To stay motivated, you must truly believe that your efforts are worth it. With a feeling of true purpose, you’ll be more motivated to switch off the game show and spend a half hour in the kitchen making dinner. At the mall, it’ll be a lot easier to walk right past the Mrs. Fields cookie stand. The sacrifices won’t feel as dire. So, as you did in the previous chapter (and will do in the upcoming chapter), think about reasons that are personally motivating to you. Sometimes the initial reason may seem superficial: You want to fit into your old jeans or lose weight for an upcoming class reunion. If that’s what gets you to fill your cart with healthy foods or pushes you to try out the Nine Step Program (page 98), that’s fine. But to keep up good nutrition habits for life, eventually you’ll need to switch to a reason that resonates more deeply with you.
These are some of the reasons that have kept my clients in it for the long haul: They feel better in their skin when they eat a balanced diet and drop weight. They want to be healthier and more energetic for their family and/or career. And they’ve developed a taste for wholesome foods and truly enjoy their new way of eating. If the latter reason sounds like something only a nutritionist could come up with, read what the two women profiled in this chapter have to say about savoring new tastes! Some of the reasons listed in the Why List below—such as reducing the risk for heart disease and other conditions—are also listed in chapter 2 (about emotional eating) and chapter 4 (about exercise). It’s inspiring to realize that you’re doubling or tripling your physical or emotional rewards when you tackle all three fronts: exercise, nutrition, and emotional eating. In the blanks at the end, add any other reasons that are personally important. Return to this list when you’re battling a craving for fried foods or sweets and could use a motivation boost.
THE WHY LIST: EIGHT REASONS TO GET CONTROL OF YOUR EATING (PICK AT LEAST ONE)
1. You’ll regain control over eating, along with your pride and self-esteem. Being ruled by a bag of chips or losing the battle with yourself over whether to eat a cinnamon bun is profoundly demoralizing.
2. You’ll trim down without obsessing over calories. When your meals are rich in fruits and vegetables, with a minimum of high-fat foods, and you switch over to whole grains, calories drop automatically. And then when you conquer any addictive eating problems, you’ll lose even more weight. Voilà! All without a single calorie counted.
3. You’ll open up a new world of tastes. Taste buds that have been battered by hypersweet, salty, and rich foods have a hard time sensing—much less appreciating—more subtle flavors in fruits, herbs, vegetables, a fresh piece of fish, and other natural foods. When you stop eating the hyped-up foods, your taste buds recover, and suddenly a wide world of foods that are lower in calories and not addictive becomes appealing.
4. You’ll cut your heart disease risk. In fact, if you pair a good diet with regular exercise, you can slash your risk by up to 80 percent.
5. You’ll reduce the risk for type 2 diabetes and prediabetes. A good diet that promotes weight loss can even reverse prediabetes and, in some cases, type 2 diabetes.
6. You’ll decrease your cancer risk, sometimes dramatically. People tend to think that cancer is strictly in the genes, but about a third of cancer cases are caused by poor diet (not enough fruits and vegetables, too much saturated fat, red meat, and alcohol), being sedentary, and/or being overweight. (Another third is attributable to smoking.)
7. You’ll boost your brain, bone, and eye health. Replacing unhealthy saturated fat with healthier unsaturated fats (see pages 94–95 for examples of each type of fat) may reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia. Loading up on greens, such as spinach and kale, can help protect against cataracts and macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness. And a diet rich in all types of vegetables and fruits (as well as calcium and vitamin D) is linked with better, stronger bones.
8. You’ll protect your children. Jennifer Levanduski, profiled on page 123, explains it perfectly: “It’s so important to me to lead by example so that my children learn proper, healthy eating habits to last a lifetime.” Many of the mothers interviewed for this book expressed the same sentiment.
Add your own reasons here:
KILLER CRAVINGS
A big bag of potato chips, a bacon cheeseburger with fries, an oversized chocolate chip muffin; it seems like these foods possess a special power over us. What makes them so irresistible is not one specific ingredient—the salt or fat or sugar—but a killer combination of two or more of these. In fact, food companies have figured out the percentages of fat, salt, and sugar that make it devilishly difficult to stick to reasonable portions, explains Dr. David Kessler, former commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), in his book The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite.
