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E25: Can you Trust Anti-Diet Dietitians? Concerns, criticisms, and legitimate considerations
50 Plays1 year ago
Disclaimer: I am a dietitian - and NO this pod is not all about defending ALL dietitians. ;) It is about gaining clarity and perspective on why what you see in the media or what you hear from you neighbor - may actually have a little *Nuance* AND to give you a behind the scenes look at the layers considered when improving ones dietary habits.
Join me today as I cover a topic I have been wanting to DIG into for a while but just got a nice catalyst nudge from the recent Washington Post article discussing the anti-diet movement…
I find that there is a LOT of distrust with dietitians out thereand I want to help ya’ll get behind the scenes so you can gain more clarity around WHY this “NONSENSE” is out there ;)
This may be one of my MOST important podcasts to date. Whether you love dietitians and/or the anti-diet approach or have massive skepticism around it all - it is a must listen for a breakdown of it all.
Please leave a review or consider sharing this episode!
The referenced articles:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/09/13/dietitian-instagram-tiktok-paid-food-industry/
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast's Mission
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Eating Between the Lines. I am your host, Therese Martinez, and I am so happy to have you here. If you want to untangle yourself from diet culture conditioning and get appropriate, actionable options to nourish your unique life and body, I'm going to dive deep into the nuanced spectrum of health to help you figure out what to prioritize in your journey
00:00:25
Speaker
without getting trapped in the extreme ideology of health optimization or total complacency. I am here to help you apply the science effectively, not rigidly, and get you feeling better in your body and mind.
Criticism Faced by Dietitians Online
00:00:40
Speaker
Here is how to eat between the lines.
00:00:46
Speaker
Hello, hello, welcome back to Eating Between the Lines. I am Therese Martinez, your host. I am very excited to talk about today's topic as a registered dietitian. This is very much an important thing to address. It is
00:01:07
Speaker
hot off the press, if you will. There has been a lot of criticism around the work that dieticians do in the online space. I think specifically around like influencers and things like that, but also in general, specifically with the anti diet approach, many registered dieticians and healthcare practitioners
00:01:35
Speaker
take when working with patients and helping them improve their health.
00:01:40
Speaker
And I want to talk about this today because I have been really interested in breaking the work down that dieticians do because I have seen a lot of criticism over the many years that I have been a dietician. I have seen and experienced also things that, I don't know, fuel a little bit of doubt with the profession.
00:02:07
Speaker
And then many people kind of rolling their eyes at what dieticians do and what they promote and how a lot of times it just does not seem to be regarded as very, quote, healthful and helpful in the big scheme of things. This is really near and dear to my heart because I find so many people, it's just so easy, right, to look at the outside in
00:02:37
Speaker
and feel like you know what's going on. Feel like you understand the complexity of certain situations. And so I want to break this
Washington Post Critique on Dietitians
00:02:48
Speaker
down. I want to break down what it is dieticians do, specifically dieticians in the anti-diet space, and why so many of these claims being made against dieticians are just
00:03:03
Speaker
false and inaccurate most of the time, right? Most of the time. I really believe these to be unfounded. So if you're not familiar with what's been going on, the Washington Post has
00:03:16
Speaker
published a couple articles, I want to say in the past few months, one was like a couple of weeks ago at this point, but essentially criticizing dieticians to be promoting and being associated with big food, right? So promoting highly ultra processed foods, telling people that it is okay to eat junk food and basically being associated with big food so that they can get a paycheck
00:03:44
Speaker
while also hurting the health of the population, right? And so this other angle in the more recent article was talking about how anti-diet dieticians are almost like the worst of them all, right? So they're just promoting these low nutrient dense foods, highly processed foods in the sake of not having someone follow a diet, but ultimately it is really harming people's health.
00:04:14
Speaker
And there's so much to say about this. So I just want to kind of shed light. I will link those those articles down in the show notes. But this is not the first time I have heard criticism around dietitians.
