Starting the New Year Without Diet Culture: A Guide for Athletes in Eating Disorder Therapy
The New Year is one of the most vulnerable times for athletes struggling with an eating disorder. There is pressure to create resolutions, talk of changing your body and performance goals. Diet culture is everywhere and impacts athletic performance. This guide is here to help athletes enter the year feeling grounded, fueled and focused on sustainable performance,.
Why Diet Culture is Especially Harmful for Athletes
Think about the factors that impact performance. A few important ones are energy levels, endurance, speed, strength and injury risk. Restriction impacts every single one of those. For the purpose of this article, I am using the term restriction to mean there is a lack of energy entering their body, as their body needs for functioning and performance, as well as limiting limiting. This may be due to “clean eating”, “reset diets”, “detoxes” or limiting food in order to change your body. This becomes dangerous for athletes recovering from or at risk of eating disorders. When restriction takes place, it leads to low energy availability. This puts you at risk for relative energy deficiancy in sport or REDs. REDs is a dangerous diagnosis that can lead to bone injuries, hormonal interruptions, irritability, GI issues and many more health concerns.
How Diet Culture Shows Up in Athletes (Common Warning Signs)
Diet culture is when thinness is put before health and well-being. Examples of diet culture may be following fad diets, advertisements that emphasize appearance and thinness, or weight stigma. This shows up in athletic culture in ways such as:
Cutting carbs or calories to get to “race weight”
Comparing body composition with others
New Year “health challenges” that are secretly disordered
Tracking every macro or trying to eat “perfectly” for performance
Reframing New Year Goals for Athletes in Eating Disorder Therapy
Setting goals in sports is a positive trait that can keep you motivated and determined. However, making sure that goals are based in performance or values, rather then weight-based is important. For example, healthy goals may look like, goals based on increasing fueling consistency, building strength or improving recovery time from workouts. Identifying a goal that is rooted in performance and athletic values rather then diet culture may not come natural. Take some time to identify why you love your sport and what is important to you.
Mindset Shifts for Starting the New Year Diet-Culture-Free
Shifting your mindset can help guide you away from unhealthy thought patterns and redirect you towards your positive goals.
Try replacing “discipline” with “trust” and “consistency”. Through consistency, we build trust between our body and mind.
Let go of the all-or-nothing thinking around food and training. Having flexibility with food and with training helps prevent burnout and decrease stress.
Recognize the comparison traps such as, among teammates, others at the gym or on social media. Comparison often leads to self destructing thoughts and decreased self-confidence.
Practice self-compassion during high-pressure training sessions. When we are able to offer ourselves compassion, we reduce shame around our bodies and what we are capable of.
Practical Strategies for Athletes to Protect Themselves from Diet Culture
It is important to be able to plan ahead for potential triggers. This can include things like creating scripts for responding to body or diet talk on teams or with friends. Cultivate a support team of an eating disorder therapist, dietitian and coach where you have weekly check-ins. Allow yourself to take a break from tracking training metics and get back to the roots of why you love your sport. Lastly, curate your social media feed to reduce potential triggers.
When to Seek Additional Support
If any of the warning signs resonate with you as an athlete, you could benefit from support. Reaching out to an eating disorder therapist or sports dietitian can be the first step to getting started. Serendipity Counseling offers 1:1 therapy for those struggling with their relationship to food, body and sport. Here are the first steps to take:
Schedule a free consultation session.
Chat with Kate and see if she is a good fit to help you reach your goals in the new year.
Get started on your journey to food and body freedom!
If you are not interested in 1:1 therapy, but are still looking for support, check out our other resources. We offer a support group for athletes looking to gain a better trusting relationship with food and their sport. Check out our featured eating disorder podcast episodes and book recommendations for further insight into what we are all about!
About the Author: An Eating Disorder Specialist in NJ
Kate Ringwood is an eating disorder therapist located in Cherry Hill, NJ. She comes from a background of eating disorders in athletes both professionally and personally. Kate went through her own eating disorder recovery process as a runner, which brought her to her passion of helping others heal their relationship with food, body and sport.
