Anti-Diet

Reclaim Your Time, Money, Well-Being, and Happiness Through Intuitive Eating

By: Christy Harrison

Narrated by: Christy Harrison

Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

Reclaim your time, money, health, and happiness from our toxic diet culture with groundbreaking strategies from a registered dietitian, journalist, and host of the Food Psych podcast.

Sixty-eight percent of Americans have dieted at some point in their lives. But upwards of 90 percent of people who intentionally lose weight gain it back within five years. And as many as 66 percent of people who embark on weight-loss efforts end up gaining more weight than they lost. If dieting is so clearly ineffective, why are we so obsessed with it?

The culprit is diet culture, a system of beliefs that equates thinness to health and moral virtue, promotes weight loss as a means of attaining higher status, and demonizes certain ways of eating while elevating others. It's sexist, racist, and classist, yet this way of thinking about food and bodies is so embedded in the fabric of our society that it can be hard to recognize. It masquerades as health, wellness, and fitness, and for some, it is all-consuming.

In Anti-Diet, Christy Harrison takes on diet culture and the multi-billion-dollar industries that profit from it, exposing all the ways it robs people of their time, money, health, and happiness. It will turn what you think you know about health and wellness upside down, as Harrison explores the history of diet culture, how it's infiltrated the health and wellness world, how to recognize it in all its sneaky forms, and how letting go of efforts to lose weight or eat "perfectly" actually helps to improve people's health - no matter their size. Drawing on scientific research, personal experience, and stories from patients and colleagues, Anti-Diet provides a radical alternative to diet culture, and helps listeners reclaim their bodies, minds, and lives so they can focus on the things that truly matter.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2019 Christy Harrison, MPH, RD (P)2019 Little, Brown Spark

Critic reviews

"Nutritionist Harrison, host of the podcast Food Psych, debuts with this impassioned and articulate plea for readers to reject 'diet culture' and reclaim their lives...Harrison's enlightening, heretical tract provides a new perspective on the dieting narrative which many take as gospel truth."—Publishers Weekly

"Anti-Diet is the 'diet' book you need to read headed into 2020. If you've been gearing up to embark on yet another diet, protocol, reset or reboot come Jan. 1, I have a different suggestion: Hit the pause button on that plan and read Christy Harrison's book. Harrison, a registered dietitian and journalist, thoroughly and elegantly lays out the strange origins of modern diet culture...then presents a path to truly holistic health that's based on self-care, not self-control."—Carrie Dennett, The Seattle Times

"Brilliant! Anti-Diet should be required reading for every health professional and in every health-related class. Harrison bridges the gap between intuitive eating and social justice issues in an engaging and compassionate way. She exposes toxic diet culture—its evolution, who profits by it, and how it hurts you. Written with a friendly touch of sass, Anti-Diet, is richly sourced with studies, stats, and expert interviews. I highly recommend this book to help you dismantle diet culture and to heal your own relationship with food, mind, and body."—Evelyn Tribole, coauthor of Intuitive Eating

An entertaining and empowering read!

It was fascinating to discover the many toxic layers of diet culture and it's origins. The author is relatable, humorous and brilliant. She makes a powerful case for leaving diets behind and embracing a self-care to health and happiness in a much more broad and compassionate way.

Wonderful for newbies or veterans in anti-diet diet culture

Highly recommended for anyone that wants to learn more about diet culture and intuitive eating. So eye-opening and well done. I’ve already read multiple books on this topic and have been into the intuitive eating lifestyle for over a year, and Christy Harrison does a wonderful job with a major overview of this topic. Everything was considered and I still learned a ton! Loved it!

Required listening for anyone who has been on a diet!

I learned so much! Christy Harrison was so thorough and well-researched. She started The history of diet culture which really opened my eyes to the way diet culture is racist, classist, and sexist. She shared anecdotes from her personal life and clients too which helped put concepts in context. I can’t recommend this book enough for anyone who’s been in the cycle of dieting and is trying to break free.

Revolutionary

I’m so glad I stumbled across this book. Well worth the listen, even if you don’t agree wholeheartedly. It will make you question the “why” and “how” we have gotten to this place with our relationship with food.

Eye-opening

I felt so “seen” while listening to this book. It opened my eyes to the evils of diet culture and how it effects everyone of us. Highly recommended!

the history of diet

it sounds well researched and written but was not what I was looking for. if you're looking for a history of body image and diet, this book is for you

Great info

Great info on the perils of the diet world and well written. Would definitely recommend

Great message, inclusive, good narration

I was getting sick of trying to find the one specific way to get down a size and decided to read this to really give the "intuitive eating" idea a try. This lays it all out with scientific and logical support, with a big dose of compassion. Trans inclusive, doesn't ignore issues of intersectionality although they are not the focus for certain parts of the book (i.e. parts of the book only fully apply if you are not food insecure, targeted by additional forms of discrimination, etc., but the book acknowledges that and speaks to it, so, on the whole not bad).

There are a couple of places where I feel like she might go a bit far (for example, in diets that eliminate certain foods, she discounts these completely unless it's for an anaphylactic allergy. I have a reaction to dairy where every time I eat it, I get really achy joints. I don't do this because of orthorexia, I would love to be able to eat dairy. But it makes me feel bad, so I don't. It's not anaphylactic, and to me it's very real. Other than that, I don't feel condescended to or preached to, which is good. There's no "snap out of it, sister!" kind of rah rah language, which I appreciate.

time for a change

Although I don't believe some of the history of diet culture, I found this book intriguing and needed to revise our way of thinking about our bodies. I will listen again if I need a reminder.

Life Changing

This journey of loving my body and finding intuitive eating was kind of on accident. I just needed some solid books to read for my 2021 reading goals and this was one that was suggested. Wow. I’m mostly blown away by the research that shows dieting/restricting and mental health go hand in hand. So much more than I had ever thought, or even wanted to believe. It is so well put together and I appreciated it’s look at diet and health culture from almost every angle. Forever changed because you can’t unhear what you learn in this book.