I really wanted to love this but it just felt a little repetitive to me and didn’t really end up telling me how to raise an intuitive eater. There were definitely some valid points but I wish the how to would have gone more in depth.

I wish I had this book when I had my child, and that my parents had it when I was young. The author does an excellent job in laying out why the way a lot of parents (including mine) used to say things like "clean your plate" or "watch what you're eating" and that this actually can lead to eating disorders. She gives a lot of examples and very clear advice on how you should handle those types of situations. I think it was excellent and the narration was great. I want to thank the author, the publisher, and Netgalley for giving me an e-copy of this book, in return for an honest review.

On the whole the book is educational and breaks down the reasoning behind each lesson, if you will, easily. But the concept of not making food such a big deal and allowing kids to eat their full to ensure they don’t build long lasting negative food habits and body image issues- without giving real life advice on how to explain to your VERY self assured 6 year old dictator that eating half a bag of pirates booty and nothing else for breakfast probably isn’t great, simple does not help.

I’m a millennial who has been taught and influenced through decades of societal food propaganda and it’s frankly hard to shake. Where’s the beef? Beef- it’s what’s for dinner. Got Milk? Weight Watchers to Jenny Craig to Noom. I Quit Sugar. Paleo. Keto. Alllllll the things.

And kids are smart sneaky little elves. How do I make them understand nutrition but also not make food a big deal? Especially when mommy and daddy are trying to lose weight and eat salads and grilled veggies but also willing to eat their way through Disney World?!

Most of what this book teaches is common knowledge now. It didn’t add anything new to the table and didn’t really give me anything new to work with. I listened to the audiobook a while ago and forgot about even reviewing this. Sadly, it’s a pass.

I loved this! I only wish that I had read it before I had kids. However, all hope is not lost. This book still provides a lot of different ways to help my daughters become intuitive eaters. A must read for all parents!

I really enjoyed this one!

As someone who grew up in the toxic diet culture era, and who worked with school aged children in a day care setting, I've seen my fair share of forcing kids to finish their meals. This never sat well with me, and I'm so glad to have this book to challenge the standards.

There was so much great information about how shifting your own experience with food and dieting can help you support children on their intuitive eating journey. While I knew the idea of labeling foods as good or bad was not a healthy approach, I was glad to also have the suggestions of a family-style self serve meal whenever possible, and the research and support for the claims made in the book.

Though I don't have children of my own, I'm doing some self reflecting and inner-child work, and this is a really great resource for digging into why I address food with so much moral value where it does not need any. I think anyone who interacts with children should read this book.

While I really enjoyed this one, it was a lot to absorb - the audiobook length of 16 hours is a testament to that! I could create bookmarks to go back and revisit, but I'd definitely recommend a physical book for reference later.

How to Raise an Intuitive Eater: Raising the Next Generation with Food and Body Confidence by Sumner Brooks; Amee Severson is an attempt to provide guidelines for raising children without food issues. I agree with the authors' beginning premise that children are not born with food issues; however, I do not think that they provide much in the way of ways to help this situation. This feels like a manifesto for why we need to help kids and a call to action. I like that the authors address the mental health and food insecurity components of this issue. I just hoped for a lot more in this book. I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher with no obligations. These opinions are entirely my own.

How to Raise an Intuitive Eater is a game changer. All parents (and adults in general) could benefit from reading it. It is well-researched, well-written, and well-narrated. It had a perfect balance of tangible steps and reasoning.

As a Millennial who was very influenced by diet culture growing up, both directly from the those around me and indirectly by the media and society, (Weight Watchers, Low Fat diet, NutriSystem, Atkins diet, Keto diet, Paleo diet) I've worked hard the past 10 years on breaking free of disordered eating, negative body image and food thoughts.

It’s been so important to me since becoming a parent to make sure I’m not passing these things on to my kiddo, and to ensure that they have a healthy relationship with food, eating, and their body.

This book really helps to guide you in shifting your thinking away from bad food vs. good foods and controlling how much and what kinds of foods your child (and yourself) should be eating to a more intuitive and food neutral approach. It gives you the language to help you change the narrative so you are creating a supportive, judgment free environment while acknowledging, it’s important to still have boundaries and do what works best for your family.

The most important thing about this book is how it embraces intersectionality.
It repeatedly talks about how race, class, ableism affect the access people have to food, how they are treated by society and the medical profession, and that fatphobia fuels a lot of misinformation and manipulation which often leads to disordered eating and mental health issues.

If you are looking to change your feelings about food and model positive thinking to give your children the tools they need to feed their bodies and feel good about themselves, this is a great place to start.

***Thank you to Dreamscape Media for providing me with a copy of the audiobook for free via NetGalley for an unbiased review.

If the Intuitive Eating book resonated with you, then you’ll enjoy How to Raise an Intuitive Eater! Very insightful with lots of good food for thought. It has had a profound effect on how I am interacting with my very selective eater.

I LOVED this book! It was so eye opening and really got me thinking. I’m a child of the 90’s and a Virgo/rule follower/recovering perfectionist/control freak/enneagram one to my absolute core and I needed this book. To be honest I really didn’t realize my own food issues until reading this book nor did I know much about intuitive eating beyond following “@feedinglittles” on Instagram. This book was very detailed and really broke things down. It will stick with me for a long time and will definitely make an impact on my life and the kids that I care for.

