I going to try the No S diet. Anyone heard of it or tried it? It's very simple. You don't eat snacks, seconds or sweets on days that don't start with S. On Saturdays and Sundays (and any day you designate as special like a birthday), you eat normally. I think it would be very good habit training for me. It would force me to dealing with stress eating which I have gotten better at but it's still an issue. Any thoughts?

I'd have to be very careful with what I deemed a "snack". I tend to classify my mini meals as snacks, but they're usually healthy - fruit, small portions of yogurt, a few nuts, cottage cheese, etc. But I think anything that motivates you and isn't an extreme diet can be good to try, for sure.

No, I haven't heard of it...

What exactly does eating "normally" mean? For me, back in the day, my "normal" well, that's EXACTLY what got me to be 287 lbs. It wasn't so very normal. I needed to CREATE a totally new and different normal.

I needed to learn how to eat responsibly and wisely EVERY day of the week.

And quite frankly, I rely HEAVILY on snacks. They get me through! Of course I had to rethink what a snack WAS. Instead of a muffin or cookies, it's now a salad, or a veggie platter with salsa, or a SF/FF yogurt or a thinly sliced apple sprinkled with cinnamon.

For me, calorie counting has made me deal with stress eating. And portion sizes. And finding nutritionally sound foods to eat, because once you want to get the most from those calories and never be hungry - you instantly make wiser choices. You learn how to navigate life every single day while adhering to those calories.

Gotta tell you, I'm not loving the idea of this S diet...

I'm so with you Robin. I'm not "normal" and I can't eat like a normal person. My normal got me to 333 pounds, and believe you me, I have had a few days in the last 2 years that I did revert back to my old normal, and it seriously affected my weight loss efforts. If you told me I could have eaten "normal" on Saturday and Sunday I would have easily wiped out my weight loss for the other 5 days. Heck I probably would have gained, because normal would then become my feast before the famine.

The think the concept of the No "S" diet seems reasonable for a starting point as long as "normal" on Saturday and Sunday is a real normal and not a obese persons concept of normal.

I have to agree with Robin, especially about the part of needing to establish for yourself a "new normal". You're not going to do that if, in your mind, they way you eat all week is not normal.

One of the biggest problems with gimmicky diets is that they tend to be short term and based on deprivation. People are able to stick to the diet because it's got an end point -- they only have to hold out and deprive themselves for so long. When they reach the weight they want, they go off the diet and go back to "normal" eating. (Cue yo-you cycle.)

This S diet seems to be based on the same principles. People on it only have to hold out until the weekend, and then for two days they can go back to "normal" eating. But every Saturday and Sunday they are reminding themselves that some foods are forbidden, and that the way they're eating all week is not normal. That's just not sustainable, and it won't help anyone develop new habits or thought patterns about food and eating.

Lisa

Yeah, I would definately not be into this type of diet.

The problem is that it doesn't really train you for maintenance. This is a really big deal for me this time around, losing weight in my opinion is easier than keeping it off.

There is nothing intrinsicly wrong with snacks, sweets, or seconds and this type of thing doesn't really teach you where they should and shouldn't fit into a forever lifestyle. Seems like the type of thing that would really lead to huge nighttime cravings and bad binge days.

So I don't think it's unhealthy, I just don't know that it's sustainable or will help you much down the road.

But as with all "advice" on this board, every one of us is different. If it seems like something you can follow and will help get you going then go for it.

That sounds like a plan. But at the same time it might just make you feel like bingeing on days without an S! Since out of 7 days, 5 days are without an S.

But I think it's good to do the No S diet on special days such as holidays because we tend to binge on food saturated holidays! It might get you used to the idea that you don't have to overeat just because it's a holiday.

I say give it a try!

Thanks for all of your comments! You've given me alot to think about. I'm looking at this diet because I think the periods of no eating will force me to stop thinking about food. I eat when I'm not hungry because I have a little snack and then that leads to another and another. My thinking is that a zero tolerance policy will keep me out of that spiral. But - I will certainly heed your warnings. If S days, turn into giant binges, then this is not helpful. I know that there is no magic formula, you just have to eat fewer calories than you use. What I am hoping is that this regiment will put food into more of a proper place in my life.

Boy, am I noticing that myself. I've been at this for over two years, and when I do have an off day, it seems like it takes weeks to take off 2-3 pounds.

