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:
Quote:
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 your 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:
Diet Coaches/Buddies - Loud knock on the front door as we were having breakfast. The neighbor warned us that it would be prudent to move the cars from our driveway as the arborist was coming to trim the dead branches from the ancient elm tree on the edge of his property next to us. Good warning. They dropped branches on our driveway. The elm tree no longer has dangerous branches but looks skinned, unfortunately. It's been dying for the last ten years. It doesn't have many years left. Really sad; it has a stately look and provides a bunch of shade.
Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Dinner was omelettes, sweet potato, spinach, and my green salad. I was full of tales of plankton, zooplankton, and other wee beasties that do 50% of the photosynthesis work of the planet. So important, so little, and so many odd shapes and ways of eating each other. So glad that there are folks with microscopes studying them.
maryann – Paris, Barcelona - your DS gets around. Congrats on achieving a tight budget month.
curlyjax – Kudos, indeed, for resisting baked potato with toppings. I do fear that "disorganized and forgetful" is where we're all headed.
Readers -
Quote:
day 7Arrange Your Environment
I don't keep food in my office or in my car because I don't always have the mental energy to resist urges to eat - particularly at the end of the workday.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Beck Diet Solution (Pink book), Pg 90
I got exercise at work by being on my feet for a few hours, and my heel is a bit sore today because of it. I did terribly with eating; freshly baked huge chocolate chip cookie in the am was my mid morning snack, and then more Easter eggs later at home. Ugh!! I was able to leave a bit early and took a nap as I was exhausted, then off to see the accountant who went over all my tax forms. He's so much better than my old one. I drove DD's car which is making a noise again, sigh. I had a nice chat with BFF about Ireland etc. It's going to be a challenge to plan a trip with her as we have some different ideas of where to stay and the reality of getting from place to place-so its a good thing we have a year to plan. But it will be fun and its good for me to flex my adventure muscles in a different way.
Bill-DW sounds very organized, I think she will keep you on track! Some people are just disorganized their whole life;I definitely have some elements of that.
Maryann-great job staying on budget! Writing down foods does help keep me on track on the Lose it app.
Coaches!
Happy April 1st. Today is weigh in day. i took no extraordinary measures to weigh less. ( Remember two weigh ins ago when I went into the sauna first?) I am determined to be methodical about this month.
Goal:
Everyday no matter what I eat I will log everything to the best of my ability into MFP. I have checked how to run reports. By the time I meet my nutritionist, I will have a monthly account of each macro and calories. I will have today's Body fit analysis along with the one I did in August and I will do one April 28. She will be able to see exactly what one month of really trying produces.
Super Credit for not falling into a Last Supper mode last night. I was hungry and down all night. I kept going into the kitchen to eat a ton of sugar but there was nothing there. Thank God for a clean environment.
OK: Here is an interesting tidbit. I logged today's food and searched in March for some favorite foods. Hmmmm. I didn't log the last half of March more than 4 times. Wow!!! I am not out of denial.
BBE: DH feels vary emotional about his trees. Of course he has 165 acres of walnuts. Each is still important to him. Curly: Love Ireland. i would go back in a minute.
I read a wonderful news story about the renovation of the train station in my town. They torn down a wall and discovered a safe that had a stash of silver dollars from 1893. Kirkwood Historical Society tracked down an unsolved crime from 1893 when the safe was transported by train from the west coast to Philadelphia, but never reached its destination. A three-year investigation at that time didn’t solve the mystery. But Kirkwoodians know that 1893 was the year that our Richardsonian Romanesque train station was built. The theory is that the safe was stashed in a temporary wall but the permanent wall was installed before the criminals could retrieve it.
I told the whole story with all the details to DH. And, then, remembered what day it was. Ha!
No fooling, I’m following my usual food and exercise plan. I’m on Day Three of the strength-training program and it’s going well so far.
Thursday - Stanley Kubrick's "2001 A Space Odyssey" premieres (1968, Washington, D.C)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - Picked up the (10 yo) DGD after Fourth Grade. She's painting and chatting like a human being – not just a kid. We were with her for an hour before she was off to soccer. Busy bee, she is.
