Beck Diet For Life/Solution – March 2026 – Support, Discussion, Buddy/Coach
 

Welcome to the discussion group, support group, Diet Coach group, Diet Buddy group relating to the two books by Dr. Judith S. Beck:

The Complete Beck Diet for Life
and the first book
The Beck DIET solution: train your brain to think like a thin person.

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 you’ve 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:

List of Monthly Beck Threads for Support, Discussion, Buddy/Coach

Sunday - Pennsylvania 1st US state to abolish slavery, newborns only (1780)
 

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Saw some of the six planet alignment after sunset last night. City lights challenge seeing anything other than the moon at night.

Excitement was a live chamber music concert in a small venue. We sat front row immediately at the right elbow of the first violinist. Mystical experience. The cellist also played a violincello - a three-quarter sized, five-string cello. The fifth string is a higher pitch reaching up to join the violin. The musician who played the theorbo also played the cornetto - a curved wooden wind instrument I'd never heard of before. During intermission, a crowd gathered around the theorbo for a discussion and demonstration. The musicians mingled with the crowd, many were long time supporters. Despite the small crowd, we bumped into three people we knew. Super good evening.

Eating was on plan, CREDIT moi with snacks. The most unnecessary snack was joining the musicians for a small spread after the concert. I had a super-unnecessary iced oatmeal raisin cookie. Enjoyed every bite. I thought I was one of the last on the planet to enjoy oatmeal raising cookies.


Joy (gardenerjoy) – Interesting theory that talking with people reduces your hunger. Waiting to read, "The Talking Diet."

maryann – I'm a big fan of a mended favorite shirt. Good luck rebuilding your "1980s tv skill muscles."

curlyjax – it's pretty special to love one's job - Congrats for being there. LOL at "excitement of gathering tax documents." Still my beating heart.

Readers -

I felt a bit crabby for awhile yesterday feeling like I was going to spend the weekend doing chores on such a beautiful day. My tendon is still sore and i'm don't want to over do it so not using elliptical which makes me crabby, I want to keep up my exercise momentum. Also mad at myself again for letting myself and the house get into such bad shape. Not just clutter but most rooms look shabby and need some intensive cleaning of the walls etc, and it all seems quite overwhelming. I was at least productive in the living room which has been taken over by DD's stuff for months. I emptied and broke down boxes, put large items in the tv room (that's even a bigger mess!) and I can finally see the floor. I also cleared off the kitchen table and changed the tablecloth which creates a feeling of peace. My garden friend texted to invite me to a museum for Sunday (today) so that perked me up and got me moving to get groceries done in the late afternoon so today can be a play day. I did have some of the fabulous Wegmans cake DD wanted, and then ate more later stress eating thinking about the news -possible war etc.
Feeling calmer today and remembering I have taken some productive steps. I can't control the larger events in the world, I can only control my own environment.
Gardenerjoy-interesting theory. I tend to be less hungry or at least can ignore it when I'm busy, so I can relate to that.
Maryann-excellent penny pinching skills. I'm not sure what I do have for free with Prime, I should check it out.
Bill-that concert sounds lovely. I'm one of those people that gets quite disappointed if I think a cookie has chocolate chips and it turns out to be raisin.

Yesterday’s experiment worked well. I was briefly hungry between events but it passed quickly and was gone before I even reached the restaurant. The meeting started immediately and I was completely distracted.

Weirdly, I wasn’t hungry when I got home. It surprises me, but since I generally stopped overeating, I realized that my hunger cues are broken in both directions. I sometimes feel hungry when I’ve eaten a lot. I sometimes don’t feel hungry when I haven’t eaten anything. It’s why eating by the clock works for me and intuitive eating does not.

Today’s challenge is leaving the house at noon and returning around 4pm — that’s for an Open House followed by a basketball game of fourth-graders. Then, leaving again at 4:30pm for a meeting at 5pm where there will be food served. I’m not fully committed to that meeting because I may be physically and mentally exhausted by then.

I’m going to eat my normal breakfast and lunch and then go without food until at least the meeting. If I’m hungry, I’ll have small portions of what is served -- especially if I can call it unique (I have high hopes since it's a meeting that supports immigrants so we might get some home-cooking that is food that I don't cook at home). If I'm not hungry and/or the food is boring, I’ll come home and have a salad and half a turkey sandwich for a late supper.

CREDIT for meeting my exercise goal in February!

