I too am working on getting rid of the diet thinking. Thought of doing low carb, but I also decided that I couldn't do it. I decided this morning that sinc this a New Month then I would re-start IE. I weighed this morning and wrote my weight in my little calendar. I am going to do my best not to weigh again until November 1st. No journaling, I just don't want to give food that much of a place in my life. I guess we are all struggling with the same things.
carol3639 You are an inspiration to me that this can be done. I just hope it won't take me so long to get my head thinking straight to IE thinking. Thanks for all the info you share with us. I hope the benefits work with dark chocolate and green tea as that is the combo I do.
I wish us all a successful month or at least better than we've had before.
Hello all. I just started intuitive eating and I just put up my own blog on the 3 Fat Chicks website. It is called "Living Large, An Intuitive Eating Roadtrip." I would post the link but I can't yet because I am still a junior member.
In my blog, there is a link to this great article about a chef/food writer who lost about 150 pounds of weight using IE principles (though she doesn't call it intuitive eating). I was really excited to read it.
Carol3639...I know I too will have a hard time not thinking of foods as "good" or "bad. I really felt naughty today, lol.
Blue...I hope it goes as well for me as it seems to be going for you. I want to feel that way too
Truffle...Speaking of you and your sisters trying to lose weight together...I have this friend at work who I had been doing WW with. I didnt have the heart to tell her i wasnt' doing it anymore. I did feel some embarrassment in telling her I'm not dieting anymore (cause she's smaller than I am) so I didnt say anything.
Pattygirl63...I threw my scale in the back of my bathroom closet, but I dont think its far enough I'm actually thinking of putting it in the trunk of my car. I will try too not to weigh until Nov 1st. Im trying not to have expectaions because Im already afraid im going to be dissappointed, silly I know.
Ok...so on my first day I had:
buttered roll at 10 am
5 chicken nuggets and a mini 3 musketeers bar at 430
a piece of cake at 10:45 pm
Does that sound right? I ate what i wanted and felt good about it. Though I did choose the roll over a bagle casue I thought it wouldn't be as dense and would be a "better choice". It wasn't hard, but i dont know if its cause I was at work from 10 am to 10 pm and was just busy. I wonder how i'll handle on my days off. I was surprised at the energy I had, I thought I'd be sluggish.
That's it Nancy! Keep at it. Here's one more article on chocolate. Can you tell I like chocolate? ha!
Is chocolate good for your health?
By Ezilon.com Articles
Feb 21, 2006, 11:37
Is chocolate good for your health?
As you hear the name “chocolate” your mouth waters! You are allured by the delicious and stimulating taste of chocolates. At the same time you are worried about the harmful effects of eating too much chocolates. But you must know that recent studies have proven that chocolates high in cocoa solids provide potential health benefits. So toss up good health and nutrition by treating yourself with chocolates!
Presently scientists are beginning to disapprove some of the myths related to the dangerous effects of eating too much chocolate. It is not true that too much intake of chocolate will rot your healthy teeth. Neither it triggers migraine headaches nor does it cause acne or makes it worse.
In fact researches have proved that chocolates have properties to work against sugar’s tendency to produce oral bacteria that can cause dental decay. Present researches have proved that chocolates are helpful to you in many ways. Chocolates release endorphins in the brain that acts as a pain reliever. It will boost your appetite without causing weight gain. It reduces the risk of heart disease and cancer. It will make you live longer. Besides sugar in chocolate reduces stress and enable you to have a calm and pain relieving effect. So chocoholics it’s time to feel less guilty about your choco-addiction!
Chocolate which is rich in cocoa solids are now regarded as having the qualities that are beneficial to health. Cocoa is an excellent source of Polyphenols of the flavanol group. Polyphenols are very good antioxidants that destroys free radicals in a body. Free radicals are dangerous to a human body and can cause some serious diseases like cancer and heart diseases.
Chocolates that are rich in flavanol have a large amount of nitric oxide. Nitric oxides are very important for human health. They resist cardiovascular diseases and help in maintaining a healthy blood pressure. Also flavanol rich chocolates act similar to low dose aspirin. They promote a healthy blood flow. They even reduce the risk of heart attack and blood’s ability to clot in the arteries and veins.
Chocolate contains some essential trace elements and nutrients that are good for health. Chocolate made from cocoa is the richest source of magnesium. Magnesium is necessary for you, as deficiency in magnesium may lead to hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, joint problems and also pre menstrual tension. Chocolates are also rich in iron, calcium, potassium and vitamins A, B1, C, D and E.
Before you grab a chocolate bar you must know what chocolate is good for your health! When cocoa is processed into chocolate products it undergoes several processes to reduce its pungent taste. The pungent taste is due to the presence of flavanols. The more chocolate is processed more flavanols are lost. Dark chocolate is reported to have highest level of polyphenols. So it is better to choose dark chocolates over milk chocolates.
Always choose the chocolates that are from reputed brands. Cheap chocolates are usually low in chocolate solids and high in sugar content and saturated fats. These chocolates can be harmful to your health.
Therefore chocoholics leave all your worries behind and boost your health by grabbing your favorite chocolate bar right away!
Sorry to post again but thought this was interesting from the Beyond Chocolate newsletter.
A recent hot topic has been this curious conundrum: that dieting is about eating more, and not dieting is about eating less. Yes, you read that right - as the discussion unfolded, we discovered that, on a diet,we'd consumed huge quantities of food - points-free veg, sin-free pasta, fat-free yoghurt, calorie-free pop - simply because it was 'allowed'. Yet all our attention was on the quantity and not the quality of what we were eating, all our focus on filling our bellies and not on fulfilling ourselves. Diets distort appetites because a large quantity of 'diet' food is still unsatisfying - after all, overeating carrots is still overeating! In contrast, a small amount of 'non-diet' food that one is really hungry for is completely satisfying. With Beyond Chocolate, all foods are free.
