In the beginning, was a man who weighed 325 pounds. This weight he had gained a bit at a time over many years. He had never been able to successfully lose weight. But on a low carb diet, he did lose 20 pounds. This was the first time ever he had lost weight. Did the low carb food cause him to lose weight? The weight loss stopped after about 20 pounds, though he didn’t change anything. Was the low carb food responsible for the stoppage?
It was probably not. Later, he learned that the kind of food he ate had little bearing on his weight loss (there are some people who find otherwise). But there was an important clue in there. The low carb diet was easy to follow because he liked the food, and it was easy to stay on the diet. It was easy to avoid noodles, rice, cereal, pizza, chips, and bread, when you can have as much meat and cheese and nuts (and vegetables) as you like.
My food intake and calorie count
Breakfast – toast (220); ham (160); salami (80);
- 460 calories
Lunch – Corned beef wraps (300); stuffed cabbage half (70); horseradish sauce (20);
- 390 calories
Dinner – pizza (900);
- 850 calories
Total for the day: 1700 calories (limit 1700)
That and responsibility makes weight control
This was one of the Doctor’s key insights: you will find it easy to stay on a diet that you really like. You will fight to stay on it.
But that was a bit of a false lead. I was completely unregulated in terms of calories. At that time, I ate as much low carb food as I wanted and didn’t measure or pay attention to how much or how many calories I was having. And since at the time my mindset was that: food = comfort, I would have just kept increasing the dose over time and would probably have started gaining weight again. I had to break that mental link and make a new one: food = enjoyable fuel. Comfort would have to come from fulfilling responsibilities and achieving my goals.
That’s leaping a bit ahead of the story. For now, I had had the important insight, that the diet had to be in alignment with your values and how you want to live your life. It had to be your lifestyle and not a temporary diet. Forcing yourself to lose weight is just too difficult. You will be on a permanent diet and never make real progress.
The next step on the Doctor’s journey was to figure out how to create the new link. Food was to be enjoyed, as a reward and as well-earned experience. It was not to be the source of comfort. It could and should be a reward for work. The harder the work, the greater the reward should be.
-The Doctor