4 out of 5 stars

I have now read three parenting books since becoming a mom and can say this has been my favorite, by far. I thought I signed up for an instructional manual on instilling healthy eating habits and instead got an intersectional, body-positive, “woke” guide on manifesting food freedom. This is a great read for anyone who has ever struggled with how to feed their child or has their own past with disordered eating or fatphobic thinking that you don’t wish to pass on. I’d say it’s also equally useful for both those who are new and practiced with Intuitive Eating concepts.

One of my greatest parenting fears has always been how to avoid giving my kid a complex about food. It took all of my adolescence and twenties to unlearn harmful food rules from diet culture. This book gave me so much confidence and clarity to help raise a human who will have a healthy relationship with food and their body.


Informed by the original work of Intuitive Eating founders Eveylyn Tribole and Elyse Resch, Brooks and Severson thoroughly cover the three keys to raising an intuitive eater:
🔑 Provide unconditional love & support for your child’s body.
🔑 Implement a flexible & reliable feeding routine.
🔑 Develop & use your “Intuitive Eating” voice.

Some quick take-aways:
🍎Avoid weight talk.
🥯Don’t restrict or push food.
🥦When possible, eat family-style (self serve) meals together.
🍩Don’t label foods as “good” or “bad.”

Some other things I loved about this book:
You know how sometimes when you’re reading nonfiction, you start to question some lessons or the author and you save that point in your head for later, hoping they address it? Every single question that came up for me was eventually answered. What about dessert? Juice? Autism eating habits? What about when my kid whines for a snack right before dinner? How does talking about exercise factor into this? What do I say when others make food and weight comments? All of them were answered.

Educational nonfiction and self-improvement books sometimes turn into a laundry list of new instructions you should be implementing into your life. The glorious part of this book is that it actually gave me permission to DO LESS and stop worrying about rules and recommendations.

This was a thorough look at the history of diet culture and its roots which are still pervasive in every part of our lives. The authors move on to discuss current socioeconomic barriers to healthy eating and ways we as parents can be mindful of looking past restricting food and letting our children determine what feels good for their body. While Ellyn Satter is the preeminent voice on food and nutrition for children, the authors do reference her division of responsibility and utilize this heavily in their "three keys" for intuitive eating. What I liked about this particular source was that they also referenced Dr. Robert Siegel, and other authorities on parenting to ensure you are meeting the needs of the whole child and not just looking at their food intake.

The audiobook was long, and some parts did feel repetitive, but being a recording, it was tricky to look ahead to see if I could skip around or flip forward to a section that pertained to me. As other reviewers stated, the manifesto took such a long time it was lengthy and repetitive.

I thought the narrator did a very nice job reading and I would overall recommend this book for anyone interested in intuitive eating and the principles behind it.

This book is SO important. Having myself struggled with the diet culture I was raised in, I am now raising 2 children who I want to have total control over their own bodies and what they are putting into them for nourishment. It's so hard to change your views on something when you have been told the opposite your whole life. This book proves that there is a better way and by giving children the tools they need, we can break the cycle and they can trust themselves with the things they eat and know what is best for themselves. It also is a great reminder that children hear and see everything you say and do and that they internalize it and it will effect their future self worth and mental health. The best part of this book is that is explains the science to back up the method. I also appreciated how it went into explaining the mental health implications. What a powerful read!

Thank you NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for access to this ARC!

Though I am not a parent, I am an educator and caregiver for young children. I gravitated to this title because I have struggled with my relationships to both food and my body for nearly my entire life, and I want to do better for the children in my care.

The conversations presented in this book are ideas and behaviors I will strive to incorporate in my classroom; in the way I talk about food and nutrition with my children.

This is a book I will be recommending to families for years to come. Before even finishing my arc, I went and ordered my own copy from my local bookstore.

It will challenge what you think you know about your relationship with food and nutrition and "diet culture," at leaat it definitely did for me, but we are all long overdue for a reset.

The ideas presented in this book are backed by real research, and both authors present the information in accessible language. They're writing to reach everyday people, not just other intellectuals and PhDs. The writing is concise and easy to understand.

More than that, they approach the concept of intuitive eating, while taking a spectrum of factors into account: culture and race, gender identity and sexuality, food insecurity and socioeconomic status. Which, frankly, is not something I see enough of when discussing "health". And these are factors that should definitely be a part of these conversations.

If you are a parent or spend any time with children at all, I highly recommend this book. In fact, I think there is something everyone could take away from this book - after all, who said we cannot raise ourselves to be intuitive eaters?

A solid five out of five stars.

There was lots of great information and argument in this audiobook. It really gets down and dirty talking about the truth of our relationship with food. I loved how it was really geared towards the parents and their issues BECAUSE kids learn behavior from their parents. This book helped me really reflect on the hard truth about the diet culture and attitudes toward food. Huge thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to listen and review this book.

As a registered dietitian who works with families with young children i found this to be a great resource and very much needed. The topics discussed in this book are very relevant for many families. I appreciated that this book was written by fellow registered dietitians.

I wanted a book to help nature kids' inner hunger cues and cravings, but I was disappointed how heavily this book focused on childhood nutrition. This is not my definition of intuitive eating.
I will not be reviewing this book publicly.