#im also passionate about combating diet culture and having a healthy relationship with food

[gay-jesus-probably]

First of all, didn't know that about testosterone, so definitely sharing that particular PSA.

Anyways, that point about eating junk food being better than nothing is absolutely correct, cannot stress that enough. Putting aside the question of nutrients, your body needs a basic amount of energy to keep going every day, and a calorie is literally just a unit of measurement for that particular energy. For most people, between 2000-3000 calories a day is what you need to maintain your baseline, and if you're under 1500 calories a day, congratulations, you're starving. ...That's a very bad thing, to be clear. Starving puts your body under extreme stress and damages your long term health.

Furthermore, remember, that 2000-3000 number is just the baseline; the human body is always doing a lot of things at any given moment, even if you're just laying in bed all day doing literally nothing you'll still need at least 1500 calories a day. Maybe you're not doing anything, but your organs are still hard at work keeping you alive. Going about your usual daily business will mean more calories, and if you're under more physical strain than usual, guess what that means, it's a higher caloric requirement.

Going through puberty? Your body is under massive stress at all times, you definitely need more calories. Having your period? Your uterus is having regular contractions for up to a week to shed its inner liner, and your bone marrow has to make a lot of new blood, you need more calories. Is it really cold out? Your endocrine system needs to work harder to keep your core temperature up, you need more calories. Are you exercising? You need more calories.

Not to circle back to the Antarctica stuff again, but a good example of that is how the Terra Nova expedition rather infamously ended in tragedy, with the entire five man South Pole team dying on the way back. They were all eating around 4400 calories a day, but Robert Scott, Edward Wilson and Henry Bowers starved to death - the British refused to use sled dogs like literally everyone else, so after all their ponies died (yes they brought ponies to Antarctica instead of Huskies, no I don't know what the fuck they were thinking) they were left manhauling all their supplies... and manhauling across Antarctica means they were burning between 7000-10,000 calories a day. Hence why the last three survivors wound up quietly dying of starvation in their tent. The other two members of the team, Edgar Evans and Lawrence Oates, died earlier in the journey. Evans probably died of head trauma, as he abruptly collapsed and died one day after having fallen and hit his head on the ice several times, while Oates committed suicide about two weeks before the other three died - he had severe frostbite and gangrene in his hands and feet, and was lethally slowing their travel speed, but the other three refused to leave him. He forced the matter by leaving the tent during a blizzard one night, ensuring the others would have to leave him behind, to give them a small chance of survival.

...That stuff about Oates is totally irrelevant to the intuitive eating thing, I just can't talk about the Terra Nova expedition without bringing him up, man went out like a hero. On his own birthday too. In other news this post is still a thinly veiled excuse for me to infodump about early Antarctic exploration, it's all just so neat! Sorry about getting depressing there, but I can make up for it; enjoy this photo from the Scottish expedition of 1902-1904, where a very confused penguin is serenaded with the bagpipes.

As a general rule, if you're having food cravings, you should probably pay attention to that, because it's usually a sign that your body needs something. Like, if you've just finished a workout and are suddenly desperately craving fries? Maybe you're low on salt, you did just sweat a whole bunch. Period cravings for junk food? Your body's under some stress and working hard, you need energy, and foods with a lot of fat and/or sugar are an easy way to get that.

Back in the early 1900's when exploring Antarctica was all the rage, y'know what was a major part of everyones daily rations? Butter. Just butter. The men out on the sledging teams would have cravings to eat entire sticks of butter with nothing else, so that was included in their rations. And that happened because under those extreme circumstances, their bodies desperately needed as many calories as possible, so their diet consisted mainly of butter, chocolate, and animal fat. Eating entire sticks of butter was the healthiest possible diet for them.

That's an extreme example of course, but my point is, there's no such thing as inherently Good or Bad food. Anything that's edible can be healthy under the right circumstances, just like anything can be an unhealthy choice under the wrong circumstances. Your body knows what it needs. Listen to it. Unless you're actively going through a serious medical situation, you do not need a tightly restricted diet. Diet culture is a scam, body fat is natural and healthy, food is good for you, and calories are the fuel your body needs to power its continued survival.