Articles
MODERATION: YES, BUT EASIER SAID THAN DONE
Every so often, we scramble to shift how we eat in response to the latest diet news. First we aim to avoid fats as if they add instant pounds. Then we learn we can eat all the fats we want, but they have to be the right kind. First we seek “high carbohydrate living”,...
THINKING OF SWIMSUITS AND SHORTS
This time of year I hear lots of worries about the coming warm weather—specifically, about the swimsuits, tank tops, and shorts now called for. Suddenly, women start to fret once again about upper arm flab, the size of the thighs, weight overall. It doesn’t seem to...
WEIGHT LOSS AND DEPRIVATION
“But not all overeating is emotional….” I blogged on March 21. In part I’d reacted to a headline stating “What Are You Hungry For?...It’s Not Food…In Fact, It’s Everything But Food.” While I bristled at that, it did precede some good wisdom in the form of an excerpt...
HEALTHY EATING AND WEIGHT LOSS: Good Advice
I’m always combing the media, looking for both the useful and the absurd on food and diet and eating. There’s certainly never a shortage of either. Much of what populates the print and other media is not particularly helpful. But it is possible to glean some...
THE WEIGHT LOSS "JUMP-START"
From time to time, I’m asked about the weight loss “jump-start”. And what is this? When people use this term, they’re usually thinking something like this: “It’s so had to lose weight….I want to go away to some program (or start a severe liquid diet, or something...
WILL “FOOD RULES” HELP YOU LOSE WEIGHT?
I return now to thinking about “food rules” (see January 31, below). These recent guideline sets, like those offered by Michael Pollan and others, aim to help us eat more healthily. And, I would add, to relate to food and eating in a healthier, happier way than is...
BUT NOT ALL OVEREATING IS EMOTIONAL….
Yes, it’s true that I spend hours each week helping people get their weight and eating in check. However, it’s also true that I find it essential to see such issues as much more than individual problems. The world we live in tends to place all the responsibility,...
EMOTIONAL EATING Part 4: Is This Addiction?
If you eat to soothe or stuff your feelings, does that make you a food addict? For years, science said “no”, you can’t really be addicted to food, not as you can with alcohol or cigarettes. Now, though, it’s become clear that the massive amounts of sugar, salt,...
CHANGE ONE SMALL THING….AND LOSE WEIGHT?
(Watch for Emotional Eating Part 4 next week.) Eating sanely means losing weight and keeping it off. This, of course, requires learning to live in a way that maintains healthy weight. Toward that end, knowing just how hard it is to do, I sometime encourage...
EMOTIONAL EATING Part 3: Soothing the Soul, Not Making Waves, and Other Uses of Overeating
While it may be hard to stop, it’s usually not so hard to see “stress eating” in operation. A lot of emotional eating, though, hides in plain sight. You might not always see the connection between what you’re feeling and how you’re eating. If you’re asking the...
EMOTIONAL EATING Part 2: Eating as Stress Management
Emotional eating takes many forms, some easier to recognize than others, most pretty common. One form that many admit to is “stress eating”. Maybe you’ve had a bad day and think “I deserve it” as you head for the Haagen Daz. Maybe you think “I just can’t bother...
WEIGHT LOSS TIPS
“Lose weight quick!” …..“drop pounds now!”….. “special miracle diet!” You may not expect to find those words here……focus as we do on keeping weight off, avoiding yo-yo diets and fads, nurturing healthy eating habits. Yes, most of us share these important food and diet...