Episode 3 Transcript
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Welcome to your daily bread with co hosts, Abbie Stasior and Hannah Calhoun. We're here to be your weekly source of spiritual nourishment, guiding you to find food freedom in a deeper connection with Christ. As we explore the intersection of faith and nutrition, these bite sized episodes will help you heal your relationship with food and your body through practical advice, biblical wisdom, and heartfelt encouragement.
And as a disclaimer, we are not pastors, but passionate registered dietitians and sisters in Christ, offering our insights to support you on this faith filled journey to a healthier, more fulfilling life. Join us by taking a seat at our table as we break bread and allow God in to break the chains of diet culture.
Abbie: Hey, y'all. In today's episode, we're going to be diving into Matthew chapter 18. And this episode is inspired by a conversation that I had with my group coaching program clients. We were kind of doing an audit on our dieting history and talking about the different diets that we've done over the years.
And. It came up in our conversations with almost every single client that they started dieting when they were a really young child. And a lot of them said, this This isn't how I ate when I was a baby, but as I got older throughout my childhood, because of my parents relationship with food, a lot of these food rules and restrictions and this disordered relationship with food, it developed based on the environment that I was in, but I don't think I was born to eat this way.
So that's what inspired me to think of this verse in Matthew chapter 18 and how we're called to have a childlike faith as well. And so I want you all to be thinking, are we also called to eat like a child as well? So Matthew chapter 18 says.
At that time, the disciples came to Jesus and asked who then is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. He called a little child to him and placed the child among them. And he said, truly, I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.
So good. So
Hannah: good.
Abbie: . So when we welcome eating like a child, being childlike, we then welcome Jesus to come in. And it's interesting because at this time the disciples are sitting around the table and they're all discussing in, you know, a little bit of maybe some pride, maybe a little bit of arrogance.
They're like, who's the greatest among all of us? And literally Jesus is like, uh, none of y'all, but this child. This is who is great. And you might look down on this child. They might have a lowly position. They might not be as older, as wise as you, but they have so much wisdom that you were overlooking.
And I think so much of a child's wisdom. , their greatness and their power comes from what's innate in them. , like, children are just so uninhibited. They don't really have any, like, shame or , embarrassment. They're just doing, doing their thing. Like, have you noticed that about children
Hannah: too?
Yeah. And, you know, I just want to, this is like really bringing up for me, like, thoughts about how God's design. For his creation is so perfect and because, you know, , we chose sin, we have like tarnished, all areas and something that God had intended to be so perfect. Like I'm just thinking about how, how children are supposed to be so innocent and they're supposed to listen to their intuition.
This is something obviously that that Jesus is highlighting and even the venom of diet culture is so poisonous and so powerful That the statistics for when girls start dieting or trying to lose weight or having bad body image is by age eight, seven, eight years old. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I personally remember putting on a bikini when I was seven.
And family was around and I was trying to suck in my stomach because that's what I saw. And I was, you know, low on the growth curve. But I saw the women in my life, you know, maybe doing that, maybe joking about it. And so it's like this, this diet culture, like people learn like, oh yeah, dieting, whatever.
Everybody has their own journey, their own diet, their own lifestyle. And they act like it's an innocent thing, but it really is corrupting even , what is supposed to be the innocence of a child.
Abbie: It is. It is. And these things are caught, not taught. So they're picking, picking this up and then shifting to, to have , those disordered, , habits when it comes to food and, and even body image disorder thoughts about their own body.
And if we think about. a baby, an infant, they have their own innate hunger cues. They know when they're hungry, they communicate that. So it's like they have the cues and then they are asking for that. They'll start crying or have different signs for when they're hungry. And then they also have Their fullness cues as well.
And I don't know if you remember from your life cycle nutrition class, but I just remember there were certain signs that we had to kind of memorize for our exam and learn about how do we know when a child, when they're breastfeeding, when they are actually done, like, you know, they'll turn their head or they'll do something and turn away.