SCAM getting better: Got a text message on my iPhone from T-Mobile that my 11,000 points would expire THAT VERY DAY unless I clicked on their link to choose how to use them. Red flags, but used my laptop computer to investigate anyway. Yup, one search on google produced articles about the T-Mobile points SCAM. If one clicks the link in the text, the site will ask for bank info to convert your points into thousands of dollars. Gotcha! Know I wouldn’t have fallen for that part but I did go investigate. But worse, when I told the story to DW, she reminded me that I use T-Mobile but don’t have a T-Mobile account – she does. We set it up that I'm attached to her account and I've never received bills or notices from T-Mobile in my life. Oh yeah, that too.
Watched Artemis II launch with fond memories of the Apollo launches of 50 years ago. Excited to see astronauts again leaving Earth orbit. It's a modern repeat of Apollo 8's manned orbit of the moon. I have astronaut Bill Anders' photo of Earthrise on my office wall from Apollo 8.
Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Dinner was finished watching the Artemis launch.
onebyone - Waving. Congrats on the glorious launch of the first Canadian on their way to the moon. Jeremy Hansen is one impressive astronaut.
Joy (gardenerjoy) – Your Kirkwood train station safe story is hilarious. I read your summary believing every word. Hats off to someone in St. Louis with a sharp sense of humor.
maryann – Kudos for using the Beck strategy of having no sweets in the kitchen to satisfy a craving. Love hearing that every single walnut tree on your DH's acres is important to him.
curlyjax – Easter with all its tempting food will soon be passed. Fun to have a whole year to plan a trip to Ireland.
Readers -
Quote:
day 7Arrange Your Environment
The dieters with whom I work also have found this practice to be a valuable strategy for losing weight and maintaining their weight loss.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Beck Diet Solution (Pink book), Pg 90
Last edited by BillBlueEyes; 04-02-2026 at 08:24 AM.
I was OP at work and then went to my workout. I must say its nice to see some of the skinny gals struggling with core stuff too. The trainer encouraged us to see if we could lift half our weight with one exercise-um, no.If you're overweight that is going to be a lot of weight! I pushed myself anyhow which felt good. I feel so good mentally afterwards, and plan to do this and that when i'm home, and then I crash and get nothing done. I overate as I was quite hungry and then got into Easter candy, ugh. I only eat jellybeans once a year at least.I did read some folks experiences of losing weight and/or struggling with it who are my age on reddit. It's helpful to see what works for other folks.
I have weighed myself, sighed and am moving forwards.
Maryann-the thing that stops me from logging is when I make a casserole and don't know how to log it, and then I just stop for the day. It's so effective though I do get back to it eventually.
Gardenerjoy- you had me going too, what a great story.
Bill-the text scams are just awful. Yay for spending time with the delightful DGD.
Yesterday I bought a nice new little binder to put my In Body scans. The first one I did in Aug and yesterday. I will put the one I do on Aug 29 before I go to the nutritionist appt. I will put the MFP reports in between. Harder than logging all my food will be not getting on the scale. I can do this. I have little orange stickers to go on my calendar for everyday I log and NOT weigh. The sticker chart worked for DS with piano in his life. It iwll work for me.
I teach at the Music Academy today. So I will have my major meal at noon. I went to 3 different places for food bargains and the house is pretty much set for the month. I have a little left in the budget for fill ins later on. easter will be sprial ham, homemade baked beans, banana nut muffins and a nifty salad.
Joy: I have usually had a little joke planned for my students on the 1st. There is always one smarty who catches me. Curly:What Reddit thread were you on? BBE: That launch remains a miracle
Our usual Thursday with kids got superseded by a previous commitment. We made DH’s eye doctor appointment a year ago, before we knew that we were supposed to keep Thursdays open for our child-care gig. Fortunately, their mom decided that she could handle things today and gave her blessing for us to take the day off.
These kind of things remind us of why we want to move closer. It would have been no big deal to take the morning shift today. The long drive is what makes it a big deal. We’re continuing to pour over real estate listings.
Exercise: 60, 60/1800 minutes for April
BillBlueEyes: I also enjoyed the Artemis II launch with nostalgia. I got DH to watch with me. He’s less excited (and less susceptible to nostalgia), but I gained his interest by pointing out that the great-niblings will be about the same ages that we were in 1969 when humans step foot on the moon again in a couple of years.
