Week 6: Mindful eating

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) - The Extreme Family Makeover focused on the mind in week six. The Reneau family practiced eating in a whole new way.

Mindful eating is being aware of when and why you are eating in a non-judgmental manner and slowing down to truly notice the taste, texture and smell of the food you are eating.

"We tend to pay attention and eat less when we mindfully eat," Behavior Coach Ann Reidenbach said.

To help teach the Reneau family how to eat in a mindful manner, Reidenbach led them on a mindful tasting exercise.

"Mindful tasting is an exaggerated form of mindful eating," she said.

During the mindful tasting the family ate one raisin, one cracker, one piece of cheese and one animal cracker. Before eating each item, the family members first had to look at and feel the texture of the food, smell it, and then put it in their mouths without chewing to notice the different tastes and aromas during the eating process.

"I thought it was interesting to really taste it and think about the different textures," Mark Reneau said.

The tasting exercise took several minutes for each food item. While learning the skills can be lengthy, the actual habit of mindful eating isn't as tedious.

"You can be mindful and still eat at a moderate pace and just be mindful as you eat. If you shovel it, you don't really taste it at all," Mark said.

His daughter, Chloe, agreed.

"When we were eating it we actually tasted it, like normally people just throw it in their mouths and just chew and don't really taste it," she said.

Mark admitted that while the tasting process was interesting, he found the thought of doing it every day for meals annoying.

"Do I want people to mindfully taste every day? No. Do I want people to mindfully eat? Yes," Reidenbach said.  "You can mindfully eat without it being painstakingly slow. You can be having a conversation while you are eating and what's important is to bring yourself back when a quarter of your food is gone and notice it, then again when it's half gone, slow down again."

Riley noticed new things about the food he was eating when he slowed down to truly taste it.

"Some of the foods felt a lot different and I was like, ‘I'm eating something that smells like this?'" he said.

The Reneaus and Reidenbach also talked about cravings.

"We're always going to have cravings and want certain things and food," Mark said.

What to do about them may sound surprising.

"You should go ahead and eat it because you will still want it and not be satisfied, but just don't eat as much of it," Amie Reneau said. "You can share the fries or get a small size, not the super-sized."

It really all comes down to balance.

"She won't have the fries and the cheeseburger and the milkshake," Mark said. "Instead, she could have the fries and maybe a grilled chicken sandwich."

It's also important to remember that no foods are "bad."

"The whole concept of food deprivation we try to avoid because that can set up the whole idea of wanting and craving," Reidenbach said. "Emotional cravings tend to arise from thinking we can't have certain types of foods."

The third key thing to remember is when eating the craved food, don't feel guilty. Instead take the time to truly enjoy it.

"Eat it mindfully, thinking about the taste and texture and how good it tastes to you," Amie said.

"If we can get through the permission part, slowing down and being mindful and then not feel guilty, Wow! What a different outlook on feeding our bodies," Reidenbach said. "[We should leave an eating situation] feeling empowered. Thinking I was in control of that eating situation and emotions."

Keeping in the theme of slowing down to savor the moment, the support gift this week was a meditation CD, Time to Relax, from Consulting and Counseling Services.

"[With meditation] we tend to be less depressed and less anxious," Reidenbach said. "Blood pressure can go down, if you have high blood pressure to a more normal level, if you practice relaxation and meditation on a daily basis."

Amie and Mark were excited to try the CD.

"My prayer time is my meditation time," Amie said. "This comes at a perfect time because I just made a commitment to spend 40 minutes a day, not necessarily all at once, praying and reading and being by myself. I think this will be helpful to be more consistent."

Mark added that prayer is important to him and Amie.

"You feel more well-rounded, more grounded. You don't get as uptight when stress happens," he said.

This week the family also re-visited the hunger/fullness concept from a few weeks ago with a fun game for the kids.

On a mat on the floor, Reidenbach laid out five pictures of a stomach at different stages of hunger or fullness: extremely hungry, hungry, just okay, full and extremely full.

"I liked seeing what your stomach would look like in a picture. It will help me in learning how I feel," Chloe said.

Under each picture, Riley and Chloe then put words to describe how the different hunger stages can feel.

"You