Maybe Your Eating Habits Make More Sense Than You Think

Written by Vania Phitidis
Peaceful Eating Coach
Last updated on 20 August 2026

This week, I spent an entire coaching session with a client while she ate a sandwich.

It might sound a bit strange. But there was a reason for it.

We weren’t trying to teach her how to eat “properly” or make her eat more slowly. We were curious about what happened when she paid attention to what was going on while she ate.

She had a sandwich with cheese and pickle, and some satsumas.

We started by checking in with her body. She was hungry. She noticed the familiar gnawing, empty feeling in her stomach. It was quite subtle, and she realised she often didn’t pay much attention to it.

She had also noticed that she’d been tempted to snack while making her lunch. Then she’d started judging herself for wanting to snack.

She hadn’t eaten since breakfast at 9.30.

So we talked about the sandwich.

She likes sandwiches. She particularly likes bread. As she ate, she noticed the smell of it and how much she enjoyed the taste.

But she also noticed something else.

She was hurrying.

Even though she knew that taking her time made eating more enjoyable, she kept thinking about the next bite.

Then she noticed something she’d never really paid attention to before.

She was eating the sandwich strategically.

She was working her way around it, eating the crusts first so that she could save the part she liked best until last.

We stopped there for a moment.

Why did she need to save the best bit?

I asked her what would happen if she ate the part she enjoyed most first.

“But then I’d have to end with the crusts.”

“Would it be possible to leave the crusts?”

“But then I might be hungry.”

Maybe.

Maybe she wouldn’t.

And if she was hungry, what could she do?

She could eat something else. She could make another half sandwich without the crusts. She could have something different.

There were lots of possibilities.

The important thing wasn’t whether she eventually ate the crusts.

It was discovering that she’d been acting as though there was only one option.

Eat the whole sandwich. Save the best bit until last. Don’t waste food. Don’t eat too much.

In the end, she didn’t eat the crusts. And she didn’t want or need anything else.

But that wasn’t the goal.

The interesting thing was that she had discovered another possibility. She didn’t have to eat the sandwich in the way she’d always eaten it.

In fact, if she’d eaten all the crusts first, she might have become full before she got to the part she really enjoyed. And she might then have eaten that anyway.

There was no way of knowing in advance what would happen.

And that was the point.

She didn’t need to know. She could pay attention and respond to what was actually happening.

Then we got curious about why eating quickly and making sure she ate the whole sandwich had felt so important.

She realised that part of the rushing came from years of eating quickly. She had worked as a nurse, where eating quickly had been normal. Her family had also tended to eat quickly.

But there was something deeper.

When she was a child, bread had been restricted because it was considered “fattening”. Her mother had decided she needed to lose weight. Portions were controlled. Seconds weren’t encouraged. Food was taken away.

She remembered often finishing a meal still hungry.

Over time, she had learned to convince herself that this was normal.

She also remembered that bread had sometimes been something she would steal because it was easy to take without anyone noticing.

Suddenly, eating a sandwich quickly didn’t look quite so much like a bad habit.

It made sense.

If you’ve learned that food might be restricted, taken away or unavailable, it makes sense to want to eat quickly when you have it.

If you’ve learned that bread is “fattening”, it makes sense that eating bread might bring up thoughts about whether you should be eating it.

If you’ve spent years overriding hunger, it makes sense that hunger might become something you barely notice.

And if you’ve learned that there is a “right” way to eat a sandwich, you might not even realise you’re following a rule.

This is one of the things I find most useful about becoming curious about our eating rather than constantly trying to change it.

Our eating habits often make sense.

Not necessarily because they’re helpful now. But because they developed for a reason.

We can have a habit of eating quickly and assume we need to practise eating slowly.

But it might be more useful to ask: What happens inside me when I slow down?

We might eat everything on our plate and assume we need more willpower to stop.

But what if there’s a part of us that has learned, Eat it now. You might not get any more later.

We might feel anxious about eating bread and think we need to challenge that fear.

But first we might ask: What have I learned about bread?

We might keep eating when we’re no longer hungry because we’ve learned not to trust hunger and fullness signals in the first place.

The session wasn’t really about the sandwich.

It was about noticing what was going on underneath the eating.

And that’s often where things get interesting.

When you’ve spent years trying to control your eating, it can be tempting to replace one set of rules with another.

Eat slowly.

Stop when you’re full.

Eat without distractions.

Listen to your hunger.

These can all be useful. But they can also become more things you’re supposed to do correctly.

The point isn’t to become a perfect mindful eater.

It’s to become more interested in what’s going on.

What am I feeling?

Am I hungry?

What am I thinking about this food?

Do I actually want it?

Am I rushing?

What am I afraid might happen if I don’t eat it?

Where did I learn that this food was “bad”?

And perhaps most importantly:

What other possibilities are there?

Sometimes the answers tell us much more than another food rule ever could.

Your eating habits might make more sense than you think.