I hate dieting! Any experienced dieters here?

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  • #611026
    WIY
    Member

    Ok, I wont rant but due to not giving a darn about what I ate for a very long time, I now have to start giving a few darns because it has caught up with me in a bad way.

    Someone has got to tell me how to stop cheating on my diet. I can be good for a few days and then I keep blowing it big time on major no-nos. Any tips and tricks for this would be helpful. And no I dont have it in the house but when I feel like it I will go to the store and buy junk and do away with it. I have to stop. Any help is welcome and encouraged. I wont say I havent lost weight but I move 2 steps forward and one step back every week so I am not getting far and I am not really changing how I eat because I keep eating the same bad stuff every few days and the second the diet is over Im scared what will happen.

    #983363
    Avram in MD
    Participant

    WIY,

    A few thoughts I have that I work on in my own life, and hopefully may be helpful to you:

    1.) Don’t diet – the popular conception of dieting in the U.S. is taking a hatchet to our intake and suffering until some goal is reached. Like in “Garfield” comics where the cat eats everything in sight, and then for one week, Jon feeds him nothing but a carrot for supper. That’s a recipe for failure, since the underlying habits are not being changed, and the diet is unsustainable for the long term. As soon as the diet is over, the bad stuff comes right back. Realistic lifestyle changes, not dieting, is needed.

    2.) Fill your space with good choices – all of us tend to take the path of least resistance and eat what is easily available to us. So remove junk food from your pantry and replace it with healthy, ready-to-eat foods such as carrot sticks, apples, grapes, celery, yogurt, whole grain crackers, bananas, etc. You can’t cheat with something that’s not there, and healthy snacks can satisfy hunger without guilt.

    3.) Don’t get over-hungry – When we get really hungry, we tend to make poorer food choices. Plan ahead, have a healthy snack, and keep yourself from getting to the point of “I need a bite NOW!” before you even start making supper.

    4.) If you drink soda – stop. Sodas add toxic amounts of sugar to our diets. It’s like a blitz on the pancreas. Water has no calories and is what our bodies are really after anyway when thirsty. If you did nothing but remove soda from your diet, then you have accomplished a big step. Diet sodas may not have sugar, but the artificial junk isn’t good for you either.

    5.) This is my biggest challenge personally – control portion sizes and eat slowly. I am a fast eater by nature, and can finish off a third helping by the time my wife is done with her first. Fast eating results in overeating – the stomach can’t even register fullness before too much has gone down the hatch. Focus on chewing thoroughly and enjoying the food. It may help to decide in advance what and how much you plan to eat, and to arrange it on your plate so that you know when you are finished. Then get up from the table. Many times I continue eating without even thinking about what I’m doing!

    6.) When you do eat something “bad”, don’t feel guilty. Nobody becomes obese from one piece of cake. If we tell ourselves that we can never eat this or that, then internal resentment and a sense that this is all too hard starts to build up. Instead of eliminating the desserts we love completely, set a realistic limit. That way, instead of thinking “Poor me, I can’t eat this”, we think “ok, I can eat this now instead of the brownie later…is it worth it?” Decide, enjoy (or enjoy something else later), and move on.

    7.) Exercise is key to health. This is a big challenge for me because I have a sedentary office job. Take walks, sit on the floor, stretch your muscles, start small and slowly build up. The times I was most successful exercising have been when I was able to make it a part of the daily routine. I would walk to the next nearest subway stop – adding just 15 minutes to my commute, but 15 minutes of exercise. Park farther away, take a walk when coming or going, it doesn’t have to be an interruption.

    Have a great Shabbos!

    #983364
    King19
    Member

    You have to understand that you are cheating your self. Also if you add major exercises to your schedule, it serves as an extra deterrent to blow it away, gets you more focused..etc. I personally went to the gym 4-5 times a week. When you build or shape your body, it’s harder to let it go by “cheating “. Also, another major thing is no fried foods, and nothing but water between meals

    #983365
    Bar Shattya
    Member

    The main thing to keep in mind is to stay away from the people who think dieting should be done in a healthy way. Seriously. A tiny bit of logic aught to help you. People who eat healthy don’t lose weight. If they did people would just disappear into nothingness by eating healthy. But they don’t. Healthy people stay the same weight. If you want to lose weight you have to do something unhealthy.

    #983366
    WIY
    Member

    Avram in MD

    Thanks. Some good advice there.

    Bar Shattya

    Dolty comment.

    #983367
    sharp
    Member

    Make sure to have a healthy breakfast in the morning every day. It doesn’t have to be a lot of food, but breakfast should be non-negotiable. Have a light snack between breakfast and lunch, say an apple and non-fat yogurt for example. Or any fruit and a serving of nuts etc. If you’re going away for a couple of hours, take something light along with you so that you won’t feel like you want to eat everything in sight when you come back.

    Eat a big salad as part of lunch as well as dinner.

    Increasing physical activity cannot be stressed enough. Exercise goes a long way for weight loss and overall health. If you can’t hit the gym, or have time constraints or whatever, try to walk as much as you could.

    Drink 2 glasses of water with every meal. Drink only water between meals.

