We’re two months into 2011 and I’m having the toughest time with my primary New Year’s resolution—the dreaded new year, new diet. About 38% of people set weight goals each year. Only 8% actually achieve their resolutions, weight related or otherwise.* Scary, but true.
Over the past couple of months several people have asked me how I shed my extra pounds. At my highest, I tipped the scale around 185; I stopped tracking my weight at that point. It took roughly a year and a half to shed around 50 pounds, but I did it and kept it off—for the most part—until now. Carrying the extra five to ten pounds of Thanksgiving-to-New Years’ weight is enough to make my clothes fit tight and make it hard to breathe again, which is my main motivation for losing weight and keeping it off. Then again, I have to admit that my five-year-old calling me “jelly belly” had a great deal to do with pushing me to get back into shape again.
Why beat around the bush? There’s no secret, super-fast short cut to losing weight. It takes hard work, exercise, and eating right. Exercise, I can do. Eating right, well, that’s another story.
What makes me qualified to talk about dieting? After all I’m not a fitness trainer, a celebrity, or getting paid to promote the latest fad. I’m a real person with real diet challenges just like most American moms out there. I don’t believe in fad diets or taking pills to shed weight. For me, dieting has to be a long term solution and one that I can maintain as part of my lifestyle as a working mom. A diet has to be realistic. If it promises that I’ll lose ten pounds in two weeks, I know that within four weeks I will have gained back the ten pounds and then some.
Everyone’s body is different. We need to find a solution that fits our individual needs. Start by consulting your doctor. Never EVER embark on a diet or exercise strategy without consulting a doctor or nutritionist first, unless you know without a doubt that you are already in optimum health. Our goal should be to get healthy, not kill ourselves in the process.
Thanks to two pregnancies and my annual hibernation / holiday binge, I’ve gained and lost a lot of weight through the years. My weight still fluctuates based on the time of year (e.g. more physical activity in summer versus winter). And I’m ok with that. It’s been a difficult notion to accept, but one that was essential for me to understand who I am and how my body works.
That said, I have five basic steps for dieting success.
1) Get Real: Set realistic goals i.e. “I want to lose 15 pounds in six months” not “I need to lose 15 pounds by next Friday.”
2) The Scale of Judgment: Don’t weigh yourself every day. Find out the best time of day to weigh yourself and do it once or twice a week. Watching your weight fluctuate day-to-day is a self-sabotaging diet killer.
3) Patience is a Virtue (& a Dieting Necessity): Be patient. Long-term diet success takes months and years. Don’t expect overnight results.
4) One Size Doesn’t Fit All: We are each unique, so don’t compare your diet success to your friends or celebrities.
5) Forgiveness: Every day is a new day and new opportunity to get back on track if you fall off of the diet caravan.
Like everything in life, it’s always easier said than done, but I’m hopefully determined. And that’s half the battle.
Stay tuned.
Resources:
* New Year’s Resolution Statistics: http://www.steveshapiro.com/2008/12/11/interesting-new-years-resolution-statistics/
Monday, February 28, 2011
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