by Terri Gerber, LICSW

Normal eating is eating when you are hungry and continuing to eat until you are satisfied. It is being able to choose food you like, enjoy it, and stop eating when you are full. Normal eating is being able to use some moderate constraint on your food choices, but not being so restrictive that you miss out on pleasurable food.

Normal eating is sometimes eating when you are sad, bored, in need of comfort, happy, or because it feels good or tastes good. But this is not the only way of coping with feelings, it is only one way in a much larger repertoire.

Normal eating is three meals a day or it can be five or six small meals, which might look like munching throughout the day. Normal eating is leaving some cookies on the plate because you know you can have some again tomorrow, or it is eating more now because they taste so wonderful fresh and hot out of the oven.

Normal eating is overeating sometimes, and sometimes feeling stuffed and uncomfortable. It is also undereating at times and wishing you had more food or more time to eat.

Normal eating is trusting your body! Normal eating takes up some of your time and attention. It takes time and thought to plan meals, grocery shop, and prepare the food. But it keeps its place as only one important self-care area of your life.

Normal eating is flexible. It varies in response to your emotions, your schedule, your hunger, and your proximity to food.

Sometimes after a person has been restricting or dieting for some time (which is not normal eating and does not work for long term weight control), their hunger mechanism is thrown off. It is often helpful to have three meals and two snacks every day for a period of time in order to get the hunger mechanism back in working order. Eventually, eating when your hungry, stopping when your full, being tuned into your body and what it needs becomes the norm.