    Going to sleep at a decent hour every night is very important. When your body is tired and needs energy the brain sends mixed messages and you end up overeating. (We all know that sleep is important. Not just for weight loss.)

    #983368
    marbehshalom
    Participant

    i switched form wheat to spelt and lost alot of weight from that

    #983369
    eclipse
    Member

    WIY, what does “dolty” mean?

    #983371
    WIY
    Member

    eclipse

    Its the adjective form of dolt. 🙂

    #983372
    Bar Shattya
    Member

    WIY

    and you have identified yourself as someone to stay away from. I dont even know you but clearly you have a few pounds to lose

    #983373
    WIY
    Member

    Shattya

    Not really sure what to say here…

    #983374
    Vogue
    Member

    Maxi health makes a dieting vitamin to take before meals. Its expensive though. And also I am not so motivated because even though I know my weight is an issue. And I know I eat to much junk, my doctor did not say anything about it at my last appointment and I did not want to point it out because I didn’t want to hear her mussar, which is usually about jow I just need to stop drinking soda which according to her, the amount I drink is relatively harmless and I excercise plenty. I try to drink like two to three liters of liquid a day mostly water. Also fruit is important to eat as well as vegetables. When I go to nice restaurants, I try to get salad and soup.

    #983375
    Outsider
    Member

    Keep a “go to” food around. When you’re hungry, it’s something you can eat anytime, and not worry. I personally try to have baby cut carrots, and apples in my fridge at all times, so, when I fill I have to fill up, I can do so with eating very few calories.

    #983376
    Nechomah
    Participant

    WIY – Make yourself accountable. Either have someone weigh you on a regular basis or find a partner to go through this with. You can be accountable to each other. When you know that you’re going to have to answer for the “crimes” you did, it puts things in perspective and the short term pleasures lose their luster. Are there any support groups for men in your area? Even OA – even though I’m not an advocate of them and it may be too serious for you, but you would benefit from having the support of other people. It helps to have ideas how to handle the situation you describe plus you will be deterred from “cheating” since others will find out. Hatzlacha!

    #983377
    kapusta
    Participant

    If you look through old threads, I think bpt had a whole long list of dieting tips. A few random stuff thats popping into my head now:

    -This time of year especially, soup is a dieters friend. Most soups start with soup mix (a looot of salt and possibly fat) so either watch how much you use or skip it and add you own base of seasonings. If you saute the veggies (you don’t need much oil, the veggies will release water when they start to cook) and add your own seasonings, you’ll be fine.

    -If you aren’t that familiar yet, this is a good time to learn about good seasonings. Its free flavor.

    -Someone told me she was on Atkins for 3 weeks with no results. You can cut out fat/carbs/other for a few weeks and not see any results. Its a matter of finding what works for you. Figure out what foods you like, and would work on a certain type of diet, and that might be a good place to start.

    -As someone mentioned before, one piece of cake is ok. Two pieces of cake is less ok. Being realistic, at some point you’ll probably be hungry or have a long day and want chocolate cake, and plan for it. Take one piece and then find something healthy to have.

    -Plan meals ahead. If you come home late one night, its much easier knowing that the chicken is ready to be cooked than to find the leftover lasagna and decide it looks very interesting and have that for dinner. (Btw, you can take something like lasagna and add veggies, use whole wheat noodles etc and make it healthier. Or use veggies instead of the noodles altogether.)

    -Figure out what healthy snacks you like and keep them around. Whole wheat pretzels, baby carrots, apples, nuts, cottage cheese are relatively healthy and quick.

    -I know someone who lost weight by dieting the whole week and then having a treat at the end of the week. Don’t plan to cut out all the bad foods, just limit them and know when to expect them so you don’t feel like you’re missing out.

    -Veggies are cheap because you can get a lot of food for low calorie and a lot of health benefits and the fiber is healthy and filling. Figure out how to stick them in wherever you can. Potato is low calorie, but not necessarily diet food.

    -Don’t become focused on losing weight. Focus on eating healthier in general, but be reasonable about it and take one day at a time.

    -If you really want sugar and see you cant avoid it, wait five or ten minutes, and then have.

    Good luck!

    *kapusta*

    #983378
    streekgeek
    Participant

    Keep a log on what you eat. Biggest deterrent ever, you really won’t find yourself cheating. I have used myfitnesspal dot com. They have tons of food in their data base so they keep track of your calories, fats, sugars… And my best part is that at the end of the day you can see how much you will weigh in 5 weeks if “if everyday was like today” in regard to what and how much you ate.

    It is totally free, and they have apps for both iPhone and Androids.

    #983379
    Avram in MD
    Participant

    Bar Shattya,

    The main thing to keep in mind is to stay away from the people who think dieting should be done in a healthy way. Seriously. A tiny bit of logic aught to help you. People who eat healthy don’t lose weight. If they did people would just disappear into nothingness by eating healthy. But they don’t. Healthy people stay the same weight. If you want to lose weight you have to do something unhealthy.

    Your statement is cute, but incorrect. If it were true, than we’d see people who ate in an unhealthy way gain wait until they exploded. A person’s weight maintenance is determined in part by how much he consumes (calories in) and how much he exercises (calories out). If either of those factors change, the person’s weight will change in response and then reach a new equilibrium.

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