Are You in a Toxic Relationship, with Yourself?

No doubt you invest in the relationships in your life that matter the most to you, but how often do you consider your relationship with yourself?

For most of us, it’s the most complex, deep-seated, and long-lasting relationship we will ever be in. You know secrets about yourself that have never been shared. You’ve been there for the lightest and darkest days of your life. Nobody could ever truly understand those intimate, interoceptive parts of you like you do. There’s communication without words or body language, and, goddam, does she work hard to keep you safe.

Understanding the Self-Relationship

How often do we actually consider the relationship we are in with ourselves? I first remember going to war with my body in early primary school. Bullies, teachers, and the world at large planted seeds in my mind that my body was a problem to be fixed. My body didn’t fit the mould of what it ‘should’ look or weigh, so my job was to fix that.

These little seeds, nurtured and watered by diet culture, reaffirmed that my worth and value in the world were directly related to my weight, shape, and size. Before I knew it, that became a belief in my body—an undeniable truth, if you will—and BOOM, I was the newest disciple of diet culture, and boy, could I preach. There was no way I could have known then that this would be the best way to enter a toxic relationship with myself.

Diet Culture and Self-Worth

Diet culture, in all its sneaky, shape-shifting forms, catapults us out of our bodies and into results, outcomes, and goal weights that our bodies have no say in. It’s a direct path to disconnect us from our innate body wisdom and instead rely on the expertise of a calculator, a book, a protocol, or a plan that someone (who has never met, spoken to, or knows anything about me) has decided is best for my body and my health.

Positive vs. Toxic Relationships

If you think about all the relationships in your life, what makes your favourite, positive, and uplifting ones work? You know, the ones that connect and ground you, empower and encourage you, and give you something to look forward to? Why do they work so well?

On the flip side, I am sure there are or have been relationships in your life that don’t feel great and aren’t working. It might be a personal, professional, or other relationship that feels draining and uncomfortable and makes you want to disappear. The thought of having to be anywhere near that person is a little nauseating.

So, what is it that makes some of those relationships work so well and others less so? If you think about some of the characteristics that make a healthy and positive relationship, you might say;

• Trust
• Respect
• Kindness
• Communication
• Honesty
• Free of judgment
• Commitment
• Unconditional love
• Forgiveness

How many of these do we apply in the relationship with ourselves? The conclusion is usually some delineation of, well, actually none.

Reflecting on Self-Trust and Self-Respect

Trust! Are you kidding me? I cannot be trusted around Nutella.

How can I respect something so hideous and unattractive? No one could love this body.

What communication? Do you mean when my body says it’s hungry, but there’s no way it could be hungry, so I try to trick and subdue my hunger cues?

I wouldn’t know how to look at a photo of myself without judging my arms, belly, or acne.

I am committed to controlling my weight, shape, and size; I’m just not doing a good enough job.

The Reality of Weight Loss

Although it became more grueling with each new attempt, I totally got that diet ‘high’ and sense of accomplishment from watching those scales and clothing sizes drop. Hearing the accolades pile in about how incredible I looked reinforced the feeling I was doing the right thing. For the first time in my life, I felt seen for being something other than the bully taunts of Fatty Miller that had ping-ponged in my brain from the age of 8. The closer my body got to the ideal I had been told was right for me, the more love and attention I seemed to get from men and women than I ever had before. I finally felt seen. People who I had previously been invisible to were now interested in me and what I was doing, what my ‘secret’ was. I was being asked for advice and direction on how they could also get THE body. I had hit the jackpot!

The more weight I lost, the more infatuated I became. My brain had connected those dots that went far beyond what I was or wasn’t eating. THIS is how I feel love and connection. THIS is how I am seen to be disciplined and committed. THIS is how I am worthy of my place on earth. THIS is how I am enough.

Never mind the toxic relationship with myself that I was trapped in to get there. It wasn’t the jackpot I hit. It was my own (and the world's) anti-fat bias and internalized weight stigma that I came crashing into, giving me a false sense of worth and value. What I would do to be able to go back and love so goddam hard on that version of me—the one I was trying to escape.

Kate, you were always enough, always worthy, and only your approval was needed.

From Dieting to Healing

Since becoming a Non-Diet Dietitian and Body Image Coach, I continue to be blown away (and completely heartbroken) by the stories my clients share with me about the behaviors that have both been prescribed to them and that they have engaged with in the name of health. Inevitably, when these behaviors fail or backfire, and they will, the shame and disappointment blanket returns, a little more intense each time. We know just how commonly people in larger bodies are prescribed eating disorder behaviors under the diet culture umbrella.

A New Perspective on Self-Care 

I wouldn’t change any of my experiences, though, because they led me here, doing this work with the most incredible humans. Having the privilege to share my food and body image healing recipe (find that here) and explore with clients how we can make peace with food and our bodies. Seeing their body war end—it’s just magical.

Food becomes food again. It’s a tool, not a weapon. It’s no longer good or bad, right or wrong, red light or green light, and as a result, we are no longer those things for eating them. Once you’re reconnected, you can now (relearn how to) rely on the awareness and communication from your body. She knows what’s best for you.

Non-diet nutrition and body image healing calls on us to understand how harmful dieting and disordered eating have been. It’s how I and so many of my clients have pivoted from this toxic relationship with ourselves to a nourished, peaceful, and kind one. It invites us to think about and interact with our bodies like we would with someone we love. We learn how to become a friend to ourselves. It is a complete paradigm shift to how we are taught how to care for ourselves, ditching that dialogue around self-control and replacing it with true self-care.

If you are already changing the way you think and talk about food and bodies, you are repairing and rebuilding a relationship that has likely been punished and mistreated, so please go gently with yourself as you learn this new language. Find people and wider communities who are modelling how to be in a healthy relationship with their body and stay close to them. Be curious when you feel like you need to change your body for someone or something and remember that NOTHING is permanent. Even that toxic relationship.

You, darling human, deserve a peaceful and nourishing relationship with food and your body.

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