One final post.......these are actually in reverse order. Author Nancy Hill
Never diet again
If diets worked, we'd all be slim and trim right now.
As you know, there are hundreds and hundreds of diets
in existence. But dieting to lose weight or live
longer is like taking a drug that causes the very
disease it is intended to cure.
Essentially, dieting is a way to train the body to
store fat. Each diet teaches the body to protect
against future famines. It's the perfect weight-
gaining technique.
In fact, a four-year study of 700 high school girls
discovered that those who dieted regularly ended up
gaining more weight than the girls who didn't restrict
their eating.
95% of dieters regain what they lost. Many of those
gain back more than what they originally lost. The
utter failure of dieting proves how strong and amazing
our bodies are. They want to survive. They will work
to stay alive no matter how much we try to starve them.
It's not that we don't have enough willpower to get
thin. When the body senses it is threatened by lack of
food, it kicks into survival mode by slowing the
metabolism to conserve energy. It sends you urgent,
overpowering messages...cravings...to eat high calorie
foods NOW.
We've been fighting against our own biological drive
to stay alive. There isn't a way to win that battle.
Yet each new diet is so tempting. They promise so much.
Millions are desperate to lose "excess" weight and be
slender. Every day we are brainwashed to desire the
media version of the perfect body. We'll do almost
anything to get it.
Ironically, the best available prescription for gaining
weight is...GO ON A DIET.
Gym owner Bob Schwartz tells how he helped thin members
of his workout gym who were desperate to gain weight...
he put them on a diet.
No matter how much they tried to put on pounds prior to
dieting, they had not been successful. But after
restricting their caloric intake for even short amounts
of time, every single thin person was finally able to
gain weight.
When you diet:
~ You frequently feel guilty or shameful about what
you've eaten.
~ You desperately want to be thinner.
~ You starve yourself and feel saintly or eat and feel
bad.
~ You think about food all the time: how much to eat,
what to eat, when to eat.
~ You spend a large amount of time and energy on menus
and rules and knowing which foods are okay to eat and
which ones are "bad".
~ You often rebel and eat to a point of feeling sick
and miserable.
~ You eat mindlessly and often don't even really taste
your food.
~ You are always on the lookout for the next diet cure.
With Undieting:
~ You take excellent, loving care of yourself.
~ All foods are equal. There are NO banned foods. You
exercise your right to choose whatever food you want
to eat.
~ You savor your food and get full enjoyment from
eating.
~ You make conscious, thoughtful choices rather than
rebelling or eating out of habit.
~ You feel energized and light.
~ You stop eating when you've had enough.
~ You love your body as it is right now.
~ You are happy and free.
~ You focus your attention on having a great life.
The first step in Undieting is to simply decide that
you will never diet again. Make it a firm, 100%
commitment.
Once you completely let go of dieting, your natural
instincts begin to surface again. Life gets easier.
Get off the diet bandwagon and return to a life worth
living. You CAN get out of the vicious diet cycle with
ease and grace.
Undieting will guide you every step of the way with
a simple 11-step roadmap.
This course is a small sample of the full "Undieting"
experience that will heal and transform your relationship
to your body and to food.
...Accepting that you sometimes eat the wrong thing, or
the wrong amount, is part of how this program leads to
a normal relationship with food.
People who eat normally sometimes eat too much. They
eat from mouth hunger. They eat a wide variety of
foods including some junk.
Former dieters tend to want to ban all such behaviors
100%. That is diet thinking and it's too rigid to be a
way of life. Give up the need to be perfect and allow
yourself to be human...
Carol, thank you very much for the posts, and especially the above portion which applies to the pizza and ice cream I ate late last night and was feeling bad about.
I didn't even feel like eating, I made myself! I only mention that because it was a rather new behavior to eat when I didn't crave it, and I was in a situation where I would normally have a craving. Not having the craving was really nice, even though I ignored my body and ate regardless.
If I had to sum up what I thought, it was "You're going to eat some pizza and some ice cream and even though you don't want it, eating it will bring pleasure because it has in the past."
So I did eat the pizza, ins spite of really just wanting to lay down and sleep (late night alone time) and then I ate some ice cream, which I really didn't want and nothing great happened. No thrill at all. Just discomfort.
But, it was different because it was more of a pure habit than a craving or a hunger of any sort (mouth or stomach).
I have been gone this weekend, it seems these bulletin boards can become adicive all by themselves! So I took a break.
Great post everyone. I have been having fun with this...I ate indian food this weekend for the first time in a long time. I ate macroni and cheese too. I ate too much. My problem is remembering to stop when satisfied in social situations. I did yoga this weekend for the first time in a while, it felt good to get back to that.
The doctor told me I am in menopause. That threw me for a loop. I wasn't expecting that so early. All the women in my family go through menopause early, but no one talks about it. Weird......
IE is really different from other programs, isn't it wiffle? Catkgo, I started menopause at 43. Is that early? All done now at age 57 (been done for a few years but can't remember when that was). Here is another thought from the undieting website:
Try a little tenderness
Work it, sculpt it, starve it, push it, train it,
discipline it. We're taught a lot of things to do to
our bodies. Most of them are not pleasant.
What about loving it?
What if we treated our bodies with love and tenderness?
Okay, it sounds a little sappy, I know. But really
think about the idea for a moment. WHAT IF you made a
decision to treat your body with the ultimate in
kindness?
How would your body feel if you...
