Last week, Channel 4 in the UK put out a documentary about Super Slimmers – people who had lost huge amounts of weight. All had achieved recognition of one kind or another for their dramatic weight-loss; there was a US winner of ‘The Biggest Loser’, a Slimming World ‘Woman of the Year’, a Rosemary Conley ‘Slimmer of the Year’, a Lighter Life ‘Wall of Fame’ loser and a couple of others.
The question in the programme title was always rhetorical – you knew that, didn’t you? Because, like 95% of dieters, all but one of these poor ‘losers’ had put masses of weight back on again.
My heart sank for the men and women whose undeniable dieting efforts had come unstuck. I felt their pain, because I’ve been there too. In 2002 I dieted with WeightWatchers. I lost 50 pounds. Then I put it all back on again – and more – in the two years that followed. And that wasn’t the first time that had happened. So I know what it’s like to lose the plot, to see a pound, and another, and another pile back on, until you stop weighing yourself because you don’t want to face what you know is happening. I know what it’s like to swell up through the dress sizes, feeling utterly bewildered by the speed at which the weight is stacking up, when you’ve hardly changed your eating habits, and only slipped every now and again… or so you tell yourself.
Getting to Goal
I can’t claim to understand the personal journeys these regained Super Slimmers have been on, but it seemed to me that in being awarded recognition for their success in reaching some predetermined goal, they were considered to have reached an end point. Perversely, the recognition and reward they received reinforced the perception that their weight-loss journey had now reached a conclusion – in effect, a point where old/bad habits could be allowed back in again. Why? Because the job of dieting was done. And because don’t we all secretly want to consume really unhealthy stuff that clogs up our digestive system and dulls our mind, all the time? Hmmm.
Responsible diet programmes usually promote some kind of maintenance plan for once goal is reached, and that’s what is supposed to help dieters keep the weight off. But the very fact that 95% of dieters regain lost weight is testimony to the inadequacy of the diet-and-maintenance approach. I speak from personal experience here and I can tell you, the difference between eating for weight-loss and eating for maintenance is infinitesimally small – much smaller than you think. Much. Most people (myself included) assume all sorts of tempting foods they had foresworn for the duration of their diet, can be welcomed back for first occasional but then, inevitably, regular consumption. Not so, friends. SO not so.
As many of you will know, my weight-loss – 70 pounds to date – was until recently frustratingly plateaued for several weeks. But in a weird way, I’ve been quite happy about this. That’s because, beyond see-sawing within a three pound threshold, I didn’t put any weight back on. I continued weighing myself every day (and, now I know it works for me, I always will) and eating for my new healthy lifestyle, with all habits established over the last few months still in place. I feel as confident as I can be that these habits are my lifetime habits, not something to cast aside in a fit of self-destructive pique when I’ve a bad day or feel weak-willed. They are, perhaps surprisingly, not habits which demand vast reserves of willpower from me any more (though they did at first), just a generally positive attitude (which I can summon up most of the time) and a constant refocusing on how much healthier, happier and more energetic I’m feeling overall, than I was two years ago.
To lose weight is one thing; but to keep it off, one needs to have changed the habits of a lifetime – food habits, exercise habits, stress habits, sleep habits, social habits. Yes, all of them. To keep the weight off, those changes have to be permanent, not temporary. They have to be about not simply squashing your overwhelming desire for a biscuit with your cuppa, but altering altogether how you think about food and exercise – and yourself. They have to be about changing mindset, so you find yourself wanting to go out for a walk, not forcing yourself to do it. They have to be about loving how the changes are making you feel, so much that you never, ever want to go back to your old ways. They’re not about resisting temptation, they’re about never feeling tempted. When this is how you feel, the chance of you keeping the weight off significantly increases.
Change is for Life
Of the six Super Slimmers, which one had successfully kept the weight off? What do you know, it was the only one who hadn’t actually been on a diet. Daniel Wheeler, the very picture of male physical health and fitness, today makes his living helping others achieve their weight loss and fitness goals by… yes, you knew it was coming… changing lifestyle and adopting healthier habits, not for a few extreme dieting months, but for LIFE.
There were some other points touched on in the programme too, to which I want to turn in future weeks… the drastic nature of powdered meal replacement programmes, the role of exercise, and overcoming the challenge of a slower resting metabolism (something called persistent metabolic adaptation). But the concept of being on a diet versus developing a healthier lifestyle for life was top of my list, as it’s very dear to my heart.
I attended an industry awards event this week with a client. For a large-scale ‘rubber chicken’ lunch (500+ seated) the food was unusually good. We began with a delicious sweetcorn soup accompanied by a delicate and tasty crouton dressed with sour cream mousse, chives and a sprinkle of popcorn flavoured with lime (very imaginative). That was followed by succulent suckling pig with all the trimmings, including a piece of very nearly crispy crackling (quite the achievement for a large-scale service).
I’ve been working on my health/wellbeing and food habits since September 2015. Healthy is how I eat now. I’ve given up 99% of added sugar and simple carbs (I have an occasional small portion of potato, the odd piece of bread in a restaurant, a microgram of sweet here and there when it sneaks into a sauce, but no cakes or cookies, donuts or desserts, ever). I don’t eat ready meals any more, or takeaways, or fast-food, or chocolate – or any confectionary. From where I was, these are all massive changes and I’m sticking with them, because they’ve made me feel healthier and more energised than I’ve felt in two decades. But… … I think I’ve let too many exceptions creep in.
Stress, anxiety and the associated sleep-loss problems all inhibit weight-loss in a number of ways. Firstly, in times of stress, we turn to food for comfort (and whilst I’m better at not doing this, I still have moments). Then, on a chemical level, physiological and hormonal responses lead to us storing or holding on to fat. Stress fuels the release of adrenaline (for a fight or flight response), and cortisol, which instructs the body to replenish energy (ie, fat) stores, even though they may not actually have been used for a fight or a flight. Weary after a night of interrupted or disturbed sleep, it’s all too easy to excuse yourself from early morning exercise. And with lethargy comes the temptation to snack.
I’ve mentioned this before, that I’m eating a little more, here and there, than I know I should. Still healthy food, but I’ve let a bigger serving, one more spoonful, an extra slice… creep in. I can even see myself doing it, and then I do it anyway. I rein it in, and it creeps back up again – nothing outlandish, but enough to turn a downward sloping graph into a horizontal line, for too long.
I weigh 70 pounds less than when I started. Yes, that’s great, really, really great. It’s the equivalent of two full-sized holiday suitcases jam-packed with clothes, shoes, accessories and jollops. It stands to reason, I need – in very simple terms – fewer calories of energy, to drag my reduced frame around. So I should be eating less than I was eating when I weighed two suitcases more. Or…
