Intuitive Eating Dietitian Explains: How to Manage Blood Sugar Without Dieting

Today, I am co-writing with my longtime friend and fellow intuitive eating dietitian (and yoga teacher!) Letal Garber, MS, RD, LD, RYT. Like myself, she is a registered dietitian nutritionist who sees nutrition through a non-diet lens and practices the original intuitive eating philosophy. Unlike myself, she is an expert in Diabetes (DM) management! So, we decided to join forces and explain how a non-diet, intuitive eating approach can absolutely be taken when it comes to managing DM while supporting your intuitive eating journey and helping you break free from disordered eating patterns.

But How Do They Go Together?

When you think about DM, you probably think of medications, testing blood sugars, and maybe even diet and exercise as possible ways to manage this condition or achieve weight loss. You probably don’t naturally think about listening to hunger cues, making peace with food or rejecting diet mentality (just a few of the principles of intuitive eating). That’s why we put our heads together — to explain why the two actually really can go hand-in-hand. This intuitive eating approach focuses on food freedom, body image healing, mindful eating, and sustainable nourishment rather than restriction.

If you are just learning about intuitive eating or you need a refresher on what it is, here you are: Intuitive eating, which was created by two registered dietitians, is a flexible, free way of eating that is in alignment with your body’s hunger and fullness cues, as well as your true food preferences – there are no “good foods” and no “bad foods”. An intuitive eating approach to nutrition also includes body acceptance, non-punitive physical activity, separating food from morality, and tending to your mental and emotional well-being. Many intuitive eating pros also recognize that healing your relationship with food can support long-term health outcomes better than chronic dieting.

The Basics of Diabetes

According to the Centers for Disease Control and prevention, Type-2 DM (T2DM) affects around 40 million Americans. DM (specifically T2DM) is a disorder of the breakdown of sugar in your body. For our bodies to function properly, we need insulin to be the gatekeeper to our cells and allow sugar to enter in. In T2DM, that process is faulty, and the blood gets saturated with sugar, which can be dangerous if not treated. The primary goal in management is to stabilize blood sugars to improve health outcomes.

Unfortunately, managing DM is not so cut and dry. There are multiple factors that may impact blood sugars including: food (timing of meals, composition of meals, distracted eating, skipping meals), exercise, weather, dehydration, anti-inflammatory meds such as steroids, stress, sleep, menstrual cycles in females, caffeine, smoking, and infection (even just a mild cold/cough). It can be exhausting and even unhealthy to try and control all of the factors mentioned above. This is especially true for individuals with eating disorders, emotional eating tendencies, binge eating, or binge eating disorder who may already feel overwhelmed by food rules and rigid plans.

How Intuitive Eating Can Help in Diabetes Management

We broke down each of the 10 intuitive eating principles and how they can fit into your diabetes care. It's often best to have the professional guidance of an eating eating dietitian to support your process.

Reject the diet mentality.

Keto, low-carb, severe caloric restriction may all have a negative impact on weight and health status due to their restrictive nature. Yo-yo dieting (years and years of going on and off diet) is often the culprit to regained weight and feelings of failure for people. Carbohydrate counting may be beneficial for some T2DM clients, especially if they are on an insulin-to-carbohydrate dosing regimen. However, eating for nourishment versus to “get rid of Diabetes,” is a more helpful approach and more sustainable than going on another diet. Working with a certified intuitive eating counselor or intuitive eating counselor can help individuals move away from rigid food rules and toward sustainable habits.

Honor your hunger.

Skipping out on meals or carbs may sound like a smart way to control blood sugars. On the contrary, missing meals may recruit sugar release from the liver to compensate for lack of food, making the blood sugars go higher OR drop the blood sugars too low. Skipping meals during the day and snacking excessively at night is a way of ignoring hunger cues or not making food a priority and is often the reason for high blood sugars upon waking. This pattern is also common among people experiencing disordered eating or emotional eating.

Make peace with food.

There are messages we receive from social media, friends, family and colleagues that skew our perception of food and eating, but if you challenge the validity of these messages and whether or not they make your life better, you could get one step closer to making peace with food and eating. One such message in the T2DM world is that all carbs are bad! Carbs is an umbrella term for fruits, vegetables, grains, milk, yogurt, and snack foods and should make up at least 50% of our daily caloric intake. Learning to trust your body is an important part of the intuitive eating journey.

Challenge the food police.

Here’s a rule for you to follow: “all food fits.” Morality and eating should not be used in the same sentence. In fact, deeming an apple “good” or a slice of pizza “bad” is unwarranted and often perpetuates feelings of guilt and shame whenever you overeat the “bad” foods. Start asking yourself this question: “when did I start relating foods to self-worth?” Healing body image and building food freedom are both key aspects of intuitive eating counseling.

Respect your fullness.