I’m enjoying that I can check the current status of the astronauts at the live stream on nasa.gov at any time. Far different from waiting around for an update from Walter Cronkite. My current favorite update when I woke up this morning:
9 hours ago Artemis II Flight Update: Crew and Ground Teams Successfully Troubleshoot Orion’s Toilet
maryann: I like your binder, calendar, and stickers. That kind of thing works wonders for me. I can get myself to do remarkable things to earn a gold star. I’m grateful because it means I do remarkable things!
curlyjax: Yay for feeling good after a workout! If I were doing an early evening workout, I think it would be hard to find the energy to cook something. I would probably come up with a routine of exactly what a post-workout eating regime looks like for me, taking into account when and how hungry that I’m likely to be. Then, eat the exact same thing on those evenings for a few weeks to see how it works. And, to maryann’s point, I’d give myself a gold star on a chart for every workout + post-workout eating plan that I completed.
Friday - Pony Express Day: St. Joseph, MO to Sacramento, CA by horse (1860)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - Held my breath during the Trans Lunar Injection (TLI) burn of Artemis II. I still feel the excitement as if I was a kid. Their next six days are irrevocably set; it's all up to gravity now. Enjoyed hearing a NASA rep answer how fast they would go, carefully explaining that the burn accelerated them to some 24K mph which will decrease until they reach lowest speed at the moon when they start to accelerate again as they fall toward Earth when they'll reach about that same speed again for reentry. Standard description of an elliptical orbit explained to the next generation. What's really amazing is the quality of real time videos possible because of laser transmission of data developed by Lincoln Labs of MA. Apollo never had that much data in real time.
Errand run in the rain. I take credit for wearing the proper rain gear. A minimal credit unless I consider the number of times I've left the house without wearing the proper gear that's readily available.
Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Dinner included quinoa cooked with roasted tomatoes. Super good. Quinoa is rare around here; this happened because the chef wanted to finish off the box in the pantry. My guess is that anything with roasted tomatoes will taste yummy. Evening snack was the standard blueberries.
Joy (gardenerjoy) – I share your experience of having to make an appointment a year in advance without being able to consider the circumstances of the time. Am also enjoying keeping track of Artemis II via nasa.gov. Do hope NASA will be able to get its audience back after three days of coasting with, presumably, BBQ rolling being the most exciting item on the agenda.
maryann – Gotta love the teacher using orange stickers for herself. Thought of your DH when I read that a big problem laying the first railroad east from Sacramento was . . . water. Smart (greedy) guys would race out to buy water rights ahead of the railroad guys who then had to pay exaggerated prices for the water they required.
curlyjax – That's some challenge at your gym. Am encouraged by your, "sighed and am moving forwards."
Readers -
Quote:
day 7Arrange Your Environment
It's especially important to avoid environmental triggers when you're first starting your diet. "out of sight, out of mind" is a good policy right now.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Beck Diet Solution (Pink book), Pg 90
Very validating day of helping folks and receiving comments on how much folks enjoy a class I run. I also helped out with a program for folks with dementia, and it was lovely to see how engaged and what fun they had. After work I visited a used clothing place that sells nice things in good condition, and was bummed to discover that I am indeed obese as very little fit. I can ignore it at times but need to ONCE MORE jump back on the wagon. I went to the library after as I've been feeling a bit book deprived, and ended up going to BFF's to round out the day. I did not have ice cream there credit, but got into the Easter candy at home. I only have jelly beans once a year at least, as well as the other Easter treats. BFF and I looked at some Ireland stuff again. Half the fun is planning the trip after all.
Gardenerjoy-I do indeed plan/cook ahead on my workout days or at least 2 out of 3, but that's an interesting idea to chart it and see what works best.
Maryann- I googled '60 year old women having trouble losing weight reddit' or something like that. Sometimes things pop up on r/loseit, sometimes things pop up on r/ask women over 60- I like to read what others are doing to and to know other folks are struggling. Reddit is awesome!
Bill-roasted tomatoes are awesome. Somehow I missed the Artemis launch.
An orange sticker day!!! It was wonderful to not have to weight this morning. Dinner was Bare Bone Chicken Broth in a thermos since I was teaching.
