwing food
12:13
Speaker 2: out all the time, or they've got you know, possibly
12:16
Speaker 2: some so ahither that's the trauma or just some just
12:18
Speaker 2: some really rigid beliefs around food. All of that stuff
12:23
Speaker 2: is just becomes this cycle of going around and around
12:25
Speaker 2: around doing the same thing. Because our culture has the
12:29
Speaker 2: sort of the belief that you're out of control with food,
12:31
Speaker 2: you can't be trusted. This is like the general everybody,
12:33
Speaker 2: you can't be trusted, you're out of control. You need
12:35
Speaker 2: you need control, you need a diet. So people go
12:38
Speaker 2: and they do their diet and the first stage is
12:39
Speaker 2: great honeymoon phase. The first time you've got around this
12:42
Speaker 2: cycle is pretty easy. People will you know, you they're
12:44
Speaker 2: in a deathicerit. Their body takes a while to adapt
12:47
Speaker 2: and so they have this honeymoon phase where sort of
12:49
Speaker 2: the it's working and then sort of the next stage is, well,
12:54
Speaker 2: there's a cheat because there's a special event. There's occasion
12:57
Speaker 2: you get sick or whatever, and usually that's not the
12:59
Speaker 2: end of the story. People like nap increase the zule
13:01
Speaker 2: one back on the horse, and so they'll keep going
13:03
Speaker 2: and they'll keep doing the same thing, but their body goes.
13:06
Speaker 2: I don't like being deficit. So it increases their food preoccupation,
13:10
Speaker 2: in increases their hunger. Hoomers, there's a plateau with their
13:13
Speaker 2: weight change even though they're still doing all the same things.
13:15
Speaker 2: That's very frustrating in a culture that says just do
13:18
Speaker 2: it harder. And so someone who doesn't have a predecision
13:21
Speaker 2: for eating disorders, usually that's just going to lead to
13:24
Speaker 2: so much frustration, hunger, irritation over it that they'll be
13:28
Speaker 2: the end of the diet with this over compensating of eating.
13:30
Speaker 2: So perhaps binging or just really forget it, I don't care,
13:33
Speaker 2: I'm eating everything whatever.
13:35
Speaker 1: But then they'd repeat the cycle when they and just
13:37
Speaker 1: diet harder.
13:38
Speaker 2: Just yes, and our culture, our culture is the only
13:42
Speaker 2: has the only answer. It's ever sort of giveness is, well,
13:44
Speaker 2: you found that you need a different diet, that one
13:46
Speaker 2: wasn't right for you. You need to find the right diet.
13:48
Speaker 2: And because people have swung between control, restrict, count limit,
13:53
Speaker 2: all that sort of negativity or I don't care, I'm
13:57
Speaker 2: eating everything whatever. They think they need the diet to
14:00
Speaker 2: stop the binging, although overcompensating eating or whatever, not realizing
14:04
Speaker 2: oh no, it's the restriction is the starter, that it's
14:07
Speaker 2: what's kicking it off. And so what sort of non
14:10
Speaker 2: diet dietitians are What I do with my clients, either
14:13
Speaker 2: for the weight cycling or of course in eating disorders
14:15
Speaker 2: as well, particularly of your binge eating disorders, is really
14:18
Speaker 2: trying to offer a different world together that is outside
14:21
Speaker 2: of that diet cycle, which is without paying attention to
14:25
Speaker 2: hunger and forwardness signals to what are your values around
14:28
Speaker 2: food and health and nutrition, because as you said, with
14:30
Speaker 2: your dad, he has different values around health than you,
14:33
Speaker 2: and that's not necessary better or worse. And so just
14:37
Speaker 2: sort of people understanding their own stuff and then finding
14:40
Speaker 2: a way to look after their bodies, to look after
14:43
Speaker 2: their wellbeing, whole big picture well being. And you know,
14:46
Speaker 2: obviously I'm a dietitian, so improving dietary quality is right
14:49
Speaker 2: up there on my priority list and my radar as
14:52
Speaker 2: part of that process. So we stop swinging and going
14:55
Speaker 2: round and around around that diet cycle. And the more
14:58
Speaker 2: times you go around it the shorter it gets, and
15:01
Speaker 2: the less like it's effective it gets. So as far
15:03
Speaker 2: as for weight loss, which I don't do weight loss,
15:07
Speaker 2: but that's a whole discussion for another day around intentional
15:11
Speaker 2: weight loss, but it does also become less effective as
15:13
Speaker 2: your body goes Oh, I know how to do this.
