Many of my new clients panic when I suggest that they eat whole healthy foods for fast weight loss. I can sympathize with them. As a child I would feel guilty if I ate a second apple in one day or if I wanted a second glass of milk. I had a bigger appetite than my thin siblings, but knew that to eat more than them proved to the world I deserved the extra weight I carried, even if that food was a couple of cucumbers for a snack in the summer. By the time I met my naturopath I weighed 256 pounds and was in a deep depression. I had gone armed with information and demanded blood work to see if my problem was liver/nutrient based. I made some great discoveries and was able to shed the depression and start a raw foods diet that let me lose 136 pounds in 9 months. When I returned to see the naturopath for my final blood work, she showed me the notes she took the first day we met. They said: “Patient views food as poison.”
For the woman I was when I first met her, that statement was very true. After working with so many other obese women, I have learned that is actually a very common idea. Food has been our lover and our enemy. Most of us don’t really know how we feel about it, but we all fear our relationship with it. The most common complaint I hear from dieters on why they quit most diets is that they just wanted to eat like a normal person.
For those of us who have grown up with obesity or entered the dieting world early, we have no idea what “normal” eating is. All we know is how to diet or not diet, and the not diet has nothing to do with eating right. We have proven to ourselves over and over again, that we have no control over the food we eat except when on a structured diet, and then it is only until we can’t do it anymore.
The obese have no clue how to eat like a regular person or even how much food we can eat to maintain our weight. When I tell new clients they are going to start their program on a 1800 calorie diet they want to turn and run. All we seem to know is starvation and deprivation as methods to lose weight. The thought of eating that much food and not be in overeating mode seems unrealistic. It takes me a good two weeks to convince them that 1800 calories is still slightly in weight loss mode for most.
The first week is always full of panic. Their menus are made up of foods and quantities they have picked up from dieting their whole lives. A lot of it is food they don’t care for and would never eat if they weren’t on a diet. When I tell them to eat more, to try something new they balk. “No, no, I will lose control. I can’t do it.” In truth, that is exactly what I want them to do. It is only after examining what puts them out of control, that I can help them bring things back to the middle and find a satisfying solution that will allow them to take responsibility for their daily food intake.
I don’t believe there is anyone diet that works for everyone. We all have different likes and dislikes and our bodies react to certain foods in both positive and negative ways. Some of us do better with low fat, some thrive on higher fats. Some of us are insulin resistant with some foods spiking our blood sugar while others can eat what they want. We also have different appetites that dictate if we are grazers or three meal a day type of eaters. There is no one right or wrong way to eat. Yet most obese men and women feel they have to conform to dieting standards which have always been about deprivation and obsession.
Dieting is exactly what has made us all afraid of eating, yet to lose weight and keep it off for life, learning to eat is imperative. That’s no brainer you are thinking, yet in my experience getting people to eat is more difficult than getting them to diet. When they do eat foods that they thought were only available during the overeating phase of their life they feel guilt and have a hard time enjoying it.
When I start a new client on this program, their first week proves how true the above statement is. They eat tentatively. The foods tend to come from their dieting history, the amounts minimal. I pick out these dieting foods and ask why they chose to eat them. Their answer is surprising. Not only was the food not satisfying, but oftentimes they ate food they didn’t like because that is what their dieting brain told them was the only acceptable choice. Now, there are diets out there on the market that promote lots of eating choices. They work for some, but the problem is they are small amounts for the calories, and most obese men and women need bigger servings, and when they eat higher fat, sugar, or salted foods, cravings dictate that one serving is never enough. That creates more fear of food, and that fear limits viable choices in their idea of what they can and cannot eat for weight loss. I make it clear, I do not want to see those diet foods in their menu again. Panic ensues.
It is a process, a hand holding to calm their nerves and gain their trust that it is okay to eat food as long as they understand that each choice they make needs to be seen as a whole, and it needs to work with them as a person. Once they see that they really can eat 1800 calories a day without gaining weight they are amazed. Amazed that they are now eating foods they saw as detrimental to their dieting cause, and eating those foods in amounts they find satisfying.
Making the decision to not let food, or the fear of it control you is freeing. No longer will you give in to cravings because you believe the food is stronger than you. Food will become what it is meant to be: nutrition and fuel. It is when that happens that the obese can step away from their fat suit for life.