To make matters even worse, food manufacturers have incorporated so many different flavors into their products, which appeal to our drive for variety. Just look at all the Hot Pockets and Hamburger Helper options. (The term tastes covers the five basics we talked about earlier: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and savory. That’s just a starting point, though. Flavors, which we experience through the millions of smell receptors in the nose, make it even tougher to stop eating. For instance, that oversized chocolate muffin is made with sugar and fat from the butter, but the addition of the chocolatey flavor from the chips, and vanilla and any other ingredients, makes it even more tempting than a pile of butter mixed with sugar.)
You may know that these foods aren’t good for you, but you probably have no idea just how bad they are. For instance, a Burger King Whopper with cheese is obviously fatty—it has nearly a day’s worth of unhealthy saturated fat—but did you bargain on getting 63 percent of your daily sodium limit, too? Check out the health risks for each ingredient found in highly craved foods and learn how to limit yourself.
Fat
The risks: In excess, any type of fat sets you up for weight gain because fat has more than double the calories per ounce as protein and carbohydrate. But beware, in particular, of two types of fat: saturated fat and trans fat. Saturated fat is found in fatty cuts of beef, lamb, and other red meat; fatty cuts of pork; full-fat dairy products; poultry skin; coconut and palm oils; and sweets made from some of these foods. The main source of trans fats in our diets is man-made: partially hydrogenated oil. You’ll find this fat lurking in some brands of margarine, baked goods, frozen foods, and breaded chicken and fish. Fatty beef and full-fat dairy products also contain small amounts of naturally occurring trans fat. Trans fat from any source as well as saturated fat can cause you to pack on dangerous visceral belly fat, which is linked with heart disease, cancer, and more; these fats also clog your arteries, another risk factor for heart disease. Trans fats are the worst of the two because they raise LDL (“bad”) cholesterol and decrease HDL (high-density lipoprotein, or “good”) cholesterol. In addition, they increase inflammation in the body, which is being shown to be a risk factor for a variety of diseases, from cancer and heart disease to Alzheimer’s and arthritis.
Your limit: Aim to consume 25 percent to 35 percent of your calories from fats—that’s 50 to 70 grams on an 1,800-calorie diet. Try to make most of your fat (90 percent) monounsaturated (found in olive and canola oils, avocados, almonds, peanuts, cashews, and pistachios) and polyunsaturated (found in corn, peanut, safflower, sesame, and soybean oils, and pumpkin, sesame, and sunflower seeds). Both of these fats have been shown to protect the heart. Also make an effort to include in your diet a particular type of polyunsaturated fat: omega-3 fats (found in walnuts, flaxseed, flaxseed oil, and canola oil, and fatty fish, such as bluefish, mackerel, salmon, sardines, and trout).
Keep your intake of saturated fat to less than 10 percent of your total calories (or 18 grams on an 1,800-calorie-per-day diet). Avoid trans fats or, at most, cap your intake at 1 percent of your total daily calories, which is 2 grams if you’re consuming 1,800 calories. You can do this by avoiding sources of trans fat; that me
ans looking at labels and checking the ingredient list for partially hydrogenated oils, and steering clear of foods that contain them. (Any product sporting the Best Life seal as well as Bob’s own Bestlife brand foods, including the Buttery Spread, Buttery Spray, and Buttery Baking Sticks are free of partially hydrogenated oil.) And if you avoid fatty beef and full-fat dairy products, you’ll have virtually eliminated naturally occurring sources of trans fat.