Exercise: 55, 1800/1800 minutes for February

Coaches,
Last minute changes had us taking Mom to the concert. Sushi before went beautifully. I split a bento box of chicken teriyaki with mom. I still didn't get home and to bed until 11:30. I woke at at 8:30. How could i ever go back to work life keeping these hours? My Australian guide said that the NT Australians don't really plan on retiring usually. Their social security really is needs based only. I will add this to my gratitude list.

I watched free movies on Tubi while I finished two more sides of the quilt binding. No injuries :dizzy:. I also used Christmas gift cards to purchase a second set of sheets for my new bed, a bed skirt and mattress cover. No out of pocket. Funny DS never complained about not have a bed skirt.

Today's must is the climbing stairs at the gym.

I have so much yard work to do at both the house and the renovation that I am completely overwhelmed. I can totally relate to Curly's feelings.
Joy: I have noticed that for me, social interactive eating success is completely dependent on the food being served. Any dessert items and I am at high risk.
BBE: I would have love the Baroque concert. Academy of St Martins was wonderful but Brahms is not my favorite.

Monday - "King Kong" film starring Fay Wray premieres (1933, NYC)
 

Diet Coaches/Buddies - The (5 yo) DGD arrived tired and hungry after an active playground adventure with friends. Didn't become herself until she'd been given a sliced apple and a bunch of grapes. Then she became her full self and more so. I accepted a game of hide-and-seek where I was to hide. I chose to hide behind the door to the living room from the hallway that didn't fully close with me there. To my surprise, she went about looking at all the places where I wouldn't fit, loudly proclaiming that I wasn't there while blatantly ignoring that I was visible behind the door. Acting just like all of us do when 'looking' for her. She fully understands that the game is to look like one is looking.

Win for the visit was sorting a milk-crate full of Legos. It's a decades old collection DS had used frequently. The contents are jumbled with a few other building sets possibly because of sloppy work on our part cleaning up after he flew the nest but likely because he constructed with different sets together - not a color within the lines type of kid. The DGD was fantastic at sorting the different sets into different zip-lock bags. The only time after a visit with her that we were more organized than before.

Eating was on plan, CREDIT moi, including snacks. The DS and DGD joined us for a simple dinner of rotisserie chicken, Beecher's mac-and-cheese, and broccoli. She eats broccoli stems. Only. Since it was a family dinner, we each cut off our stems and passed them to her. She gobbled them immediately. Her mac-and-cheese and tiny serving of chicken were debated with her dad about how much she had to eat in order to get dessert. She's active, muscular, and growing so food intake isn't a general problem but negotiating food is their style.


Joy (gardenerjoy) – Congrats for being willing to attend a basketball game of fourth-graders. Hope your willingness to attend Open Houses is helping you figure out what you want.

maryann – I join you in being grateful that our retirement wasn't needs based; I might still be working.

curlyjax – Thanks for "I can't control the larger events in the world, I can only control my own environment." Useful to remember during a time of major events.

Readers -

Fun day at the Worcester Art Museum to catch the last day of their Flora in Winter fundraiser which is called Art in Bloom elsewhere, where local garden club members design a piece inspired by a piece of art. I decided to become a member at the tier that gets me into many other museums free or at least at a reduced rate. I went with my gardenfriend who is a decade older than me but has more stamina. She also talks nonstop which is exhausting! The docents were eager to share their knowledge and pounced on us, and then would ask what we thought of the piece. I did not want to do audience participation;) and sometimes slunk away. I needed a nap when I got home but it was a nice outing. Food was not good, too many of the wrong carbs. I did some work on gathering things for taxes, then chilled with tv for the rest of the night. As I get older I do need more rest periods but then I have never been a high energy sort of person regardless of what I eat or exercise.
I woke up too early and i'm tired, crabby and hungry. Grr.
Gardenerjoy-such fun going to an open house.
Maryann-the only upside of our snow is that there's no yard work for awhile.
Bill-sorting legos can be quite satisfying for some kids. And adults, it can be almost meditative.

Coaches
Posting in the afternoon because I was up before dawn to travel an hour away for errands concerning DH and Mom. The best news first: DH has lost 35 pounds, gone the gym regularly, and has used his sleep machine for 5 months. As a result he no longer has to take his cholesterol medicine OR his blood pressure medicine. This is a huge win for our teams. He has tremendous pressures on him in the business, in his family and in his body. To continue to work through these AND eat only what I give him in the bag PLUS use the hated sleep machine has nearly driven my strong farmer to tears. These wins show all his work has paid off.

Mom had car things to get accomplished with which DH helped, thank the Lord, and then I did a massive grocery shopping. So I am going to take a Curly recommended nap. Light puttering afterwards.

