Support for INTUITIVE Eating and Body Image in White Bear Lake, MN
You deserve a peaceful relationship with food, your body, and yourself.
If you are constantly thinking about food, your body, or how to control both, it can feel like you never get a break. Disordered eating and body image struggles are not just about food or appearance. They are often about pain, anxiety, shame, or feeling out of control in other areas of life.
At White Bear Psychological Services, we help people break free from exhausting patterns around eating and self-image and form a healthy, healing relationship with food. If your relationship with food and your body is making life harder than it needs to be, we are here to help. Through intuitive eating, you can learn to listen to your body’s natural cues and create a relationship with food that feels sustainable, nourishing, and free of judgment.
What Do Disordered Eating and Body Image Concerns Look Like?
These challenges can take many different forms. For some, it looks like skipping meals, bingeing, or obsessively tracking calories. For others, it is a quiet but constant voice of self-criticism. You may notice:
Obsessive thoughts about food, eating, or your weight
Guilt or shame after eating
Rigid food rules or rituals
Avoiding social situations that involve eating
Exercising to "earn" food or punish your body
Distorted body image or constantly checking your appearance
Feeling unworthy or not good enough because of your body
Mood swings, low self-esteem, or anxiety linked to eating patterns
Even if these behaviors do not happen every day, they can take a heavy emotional toll. And they are not things you have to figure out alone.
You Are Not the Problem
Our culture places a lot of pressure on people to look a certain way or follow unrealistic food rules. These messages can shape how you see yourself and how you treat your body. But your worth is not measured by your size, your weight, or what you ate today.
You are not weak for struggling. These are symptoms of deeper pain, and they are treatable. Therapy can help you understand where these thoughts and patterns come from and teach you how to relate to food and your body in a new, kinder way. Intuitive eating offers a framework for this healing process, helping you reject diet culture and reconnect with your body’s wisdom.
You Deserve to Feel at Home in Your Body
You do not have to keep fighting yourself. If you are ready to explore a gentler, more compassionate way of living, therapy can support you on that journey. Our therapists are here to walk with you as you build trust in your body, let go of shame, and discover that food can bring nourishment, connection, and peace.
Twin Cities HAES® Therapist
Health At Every Size® (HAES®) is a social justice movement that embraces size diversity as equal to every other type of diversity present in humanity. As a HAES® Advocates, we at Venture Therapy operate from the knowledge that health is independent from the size of one’s body and we believe strongly that diet culture does far more damage than good. Unfortunately, in recent years, diet culture has gone underground, disguising itself as a “health and wellness” culture, promising that “it’s a lifestyle, not a diet!” while still encouraging a restrictive mindset around food that ultimately damages one’s mental, emotional, and physical health. As HAES® Advocates, our hope is that we can help you trust your body to communicate what it wants and needs in terms of food, movement, spirituality, and self-care, and that the proof of well-being will be in your mental and emotional health, not in the number on a scale. We work with people experiencing body-image and eating issues on a regular basis, and as HAES® advocates, we strive to help individuals accept themselves for who they are. If you’re interested in learning more about HAES® or scheduling a therapy session, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
What is HAES®?
HAES® is not a therapy technique or specific service, it’s a social movement. HAES® advocates are dedicated to helping people lead healthier lives and spread acceptance of size diversity. It encourages people to accept themselves and others for who they are and support healthy diet and lifestyle choices. HAES® is based firmly in scientific research that debunks the commonly held belief that body size/weight is an indicator of a person’s health. The truth is, there are many facets to a person’s overall health and well-being, including genetics, stress, trauma history, mental health, emotional support, family relationships, socioeconomic status, access to healthcare, environmental factors, and more. Diet is one tiny part of what makes up a person’s health, and in elevating weight as the primary indicator of health, pressure is put on the individual to change their diet, to take in less (or different) types of food, while completely ignoring the factors that make weight loss an unlikely, and unhealthy goal.
Read the HAES® Manifesto
If you want to learn more about HAES®, we recommend you start by reading the HAES® Principles and Framework of Care as outlined by ASDAH. This summarizes the belief system and confronts some false beliefs that have damaged our culture’s perception of body image.
What Can I Do Now to Incorporate HAES® Principles?
The first step to incorporating the beliefs of the HAES® movement is to accept your size – whatever it is. Step away from the scale, stop planning your life around your ideal weight, and start enjoying your life as you are. Next, you need to reestablish self-trust. Your body is designed to be healthy and functional. Listen to it. When you’re hungry, eat. Most of all, allow yourself to enjoy eating and stop denying yourself the foods you love. Next, start finding the joy in movement, while also allowing yourself plentiful rest. You were made to not only be active, but also to love your body by allowing yourself unrestricted, shame-free rest. Do what feels good to you. Stretch out on the couch. Take a walk. Turn up the radio and dance. Go for a swim. Finally, embrace size diversity. See beauty in people of every shape and size and encourage those around you to learn to accept themselves at any weight and value size diversity.