Added Sugar
The risks: Added sugar, which is any type of calorie-containing sweetener added to a food, such as cereals, cookies, candy, bread, salad dressing, barbecue sauce—even the sugar you add to your coffee or the maple syrup on your pancakes—can be a problem for a few reasons. For one, the main sources of sugar in our diets are soft drinks and other sugary beverages; these have been linked with an increased risk for heart disease and diabetes. Too much added sugar is also associated with high blood pressure, inflammation, and high triglycerides, a dangerous fat found in the blood, as well as a decrease in HDL (“good” cholesterol). Plus, the amount we take in each day (84 grams, or 21 teaspoons) translates to 336 nutritionally empty calories. Naturally occurring sugar—the sugar in fruit and milk, and in small quantities in vegetables—is not a problem because these foods provide many other healthful nutrients and tend not to be addictive.
Basically all calorie-containing sweeteners—white sugar, raw sugar, brown sugar, maple syrup, honey, corn syrup, molasses, fruit juice sweetener, dextrose, or maltose and even high-fructose corn syrup—are about the same healthwise. The only exception is plain fructose, which is being used in products like energy drinks and some foods marketed to those with diabetes, because it doesn’t raise blood sugar quickly. Some animal studies, and now a few human studies, suggest that fructose causes a spike in artery-clogging cholesterol and triglycerides, promotes weight gain in the dangerous abdominal area, and increases inflammation, a trigger to a host of diseases. (Agave syrup is 80 percent or more fructose, so in my book, it’s basically fructose.)
Your limit: No more than 10 percent of your total daily calories. That translates to about 45 grams if you’re taking in 1,800 calories per day. It can be hard to suss out added sugar from naturally occurring sugar because they’re not listed separately on the food label. To get an idea of how much added sugar a product has, check the ingredients list. If it contains no sources of naturally occurring sugar (in fruit or milk), or they’re way down on the ingredients list, long after added sugars, then you know that most of the sugar is added. And I’d recommend steering clear of all forms of fructose (including the popular “crystalline fructose”) or agave syrup until the safety has been established. As the science on sugar and other nutrition issues comes in, we’ll post updates at www.thebestlife.com.
Salt
The risks: Foods loaded with sodium can increase your blood pressure. Chronic high blood pressure, or hypertension, is a leading cause of heart disease, stroke, and kidney disease. Another problem with sodium: A high-salt diet can make it harder to give up high-calorie foods. By adding salt to chips, pretzels, sweets, and many other foods, manufacturers increase the foods’ addictive powers. And as long as you keep eating these foods, your taste buds aren’t going to be satisfied with lower sodium levels. (See “Train Down Your Tastes for Fat, Salt, and Sugar,” on page 121.)
Your limit: We do need some sodium in our diet; our bodies don’t make it, and we can’t function without it. (Sodium helps regulate muscles, including the heart, for instance.) But we don’t need anywhere near the crazy levels we’re getting. “The average American adult takes in 3,734 milligrams daily; studies show that we need only a fraction of that,” says Paul K. Whelton, MB, MD, MSc, president and chief executive officer of Loyola University Medical Center. Although some organizations recommend 2,300 to 2,400 milligrams daily for healthy individuals, 1,500 milligrams (the level recommended for people with hypertension) might be a safer bet. In fact, the U.S. government will probably be suggesting in its upcoming Dietary Guidelines for Americans that everyone cap it at 1,500 milligrams daily. (As of press time, the Dietary Guidelines were still not finalized, but odds are that the sodium recommendation will stick.) The recommendations dip to 1,300 milligrams for fifty-one- to seventy-year-olds and 1,200 milligrams after age seventy; that’s because you usually need fewer calories as you age, and when you eat fewer calories, you typically consume less sodium.
FORGING NEW PATHS TO PLEASURE
Imagine a life where you feel in control of food. You’re eating a balanced diet, calories are in check, and you’ve left room for occasional treats. You lose weight and feel really good about yourself. You know you’re protecting yourself from long-term diseases and setting a good example for those around you—basically, you’re able to check off all the points made on the Why List.
How does that scenario strike you? If you’ve been ruled by food, it probably strikes you as wonderful, but perhaps unrealistic. You might think, I’ve been there, tried that. I’ve cleaned up my diet before but always gravitate back to overeating or addictive eating. And as much of a relief as it may sound to not have to worry about food all the time, when you think hard about giving up addictive foods, it might also be a little frightening. Deep down, you may actually think, Food’s just too big a part of my life. I lean on it. It’s so much a part of who I am, I’d be at loose ends without it.
