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For the rest of my life? Hmmmm.....
troylfullerton
Posts: 49 Member
I had a conversation with somebody today that really got me thinking. I suddenly had a watershed moment of realization of something I already knew, but that I had let slip at some point. Sustained (and sustainable) changes in eating habits are the key to successful weight loss--we know that. With that in mind, I wish I had a dollar for every time I've said the following two things to people starting the weight-loss journey: 1. we need to be eating "real", ordinary food (within healthy parameters, of course), and 2. you shouldn't do anything to lose weight that you're not willing to do for the rest of your life. The person I was talking to was referring to fad diets and Draconian approaches--but who decides when that threshold has been reached? What makes a program a restrictive diet? I suddenly realized the implausibility of staying "for the long haul" on a food plan that you can't live with--even if the mainstay of the program seems to surround certain healthy foods. I absolutely love the total freedom of choosing how to spend my calories. I already have fairly healthy eating habits overall--which means that it's not hard to stay within my caloric allotment. I'm not hungry...I'm losing weight...this feels like old times again!! 
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Yup! It's a Death March. LOL0
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troylfullerton wrote: »...1. we need to be eating "real", ordinary food (within healthy parameters, of course), and 2. you shouldn't do anything to lose weight that you're not willing to do for the rest of your life...
In many ways, these two statements have been the mantra of the GOAD board for a long time, but as I continue to work to manage my weight, I'm not sure I totally agree with these statements any more.
As @whathapnd reworked my quote in your other thread (the "I can have it...so I don't really want it" thread)steve0mania wrote: »
I guess we all have to figure out what works for us!
...For me, its, "I guess we all have to figure out what works for us right now."
I agree with her 100%. My own process of weight-loss and management has changed over time, and at different times different processes seem to work better or worse. Currently I'm in a non-counting but pretty restrictive mode. I eat mostly "real" food, but I do eat various light-breads, bagel thins, low-fat cheese, rice-cakes, and other items that folks might consider "non-real" foods. It's all part of the trade-off. I'd rather eat for "volume" than "taste," so to speak. I am not a foodie, and I don't think I have a particularly sophisticated palate. That's fine by me, and so I choose foods differently than some of our GOAD friends might.
Likewise, I am currently cutting out all snacking and alcohol during the week. This does require a high-level of willpower and white-knuckles some days!
So, is all of this "sustainable" and am I willing to do all of this for the rest of my life? I dunno. Maybe, but maybe not. At this point, though, I feel like I need to get my weight-loss kick-started and get back in the groove (and I'm just a few pounds over my target weight right now, and I'm below my official WW goal). Once I get down to where I want to be, I guess I'll learn what's really sustainable and what's not.
The message, in my mind, is that there is no one-size-fits-all mantra, and maybe it's not the best idea to judge others' approaches to weight loss. Believe me, there were plenty of folks who absolutely loved the WW approach, bought into the "eat real food and don't do anything you won't do for the rest of your life" mantra, and who ultimately weren't able to get down to goal weight and keep the weight off. I think weight loss is such a complicated thing that has so many components to it (many physiologic, but many psychological factors too) that it's hard to make such generalizations.
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XLNT Troy. I will say that I did give up some stuff while learning the ropes and slowly learned how to add back things I really liked but in a more measured way.
Certainly no one size fits all but I agree with yur sentiments at least for me.0 -
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I don't even pretend "I've got this", let alone for "the rest of my life". I treat it one day at a time. Not the cliché so much as a workable approach for me.0
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steve0mania wrote: »I eat mostly "real" food, but I do eat various light-breads, bagel thins, low-fat cheese, rice-cakes, and other items that folks might consider "non-real" foods. It's all part of the trade-off. I'd rather eat for "volume" than "taste," so to speak. I am not a foodie, and I don't think I have a particularly sophisticated palate.
Believe me, there were plenty of folks who absolutely loved the WW approach, bought into the "eat real food and don't do anything you won't do for the rest of your life" mantra, and who ultimately weren't able to get down to goal weight and keep the weight off. I think weight loss is such a complicated thing that has so many components to it (many physiologic, but many psychological factors too) that it's hard to make such generalizations.
Hey, Steve--I actually DO consider bagel thins, rice cakes, low-fat cheese, and reduced calorie break "real food"--with the advantage being that they are lower in calories. I'm actually delighted by the trade-off, because I can live with them (whereas non-fat cheese or card-board-like breads made with cellulose are, well...gross). I really can live with commonly-available reduced calorie things for the rest of my life. Habits change with time (including food preferences), and anymore, I just don't want a lot of greasy, high-calorie stuff.
For example, I grew up on bread and margarine-now, regular white bread seems mealy to me (I prefer wheat), and I could care less if I never ate margarine again. I also don't mind limiting added sugar--to me, that's just healthy eating. I guess what I'm referring to is the freedom to...within reasonably healthy parameters...eat commonly available foods without having to buy specialty items (such as pre-packaged diet food) or mainly rely on an over-rely a restrictive list of certain foods while most other foods are severely limited.
Let me put it in practical terms--if you can hardly eat at a restaurant without feeling like if you don't ask for grilled fish with steamed vegetables or a grilled chicken salad ("no croutons--take off half the cheese--I brought my own dressing"), or if it's been so long since you had a serving of potato salad that you scarcely remember what it tastes like, it may do you well to discover that some of what you're avoiding really isn't as detrimental to your weight loss as you might have thought. A half-cup of potato salad (for example) is only 146 calories.0 -
@troylfullerton, we're probably interpreting words and approaches via different lenses. That's fine. I just think that at different times, I'm willing to take different approaches, and some of those approaches would have gone against the old "mantra" of the WW GOAD board. Back in the day, I would have frowned at someone eating rice cakes. Of course, I have layered on the additional challenge of keeping kosher, that creates a unique set of Venn-diagrams overlaps between kosher food and calorie-friendly foods!0
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Good discussion. And I just restocked on Lundberg Thin Stacker rice cakes which I often enjoy as part of a snack or lunch0
This discussion has been closed.