Not All or Nothing (8-09)

The CDC just released data that 1 out of 4 Americans is now considered overweight.  Even though supermarket aisles are crammed with reduced-fat or calorie-free products, bookstores and infomercials are filled with paraphernalia geared to help us lose weight successfully, the truth is that  our weight problems keep growing.   

From where I stand with my own addiction being a compulsive overeater, I need fewer diet foods and diet products, and more information and support on changing my life, hanging in there when the going gets tough, and strategies that have helped many people like myself not give up.  The more “diet” products I keep consuming, the harder it is to maintain a weight loss.  I am hungry for information, not food.

 We need to retire the word “diet.”  There is something about uttering that four-letter word that makes me want to eat everything in sight.   I embarked on a journey; I set out to change my life, not just “diet.”  When people ask me how long I have kept my weight off I always say the same thing, “I changed my life 5 years ago, and I have never gone back to the way it was.”  

We need more information how different people found successful results losing weight and sustained their weight loss longer than a month.   What works for one person may not work for another, and many alternative solutions should be coming our way. All of us start out full of energy and enthusiasm, and as the hurdles we jump become more frequent and even harder to get over, we give up.  That is the point where the person struggling with healthy eating needs the most support, and the most help.  The last thing he/she needs is another package of “100” calorie snacks.

 I had to learn to cope with life and not to reach for my plate for answers.  If I did overeat at lunch, another meal was coming down the pike, and I was going to get a chance to try all over again to be more sensible.  When I did overeat I learned to reverse my meals.  My “light” lunch was now going to be my dinner.  My stomach doesn’t know what time it is, and it is my head that gets me in trouble every time. Embracing that logic helped forge my new life today.  

Why do we place so much emphasis on starting the game and ending the game instead of how the game is played?  So many times people come up to me and tell me about someone they know that was doing well losing weight, and then gave up and gained all of it and more back.  What new product or book on the shelves is helping that person cope with the misery they are feeling? How do we help them stay in the game?  What strategies have people used to assuage the negative comments they are now subjected to so they don’t fall apart even more?

More than any addiction that people suffer from, breaking away from a food addiction is the hardest; we must eat to survive.   Two years ago when an article I wrote on my struggles with food was rejected from a major health magazine (they said it was too depressing) I realized then that dieting, quitting and starting all over again, is a huge money-making business; they did not want to publicize the “in between” parts.    

The “All or Nothing” attitude that I had all my life has been put to rest.  I have learned it is better to be in the game and playing than to stand on the sidelines and watch.  Some days I score, and the victory is within me; the days I don’t I still keep playing.  This is what we need more information on: staying in the game. A healthy lifestyle is possible for everyone, not just a select few.