15:16
Speaker 2: I was going to down regulate. I'm going to make
15:17
Speaker 2: you really hungry, and I'm going to get this cycle
15:20
Speaker 2: finished as quick as possible because our body is actually
15:22
Speaker 2: really like being in balance. So where this sort of
15:25
Speaker 2: lead that gets into in disorders, So people who have
15:27
Speaker 2: a genetic predisposition for in disorders, that guieting, that restriction,
15:31
Speaker 2: that controlling can really kick off the development of a
15:37
Speaker 2: really serious eat disorder.
15:42
Speaker 1: We need to talk about that serious stuff to eating disorders.
15:44
Speaker 1: I promised that at the very start.
15:45
Speaker 2: We've got off track. No we did. That's okay, But.
15:47
Speaker 1: I love what you're talking about and it's fascinating. I
15:49
Speaker 1: want to ask you to just to sort of finish
15:52
Speaker 1: off the question that I had asked previously. If you've
15:55
Speaker 1: got a child who is not eating well, who is
15:57
Speaker 1: clearly nutritionally deficient, and it's probably eating lots and lots
16:01
Speaker 1: of white foods and yellow foods, but not getting the
16:04
Speaker 1: rest of the rainbow and certainly missing out on the
16:06
Speaker 1: nutritional quality. It would lead to a healthier childhood and
16:09
Speaker 1: help them to be more active. How do we help
16:12
Speaker 1: them to shift, like, how do we help them to
16:14
Speaker 1: move in a healthy direction without increasing the risk of
16:19
Speaker 1: well predisposing them towards and eating disorder.
16:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, so obviously not having panics. I think often people
16:25
Speaker 2: sort of panic and get really stressed about short term
16:28
Speaker 2: eating behavior or what's happening for their kids in a
16:31
Speaker 2: sort of a distrect period of time and put the
16:34
Speaker 2: pressure on. And what happens when we put pressure on
16:36
Speaker 2: kids is usually that sort of the push back and
16:38
Speaker 2: that reaction.
16:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, resistance, Yeah.
16:40
Speaker 2: Absolutely, And so trying to zooming out of a k
16:43
Speaker 2: nutrition matters over a lifetime. And so we're going to
16:46
Speaker 2: be moving towards you know where we would want as
16:49
Speaker 2: a family to our kids to be eating. But the
16:51
Speaker 2: best thing we can do for that is modeling, is
16:54
Speaker 2: continuing to offer a wide range of foods and that predictability.
16:58
Speaker 2: So there's an I sort of the phrase that can
17:01
Speaker 2: be useful of that sort of really gentle rule of
17:03
Speaker 2: threes that kids they need to eat around at every
17:05
Speaker 2: three hours and try to have something for more three magnuchance.
17:08
Speaker 2: Let's make sure there's some fats and proteins and carbohydrate
17:11
Speaker 2: on offer at every time, and then we have these
17:13
Speaker 2: foods between meals where we're not eating to work with
17:16
Speaker 2: our natural appetites. Another issue with our diet culture is
17:20
Speaker 2: that says, well, you read the paper and that tells
17:22
Speaker 2: you what and when to eat, as opposed to when
17:25
Speaker 2: you're actually hungry or when your body tells you to stop.
17:28
Speaker 2: Our gods like, well, but there's still more on your
17:30
Speaker 2: meal plan, or you haven't had your five vegies, you
17:32
Speaker 2: better keep going. So really trying to work with their
17:35
Speaker 2: inbuilt natural appetites and not destroy that connection but actually
17:40
Speaker 2: help them have body trust. Continued exposure like low pressure
17:44
Speaker 2: exposure and modeling are probably the strongest things in there.
17:49
Speaker 1: So two follow up questions on that number One, you
17:51
Speaker 1: said ideally kidstributing every three hours. What age you are
17:54
Speaker 1: around about? Yeah, give or take. But what age are
17:56
Speaker 1: we talking about here? Oh?
17:58
Speaker 2: So, so from sort of free school through it's just
18:02
Speaker 2: it's generally how work our school days are going to
18:04
Speaker 2: sit up anyway. But just if we look at sort
18:07
Speaker 2: of the appetite hormones. There's a whole of different hormones
18:10
Speaker 2: involved in appetite and once for hunger and for fullness,
18:13
Speaker 2: and they kind of will sort of go in a
18:15
Speaker 2: it's not exact science, but they'll go in a bit
18:18
Speaker 2: of a three hour cycle. And if we if we
18:21
Speaker 2: go too long. One thing is people can actually not
18:25
Speaker 2: feel hunger because they can sort of turn off that
18:27
Speaker 2: connection because they're like, this doesn't feel pleasant. The other
18:30
Speaker 2: thing is that we can really disconnect from hunger of
18:33
Speaker 2: fullness and just when the food comes really overdo it.