Trust that your body will tell you when you’ve had enough to eat. Intuitive and mindful eating go hand-in-hand, and mindfulness teaches us to be aware of what the present moment is telling us. Allow yourself to slow down and have an “intimate” moment with the meal in front of you and ask yourself throughout the meal “what is my fullness level?” You may be surprised to find that you get more satisfied than when you eat in a rush or distracted. At the same time, if you eat past fullness, give yourself grace and know that your body will simply take longer to get hungry again.

Discover the Satisfaction Factor.

Eat what you actually want to eat! Once you are fulfilling your true food desires, you’ll notice that your body does not want too much or too little of anything – this goes for both donuts and broccoli. Allowing yourself to take pleasure in eating is a big piece of healing your relationship to food and to yourself – even with DM. And when we do not allow ourselves to eat satisfying foods, we often end up eating more food than we would have if we had allowed ourselves to eat some of the truly preferred thing! This may create a rollercoaster ride with your blood sugars as a result!

Honor Your Feelings Without Using Food.

This principle encourages you to address emotional distress without using food. While turning to food for comfort sometimes is okay, it becomes an issue when it is all the time and the only coping skill used to deal with stress and other unpleasant emotions that come along with being human. Stress causes cortisol (our stress hormone) to increase and our blood sugars to rise, which makes learning to cope and manage stress without using food important for managing DM. This can be especially important for individuals struggling with binge eating disorder or other eating disorders.

Respect Your Body.

We all have a natural weight range that our bodies want to maintain, and this is rooted largely in genetics. Instead of fighting your body by dieting and weight cycling, which is unhealthy for anyone (and particularly someone with DM), work on accepting your body where it is right now. Once a person is truly eating and moving intuitively, weight will settle in its natural place. And remember – it’s hard to take good care of something we hate or dislike. Improving body image and learning to respect your body can help you break free from chronic dieting behaviors.

Exercise – Feel the Difference.

Physical activity is one of the best ways to naturally manage DM! But the key is making sure you are moving your body in ways that are enjoyable to you, not to punish yourself or “earn” food. Intuitive movement is about enjoying movement that is fun and feels good. Do what you love often, and if you don’t know what that is, think back to when you were a kid and what you liked to do then. Try things out and be honest with yourself about whether or not it brings you joy.

Honor Your Health – Gentle Nutrition.

One of the biggest misconceptions of intuitive eating may be that it leaves health out of the picture. But this principle actually highlights honoring health without rigidity and perfectionism, which is entirely possible when managing Pre-DM or DM. Shoot for a balance of food groups at meals and snacks, and specifically pair carbs with protein as much as possible to avoid large blood sugar swings.

What is an Intuitive Eating Dietitian?

An intuitive eating dietitian provides guidance and support as you learn and practice intuitive eating. A registered dietitian nutritionist trained in the intuitive eating framework can help clients improve their relationship with food while supporting medical nutrition needs. Through nutrition counseling and intuitive eating counseling, the goal is to help you:

• Feel more confident in how to nourish your body

• Use practical, sustainable strategies to support your health goals without dieting

• Increase flexibility and freedom around food

• Reduce guilt, anxiety, and stress around eating

• Pursue peace and connection with your body

An intuitive eating counselor can also support people navigating emotional eating, eating disorder recovery, binge eating, or chronic dieting patterns. Working with an intuitive eating dietitian allows you to receive individualized support rooted in compassion, body respect, and evidence-based nutrition care from a trusted dietitian.

FAQs

Here are some of the most common questions we get from clients, friends, and family members when it comes to merging intuitive eating and blood sugar control:

What is the best way to start intuitive eating?

It's best to start your intuitive eating journey with the help of an intuitive eating registered dietitian, so you have professional support during a process that can often be challenging, especially at first.

Is intuitive eating healthy?

Intuitive eating is a way of eating and living that allows for flexibility and freedom with food, body, and exercise, and that honors a person's holistic health and well-being—withiut going to unnecessary extremes.

What are some strategies to encourage a balanced and intuitive approach to eating?

A really good starting point is to eating every 3-5 hours, within an hour or two of waking in the morning. Be sure to include foods from all food groups throughout the day, and that you have at least one of each macronutrient source (carb, fat, and protein) at every meal. Slow down and check in with your body's signals before, during, and after meals.

Does intuitive eating help with weight loss?

Sometimes, weight loss occurs naturally when someone adopts an intuitive eating approach, but it's not always the case. Intuitive eating includes honoring your body's natural size and shape.

How do intuitive eaters eat intuitively on a tight schedule like when you have a lunch break at school and can only eat then, for example?

Part of intuitive eating is getting your basic food needs met within the context of your life. Sometimes, life gets busy and some days require a more "mechanical eating" approach—where you need to eat at a certain time because it's the window of opportunity that you have that day.

Reach out if you need help

If you are struggling with your relationship to food, your body or exercise, we would love to work with you. Please contact us via the contact page and we can set up a free discovery call to see if we are a good fit! Our practice is here to help you reconnect with your body and your health in a sustainable way.

In true Health,

Caroline & Letal