The Beck Diet Solution is a psychological program, not a food plan. It provides a step-by-step program to learn specific techniques to stay on our diet, lose weight, and maintain our weight loss for life. The program is based on Dr. Beck's clinical research in Cognitive Therapy (CT).
The Complete Beck Diet for Life expands the earlier work and includes a food plan with suggested menus. From the cover:
With The Complete Beck Diet for Life you'll discover the 5 stages of successful dieting and maintenance. You'll learn how to motivate yourself, give yourself credit for every change you make, create time and energy for dieting, and handle hunger and cravings. Dr. Beck eases you into changing one step at a time. You'll master one task before moving on to the next. And you'll learn techniques to deal with challenging situations, such as sticking with ou plan at celebrations and dealing with "food pushers." With Dr. Beck's skills, you'll achieve a lifetime of healthful eating and lifelong motivation.
This is a place to discuss the Beck strategies and our daily efforts, to receive and provide support, and, for some of us, is where we serve as on-line diet buddy (coach) to each other.
If youve arrived from a search engine, you've landed at the site of 3 Fat Chicks (3FC), a remarkable place for those interested in a healthy life style, including mindful eating, exercise, and weight loss. More about the site, including how to register so that you can post, can be found here.
The books are available on Amazon through the 3FC store by clicking their names above; buying through 3FC helps to cover the costs of running this site.
You can find the list of previous (or more current) monthly Beck threads here on 3 Fat Chicks via:
Thursday - Golden Gate Bridge closes due to high winds (1951, San Francisco)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - Was surprised that half my class didn't show up. One member had contacted COVID-19 and, although not sure, thinks it was from the class because "Where else would it have been from." I'm not convinced. I attended wearing a mask. Only one other person of the six students at the big table wore a mask. I have such mixed feelings about how much to isolate for protection. For the first two years, I was almost a hermit. Wish it was more obvious how to go forward.
The class on Information, Inference, and Learning covered two neat ideas. "Gambler's Ruin" shows that a gambler in a fair game with a negative expectation, will eventually go broke regardless of his betting strategy. Good to know should I decide to take to casino visiting for my next amusement. The other showed that the process of genetic inheritance will either completely eliminate a new gene from a population or 100% insert it into the genome of the entire population. Statistics are so not intuitive to me. Today, we have the advantage that we can run a simulation for a zillion generations to demonstrate this happening. I so admire the mathematicians of old who could only do this on paper. Thank you Andrey Markov and Pavel Nekrasov whose bitter rivalry pushed the study of statistics forward making possible the Google page search algorithm.
Eating was on plan, CREDIT moi, with only some almonds for an afternoon snack. I have something that I have to find among some boxes of papers that I don't look forward to. It was obvious to me that a snack would make the searching more productive. Dinner was a chicken dish in a to-die-for sauce that called for a baguette to sop up the juice. Felt like five star dining. A good baguette makes everything better.
Joy (gardenerjoy) - And now, Super Congrats for completing your novel. Do you have thoughts about publishing? The topic sounds enticing. My take is that 19% completing 50,000 words is very high.
maryann - So neat that you'll get to attend your DS's concert in Michigan.
Karen (karenrn) - Yay for your DH being the consumer of the cashew brittle. Thanks for the reminder that we have more time behind us than ahead.
curlyjax - Ouch for the wrong credit card charges; hope that gets resolved. I would be more concerned about coyotes than bears, also.
Readers -
Quote:
Chapter 6Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan
Create a Social Eating Mindset
If you feel deprived, remind yourself that if you overeat, you will be deprived of feeling in control, good about yourself, proud when you leave the event, and happy when you get on the scale the next morning.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 151.
I successfully wrote a few paragraphs this morning in what kind of feels like my New Year for writing.
I weighed for the first time in an over a week and was pleasantly surprised by the number. It's about a pound above where I want to be, but five pounds less than I feared. My goal for December is to just keep stepping on the scale. That's enough to keep things from going off the rails too much.
I successfully completed my exercise goals for November. It was a little harder to get there this month with only one hiking day. I'll try to take advantage of any better weather days to get out to Shaw Nature Reserve this month.