OOOH! Finished the quilt . I just love it. very warm and comfy. https://ibb.co/Qv9TfYk0

BBE: Nothing better developmentally for a 5 year old to do than sort shapes and sizes.

I didn’t have the energy for the evening meeting last night, but I was successful at skipping a snack due to being out of the house and busy all afternoon. CREDIT!

The weekend’s experimentation was rewarded with a drop on the scale. Yay!

Exercise: 60, 60/1800 minutes for March

BillBlueEyes: We learn from every Open House — more about ourselves than about houses, but that counts as progress. Yesterday’s house didn’t have our kitchen or basement but gave us a better idea of what we really want from those spaces.

curlyjax: The Art in Bloom at the St. Louis Art Museum is done by professional florists. I think I’d be more interested if it was garden club members.

maryann: Yay for DH seeing results from all of his work. That quilt is gorgeous! There’s the Arch. (A joke in St. Louis is that every single one of us returns home from a trip and says “There’s the Arch" -- whether we see it from the air or the road and whether there is anyone to hear us say it or not).

Lots of NSVs here today!
 

Coaches:

Congrats to everyone here! Lots of wins and progress all round. You guys are inspiring.

Today the scale popped up a lb from yesterday. I am up and down for the past few days. I'm not doing anything to keep it falling. I'm getting ready to pull it together though.

Today I happily did dishes once again. I am becoming well acquainted with the countertop dishwasher and how to load it. It looks like everything can fit in there except a few pots with long handles.

Today I finished off the homemade instant pot beef stew and then immediately cleaned, (by hand), the instant pot so I could make pea soup with ham. I think I've made the best pea soup with ham in my life. So tasty. I consulted a recipe to see how long to cook it in the instant pot. 20 minutes! This was perfect and unbelievable.

I also tracked down and filled out and sent the forms the insurance needs to my endocrinologist in order to cover the Mounjaro prescription. They'll see it tomorrow. I am hoping the Dr will fax the forms over to the insurance company. We'll see. It will take another 5-7 workdays to get the official confirmation of coverage. So It will be another week or so before I begin. Between now and then I want to drop the sugar and high carbs and be back on a more health supporting food plan.Today I started clearing off the chaise again. I'm consolidating all the containers of ceramic tools I have everywhere. I want them all together. I also started sorting clothes once more. A little bit of progress in all directions. The key is to keep it up.

Bye for now.

Tuesday - Anne Sullivan begins teaching 6-yo blind-deaf Helen Keller (1887)
 

Diet Coaches/Buddies - A busy day with too many fixed time appointments and multiple errands to squeeze into the spaces left over. A routine doctor's visit required an extra 30 minutes delay as, "The doctor is running late." When scheduling my next visit, I requested the first appointment of the day.

Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Celebrating the lack of daytime snacking. Can obviously conclude that being constantly on the run precludes snacking at my desk. Dinner was a satisfying grilled salmon, sauteed spinach, new potatoes, and my green salad. Standard fare here that always seems elegant to me. Caught up with the story of a friend who is going for back surgery. For the entire week before, he's required to shower daily using Hibiclens (antiseptic skin cleanser containing 4% chlorhexidine gluconate), to change sheets and PJ's daily as well as his clothes, and to wipe all surfaces of his house that he'll touch. About the same as a surgeon prepping for surgery. That's a lot of laundry. Meanwhile, I bring to the table tales of folks traveling the Oregon Trail who can't bathe for weeks.


onebyone – Drooling for pea soup with ham; I love that stuff. Your countertop dishwasher sounds like a resounding success. Wish you well slaying the dragons between you and Mounjaro.

Joy (gardenerjoy) – I share your experience that a snack can get skipped because one is running about. Good use of your time to make each not-for-us house a teaching experience instead of wasted time.

maryann – Congrats to you and your DH both for such grand successes. Love the quilt - what a memory for someone who has been to all (most) of those National Parks.

curlyjax – LOL at too eager docents at a museum. "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar."