Yeah. Right. Like there are certain things that, you know, we as dieticians are taught to teach our moms, like these are the signs to look for, especially, or if they're like not latching, right. Or whatever it is, but when they are done, because children will be very clear when they are done eating and they will respect their fullness cues.
So they'll have hunger cues, they'll honor them and. They will also have fullness cues and respect those as well. So relying on our body's inner wisdom is innately what we want to do. But as we are in the world, and as you're saying, as young as seven or eight years old, the world changes us and gets us to doubt our body's inner wisdom and instead rely on external cues for when, how much, and what to eat.
Hannah: Yes, and we're even imposing this distrust of our own bodily intuition and cues onto our children and babies. Like, oh, they know they they should want more. They should, you know, drink more. I just fed them. And, you know, I'm not mom bashing, obviously, because Um, you know, right now I'm working with moms and in the setting that I'm at clinically in my, um, dietetic internship and it's, it's no joke.
It's no joke. And it's hard to be a mother and you can read all the books, but once you go home with this little tiny fragile baby that you're supposed to take care of, it's like, what in the world am I supposed to do? And everybody is genuinely, truly trying their best. I really do believe that. Um, but it's almost like, yeah, the, the baby's got it right.
Like they have it right. But , we've lived. , 20, 30, 40, 50 years, like, Oh, I should be eating more, I should be eating less, and like, Literally ignoring the cues.
Abbie: . Yes, we, we 100 percent ditch our cues and , did you learn about like Ellen Satter's division of responsibility in school?
Okay. I literally, I was thinking about that based on what you just said. And I'm also using her book, child of mine to like prop up my microphone, uh, which is fun because we're talking about children in this episode. Um, and. So for those that are listening that don't know about Ellen Satter's division of responsibility, she said that when it comes to feeding children, there are responsibilities for the child and responsibilities for the parent.
And the child will have like almost disordered eating habits, or they're not going to be nourishing themselves properly. If these responsibilities are either shared or mixed, or you're taking on a responsibility that is not yours or neglecting a responsibility. And it says, It's the parent's job to provide consistent meals for their child and to make sure that those meals are balanced.
So you want to make sure that you're providing all the different food, all the things that they would need, and also making sure that the child can rely on the fact that They will be fed consistently. They can trust. I will always have a meal. It is the child's responsibility to choose what to eat, how much to eat, and if they will eat at all.
So, so many parents will say you can't get up from the table until you finish everything on your plate. You can't get dessert until you eat all of your vegetables and it's teaching kids. Number one, you're just putting sweets at such a pedestal, which that can be a whole other episode, but you're teaching kids to finish their plate.
And making that the most important thing versus having them honor their fullness cues.
Hannah: And I, yeah, and it, you know, that was something that my parents did that, you know, they never forced us to , clean our plate. Um, and there wasn't like this, you better eat your meal before you get dessert.
And so I grew up with a very balanced, uh, and good relationship. With food, there was also consistent mealtimes and, and snack times and things like that. But I think parents get scared because they're like, well, how do I know? Like my kid will just say that they're not going to eat the dinner and then they're just going to want ice cream and then they're going to go to sleep and then they're going to be hungry and then they're going to wake me up and expect me to make a whole different meal.
But it's like, we're thinking that because maybe that's what we would do. Because we're disordered. Right. You know what I mean? But it's like, if this young child, like, if you put, like, on the plate with the cheese, with the pretzels, with the strawberries, , with the mixed nuts, whatever, like, if you have all of it together, then there isn't like this separation of like, you got to eat all this first before you can get, you know, the sweets because they're, they're like, you know, on a pedestal, like you said.
Abbie: Right, right. The more that we restrict those foods and try and shelter our kids from them. When they encounter them in the real world, because they will, they're not going to have the skills , for knowing like how to handle themselves around those foods. They will go all out maybe because there's a fear of like, I don't know when I'm going to be allowed to have this again.
