I don’t diet. I don’t restrict myself. A long time ago, I made a promise to myself: I can eat what I want, when I want. It’s been key to how I created peace with food and freedom from overeating in my own life. And a week before I recorded this episode, I felt that changing. For the first time in a long time, I felt like I couldn’t honor this promise. What happened? I got braces. The invisible kind that you have to wear constantly, except for when you remove them to eat and then do a complete oral hygiene routine. For the first time in my life, spontaneous eating is off the table (pardon the pun).
In this episode, I’ll explain more about why this led to deprivation thinking, what I’m doing about it, and the concept of constraint. I’m sharing how I’m using constraint and also some examples of how constraint can be useful for breaking overeating habits – including how a client used it to enjoy food without overeating when she went on vacation.