00:04:31
Speaker
And, you know, there are so many dieticians out there. It's so hard to talk about people in this field super generically, but I do want to touch on some considerations when it comes to jumping on the judgment train with, especially in regards to the anti-diet approach.
00:04:53
Speaker
Now I am, I'm actually not someone that considers themselves like officially anti-diet at this point in my career. I believe that saying anti-diet just, it feels a little bit more complex than just like against all diets ever. You know, I really am pro people figuring out how to eat that works for themselves with the right information.
00:05:23
Speaker
and the accurate information being their motives and then connecting to their body and seeing really truly if it makes sense for them.
What is Anti-Diet?
00:05:33
Speaker
So I really do believe though, that when people are solely motivated to engage in a diet, to shift their aesthetics, or because it is quote in the name of health, when that is also inaccurate,
00:05:50
Speaker
That is where we see a lot of damage and struggle. So just to kind of clarify my own angle while also getting into what I think the anti-diet space generally means is that we are not following restrictive and rigid diets to improve our health. We're pulling rules out of the equation. OK.
00:06:16
Speaker
I want to get a few things straight here in the hopes that it sheds some light on the intentions of many, not all, dieticians in this space, while hopefully gaining clarity and building your trust with the approach to, again, give you more autonomy and understanding of who can help you the best for your own needs.
00:06:42
Speaker
Going back real quick here, what is an anti-diet approach? So first, there are many self-proclaimed anti-diet professionals out there, and I would not say all are created equal. I just listened to a podcast actually. Sami, oh, I forget her last name. She is the founder of Fine Food Freedom, which is a company that is
00:07:08
Speaker
comprised of, I think, 13 dieticians, they have an intuitive eating approach, but she did a really good response to this article as well, noting that
00:07:16
Speaker
that this needs to be clear, that there are many people that are not really credentialed officially that do not use appropriate framework being anti-diet. And no one's claimed the anti-diet terminology to my knowledge at this point. It's not like intuitive eating where there is a very specific framework and very specific approach.
00:07:40
Speaker
But I think that many people claim to be anti-diet when they still apply very diet like structure and rigidity, I suppose, in their programs. And so I think that
00:07:55
Speaker
that can be a little damaging for folks. And also just very confusing, honestly, like, are you anti diet? Are you not? What does this look like? Why are you saying this isn't a diet when I'm what it feels very restrictive, things like that. So in any case, anti diet is sort of like what I mentioned before, it is pulling out the rules and rigidity and restriction with an approach to intake. So there can be kind of this,
00:08:21
Speaker
idea that all foods fit, right? So a couple approaches that I know that fall in line with this would be something like the health at every size and also intuitive eating and
00:08:35
Speaker
Like I mentioned before, you need a certification to promote yourself as an intuitive eating counselor. Okay. There are, there's a framework when it comes to intuitive eating. A lot of people think it's like, eat whatever you want, whenever you want. And while that is a part of one of the principles to give yourself full permission to eat food, there are so many additional layers to intuitive eating, right? It's,
00:09:02
Speaker
There's a lot more to it. There's a lot more connecting back to your body, honoring fullness and hunger and movement and nutrition. And so this isn't a podcast on intuitive eating, but I do just like to note that it's important to talk to the people in the field to get a better understanding of that type of approach.
Understanding Anti-Diet Complexity
00:09:24
Speaker
Right. Sammy also kind of talked about that. It's like,
00:09:26
Speaker
talk to the professionals. This was not done in the Washington Post article, or at least it wasn't published. I actually think that there were a couple of people that were talked to. She was one of them, but her input was not shared in any case.
00:09:42
Speaker
I think that there is a huge issue with kind of the just write about what you're perceiving versus talking to the people that are actually in the field, working on the approach to get the better understanding, right.
00:09:57
Speaker
So I don't want to get too caught in the weeds here, but I do feel like I need to disclaim that there are a few different types of anti-diet professionals out there. Some are more credential than some claim anti-diet and still have sneaky diet like considerations with their programs. Okay. Either way, I am going to just focus on this a little bit more generically with that definition of being anti-diet is essentially removing a diet focus from an approach to eating.
