On trying to be the five percent

[lisefrac]

A popular phrase at Shapely Prose, a fat acceptance blog I have been known to read, is diets don't work. When further explained, it boils down to the statistic that after two years, 95% of people who diet have not lost weight, or have not maintained that weight loss.

I realized recently that this true not only of dieting, but of any habit change.

Comments

[sethrak]

::nods:: I'd theoretically like to lose about 15 to 25 pounds. (I'm at 155, 5'6".) But lately I've decided that it's more important to work on good diet habits, for cholesterol and blood pressure reasons, and to work on trying to get more activity in general. davner was told at his last physical that his chol. and bp are "borderline", and he needs to work on his diet to avoid needing daily meds. Mine are ok, but my family history suggests I need to be careful too.

Baby steps help. Figure out what some of your dietary besetting sins are, and slowly find ways around them that leave you satisfied. One of mine is popsicles with 100% juice instead of ice cream. Portion control's easier, and they're still really yummy.

Good luck! ^_^

[roguesylph]

I am sometimes totally encouraged to have stuff like lean cuisine for lunch, both because it's convenient to know I can eat one and not kill my meal plan, and also because my diet tracker has a bar code scanner on my phone...so I can just scan anything pre-packaged and track the calories at the click of a button. It seems so annoying to eat fresh food in comparison... :)

[lisefrac]

I do like the Smart Ones meals, although I don't find them as filling as I'd like them to be. Maybe I should try the Lean Cuisine ones. And I definitely need them for the office.

[roguesylph]

I definitely like them for quick and easy meals (and I honestly find a bunch of the smart ones/lean cuisines/etc to be pretty tasty). It might help if you add some high fiber, low calorie stuff to the meal to help it stay satisfying longer. A coworker stirs some fresh spinach into lean cuisine fettucini alfredo at the last second so it's just a little wilted. I tend to just have a snack mid-afternoon because it helps to keep me focused, so I have a stock of nuts, granola bars, rice cakes, etc in my desk drawer so I'm less tempted to snack on the junk food that's also around. :)

Not that any of this helps me. I'm pretty bad about actually sticking to a good diet. I do really well if we pre-plan the meals and have time to cook them, but if we fall behind a day or two I tend to just get further and further behind.

[utenatai]

It takes a hair more prep, but I usually take them and toss them out over a bed of spinach or green beans to fill them out a bit.

re: the 5%

[utenatai]

I don't think I tell you this enough, but I think it's AMAZING that you quit gaming. I have a hard enough time staying away from the internet in general, quitting MMOs has got to be about a hundred times harder than that.

You don't need to do it forever, but a couple weeks of getting out your measuring cups and your food scales is a good mental exercise until visualizing portions becomes second nature.

Re: the 5%

[lisefrac]

Thanks for the encouragement :) I typically do measure stuff at home, but it's when I'm in the office that it's more difficult. I keep meaning to get some measuring cups for work.

[laurion]

I'm back to the tracking as well. Just recently fell back below the 200# mark.

Mindless Eating

[lady_ceylonna]

I'd highly recommend the book Mindless Eating. (http://www.mindlesseating.org/) It's a book by a food psychologist that discusses many unconscious tendencies people have with regards to food that can induce you to eat more than you think. It also has small tips that are reasonably easy to incorporate into you life that will build good eating habits long term.

I also read the study that surveyed people who lost at least 60 pounds and kept it off for at least five years. The top four things that most people had in common were:
1) Weight themselves at least once a week (to correct weight shifts sooner)
2) Watch less than 10 hours of TV a week
3) Exercise (on average) 1 hour a day
4) Eat breakfast.

I' also read a some studies that strongly indicate that exercise do not help you lose weight, but is pretty important to maintaining you weight/preventing weight gain.

Re: Mindless Eating

[lisefrac]

I have read that book, in fact! In one sitting, in a Borders cafe! It's awesome, no? I was just telling _dragonwolf_ the other day about the study with the soup bowl that they kept pumping soup into.

Well, let's see which of these are true of me:

1) I'm trying to do that now.
2) Check, especially since I no longer have cable.
3) Haha, so much no on the exercise. That's one to work on.
4) Most of the time I do eat breakfast. It really, really helps with not being hungry all day long.