Exercise +45, 1700/1700 minutes for November
karenrn: I'm approaching the next draft with an experimental attitude. To start, I'm aiming for an hour or two a day but if I could sneak it up to three hours, that's going to help me feel like I'm really making progress. Today, I only managed about an hour and a half. That got me a few paragraphs and some research that will help me get a few more paragraphs tomorrow.
Thanks for the reminder about distractions. I've been frequently hungry right after I eat, which I find annoying and give into more than I want. Much better to wait a while to see if it disappears since I know that it almost always will.
BillBlueEyes: I'm remaining a hermit and, for the most part, not being too concerned about it. I remind myself that I'm actually writing a novel instead of just talking about it. That might never have happened and going back to my normal life will make it hard to continue.
I estimate that I'm a year away from having a draft that I'd let my brother read. Publishing is a daydream.
Just a quick check in. I went to the gym and did elliptical and weights instead of the class cause I wanted to go earlier. Food has been on plan, weight down a smidge. I made a batch of candy and put it in the drawer. So far no nibbles. This afternoon I saw the Fablemans. It was really good, but long and quite sad.
Friday - Napoleon Bonaparte crowned Emperor of the French (1804, Notre Dame de Paris)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - The mission was to buy a corded electric snow blower. We'd used one that an ex-neighbor owned that worked pretty well. We want corded with the cumbersome electric cord to drag around because we live on a small property and the plug-in version is significantly lighter than the battery versions. (And DW is thinking about one that she can use if I disappear.) Trip to Home Depot was a mess. Met a helpful "associate" with gray hair who was doing this job after a career as a teacher. Very laid back. Very knowledgeable. They had none in stock - in fact they still had lawnmowers on the floor. "There's no big back room to store stuff; what you see is what we have." Didn't solve our problem that DW wanted to see if she could lift it to carry up from the basement.
So off we go to a specialty store that sells powered equipment, including massive lawn equipment. I like visiting to tweek the geek in me. Especially like the stand on rider mowers even though that could make for a long day. None in stock. "But try the hardware store next door; they have the Toro 1800." Jiminy Crickets, that's the exact model we want. It's the hardware store where the manager calls DW by her first name since she buys so much stuff for her different gardens. "That floor model is our last one; none in the back, none at the distributor." We grabbed it with glee, along with two green wreaths and a red Poinsettia. The green wreaths were much better than the ones being sold at the supermarket that, in the past, DW has bought, taken apart, and put back together as an acceptable wreath. Great shopping trip. A successful shopping trip is rare enough for me to celebrate.
Eating was on plan, CREDIT moi, with only an afternoon snack of some almonds. I continue to think that a snack will cure whatever ails at the moment. Dinner was reheated grilled salmon, broccoli, and half a sweet potato along with the always served green salad. Standard fare for us, but rather splendid eating.
Joy (gardenerjoy) - Neat to have a goal of a version of your novel sufficiently advanced that you'd let your brother read it. I look forward to buying it at my local book store.
Karen (karenrn) - What a surprise that you have a Steven Speilberg movie about Arizona, The Fabelmans. I hadn't known that Speilberg grew up in Arizona.
Readers -
Quote:
Chapter 6Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan
Create a Social Eating Mindset
If you fool yourself into thinking it is okay to change your eating plan at the last minute, ask yourself how well making spontaneous food decisions has worked in the past.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 151.
The exterminator came yesterday and plugged up another hole, hopefully I'm set for a year. he suggested I put crushed gravel around the house to prevent that again, so I made a note of it. I've been having a fun time reading some diet/lifestyle plans like The Total Reset, and Target 100 -thank you Penny. Food will be a little challenging over the next few days as I'm zipping off today to bring my dad home from rehab and settle him back home. The weather looks decent for this part-maybe rain when I come back but better than snow as they say. I'm mostly packed but have some odds and ends to deal with. I won't be checking in since its too hard on the phone and I only have a wierd password in my laptop that I can't remember so wave to all and see you in a few days!
I'm experiencing some stress over family dynamics, financial worry for the Dear Niece, and a list that's starting to feel perennially too long at a time when I expected things to ease up a bit. Usually what works for me is taking some time to plan -- but time is the one thing that seems short at the moment.
Here's my reminder that the one thing that I know won't help is extra food. The one thing that I know will help is exercise. So, there's two priorities for today. That actually helps. I wasn't sure that I knew one thing for certain and it turns out that I know two!