~ Fed it the best, most delicious, most nutritious
foods
~ Gave it just the right amounts of food to feel light
and full of energy
~ Pampered it with fun movement
~ Let it nap or rest when it was tired
~ Treated it to healing massages and long soaks in
warm water
~ Noticed all the wonderful, beautiful things about
it and overlooked its flaws
Your body would LOVE YOU for LOVING IT. You would
naturally live at your own perfect weight without
effort or strain.
By treating yourself well and loving your body, you
will effortlessly live at the peak of health.
Undieting will guide you every step of the way with a
simple 11-step roadmap.
Was really tempted today....by dieting. I was reading about a girl here who has lost about 70lb on LA weight loss. I was going to just ask how much it cost and then didn't. Sooooooo tempting.
Carol, I too was tempted to diet not too long ago. It was a diet plan that came with an exercise DVD. I even bought some of the food items. This brought on a binge of epic proportions! Ha ha - I decided to not try the diet again, after I calmed my eating down.
Hey ladies finally moved into the condo...moving sucks...
I did pretty well with the IE, but ate out alot while moving last week. So going grocery shopping today. I am doing about 2 meals a day...and seem to be ok....The BF and I went out to eat yesterday and I ordered more than I wanted because I was really hungry, but ended up giving him my appetiver to take home and ignoring the french fries....I grabbed something from the salad bar and was much happier. definitely a difference from the olden days. Me liking choosing salad over fried...who would have thought it.
Anyway, glad to see the thread is staying active and hi wiffle and glad to see you're on board ckatgo.
I had a strange day eating wise yesterday. I had soy milk in the morning and then had a craving for crab ragoon. So my daughter showed me how to make it and that is about all I ate all day except for some fruit at supper. I'm not sure I like how I felt.... kind of sluggish. Is that the fat doing that? I'm glad I read the above article aboue forgiveness and learning from mistakes. It makes such a difference. How is everyone doing?
Obsidianbbw, congratulations on moving. It is such a stressor! We moved a few months ago and I am still not over it. I don't know if you just went through the whole sell/buy process, but we did and it was horrible. And then, of course, the actual moving of stuff. Ugh!
Carol, was crab ragoon something you felt bad for eating before?
Sometimes I go through days of just eating the one thing. Right now I have some french onion soup. I made a large pot over the weekend and I really love it. I don't think that is bad as long as we eat when hungry and stop when we aren't.
Is LAWL L.A. Weight Loss?
How do you all do at feeding your families while incorporating this change into your life? Sometimes I sit and just eat some green beans or other vegetable with some bleu cheese dressing. Sometimes I don't eat at all if I am not hungry and just busy myself in the kitchen or sit and drink some water with lemon.
We've always been an eat-together kind of family so to just have everyone come and go at will is not real workable at the moment, especially with kids.
One thing everyone likes is that we use small plates much more often, and we are far more likely to eat something pricier.
Wiffle, I guess all fried food is in my memory bank as not the best choice. Yes, that is LA weight loss. I'm the same with family eating. Last night I ate only the fruit but sometimes I don't eat. My dh likes to eat together. I am learning what works. I don't think it hurts to just sit and visit and not eat. If their are a lot of people no one will notice that you aren't eating. I have 10 kids but only one at home now so it is quite different. Lots of times the older ones families come over so we keep busy.
I thought it might be good to repost one of the first posts on Intuitive Eating for those who have never read about it.
"This study will evaluate the effectiveness of an innovative weight loss program, called thintuition®, that Lakeshore Athletic Club believes is the future of weight loss. The thintuition® weight loss program involves natural eating and weight loss and is built on the foundation of six basic principles:
1. Distinguish appetite from hunger: An appetite is thoughts about food, while hunger is an actual physical sensation in your body telling you to eat.
2. Eat to satisfy physical hunger: The goal of eating is purely to satisfy those physical sensations of hunger and not for any other reason. And other reason for eating is consider overeating, which contributes to weight gain.
3. Eat the foods you desire: Before sitting down to eat, you determine what food(s) will satisfy your hunger, and those are the foods you eat.
4. Savor each and every bite: Take time to enjoy the food you are eating. This means tasting the flavors, smelling the aromas, experiencing the textures, and appreciating how great the food looks.
5. Regard food as fuel: Understanding that food is not comfort or love is an important step toward following your thintuition®. Food is what you put in your body to keep it running.
6. Stop eating when hunger disappears: There is a moment when your hunger disappears. The feeling is like that of no longer being thirsty. It is a place where you feel most comfortable and when you should flip the “off switch” and stop eating.
In addition to the on-line program, daily emails and other materials, there is an optional exercise component that will begin in the second month of this study. At that time, you will receive two free passes each week to use at the Lakeshore Athletic Club you registered for. We will give you more information about the exercise component and when you can begin using your passes a little further into the study."
And his name is Rob Stevens and his book is called Thintuition. I'll let you know how the program looks, I'm a bit disappointed because I thought we would be having meetings but from this it doesn't appear that way. Now my problem is that before I heard about this program starting, I signed up for weight watchers at work and gave them a check (which hasn't cleared yet) so I may have to do both? I'm not sure if that's entirely possible. What to do?!
I have found that since doing IE at home. My 10 year old boy has become more of an IE eater. He will notice that he isn't really hungry or ask himself what he really wants. Whenever my dh tries to force our 3 year old to eat, I try to step in. My dh hasn't noticed, but he is eating better. As a wrestler growing up, he did a lot of starving, binging and purging, so he has had a lot of food issues as an adult- food restriction etc. Now he actually allowing himself to eat some foods! We used to sit down for dinner and all four eat different food! Now we are actually eating the same food a lot of the time.
It is a nice change.