I don't know when I'm going to see this again, almost that scarcity mindset. So I'm going to go all out and make the most of this experience. So there might be some of that, but also if you haven't taught your kids, how. To handle those foods, they are going to go all out with them. So if we start to normalize it, not make it such a big deal, it's just one other thing on the plate.
Hannah: Right. And I think too, like, when the kids having ice cream or whatever, the dessert of choice may be like, Oh, that's so yummy. , do you think it's yummy? What does it taste like? Is it really cold? Are you getting a brain freeze? Like, instead of being like, oh, that has a lot of sugar, you're gonna get a sugar high, you're gonna get a sugar crash, you're gonna be bouncing off the walls, you're gonna don't have too much, you can only have one.
, all of this is like, Whoa, now I'm not even enjoying the ice cream anymore. Now I'm like, are they expecting me to be bouncing off the walls? Like what if I wanted another one or what if I didn't even want to finish that? Like, you know, it just Right. Suddenly we're like projecting the diet culture mindset on to our kids who are just innocently enjoying a dessert .
Abbie: Yes. And then we're the ones that are still harping on it. Um, so I wonder if you could like ask your kids instead, like what. What do you taste? What do you like about it? Do you like that? It's cool. Do you like that? It's creamy. Do you like that? It's sweet and start to give them some language around those things so that if a child like asks for a banana, for example, and say you just like ran out of bananas, you could be like, okay, it sounds like you want something that's soft and sweet.
Here are some other options that we have at home right now that are like readily available that are soft and sweet, which. sound good to you. So you start to give them those more neutral descriptors of food versus from the get go employing morality on, on food. Like, Oh, this is good. This is bad.
This is something I should have. This is something I shouldn't have because we then take that to mean, Oh, if I have this good food, I'm a good person. If I have this bad food, I'm doing something bad. I'm a bad person. I'm failing.
Hannah: Right. I'm failing. I'm bad. I'm going to get diabetes. I'm going to get fat, like, and then the negative connotation around fatness, like, and people might be like, oh my gosh, this is so ridiculous, but , what people don't realize is that , a diet culture mindset can quickly turn into an eating disorder.
And, you know, eating disorders, anorexia specifically has the highest mortality rate among all psychiatric disorders right under opioid addiction.
Abbie: Every 52 minutes, somebody is passing away as a consequence of an eating disorder.
Hannah: Right. And so, you know, there's, there's a lot of pressure in, in mommy groups and in school and what's your kid eating and what did you pack for lunch?
And there's just a lot of pressure in, in society, but, Really focusing on making sure that, that your spirit is being nourished with God's word and that your kid's spirit is being nourished with God's word and, and focusing more on eternity than, than on God's word. This, this world and the little, the little minute details of this world and trying to control, you know, the future diseases of your child or the waist circumference of your child, like there's, there's just so much more that we can fix our eyes
Abbie: on.
Yes. Yes. So I'll end this episode with reading Psalm 131, because I think it really relates to what we're talking about here and what we should fix our eyes on instead. My heart is not proud, Lord. My eyes are not haughty. I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me, but I have calmed and quieted myself.
I am like a weaned child with its mother. Like a weaned child, I am content. Israel, put your hope in the Lord, both now and forevermore. Amen. Amen.
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thank you for joining us on this episode of your daily bread. We hope you found inspiration and practical guidance to nourish your body and soul. Remember the journey to a healthier relationship with food and a deeper connection with Christ is ongoing and we're here to support you every step of the way.
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As we conclude today's episode, we encourage you to take what resonated with you into your quiet time with God, allow God to reveal to you any changes that you can make for his glory, trusting that you are fearfully and wonderfully made in his image. Stay tuned for our next episode where we'll continue to explore how God's word helps us heal our relationship with food in our bodies Until then may you find both physical and spiritual nourishment and may you be filled with his peace and joy.
God bless