Woops missed a day BUT, I'm still on plan. Doing pretty good even with a couple longings to comfort eat- once after returning home from sitting with my friend getting her chemo treatment, and then again today after working a long shift.
Bill, I'm glad you weren't one of the many out with Covid. The flu seems to be going around a lot right now, and I'm seeing covid people too. Hoping my mask is holding tight.
Joy, congrats on a successful month, and how exciting you're making real progress on a novel! I hope things smooth out with your niece.
Curly, yay for getting your dad settled back into his place. Maryann got all of us reading that Target 100 book. I'm still slowly working through it, a few pages before sleep each night.
Karen, all this baking sounds so good! The smell would make it tempting.
Saturday - Neon lights first publicly displayed (1910, Paris Auto Show)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - Was rather inconvenienced by some traffic jams and annoyed at the sound of overhead helicopters. Didn't get it at first; then remembered that Joe and Jill and Kate and Will were all in town for different reasons all to merge at the Kennedy Center for the Royals to make "Earthshot Prize Awards." The good news is that the local newspapers carried a to-die-for picture of a young boy in a faux bear-skin hat giving flowers to Princess Kate. Can always use one more picture of a cute kid. The papers are spending little space describing the good work of the award winners, but putting out the front page story that Kate rented her green dress. We are not amused.
Eating was kinda OK, but high. I attended a party associated with the classes I'm taking held in an old building with lots and lots of dark, carved, paneling. Good 'ole boys kind of place. I skipped lunch so that I could declare whatever I ate to be lunch. CREDIT moi for that part. I snacked modestly at the cheese table; nothing that I hadn't had before. But then the walking hors d'oeurves started. The lobster and avocado on small cracker was worth fighting for. The vertical spiral of smoked salmon with a tiny touch of marvelous white sauce grabbed me. There was an unknown sausage in a minuscule filo (phylo) pastry tube. All were one-bite tiny - none of those skewered teriyaki-covered chicken tenders that require a plate and napkin to survive. I had a half-dozen good conversations with folks that I've known for a few years and taken classes with. Only at a family gathering do I tend to know so many people.
Joy (gardenerjoy) - Good to be reminded that extra food won't help but that exercise will. Wish you well trying to help your Dear Niece.
curlyjax - Wish you a successful trip to settle your dad from rehab to home. Good to hear that he's making that transition.
Penny. - Always Kudos for "still on plan." You're a good friend for sitting with your friend for her chemo treatment.
Readers -
Quote:
Chapter 6Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan
Create a Social Eating Mindset
Overeating at social events strengthens your giving in muscle and is likely to make it harder to stay on track, exert self-control at the next event, and, ultimately, lose weight.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 151.
Yesterday was too much off plan eating. It was a very unstructured day which doesn't seem to help me. I did get Otis out for a walk and drove around doing some errands. I'm not hiking again today and will get some more Christmas things done like the cards and finish the last bit of decorating. Yesterday was 6 years since we flew to Denver to pick up Otis. We enjoyed looking back at the photos we took that day or our beautiful little pup.
Bill I wanted to remember to tell you that I saw in the paper the other day that on Wednesday, UNESCO, named the baguette something worthy of humanity's preservation, adding it to its exalted "intangible cultural heritage" list. I guess this was done as boulangeries in rural areas are vanishing. I know you will appreciate this. The appetizers at your function sound wonderful.
Penny I'm sure your friend was very grateful to have your companionship and support as she had her chemo treatment. Good job on staying on plan. I shall return to on plan today.
GardenerJoy I hope the stress over dn and the too long list subsides. Meanwhile congrats for remembering food won't help.
Curlyjax I hope things go smoothly with getting your Dad home and situated. It's those kind of situations that make me want to move back to Washington where there is more family nearby at some point. I just hope if we move in ten years or so that it is soon enough.
Maryann I hope you got to Michigan safe and sound and are having a good time. I think today is the concert.
I got to a point of "That's all I can do" with the family stuff, yesterday. Fortunately, I've managed to develop a skill for letting go of things when I've done all I can do. So, the day improved after that. CREDIT for no extraneous eating and for using exercise to release any remaining stress.
Today's a new day with a new thing to try, but I'll see if I can continue yesterday's stance of observation and detachment.
I intend to take part of the weekend to figure out how to build a more relaxed December than the one that has been developing so far.