Hello all you IE'rs!
So I am really sick today, and I kind of feel bad because all I feel like doing is sitting around the house. At first I started to get mad at myself and hopeless about the situation because since I am sick I can't exercise. And if I still subscribed to the diet mentality, that would mean I would be mad at myself for being sick and missing a day of working out. So that is a weird new feeling, accepting that I am sick and that it is okay not to exercise because I am on a diet mentality.
It's just hard to be like this because it is so new! But it is a little freeing in a way.
Carolr3639...thanks! it just didnt seem right but I guess it is!
etherence...Im sorry you're sick, that stinks. Im glad to see you're letting yourself of the hook with the excercise I was thinking this morning (since this is only the second day for me) how freeing this is too! Im not so consumed with counting and making sure I have the "right" things to eat. Im just flying by the seat of my pants now, lol!
Rachelle Hope you get to feeling better soon. Don't worry about the exercise. I read recently that sometimes we over exercise thinking it will help us lose better. It seems to be part of the "diet" thinking. I know I feel guilty because I don't exercise even though my doctor told me that I can't exercise right now.
carol3639 I agree with the Beyond Chocolate newsletter. I always looked at diets and thought, "that is too much food". But then when I was counting points on WW, I would eat a lot of empty calories as well as the foods that were 0 pts because they were less pts. so I could eat more. There were times I couldn't eat all my pts but was told that I had to eat them. This way I find that when I eat what I want that I not only eat less of it, but I don't get hungry as much so I honestly think I am not eating as much or as often as I did. Diets just kept me hungry and thinking about nothing but food all the time. It is wonderful to be free of all that stuff. Thanks again for the chocolate benefits article. You know that explains why I am feeling so much better since I started eating my dark chocolate bar again this week. My joints don't hurt and I'm not experiencing some other things I was feeling even last week.
Thanks everyone...I know there is thread on here about Paul McKenna's I Can Make You Thin...but I wanted to ask if anyone noticied similarities and differences between that in IE.
McKenna has four rules vs. the 10 in IE, but what I have to admit that McKenna's way is a little more goal (i.e weight loss) oriented than traditional IE.
Some IE groups don't talk about losing weight at all but I've always been interested in losing, maybe not as fast but still losing. It's about getting back to where you were when you were thin, physically as well as mentally.
I gave Paul McKenna's way of eating a half-hearted try. Freedom was good as with IE but what I got hung up on was the tapping technique. Felt silly doing it and in hindsight, I realize that I hadn't made the mental shift from "dieting" to "not dieting" so tapping away my cravings (even tho people claim tapping works) kept me focused on the fact that I was craving. With IE, since I'm not worried about trying to avoid a certain food (like Paul had people do with the visualization techniques, squeezing fingers, etc.) I know if I want that certain food I'll eat it when my stomach asks for a little food! I don't want to tap away my desire to eat a piece of chocolate or squeeze and visualize my "bad" food ... I want to EAT it! I just have to learn the patience to wait until I'm truly hungry for it. Not as big a problem as telling myself I can't have it or don't want it.
I don't have the IE book, but I understand from what others have said is that it is not as focused on waiting for true hunger signals as is The Weigh Down Diet, for instance. I can't prove anything one way or another but I truly believe that waiting for true hunger is key to getting this to work right and see steady weight loss. (As well as paying close attention to that satisfied/full signal.) I do speak from my own experience eating this way last year and having lost a decent amount of weight.
Paul McKenna's way didn't work for me, but like I said, it was a half-hearted effort and I was VERY skeptical going into it. (I guess maybe I had already made up my mind it wasn't going to work for me.) Probably for the same reason a diet doesn't work for me ... if I have to put too much effort into it, I won't do it. Tapping, weighing, measuring, counting, squeezing ... it's just not natural when it comes to eating. Personally, I just need the freedom without all the craziness.
Just like Tigerseye, I'm flying by the seat of my pants!
Blue Serenity wrote I can't prove anything one way or another but I truly believe that waiting for true hunger is key to getting this to work right and see steady weight loss. (As well as paying close attention to that satisfied/full signal.) I do speak from my own experience eating this way last year and having lost a decent amount of weight.
I agree with you about this being the key to IE working. About 4 years ago, I read in a book about a woman who didn't eat anything until she was truly hungry and she only ate what she needed to eat to feel satisfied. I liked that since I have never liked the "full/stuffed" feeling which is why I can't do high fiber dietw so I decided to do what she did and I lost down from 245 lb to 176 lbs. I never made the connection until I read your post just now, because I did a lot of low carbing back then too. I had always thought it was the low carb diet since I didn't know anything about IE back then and I was very disgusted with myself because I just never have been able to do the low carb thing again. I only learned about IE sometime this past year.
Now that I see that the way I lost weight then was actually more like IE, then I know that this way of eating will work for me now and this time I will go on down to my normal healthy weight and keep it off. Thank you for your post. You have probably changed my life. Now I just have to work to get rid of thinking "diet" and I hope that I will be fine.
I do agree that in the IE book, waiting for true hunger is not emphasized as much as it is with Paul McKenna. In the IE book, I got the idea (just my personal take) that if you feel like eating it (either with your head or stomach)
you should eat it to legalize foods. I don't disagree, in fact I did a fair amount of this myself (Hello Jack in the Box ) but like I send, I think I will blend some of Paul McKenna's techniques into this, though I did not care for the silly tapping technique myself.