Readers -

A lot of work was taken up by a client who has serious memory issues as well as a tricky personality. I'm providing emotional support for her caregiver; its a really tough situation with no easy solutions. I nipped off to the store for a few things after, then came home and took a quick nap which did refresh me. I baked salmon and tiny frozen butternut squash cubes and made spinach cheese ravioli, got my lunch and breakfast ready and cleaned up everything. DD and I had a nice chat. I was feeling grumpy about some of the tax prep that I'm not sure about and not up to dealing with it, but panicky as it needs to be in by March 15 to my accountant. I got into the Wegmans cake again, ugh. I need to figure out how to have stuff here for DD but not get into it myself. At least the rest of the day was filled with very healthy OP food.
Maryann-the quilt is beautiful! Congrats for DH, that is a major accomplishment.
Gardenerjoy-It is interesting to see how garden club members interpret art. There were professional arrangements in other parts of the museum and some were quite large and inventive, so that was cool too.
Onebyone-great job with decluttering and cooking. Glad your DW is working out well.
Bill-I did the Hibiclens before my surgeries but only needed clean sheets the night before fortunately, I only have two sets. That is a lot of laundry!

Coaches,

Today is the big weigh in reset. It is topugh for me to face it knowing the scale will be up some. I have decided to get over it. Since August I have lost weight and gained muscle. That will happen again.

Tonite i am chairing a woman's AA meeting about an hour and 35 minutes away. I also get my staples in the knee outt.

I have successfully connected the AV dvd to the digital smart tv. It took about an hour of silliness ( bad power outlet, wrong connection slots, etc. . . ) I have canceled about $100 of subscriptions to various things. The library is my new best friend. I checked out 2 seasons of a tv show I am watching.

Joy: Thanks for suggesting the emagazines at the library. I found 3 of the designer decisions I made for the River House in the most recent Better Homes and Gardens.

Wave to all.:

Curious
 

Hello Coaches

It's really late here but I wanted to check in. I taught my class tonight. Two more to go. It was a really odd class. Super relaxed. Two people were missing. People peeled out of the class before it was officially over at 10. But it was all okay. Everyone did what they needed to do. The next two Tuesdays will be hectic.

So I texted DH asking if he was driving into his work tomorrow and he is. Unlike to fill the car with gas for him the night before so I headed to the usual gas station. There was a HUGE line up at 10:30pm that filled the gas station parking lot right up to the pumps and flowed out onto the street about 8 cars deep. Wow. So I drove ton the next station and again a lineup out onto the street about 8 deep. I was in the line for a while and then I left. I saw how chaotic it was in the station itself by the pumps and I got overwhelmed and drove home with one notch of gas showing. We've discovered that the price at the pump falls dramatically after 9:30pm but today it was the same as it was all day: $125.9/litre. So no bargain. I think people are expecting a big jump tomorrow in price or something. I hope it's that vs. not enough gas to go around. I'm sure we're not there yet. How can we ever know anything for sure right now.

Anyway so I drove home and told DH all about the goings on at the pumps. I felt bad the car isn't full. He will drive on that one notch of gas tomorrow. He's not going to fill up. Drives me nuts but it's his choice.

I wasn't hungry when I got home but I made a mixed nut butter butter and banana sandwich plus I grabbed a diet coke. I wasn't hungry but I ate. And right now I could eat again and AI still know I'm not hungry so I am going to bed.

Tomorrow is a clean-up day.

Have a goodnight.

Wednesday - March Forth Day, Take risks to achieve dreams (since 2011)
 

Diet Coaches/Buddies - After a full day, exercise, CREDIT moi, came after dinner when a predicted "light coating" of snow became more and had to be shoveled so that folks walking the sidewalk didn't pack it into ice. I felt noble working in the dark while it was raining. Shoveling snow in the rain is an oxymoron to me.

Was prepared on my trip to the supermarket to ignore Easter candy. Was whopped upside the head with St. Patrick's Day candy even more so. To show my Irish side, I'm to buy green Mylar balloons, green M&Ms, green jelly beans, and super cheap looking this-and-that declaring, "Kiss me, I'm Irish". I wish St. Patrick would reappear and drive all the green brouhaha out of the country, LOL.

Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. This being too busy to snack works for me, although I'm in need of more quiet time to recover. Lunch was some leftover bits of burger, beans, and rice from whenever ago; heroically, I had to consume it before it turned green. Dinner was homemade chicken noodle soup. Unbelievably good. I've hated chicken noodle soup all my life until DW taught me that adding oodles of chicken made it great. It's the best use of the remnants of a rotisserie chicken that there is.



onebyone - Neat that your students can get their work done for a class and just take off. Our news keeps reporting that gasoline prices are up since the Iran situation started. But you caught my attention with the typo "$125.9/litre" - more likely CN$1.259/liter.

maryann – Getting free of all the Pay-Me-Monthly leaches must be so satisfying. I do admire that you're mastering all the ways to hook up your TV.

curlyjax – Wish you well trying to figure out how to help someone with memory issues. I dread that that's coming to us all.

Readers -