It’s perfectly normal to have some ambivalence about giving up a habit that’s been with you for a while, sometimes a long while. As much as you may hate it, there’s a comfort to it: Food is soothing. And it’s the known; without it, will you feel uncomfortable? If you change your eating habits and then return to your old ways, will you feel even more defeated than you do now? As you did in the previous chapter, you can get a barometer on your readiness to change as well as why you may be resistant to change by interviewing yourself, using the motivational interview in appendix 5. I’m hoping this interview will reveal at least a little willingness to try the Nine Step Program, below.
SAVORING THE TASTE OF SUCCESS
Sheryl Savard, a thirty-eight-year-old lawyer and mother of three, had battled with her weight since she was a teen. “I tried Weight Watchers when I was in high school,” recalls Sheryl. “But that lasted all of three weeks, at which point I found and inhaled half a chocolate cake.” Her first failed attempt at weight loss, combined with a lifetime of watching her mother yoyo diet, was enough to convince Sheryl that being on a diet meant deprivation, misery, and disappointment. “I had no answers for finding and keeping a healthy body, so I did nothing, and the pounds piled on.” By age thirty-four, petite five-foot-two Sheryl weighed in at 181 pounds. Stressed, overweight, uncomfortable, and trying to raise three children while attending law school, Sheryl decided it was finally time to take back control of her life—and her eating.
She joined Bob’s website (www.thebestlife.com) and started revising some long-held beliefs about food, dieting, and weight loss. “It was interesting to realize that even though I claimed to love food, I rarely slowed down enough to appreciate it,” Sheryl reflects. “I’ve adopted the fine art of slow eating, and this has helped me truly enjoy food. And once I learned to savor every bite, some of my favorite foods fell off my list completely. For example, I haven’t eaten fast food in almost three years and can honestly say that I don’t miss it.”
Now she makes an effort to cook at home regularly, and this has opened a door to new tastes. “I’ve learned that buying good quality foods and produce, and reading labels, is well worth the cost and effort; ‘processed’ is just not an option anymore,” she says. And while treats are still part of her diet, Sheryl has learned to make smarter decisions with these, too. “I still enjoy my favorite foods but in smaller portions and less often,” she explains. “For example, I love chocolate-peanut-butter ice cream, but instead of a double-scoop waffle cone every week, I now eat a child-sized cup on occasion. I have a small piece of dark chocolate or a cup of hot cocoa made with water instead of an entire milk chocola
te candy bar. Fruit is now my family’s preferred dessert, and for my birthday, we had angel food cake with fresh strawberries.”
The changes show; Sheryl is not only forty-six pounds slimmer, but she also became hooked on exercise, recently finishing her first half marathon. Her family is also reaping the benefits. “Bob’s program has become so much more than just a weight loss strategy,” she says. “The psychological component of looking at your life and assessing what’s working and what’s not has strengthened our family and other relationships. My husband and I set aside a night each week to focus on long-term and short-term goals.”
THE NINE STEP PROGRAM
If you want to stick with a nutritious, calorie-appropriate diet, you’re going to have to override some of your brain circuitry and get rid of those automatic impulses to eat when you’re triggered by situations or emotions. For instance, maybe you develop a new MO when you enter the mall: Instead of smelling the cinnamon rolls and battling with yourself over whether to have one (and usually giving in), you take a brisk walk to the opposite end and back. Now mall starts to be linked with walking in your brain.
The goal of this plan is to break the old habits—eating too many high-calorie foods—and create new, benign, or healthful habits. Because the pathway in the brain from trigger to treat is well worn and, literally, the path of least resistance, breaking the habit may prove tough. You’ll probably slip up here and there; that’s a normal part of the process. Keep at it, and you’ll find that you’re giving in less and less and feeling more and more in control. And that’s such a good feeling, you’ll be coming back for more.
The Life You Want Page 11