5 Tips to Eat Intuitively With Food Allergies and Restrictions

When living with dietary restrictions, like food allergies, it may be difficult to eat intuitively. Since May is Food Allergy Awareness Month, I’m sharing my top tips on how you absolutely can eat intuitively with food allergies and restrictions.

Eating intuitively is eating according to your basic instincts. Eating what you want, when you want it, according to your hunger and fullness cues (most of the time). So when you live with a food allergy, intolerance, or medically-necessary restriction, can you still eat intuitively?

Let’s find out…

Food intolerances and restrictions are at an all time high. Even more, diagnosed food allergies are also at an all time high, especially in the U.S. Personally and professionally, I find it hard to speak with someone without ANY intolerances or allergies. If that’s you – tell me your secrets – you’re SO lucky!

With our changing food environment, soil, environmental exposure to chemicals, and tons of additives that our government considers “generally recognized as safe (GRAS),” we’re exposed to more CRAP than ever before. Pardon my language, but the truth of the matter is that there are more man-made chemicals and substances in our environment and food than ever before. These environmental causes are just one set of reasons food intolerances and allergies are skyrocketing. There are also genetic causes, avoidance of well-known allergens, and more.

As you may know, I’ve lived with severe food allergies for almost my entire life. I know no different than avoiding tree nuts, peanuts, and sesame seeds at all costs. However, over the past year I’ve had to cope with even more intolerances…

After a hefty dose of antibiotics to combat some serious lung infections, my gut has been through the wringer. Yes, I’ve had Irritable Bowel Syndrome, like 11% of the global population, since high school, but we’re talking about totally being off kilter… so much so, my gut issues influenced the style of wedding dress I picked out!

Feeling so discombobulated is no fun, so if you’re there – I feel your pain. The good news is that there are many ways you can help yourself. In a effort to repair my gut and solve some intense bloating, pain, and uncomfortableness (hello tight pants cutting into me – the WORST), I put myself on an extremely restrictive low fodmap diet. Within several weeks, my pain (for the most part) resolved, my crazy bloating improved, and I felt more confident again. Please note: This is my story; please seek help with a qualified dietitian if you are experiencing similar symptoms. 

The only downfall: following an even MORE restrictive diet than I previously had to follow.

^^ The serious uncomfortable bloat before a workout class

This post isn’t about my experiences on a low fodmap diet (you can read a little more about that here). But how did I follow my own nutrition philosophy of including all foods and eating according to my cravings when I was purposely excluding a wide variety of foods (and especially a handful of foods I LOVED)?

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Whether you temporarily need to follow a limited diet or you have an anaphylactic food allergy, it is possible to eat intuitively with food allergies and restrictions. It may not always be as easy or freeing, but it’s possible. I know, because it’s how I live my life.

Here’s how you can eat intuitively with food allergies and restrictions:

1. Recognize Your Frustration… It’s Normal!

You don’t have to like that you can’t include every single food in your diet. I get it. It SUCKS sometimes.

I don’t just have personal experience with this one, but professionally too. Being in the food and wellness space, there are SO many delicious treats that are made with almond flour that I can have no part of. But even worse, as I work with brands as part of my business, there are times when I have to turn down business when a national brand reaches out to work with me and I’m allergic! Womp womp…

It’s annoying, irritating, and unfair. Who wants to feel excluded like that?

Instead of harping on it (see point number 2), I recognize it and feel the frustration. Living with food allergies and intolerances isn’t easy. It takes work, extra effort, and cautious tendencies every single day. You can read more about that here.

But don’t let it define you. There is still a lot you CAN eat…

2. Focus On the Foods You CAN Eat

If you must restrict a specific food (or foods), there’s no point in harping on the fact that you can’t eat it. However, if you’re newly diagnosed with a permanent allergy or intolerance, you may need to mourn the elimination of a favorite food. That’s A OK! 

It may be helpful to make a list of your favorite foods that you can eat, depending on how many restrictions you have. Not only will this help you see the wide variety of foods still available for you, but it can also suggest a substitution for a restricted food that you find just as satisfying.

That will also help you with my next point…

 

3. Identify Your Cravings, and Satisfy Them

If you’re intolerant to gluten, you may not be able to dive carefree into a giant bowl of pasta, but there are SO many substitutions that I bet you can find something that is just as satisfying, but also gluten free.

This shift we’re seeing in the healthy food movement is much more inclusive to intolerances and allergies (also likely because they’re rampant). Therefore, when you’re having a craving, know how you can satisfy it within the food that you can eat.

It may take some time to figure out the foods you love to satisfy your cookie craving or pretzel fix, but over time you’ll be more open to trying new things to satisfy your cravings safely.

4. Think About How Food Makes You Feel

When you’re able to eat intuitively, you learn to eat according to your cravings and when your hungry. Intuitive eating also focuses on including those foods that make you feel like a million bucks. Because 95% of the time, why would you want to fill your tank with anything but the best?

If your restrictions are based on intolerances, not an allergy, then this tip is especially helpful. Think about how food makes you feel. Do you feel bloated for weeks after eating something with garlic and onions? Does a bagel make you feel sick, but you sometimes eat it anyways?

We want to eat more foods that nourish our bodies and help you FEEL amazing. Because don’t you want to feel your BEST as much as possible?! After all, do you want to mosey through life feeling sluggish, lethargic, less than yourself? I didn’t think so! If your car requires premium diesel fuel, why would you give it regular to run at 50%?

Fill your tank with the best fuel for YOU… and remember that’s not necessarily what the person next to you is eating!

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5. Make your own rules

We’re born intuitive eaters. Even if Mom is trying to choo choo food into the train station, we turn it down when we’re no longer hungry.

Around the age 5, however, we stop listening to our innate hunger/satiety cues and start eating because it’s snack time in kindergarten or because Mom says you can’t eat dessert unless you finish the food on our plate. (And obviously, you want dessert, duh!)

But we’re learning more and more that this may not be best.

It continues as we get older… We eat 3 square meals, perhaps with a couple of snacks, because that’s what we’re told we need to do. That’s not listening to our needs.

We need to stop doing what we’re told is right and do what we need for our own bodies. Stop comparing your habits to your co-workers, your family, or your significant other. Do what YOUR body needs!

That means:

• Honor your hunger, don’t ignore it!
• Stop eating when you’re full… you can always eat more when you’re hungry again.
• Consider your cravings. Identify what you want to eat so you can eat, feel satisfied, and move on.
• Focus on how you FEEL, not how you look.
• Give yourself some grace. Eat for energy… but also to soothe your soul, because that’s all a normal part of your relationship with food.

If you have food restrictions, it’s imperative to avoid adopting restrictive behaviors. It’s easy to hide behind true intolerances as a way of limiting what you eat. However, we should do just the opposite. Be open to trying more new foods so you can have a more inclusive diet. This doesn’t only help you meet your nutritional needs, but it also helps prevent the feelings of deprivation that often accompany diagnosed food restrictions and allergies.

Most importantly, if you’re having trouble figuring out what to eat, seek professional help. Look for someone who specializes in food allergies and intolerances, with an intuitive eating focus, so you can find your neutral relationship to food, despite any restrictions in place.

I’m always here to help! Let me know how you eat intuitively with food allergies and restrictions in the comments below…
XO