The journey to ‘intuitive eating’ is a long, hard, bumpy road. Don’t ever let anyone fool you into thinking its easy.

Coming from a background of obsessive calorie counting and disordered eating, I knew this was going to be a tough journey to break these habits and find peace with releasing control over food. But I have committed to this journey for many months now and I’m beginning to reap the benefits.

So I want to share my journey so far and continue to document my journey to becoming an intuitive eater because I know there are so many other girls (and guys) out there going through the same thing. We are not alone. And we will get through this obsession with food and calories to find peace with ourselves and our bodies.

My journey has been a long one, but to sum it all up, I became so obsessed with achieving the physic and ‘abs’ social media portrayed as the ideal body type that I developed extreme obsessive behaviours around my exercise and food. I never was diagnosed with an eating disorder officially as I didn’t fall into any exact category, but I certainly had many of the signs and symptoms and if it went on any longer, I worry about the further damage I would have done to my body. I’d already lost my period for 2 years, suffered extreme fatigue and exhaustion, constant panic and anxiety attacks and brain fog.

I use to exercise twice a day for hours on end to burn a certain amount of calories I thought were necessary. I became obsessed with counting calories and macros – at this point in my life the only two words to describe my diet were ‘restrictive’ and ‘deprivation’. I was living off less than 1200 a day while exercising for hours on end. I totally lost touch with my body at this point in time. I didn’t even remember what it was like to feel hungry up until not too long ago! I was so controlling over every aspect of my diet, down to the minute of each meal.

However, fast forward to late-2018, I’ve now made the commitment to myself to trust my body again and truly be an intuitive eater.

So what is an ‘intuitive eater’? Intuitive eating is when you make food choices that honour your hunger and fullness cues by listening to your body and its cravings. It’s giving up all food rules and restrictions and eating how and what makes you feel good.

My journey from chronic calorie counter to intuitive eater is a journey I’ve well and truly committed to for majority of 2018. There have been times of relapse but I’ve now been successfully intuitively listening to my body for over 6 months now and I’m starting to notice some incredible changes.

So I wanted to create this ‘Intuitive Eating Diaries’ series as a way to document each step in this journey. I want to share my experiences so far, share the lesson’s I’ve learnt/learn, as well as share my struggles. Because I know I’m not alone in this struggle. In a world where we are constantly told we are not good enough by the media and told that we ‘need’ to diet, trusting your own intuition and body is the hardest thing to do. But all you need to do is make the commitment, start and you’ll never look back.

So come along with me on my Intuitive Eating journey! I'll be sharing regular blog posts on lessons I've learnt and challenging I'm facing and just documenting the entire journey. I want to share this with you all but I also want to document this for myself; for those times of relapse, to remind myself how strong I am, how far I've come and how this is 100% the right thing for me and my body.