18:37
Speaker 2: If there's predictability and kids know, oh, I'm going to
18:39
Speaker 2: get another gult that later on, then they're less likely
18:43
Speaker 2: to eat all the stuff now because they don't know
18:45
Speaker 2: when they're going to get it again. And that's you know,
18:47
Speaker 2: linking in particularly to sort of your more binge eating
18:50
Speaker 2: disorders where the scarcity mentality thing back to COVID and
18:54
Speaker 2: the toilet paper, like people are like, oh, no, I'm
18:56
Speaker 2: not gonna have enough toilet paper, so they bought enough
18:57
Speaker 2: toilet paper of three years. You know, a very human things.
19:01
Speaker 1: We're still working for hours right now and we've got.
19:03
Speaker 2: Stuck and so we can apply it. So you know
19:06
Speaker 2: how often people think about food if they think I'm
19:08
Speaker 2: not gonna let myself have this again, or I only
19:10
Speaker 2: get this at parties because our house has none of
19:12
Speaker 2: this stuff in it. Often these are the kids actually
19:15
Speaker 2: don't have their own off switch or don't have their
19:17
Speaker 2: own connection because they override it because of that desire
19:20
Speaker 2: because it's delicious and it's enjoyable, but they're taught that
19:23
Speaker 2: it's really special and that they're not going to have
19:25
Speaker 2: it regularly.
19:26
Speaker 1: Okay, So that takes care of my second question because
19:28
Speaker 1: you also mentioned the word predictability around food, But what
19:30
Speaker 1: you're saying is they know they're going to get food
19:32
Speaker 1: again in a couple of hours time. Three absolutely, Okay,
19:36
Speaker 1: tell me in terms of eating disorders, how prevalent are
19:38
Speaker 1: they in Australia. How much do we see this occurring
19:41
Speaker 1: in our kids.
19:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, so if we think about all eating sauce, so
19:44
Speaker 2: off from when we say eating sours, people just think
19:46
Speaker 2: about ANIREXI interface, So that really sort of stereotypical. And
19:49
Speaker 2: I see everybody is teenage girl, which is just such
19:52
Speaker 2: a tiny proportion. So around about four percent of the
19:56
Speaker 2: total population will experience and eating disorder. Maybe three percent
19:59
Speaker 2: of those is anarexi in nevosa, and so it's really
20:04
Speaker 2: broad spectrum. Some research suggests in Australia adolescents expensing disordered
20:09
Speaker 2: eatings up to around thirty percent. So that's the stuff
20:13
Speaker 2: that hides in plain sight because in our culture that says, hey,
20:17
Speaker 2: dieting is normal, dieting is goods is how you look.
20:19
Speaker 2: This is how you quote unquote look after yourself, those
20:22
Speaker 2: things which are quite disordered and causing possibly distress or
20:25
Speaker 2: shame or worry or just a whole lot of headspace
20:28
Speaker 2: being used up on food food thinking over the normalized
20:31
Speaker 2: and a scene as you know, perhaps good if we
20:33
Speaker 2: look at what is called atypical anorexin novosa, which is
20:36
Speaker 2: all of the psychological distress and the physical risk of
20:41
Speaker 2: our sort of typical arexia but without a low body weight.
20:45
Speaker 2: And there's some really interesting Australian research that showed that
20:48
Speaker 2: actually kids who started in a bigger body and lose
20:51
Speaker 2: a significant amount of weight are at higher risk of
20:53
Speaker 2: medical instability than kids who perhaps started in a small
20:57
Speaker 2: body and lost weight to an underweight stage. But because
21:02
Speaker 2: of their starting point, actually they are still at rithmetically,
21:05
Speaker 2: and we want to help sort them out and you
21:07
Speaker 2: get them out of deficit. But there's this whole cohort
21:10
Speaker 2: of kids who are naturally larger or who've just been bigger,
21:13
Speaker 2: who then do what society tells them to do and
21:16
Speaker 2: lose weight, which actually kicks off this really significant, really
21:20
Speaker 2: life harming in disorder that can hang around for years
21:23
Speaker 2: and years and years. But instead of getting help, they
21:25
Speaker 2: get congratulated or they get told, I'll keep doing what
21:27
Speaker 2: you're doing. So weight loss in teenagers, even intentional weight
21:31
Speaker 2: loss in teenagers, it's not normal. They should that's the
21:34
Speaker 2: wrong direction. Even for a kid who's fat's in a
21:36
Speaker 2: larger body. It actually is like warning, signed red flag,
21:41
Speaker 2: but often missed. You know, sometimes often in boys in particular,
21:44
Speaker 2: who suddenly get like a gym obsession. They really at
21:46
Speaker 2: the gym and they're counting their macros and they're doing this,
21:48
Speaker 2: that and the other, and it was like, oh, he's
21:50
Speaker 2: so healthy. Is we looking out for his health? And
21:52
Speaker 2: then you know, I've got plenty of clients who that
21:54
Speaker 2: was them as a teen and it was years later
21:56
Speaker 2: that they were like, oh, yeah, I was really unwell.