00:10:25
Speaker
It encourages people to get off the yo-yo dieting roller coaster because of the unsustainability that so many restrictive approaches have, in addition to the very damaging repercussions that may ensue with constant cycling. That is shown. There is evidence that shows diet cycling is very harmful to one's health, psychologically and physically, by the way. But I was actually referencing more physically.
00:10:54
Speaker
100% psychologically too. Many times diets reinforce a massive disconnect with our bodies too. So that creates shame, guilt, negative self-talk, in addition to feeding into fat phobia, weight stigma, and the like. So examples of diets include the ketogenic diet.
00:11:15
Speaker
the Whole30 diet, paleo diet, the realm of detoxes, cleanses, calorie restriction and calorie counting, macro counting. Generally, it's where there is some restrictive element taking out food groups or foods outside of legitimate health reasons. So I want you to consider this process, okay? A diet.
00:11:43
Speaker
is pushed on you because you are told you need to lose weight. Losing weight is associated with being more respected and attractive in the society. It is also pushed quote in the name of health. So losing weight now has a narrative
00:12:00
Speaker
often associated with more self-discipline, quote, caring about your health, morality around good and bad foods dictating your then morality, and a general sense of safety in this world because of societal approval and acceptance. So like, yeah, it makes sense that people would want to diet, right? Diets make sense.
00:12:25
Speaker
So you diet. Number two, you diet against cultural values. I see this all the time. People dieting, taking out foundations of their cultural foods like rice and corn and tortillas and breads.
00:12:43
Speaker
They don't listen to cravings and desires. So you feel hungry all the time. You don't like the food. You white knuckle your way through hunger or intake in the name of health, discipline, and acceptance and safety in this world. Foods are now put on pedestals associated with shoulds and shouldn'ts and good and bad. You build anxiety when you are around certain foods. You feel totally out of control around certain foods and find yourself binging
00:13:13
Speaker
here and there and now develop an association of feeling addicted to the food or that you can't ever have it in the house or you'll eat it all. You try to control, control, control when it feels wildly unaligned. Number three, you find it unsustainable and end up binging or saying, screw it, all while creating the narrative that in order to be accepted and healthy,
00:13:41
Speaker
you have to have the discipline to follow these diets. So now you create narratives around your own self, your own worth, your own discipline and willpower, which chips away at your own self-esteem, confidence, and trust in your body. You now put other people on pedestals because of the way they look, how they must be doing things better than you, must care more than you,
00:14:08
Speaker
all while feeding into your wiring of fat phobia and weight stigma. Do you see the destruction? You were never shown how to get connected to yourself. You were just told what you should and shouldn't do and why you needed to do it, creating more and more disconnection between you and your body. You were never taught how to
00:14:33
Speaker
balance meals appropriately, appropriate nutrition intake to kind of help regulate hunger and regulate patterns. You know, you never checked with yourself. You never questioned things. You didn't question if it really felt aligned or not and understood a different way. It's just, it's essentially kind of impossible when you're so bombarded, so bombarded. So you need tools, skills and knowledge to find a way to eat that works for you.
00:15:02
Speaker
How to utilize your resources, time, and palette to find healthier alternatives and options. You need troubleshooting of obstacles in your own life to help with consistency of application and patience, acceptance, and push toward behavioral changes versus aesthetics. Because chasing aesthetics and weight loss as motives has been shown time and time again to be unreliable, fleeting, psychologically damaging, and very hard to sustain.
00:15:31
Speaker
can it work as a motive sometimes?
00:15:34
Speaker
You know, it can. I have seen it work. But ultimately, it works when people fall in love with the process of implementing healthful behaviors and reap associated benefits, like more energy, more strength, agility, more mental clarity, enhanced brain cognition, lab values improving. It's not when they get hooked on the weight loss. Oftentimes.
00:16:03
Speaker
The psychology of food is complex. This is why anti-diet approaches are being utilized more and more.
