Let me start by saying something you might not expect to hear from a non-diet dietitian.
Of course you want to change your body.
Of course a part of you wants to lose weight. You live in a world that has told you, over and over, that a thinner body is the answer to almost everything. More success. More confidence. Clothes that finally fit the way you want them to. Shopping at the stores you actually like. People noticing how great you look.
How could you not want that?
Being a non-diet dietitian does not mean I am against you, or against your desire to lose weight. It does not mean I will wag a finger, take away your goals, or make you feel ashamed for wanting something our whole culture has trained you to want. I find this is a common stumbling block that can trip a lot of people up before they ever reach out.
If you have ever wondered what this approach actually looks like in practice, I wrote a whole post on what it looks like to work with a non-diet dietitian that walks you through it. The short version? Non-diet is not anti-you. It is not even anti-goal. It is a different starting point, one rooted in compassion, curiosity, and what actually helps you feel well for the long haul.
So let’s stay here together for a minute.
Wanting to change your body does not make you a bad person
I want you to know that wanting to change your body does not make you shallow, or weak, or “not far enough along” in some healing journey you never signed up for.
It makes you human, living inside a culture that has been selling you this message since before you can probably remember. There is nothing to be ashamed of in that.
We can hold your desire with a lot of compassion. We do not have to villainize it, yet we do not have to obey it either. We can simply set it on the table, look at it honestly, and get curious about what is underneath.
Because most of the time, the wish to lose weight is not really about the weight. It is about what we believe the weight will give us. Belonging. Confidence. Safety. Feeling at home in a room. Those longings are real. Our desire to feel safe, valued, and worthy is valid. The question is whether shrinking your body is actually the thing that delivers this, or whether it is just the thing we have been told to reach for.
Is eating for health the same as eating for weight loss?
Not necessarily. And this is one of the most important distinctions I explore with clients.
The tricky part is the behaviour can look almost identical from the outside. Two people could have the exact same grocery cart. The intention behind the cart is where everything quietly changes.
Let me show you what I mean with two people.
Scenario one: eating for health
Imagine someone who decides to focus on getting more fibre in. So they start eating more fruits and vegetables. More whole grains. Maybe they add beans to a few meals, or swap in some oats at breakfast.
As a result, their digestion starts to feel more comfortable. Their energy is steadier through the afternoon. They are not white-knuckling anything. And yes, their body weight might shift too.
But here is the key part. That shift is not the goal. It is simply something that can happen as a byproduct of caring for their body. If the number on the scale never moved at all, they would keep these habits anyway, because the habits themselves feel good. The focus stays on how they feel and function, not on how much they weigh.
This is what eating for nourishment looks like. It is additive. It is flexible. It has room to breathe.
Scenario two: eating for weight loss
Now imagine someone who says, “I want to lose 10 pounds for summer.”
At first, some of the behaviours might look the same. More fruits and vegetables. More whole grains. Except odds are, carbs quietly start getting cut too. Portions get watched. The scale becomes the scorekeeper, and it gets the final say on whether the day was a “good” one.
And here is where it can turn, often without us even noticing. When the behaviours do not deliver the outcome we were promised, we usually do not stop. We escalate. We restrict a little further. We cut out another food group. We tell ourselves we just were not disciplined enough. Things that started off in the name of “health” can slowly drift into patterns that are actually disordered and depleting.
Same starting point. Very different destination.
The difference is not willpower or morality. It is direction. One path is about adding care in. The other is about taking more and more away, until there is not much freedom left.
Why cutting out whole food groups can backfire
When we cut out entire food groups or categories of foods in pursuit of weight loss, we are often losing far more than we realize. Take carbohydrates, and whole grains in particular as an example:
- The fibre that keeps digestion moving and helps our gut microbiome flourish
- Key micronutrients our bodies quietly rely on to feel steady and well
- The long-term diversity in our gut that supports our health for years to come
As a gut-loving dietitian, that last point matters the most. A less diverse gut microbiome over time can bring its own set of complications, from digestion that feels off to impacts on how we feel day to day. So a change that was supposed to make us “healthier” can end up chipping away at the very health we were chasing.
This is the quiet cost of eating for weight loss instead of eating for nourishment. It often does not show up right away. It shows up later, in energy, in digestion, and in a relationship with food that has grown smaller and more fearful.
So how do I know which one I’m doing?
Come back to intention. It is not really about the food on your plate. It is about the “why” humming underneath it.
You might gently ask yourself:
- Am I adding nourishment in, or am I cutting out and bracing?
- Am I caring for this body, or am I trying to shrink it?
- Would I keep this up even if the scale never moved again?
There are no wrong answers here. It is just information, but choosing to honestly look inward and seek the answers to these questions takes a good amount of bravery and self-reflection.
If the honest answer is “I am doing this to lose weight, and I do not totally know how to feel about that,” you are still welcome here. That honesty is exactly where the real, freeing work begins. We do not have to have it all sorted before we start.
It takes work and support to shift the focus from your body as an ornament to viewing your body as an instrument. But I can promise you the work is so worth it. Because the time, money, and freedom you’ll gain back is so worth it. Besides, you were made for so much more than a life spent shrinking your body!
Want a co-pilot for this work?
If you are somewhere in Calgary, Alberta, or anywhere across AB or BC, and you are tired of trying to sort this out alone, I would love to walk alongside you. As a non-diet, weight-inclusive Registered Dietitian, I help people find freedom with food and use nutrition as self-care over self-control.
Together, we can untangle the difference between caring for your body and trying to control it, and figure out what nourishment gets to look like for you.
If that feels like the next step, you can book a free Connection Call with me. I’d love to chat with you!
0 Comments