21:59
Speaker 2: I was just dressed I was body checking, I was
22:01
Speaker 2: weighing myself constantly, I was thinking about nothing of food.
22:05
Speaker 2: I had really low hormone levels. I was tired, I
22:09
Speaker 2: was insomniac, like life was awful, and yet on the
22:13
Speaker 2: outside I was like, yeah, buddy, keep doing what you're doing.
22:15
Speaker 2: That's amazing. So it's really it can be really hard.
22:19
Speaker 2: I have a heap of compassion for parents who want
22:21
Speaker 2: the best for their kids and have also grown up
22:24
Speaker 2: in this culture that has sort of a hierarchy of
22:26
Speaker 2: bodies and uses a body shape or size to decide
22:31
Speaker 2: if someone's healthy or not.
22:32
Speaker 1: So I feel like I need to I don't know
22:34
Speaker 1: if pushback is the right word, but I'm having a
22:36
Speaker 1: reaction to some of the stuff that you're saying, particularly
22:39
Speaker 1: around like there comes a point though, when your body
22:43
Speaker 1: is simply unhealthy, and that may or may not have
22:47
Speaker 1: to do with the size of it, but clearly there's
22:48
Speaker 1: a correlation. The bigger body, the more likely it is
22:50
Speaker 1: that you're going to suffer ill health people who are yes.
22:53
Speaker 2: So there are definitely a risk factor. So no one
22:55
Speaker 2: is sort of annoying that, you know, being in a
22:57
Speaker 2: large body isn't associated with increased rates of different sort
23:01
Speaker 2: of I guess more video mortality, different chronic diseases. But
23:04
Speaker 2: when the research actually looks at behaviors, particularly on physical
23:08
Speaker 2: activity behaviors and body side, the association between a higher
23:13
Speaker 2: risk and the body size actually goes away. And if
23:16
Speaker 2: we actually look at people's behaviors any plenty fruits and vegetables,
23:19
Speaker 2: not smoking, and moving, those risks are really they really disappear.
23:26
Speaker 2: There's some really good research around particularly the impact of
23:30
Speaker 2: physical activity on risk. And the piece of the puzzle
23:34
Speaker 2: that often gets missed is our culture makes it really
23:37
Speaker 2: hard to just live your life happily and healthily if
23:39
Speaker 2: you're in a larger body, and so that weight stigma
23:42
Speaker 2: piece of the puzzle often gets missed. So we know
23:45
Speaker 2: this around you know, different minorities have increased risk of
23:49
Speaker 2: quantican complex disease due to stigma, but we kind of
23:53
Speaker 2: miss that. We've got a real weight stigma problem in
23:56
Speaker 2: our culture. So it's hard for kids to feel okay
23:59
Speaker 2: in their bodies if they don't sort of if they're
24:01
Speaker 2: sort of outside of those thin ideas or those sort
24:04
Speaker 2: of normal body ideals.
24:06
Speaker 1: So this is a podcast for the time poor parent
24:07
Speaker 1: who just wants answers. Now they listening to this conversation,
24:10
Speaker 1: they're saying, okay, okay, I get the general overall gist
24:14
Speaker 1: that this is a discussion about overall health rather than
24:17
Speaker 1: the size of my child's body. Nevertheless, I know that
24:20
Speaker 1: my child is not in a healthy body right now,
24:22
Speaker 1: and I want them to be healthy. But every time
24:24
Speaker 1: I talk to them about it, it backfires, They get defensive,
24:27
Speaker 1: or they gone do something unhelpful, unhealthy. If I'm a
24:30
Speaker 1: parent who just wants my kidd to make better decisions, here,
24:34
Speaker 1: what would be your top couple of tips, top three
24:36
Speaker 1: tips that can really be actively followed by a parent
24:40
Speaker 1: who's struggling with this right now.
24:43
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely so. The biggest thing is that your child
24:47
Speaker 2: knows that no matter what their size is and what
24:50
Speaker 2: happens with their body, they are one hundred percent loved, accepted.