Encouraging a Healthy Food Relationship
00:16:11
Speaker
When we can come at food intake from an angle of all foods fit,
00:16:16
Speaker
We take morality of foods off. We take foods off pedestals. We focus on behavior, how we feel, and acceptance around where our bodies land. Many dietitians online give permissions to have foods like soda, chips, burgers, and ice cream, not because they are encouraging intake of these foods all day every day, but because with permission comes a little less guilt and shame.
00:16:41
Speaker
and with less guilt and shame, comes more clarity on what your body needs and wants. If you ever can't or shouldn't have something, you will likely want it a lot more. So permission lessens the likelihood of binging, and now it provides an opportunity for one to explore ways to nourish their body. Nourishing one's body is also something that is very encouraged by many anti-diet dieticians.
00:17:10
Speaker
Working on addition of nutrients versus elimination has a profound effect on the psychological shift of behavioral change. So finding ways to add, shift, and experiment with foods to increase nutrient intake is a huge goal. This is why, again, developing skills to figure out how to do that and growing a database of options that works for you, makes you feel good, impacts your patterns of intake positively,
00:17:38
Speaker
and has downstream effects on your overall health, is key to traction, which is key to sustainability. As a dietician working across a handful of populations, I will tell you that I see an element of disordered eating in most people. You know, digestive health, diabetes, weight loss, and general, quote, health optimization, often found with folks deep in wellness culture that have developed serious anxiety around things like blood sugar fluctuations.
00:18:08
Speaker
When you see people day in and day out come in with legit fear and anxiety around food that are so disconnected from their bodies who have struggled for years being comfortable around food and in their bodies, you see firsthand the damage all the diet culture and wellness culture talk does. There are absolutely
00:18:33
Speaker
tidbits of great advice out there that would be considered components of wellness culture, maybe diet culture. I don't know. Honestly, I had to like sit and think about it all for a minute, but the issue lies in the lack of addressing the nuance plus the guilt, shame, morality associated with it. And the very weighted messaging that is the end all be all to do all things for, you know, X condition.
00:19:03
Speaker
This is why many people have picked up on the anti-diet messaging. We have to untangle and rewire years and years of bombarding messaging and narratives and teach people how to apply recommendations in a far more balanced fashion.
00:19:21
Speaker
We have to basically compensate in many ways to neutralize the playing field. That doesn't mean that we are encouraging people to eat low quality foods all day every day. It is really tough treading this line sometimes too. To have to always disclaim all nuances all the time on every social media post or marketing is a lot and it is far easier to utilize clickbait extremes.
00:19:46
Speaker
Like, I get that. I get that it's like, really, you're expecting me to disclaim all the nuance to this? I think about, oh, Biolane. Lane Norton, Lauren, I think his last name. But Biolane is his handle. And I like a lot of his information. He's extremely evidence-based. But I also find that it's really easy for people to insinuate a lot of his messages around weight loss to mean that weight loss equals health exclusively.
00:20:16
Speaker
And I would personally love if he would address a little bit more nuance than at least some of his posts. It's not that it needs to be in every single one, but it's just like, I know a lot of times people say, well, it's up to the person to kind of have more discernment around the messaging. And it's like, yeah, but like, let's be real.
00:20:34
Speaker
People won't do the research on their own. It's like, it's really challenging when you're just kind of bombarded on social media or otherwise with like, must do this, don't do this. And then, you know, even when you see things reviewed by professionals and you trust them, then you just don't want to do the work on your own. And I get that too.
00:20:57
Speaker
And that's why I would like more of the nuance a little bit more disclaimed when people are posting things or talking about certain considerations with intake, even if it feels super repetitive all the time, at least in some posts, right? If people follow you, they'll start to see the disclaimers and the recognition of some of the nuance. Oh, it's really tough though. And I get it. I am someone that does not like diets and pushing restriction.
00:21:27
Speaker
And I am someone that meets the individual where they are at in their education and experiences around food. And sometimes more structure is important to start off like it isn't just black and white. So this is what I'm talking about when it comes to nuance, right? Say, for example, eating three balanced meals a day with a focus of protein at breakfast. Is that diet culture? Like, no, that is trial and error.
