When diets are projected in Plato’s Insta-cave

A few weeks ago, my private Instagram led me to a reel titled ‘What my toddler eats in a day’. Unlike those ‘my kid eats broccoli like a champion’ videos – that are falsely suggesting that eating broccoli is one of the highest achievements in parenting – this video promoted a high-protein, low-carb, and moderately fruits and veggies diet for young kids, casually posted by a baby food brand. Think of it as a mini version of the caveman diet, thriving on controversy, pseudoscience, and food privilege. While I could debunk her nutritional arguments, I won’t do that here and now.

What struck me most was how naturally my old Instagram account – with the likes and loves from my past self – guided me to this content, normalizing what I now categorize as disordered eating. If there’s one takeaway I want you to remember, it’s please be mindful of the social media accounts you follow. Think of all the accounts you follow like the digital version of Plato’s cave, where we sit down, disconnected from each other, scrolling and letting social media consciously and unconsciously co-shape our reality. When our Instagram walls project highly restrictive diets, this digital cave can imprison us in diet culture, negatively affecting our health. Yet, we don’t always see these diets as highly restrictive. We see them as ‘normal’, as within range, as ‘this is how I should eat’, making us feel bad if reality takes us – or our kids – to different food choices.

This brings me to the second important point – what’s often misunderstood about picky eating is how much it depends on our adult perspective. ‘Food neophobia’, as this natural developmental stage is called, offers a more objective, child-focused perspective, freeing us from the constraints of our digital cave. After all, in this digital cave, it’s easy to think that kids are picky when they refuse some proteins, say ‘no’ to most veggies, and prefer bread, pasta, or cookies. What if what we collectively call ‘picky’ could be a child showing a natural preference for carbs, responding to their hunger cues, energy needs, and what feels good to eat? I’m not saying that we need to serve kids’ food, on the contrary. But what might be helpful is to release ourselves from the idea that it is our job to get our kids to eat – in general, or specific foods because they are projected in our digital cave.

So how do we step out of this digital cave, where we feel the need to match, morph or control our (child’s) eating to what we see on our walls? One of the steps is to connect with other parents, which is exactly what we do in the weekly sessions of my membership. Another step is to truly understand what is going on. From there, we can become more food-neutral. Say, what? Food neutrality does not mean that food leaves you cold, or that all food is alike. I love food, and I’d be sad if all food tastes equally (image that!). But what this concept of food neutrality means is that we treat all foods the same, meaning that we delete the morality, the good and the bad, so that the emotional after-taste is equal. Our food choices are highly complex, and narrowing it down to ‘good versus bad for us’ has rarely served anyone.

Now, take a moment to reflect on how Instagram (or TikTok) influences your experience of your kids’ eating habits. 

• How does the content that you see (in general or from specific accounts) co-shape your thoughts and feelings about what your child eats?
• What does this content make you do? How does this affect your family meals?
• Is all of this helpful (or not), and why?

And if that feels hard, I’m here to help you.