24:53
Speaker 2: Their value in your eyes doesn't change that because we
24:56
Speaker 2: don't look after things we don't care about. And so
24:59
Speaker 2: if kids are getting there idea that they're not cared for,
25:02
Speaker 2: how they actually don't that their body isn't worth caring
25:04
Speaker 2: for because of the way it looks, they're not going
25:06
Speaker 2: to care for it.
25:06
Speaker 1: I remember reading some research a couple of years ago
25:08
Speaker 1: that showed that kids, I think nine year old, nine
25:11
Speaker 1: year old kids who received messages from their parents that
25:14
Speaker 1: indicate that their parents are not satisfied with that child's body.
25:17
Speaker 1: In other words, hey kiddo, you need to lose some weight.
25:19
Speaker 1: At the age of like sixteen seventeen, they were I
25:21
Speaker 1: don't remember how many times, but they were two or
25:23
Speaker 1: three or four times more likely to still be overweight
25:26
Speaker 1: or obese in their mid eighteens because of what they
25:29
Speaker 1: heard when they were nine.
25:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, and if you're in a culture that says, oh,
25:32
Speaker 2: actually you don't belong here, we don't have uniform that
25:34
Speaker 2: fits you, or you don't look like the other kids
25:36
Speaker 2: on the sporting team or whatever, well what are you
25:39
Speaker 2: going to do. You're gonna withdraw, You're going to sit
25:40
Speaker 2: in your room. You maybe you don't increase your online
25:43
Speaker 2: presence being on you know, computer games, because well, you're safe,
25:47
Speaker 2: you're accepted that no one's judging you on your body.
25:49
Speaker 1: So number one, unconditional love, right, unconditional love, and really
25:52
Speaker 1: really focusing on no matter how you look, you've got
25:56
Speaker 1: my love and my support absolutely.
25:59
Speaker 2: So from there you can then spring into that modeling
26:02
Speaker 2: that regulation about what's good for all bodies, because it's
26:07
Speaker 2: not like people who are actually in small bodies it's
26:09
Speaker 2: good for them to sit around, not do any movement
26:11
Speaker 2: and only donates to McDonald's and you know, so what's
26:15
Speaker 2: good for all bodies? So rather than having a sort
26:16
Speaker 2: of a this is good for you and this is
26:18
Speaker 2: bad for you, we actually be like, you know, it's
26:20
Speaker 2: good for everybody, movement, stress management, eating plenty fruits and vegetables,
26:25
Speaker 2: eating regular meals, you know, having that sort of that ballance.
26:29
Speaker 2: So that's the starting point is if I wasn't worried
26:33
Speaker 2: about my child's body size, what would I be wanting
26:35
Speaker 2: them to do anyway? And starting there with those sort
26:38
Speaker 2: of conversations because there's every single chard is in a
26:41
Speaker 2: larger body. They know it. You know, we've got kids
26:43
Speaker 2: as young ast for you know, we can actually identify
26:46
Speaker 2: that there's levels of weight steam where that young people
26:49
Speaker 2: don't need to be told they need to be supported
26:51
Speaker 2: to look after the body as it is. And again,
26:56
Speaker 2: there's so much more we could talk about around and
27:00
Speaker 2: how that might look, because it's going to be really
27:01
Speaker 2: different for different families. But at the end of the day,
27:06
Speaker 2: our bodies are worth respecting and looking after, no how
27:10
Speaker 2: they look, and that we undermine people's ability to look
27:14
Speaker 2: after their body by telling them it's something wrong with them.
27:17
Speaker 1: Meg McClintock is an accredited practicing dietitian. You can find
27:20
Speaker 1: out more at Choose Nutrition. She's also the co host
27:23
Speaker 1: of the podcast Life's Too Short to Count almends. Love
27:27
Speaker 1: that title. Hey Meg, thanks for joining me on the
27:29
Speaker 1: Happy Family Podcast.
27:30
Speaker 2: Been a pleasure.
27:31
Speaker 1: If you'd like more information, we'll link to everything Meg
27:34
Speaker 1: related in our show notes. You can also check out
27:36
Speaker 1: happy families dot com dot you. The Happy Families podcast
27:39
Speaker 1: is produced by Justin ruland Craig Bruce is our executive producer,
27:42
Speaker 1: and if you'd like more info about making your family
27:44
Speaker 1: happier and healthier, check out Choose Nutrition online with Meg
27:48
Speaker 1: McClintock her podcast Life's Too Short to Count almends. We'll
27:52
Speaker 1: visit us at Happy families dot com dot a you