00:21:52
Speaker
helping people see what happens to their patterns and establishing a little routine and balance in their meals. So it's, it is flexible. Diet culture and wellness culture are very, very black and white. And I don't mean to get like caught in the weeds with diet and wellness culture. I know I've talked about those a good handful of times on this podcast, but this is
00:22:11
Speaker
part again of why there is this other movement of the anti-diet approach. Because anti-diet generally understands more of the nuance that comes with nutrition and a little bit more of the flexibility and a lot of the damage that comes with history of following things in the realms of diet and wellness culture, restriction, things like that.
00:22:38
Speaker
I get that people see a lot of permission giving to folks and feel like all hell will break loose with everyone's health. I know I felt like that for a long time. I also know that I felt like I had to control other people's health for a long time or like, I don't know. There was kind of this interesting energy for years when I was in wellness culture, there would kind of be this like misunderstanding honestly of what it takes to be healthy, what it means to be healthy.
00:23:07
Speaker
And I would get nervous allowing my own self to have certain foods because I would feel like all hell will break loose with my own health, right? And once you are in this field for a little while or you get exposed to a little more of the individuals that are struggling and are so confused and are so fearful,
00:23:32
Speaker
I mean, this was me firsthand, but I've seen it now for many, many years. And you start to get that shame and guilt are not great motivators for change. You also get that health is everybody's prerogative with however they want to approach their own bodies.
Public Misunderstanding of Dietitians' Intentions
00:23:55
Speaker
And it's just not cool to like push so many narratives on people.
00:24:01
Speaker
and pass so many judgments. And there are a lot of different podcasts out there that kind of go into more detail around
00:24:11
Speaker
He has ramifications of our current state of health in the United States and globally, honestly, too. I don't need to talk too much about that here, but it was just kind of came to my mind when it comes to like, you know, if you are voicing that you care about the other people's health because you care about the ramifications that it might have with your own kids or your family or health overall with the world.
00:24:40
Speaker
it just kind of helps you check yourself a little bit more. I'm going to try to remember what those podcasts are. I know Fierce Fatty had one on how much obesity actually costs, but in any case,
00:24:52
Speaker
I also get that it seems sketchy and corrupt that dieticians promote big food. I know that there can be some funding out there or ulterior motives for people to do so.
00:25:11
Speaker
And so I'm not speaking for absolutely everyone here, but I am speaking for like probably most dieticians. Like we do not get checks from big food. We do not. And we are just in the front lines. We are in the front lines and we are trying to help people give themselves some grace.
00:25:30
Speaker
around their food choices with the hope that we can also improve nutritional quality within the space of resources, time, and capability that people have.
00:25:43
Speaker
I also get that there are a lot of people scared as hell and disordered as fuck when it comes to food intake because of the fear around body size and healthy precautions that are being pushed. I also get that not everyone has resources, time, money, or accessibility to so many of the black and white recommendations out there and that highlighting other pillars of health can go a long ways too while meeting them with what they can do.
Call to Action and Final Thoughts
00:26:10
Speaker
Like I said before,
00:26:12
Speaker
So please, next time you see a flashy headline criticizing dieticians, consider this. Consider the bigger picture of what we're trying to do. Consider the facts. Talk to more people that are actually in the space versus the people outside of the space criticizing it. Honestly,
00:26:35
Speaker
That should just be kind of a rule of thumb anyways. It goes with so many things, but okay. Hope this clarified a few things. Hope you guys have a wonderful week and I will catch you next time. Thank you so much for listening today. If you found this information valuable, please share this episode and give it a review. They truly help a ton. If you want additional support and information, you can head over to my website, teresmartinezrd.com.
00:27:05
Speaker
where you can snag my free guide on how to improve your hunger signals, get on my email list for regular juicy content, or apply for the next round of my signature program, restoring nutrition intuition. Otherwise, Instagram at Teresa Martinez, RD, or my Facebook group Fed Fit and Fad Free Nutrition with Teresa are always places for more content and support. Until next time.