Beyond Chocolate Mistake Number 4 - Despairing that we will NEVER feel ‘normal’ around food

Gretel Hallet, is a trained Chocolate Fairy and is running the Getting Started half day workshop in Norwich. If you live in East Anglia and want to know more about Beyond Chocolate, get in touch with Gretel. 

I can remember this feeling very well. I used to regularly despair that I would never be ‘normal’ around food, that I would forever have to ‘watch myself’ around it...and that I would always ‘feel fat’. If you know what this feeling is like, you may also know that it  can be compounded by the belief that, really, we ought to go back to dieting, because that provided structure and there’s no structure with Beyond Chocolate and we need to be told what to do!


This is a moment where we need to calm down, take deep breaths, go back to basics. This may be the moment where we go back to the book, or decide to focus on just one principle and do it just once and build again on small successes. Gradually we will reach a point where we aren’t watching ourselves with the hawk-like vigilance required for dieting, we will begin to trust ourselves to make the right food choices.  


We may begin to feel happier in our bodies, regardless of weight, shape or size – this is what we’ve got, this is us! And always reach out for support – the Forum, a sympathetic friend, any way that helps.
And (because I have an eye for the main chance!) how about attending a Beyond Chocolate workshop? Even if you’ve been on one before, there’s nothing like a top-up, meeting other like-minded women – you never know, if they’re newbies and you’ve been working with Beyond Chocolate for a while, you may realise quite how much you know and how far you’ve come. And that’s got to make you feel good.


Someone commented after one of my previous blogs that it all sounded too hard, that she didn’t want to have to ‘watch herself’ all the time ... well, I can assure you all that there will come a time when you realise that’s not true any more. I keep an eye on myself but only at those moments when I tune in to check whether this is hunger I’m feeling, or boredom or upset or happiness – because I can then choose what to do about it. The process has become semi-automatic for me and is no longer something I do mechanically, as I did at the start.


I have now reached a point where I feel ‘normal’ around food and where dieting no longer has any appeal at all. It’s a great place to be – join me!