In the meantime, I completed my first scene in my new draft of my novel. It's not the first scene in the novel. For the first time, I'm going to work on scenes out of order, in ways that help me focus the research so that I'm researching just enough to write the scenes. In the last couple of years, I've generated a lot of research notes, but research notes aren't scenes and don't help me write a novel as much as I like to think they will.
I stepped on the scale and am pleased with the direction it's going.
The house is a disaster again and I'd like to organized a bit and pack up my paintings today. Both the ex and my youngest noted that would be sad and make the home feel less homey. Yes, that is exactly my reason. Better to feel the sadness now and make adjustments while I'm still here. I think everyone will adjust easier.
Sunday - Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent occupies Baghdad (1534)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - The bummer was scheduling a walk to include picking up a prescription from the drug store. Promised to be ready by 3:00 pm. Thanks to the marvels of their good interactive data base that I kept checking, I knew that it continued to be "In Progress." So, I kept delaying . . . until too late to take the walk. I'm really annoyed with myself because I didn't NEED the prescription immediately; I could get it on any day out walking over the next week. But I let clever technology dictate my plan instead of being a servant. The only good news about that is that I avoided going into the drug store and waiting in line for an hour. Now THAT'S a real bummer.
Excitement was going to a live concert in the evening. Once again, we saw George Frideric Handel's Messiah. And, once again, we were within ten feet of the soloists and conductor. We wore masks the whole time; only about 20% of the audience did. Most of the orchestra didn't. The debate seems to rage whether we're still in the midst of a pandemic or past it. As always, we were moved nearly to tears when the bass soloist sang "The trumpet shall sound" and the period-horn blasted away. The bass and the horn player were both young and both Blacks in a sea of white and often old faces. When done, while the audience was bringing down the rafters with applause, the Bass fist-bumped the horn player in appreciation. Hope that was picked up by one of the eight cameras creating a live-stream as well a version for repeat performances. On the drive home, the three of us (an old friend goes with us) talked in the manner of the 1741 libretto: "He was despisED and rejectED" feeling school-child giddy but honoring the sacred nature of the text.
Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. A simple dinner was eaten in rush so we could get to the concert early; ABSOLUTELY no late seating in a televised performance. A minor exercise of the day was grabbing a parking space in a nearly full parking lot that was far away from the exit we wanted. So far away that when we exited that corner, it was through a one-way "Re-entrance prohibited" door around the block from our destination. Laughed about needing a snack for enough energy to get all the way around to the entrance.
Joy (gardenerjoy) - Wish you could write a book on "letting go of things when I've done all I can do" - I could use that.
Karen (karenrn) - So neat that "UNESCO, named the baguette something worthy of humanity's preservation." We need a splash of good news. I no longer have to feel that I'm overeating when I'm preserving humanity.
Penny. - It's touching to read how you're trying to get the kids to slowly become aware that you're actually leaving the house. Congrats on the desired scale direction.
Readers -
Quote:
Chapter 6Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan
Create a Social Eating Mindset
Keep reminding yourself that you're not being deprived of all food, and you get so many advantages in return.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 151.
No hiking again today. It rained most of the night. I guess I'm not ready to move to Washington because I don't want to get used to that weather again. Food was on plan yesterday. The plan for today is to complete the Christmas cards and do some housework. I'll alternate to make it easier to do both of them.
Bill The concert sounds just fabulous. Do you go every year?
Penny So nice to get positive feedback from the scale. Good job!
GardenerJoy I'm glad you've been able to develop a strategy to let it go when you can do no more. I think I'm a lot better than I used to be for sure.
Curlyjax and Maryann I hope your weekend travels are safe.
DN has signaled that she doesn't want to deal with the thing that everyone else thinks she should be dealing with. I'm not sure whether to be envious or concerned. Mostly, I'm just relieved that she's still communicating with me.
That continues to leave me with nothing to do on the matter, so I'm working on my own stuff. Today is about planning the week, considering what I'm learning from Brenι Brown’s Atlas of the Heart, and reflecting on 2022 while contemplating possibilities for 2023.
Beck Diet For Life/Solution December 2022 Support, Discussion, Buddy/Coach
Thursday - Golden Gate Bridge closes due to high winds (1951, San Francisco)
so wave to all and see you in a few days!