I can see good and bad in it. I agree with the no snacks and no seconds, particularly early in the process when you are still learning your limits and reestablishing some control. I don't like the blanket statement 'no snacks', because I eat a lot of snacks. It is in definition - a lot of people hear snack and immediately think Dorito's or a Hershey bar. I think string cheese, a few nuts, peanut butter & banana on a small tortilla, a bowl of sliced fruit, Greek yogurt w/ honey and some granola, things like that. Those snacks are an important survival method for me - they give me enough calories to process during the day and they keep me from reaching for the Dorito's an hour later.

I also would be careful with the concept of 'eat normal on Saturday & Sunday'. Like has been said, my normal often included a 1700 calorie dinner, followed by ice cream after an already calorie full day. Saying to yourself "I'm going to diet all week and then go back to normal on the weekends" doesn't really set you up for success. It says that you are suffering all week only to live on the weekend. Do you want to live like that forever? Weight loss has to be sustainable, and I don't think teaching yourself to just live for the weekend to be normal again is sustainable. It would make me bitter and resentful of the entire process.

I counted calories, every day. Some days I allowed higher calorie meals or snacks, but I planned them in advance and they weren't on specific days of the week. And ,they were never what I would have considered 'normal' in the past. I had to learn a new normal.

Good luck sweetie.

Mmm, it would have the opposite affect on me. If I couldn't have it, it's all I would think about.

Snacks are a vital part of my weight loss effort. My "snacks" are really planned meals Every 2-2.5 hours I am eating something so that I am never ravenous. Snacking does two things for the body: 1. It keeps the metabolism revved 2. It keeps the blood sugar from spiking and dropping.

It's ok to eat...it's a matter of how much and how nutritious at each sitting.

No if you want to make cookies, chips, sugar off limits...more power to you! I think you'd get some big pats on the back for that one!

I could see something sort of like this working in maintenance, meaning keeping to a fairly strict routine during the week, and being a little more relaxed on weekends (operative word being LITTLE). But I agree that it all depends on what your definition of "eating normally" means, and I'm pretty sure that "normal" is probably not a way of eating that put me at over 250 lbs.

Ha yes, the old joke around 3FC - what do you call a person who is offplan every weekend - a maintainer!

(ie. weekend calories can bring weight loss to a standstill).

It also wouldn't work for me because I looooove snacks. Healthy snacks are one of the keys to my success. I determined that I was an afternoon boredom eater. So, one of my tricks is to plan healthy snacks all afternoon, so I'm happy and satisfied. My afternoon snacks are: a non fat latte (90 calories), a piece of fruit (usually a tangelo - 100 calories) and a string cheese (80 calories).

As a rule, weekend days are just normal, onplan days for me. I plan breakfasts, lunches, healthy snacks. They look just like any other day, with the exception of DINNER (one night a week, usually Saturday). Then, as a MAINTAINER, I have a nice dinner in a restaurant. A glass of wine, a piece of bread out of the basket, reasonable dinner (I still avoid fried foods, cream based sauces, huge portions) and split a dessert. Although this is a treat meal, it's still different than what my normal dinner used to look like at a restaurant where I could devour the bread basket by myself, eat a huge dinner and my own dessert!

Going "all out" for the majority of the meals every weekend would be a DISASTER for me.

When I'm on-plan during the week, my calorie deficit probably ranges from 500 to 1000 cals/day. So from Mon to Fri, I've accumulated, let's say, 3000 calories' worth of deficit...it's all going good...Saturday and Sunday I eat 1500 calories over what I need on those days (because I'm less active and my eating is less structured too), and guess what? I've just reduced my weekly deficit to 0, or perhaps squeaked by with some tiny deficit; I'm going to lose less than half a pound that week--if I'm fortunate.

That's what I, personally, see as the likelihood of what will happen on this sort of plan.

Weekends are difficult for many of us, and it's very VERY easy to undo in two days what one has worked hard to achieve over the previous five.

Just to share an my experience that seems to be very different from everyone else's, I generally operate on the "no snacks" principle (not in a M-F way, but in a try to have a snack once a week or less way). Like the OP said, if I have one snack it has a tendency to turn into two or three, but if I know I'm not going to have any at all I don't even think about it.

I wonder if this difference is based in different experiences of hunger. I can't tell when I'm hungry (hungry and full actually feel pretty similar to me), so it's much easier for me to eat three square meals and no snacks. I imagine if I had issues with hunger, I might be more liable to try "mini-meals" and healthy snacks like many people here do.