Blog | Own It Babe

The one thing you need to do to stop counting calories

Out of sheer curiosity, I googled the title of my article before publishing it. All that came up was "how to stop counting calories and still lose weight". The intention of weight loss is the whole problem our society is so obsessed with calories and macronutrients. It is weight loss or an innocent "healthy eating journey" that usually gets us into this mess. The recipe for a food and body obsession The recipe for this obsession is this. Take a society that is obsessed with small bodies, throw i[...]

Navigating Recovery Symptoms of an Eating Disorder

[Disclaimer: This article is for informational and educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice, mental health care or eating disorder treatment.] You finally made the choice to pursue recovery from your eating disorder or disordered eating behaviors. Maybe you hit rock bottom or something happened that you took as a sign to finally embark on this journey. You have fought your demons and the old voices that tell you to keep shrinking your body. You have had enough[...]

Blog Intuitive Eating Mental Health

5 eating disorder recovery myths – BUSTED

[Disclaimer: The content of this article is for informational and educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice, health care or eating disorder treatment.] Recovering from an eating disorder or disordered eating is one of the hardest challenges I ever put myself through. The daily struggle, especially at the beginning, the shame about giving up a piece of your identity... There is so many challenges that come with recovery, but I absolutely believe that a full reco[...]

Blog Intuitive Eating

5 Reasons why Intuitive Eating works for EveryBODY

[Disclaimer: This article is for informational and educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice, mental health care or eating disorder treatment.] Intuitive eating is not a diet. It is a way of eating that honours your body's hunger and fullness signals, while bringing pleasure and enjoyment into your meals. There are no rules to intuitive eating. You basically eat foods that feel good in your body and that feel right in the moment. No foods are off limits. I hear you lou[...]

Blog Intuitive Eating

Hypothalamic Amenorrhea – The one trick that brought my period back

[Disclaimer: This article is for informational and educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice, mental health care or eating disorder treatment.] I love science. It is the one thing I believe in and research is a passion of mine. Some would even call it a compulsion. I like to question everything people tell me and look for scientific facts online to back up their theory. However, I know that scientific research can be quite dry and boring to some people. In this[...]

The one thing Instagram taught me about Body Acceptance

Instagram started out as a platform for photographers to share their work. Once it became mainstream and popular, the selfie movement, butt pictures and a whole lot of “fitspo” images became the norm. I spent years of my life following “fitspo” accounts, bodybuilding competitors, models and celebrities. At first, I took great pleasure in getting such a private glimpse into everyone’s life. I convinced myself that all I do is inspire myself to work harder in the gym and the kitchen. Li[...]

Blog Intuitive Eating Mental Health

You binge ate – now what?

If you have ever struggled with binge eating, you can probably relate: Your alarm goes off and you are in a haze. What happened last night? You need a few seconds to realize that you still feel sick to your stomach. Your eyes and face feel puffy and you don’t even want to look in the mirror and see the damage. Your guilt is weighing you down, before you even got out of bed. All you want to do is shut the blinds and sleep forever. You probably made a promise to yourself last night that you won[...]

A letter to my 18-year-old self

Dear 18-year old Rini, Here is a very heartfelt letter from your future self. You have just finished high school, which given your laziness in class is actually quite the miracle. Now, you are about to have the most amazing summer with all of your friends. You will stay up with your friends until 6 in the morning every other day. You will cycle home on your bike while watching the sunrise and feeling absolutely free and invincible. Make sure you are present every single moment, because ten years[...]

5 Ways to track your progress without dieting

Spoiler alert: I don’t ever talk about or promote dieting, weight loss and body transformations. Why? Because there is an incredible amount of people out there doing this. Also, we seem to know exactly what we have to do in order to achieve that “perfect body”. Nevertheless, the struggle with disordered eating and a crappy body image is bigger than it has ever been before. Hence, this article is about 5 ways to track your progress in terms of self-acceptance as well as in terms of improvin[...]

Blog Intuitive Eating

5 Signs you are overexercising and how to fix it

How do you know that you took your exercise regime too far? Here is what my life looked like a year ago. I exercised for about 1-2 hours per day and tracked my food and macronutrients in order to stay in a caloric deficit. I stayed in a caloric deficit for about 10 years, with several binge episodes in between. In previous blog posts, I have talked a lot about disordered eating, but how about an exercise addiction that you are totally unaware of? We often overlook the consequences of t[...]