I literally felt joy coming home after interacting with all 8 students. The first three were my age!!! I was told "Gary" was a beginner so i assumed he was fieve years old. Nope - an incredibly charismatic man who hasn't played an instrument since he was a kid with a drum set. Janice was secretly taking voice lessons to sing at Karaoke on Friday nights. I was able to help both with the very basics. So fun to see such improvement in just 3o mins.
Today should be a vacuum the whole house day. I will wait for the spirit to move me.
BBE: Send the rain! we only received and inch. Curly: I get a lot of validation and tips on reddit. It is dangerous however because I can fall into a rabbit hole. Joy: There is a real advantage to being externally motivated.
I made today’s plan, but just figured out that it is flawed. I intend to run errands through my normal lunch time. That will set me up for failure because there are way too many places where I will encounter Easter treats and Good Friday is the very day that I’m likely to succumb.
Okay. Quick re-think. I’ll eat lunch early and have my most treat-like snack ready to go when I get home. That should do it.
Saturday - R.I.P. Martin Luther King Jr. (1968, Lorraine Motel, Memphis, TN)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - Did my job of keeping the Artemis II crew on the elliptical orbit just right to achieve a lunar fly-by. Just now, the nasa.gov site shows one astronaut vigorously exercising. What a good reminder that exercise is necessary to maintain the human body. The crew wears pants with belts instead of wearing one-piece flight suits. I thought there was some kind of law that test pilots wore flight suits. Chuck Yeager always did.
Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Dinner was the second dip into burger, beans, and rice, along with my green salad. We ate separately because I declined to join DW at an in-person lecture on invasive jumping worms. I got the whole story when she came home. Yikes! Another thing to worry about. The little critters actually jump. They deplete the soil because their castings (poop) are coffee grain looking hard that wash away in the rain taking the nutrients and organic matter. So good to have something to worry about that isn't caused by the administration.
Joy (gardenerjoy) – Hold your breath - Easter treats will only be displayed for one more day.
maryann – Good to be reminded that adults can be helped learning music.
curlyjax – Fun description, "feeling a bit book deprived". So neat that you're able to connect to folks with dementia.
Readers -
Quote:
day 7Arrange Your Environment
Although you wont necessarily have to reduce environmental triggers forever, you may decide, as I have, that you prefer to keep certain foods out of sight even after you've lost weight.
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Beck Diet Solution (Pink book), Pg 90
Busy day at work with various conversations. My colleague's son sustained a concussion and is doing better thankfully.She is on the warpath about the incident and it will be interesting to see what happens. People underestimate moms sometimes I went to my workout and graduated to an assisted pullup. It's hard to describe-your weight is supported by a thick exercise band but it allows you to do a pull up on a bar.It feels awkward but quite exciting to do this. I was exhausted before I went in so didn't push myself as much as usual as the pullups took a lot out of me.At home I relaxed for awhile, then DS came over and the 3 of us went out to dinner rather late for me-8:00 but it was nice. I had a cheeseburger which I've been craving and it was fabulous. I did nosh on more Easter candy at home. I'm going to set up a nice basket for DD (DS doesn't care about such things) and get rid of the rest today.
I had a good long nice sleep finally. Today is the usual clean out the refrig in prep for the dump, figure out meals for the week, groceries, and minor meal prep for tonight. DD is working tonight so i'll have the house to myself at night yay. The kitchen is a huge mess again but i'm going to put my headphones on and listen to an audiobook and take my time.
Gardenerjoy-good idea to switch things around and have a treat prepared.
Maryann-What a lovely day. I totally hear you about falling into the rabbit hole too.
Bill-I'm letting someone else worry about worms too
Beck Diet For Life/Solution - April 2026 - Support, Discussion, Buddy/Coach
Wednesday - April Fools’ Day - Beware bamboozling
I went to my workout and graduated to an assisted pullup. It's hard to describe-your weight is supported by a thick exercise band but it allows you to do a pull up on a bar.It feels awkward but quite exciting to do this. I was exhausted before I went in so didn't push myself as much as usual as the pullups took a lot out of me.At home I relaxed for awhile, then DS came over and the 3 of us went out to dinner rather late for me-8:00 but it was nice. I had a cheeseburger which I've been craving and it was fabulous. I did nosh on more Easter candy at home. I'm going to set up a nice basket for DD (DS doesn't care about such things) and get rid of the rest today.