WORKBOOK DITCH DIETING

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2 Are You Ready to Ditch Dieting Forever & Start Living Life? Did you know that a staggering 95% of people who are on diets then regain their lost weight usually within the first year? Even what s more alarming is that research suggests that people then put on even more weight than when they first started! 1 Why is it that we continue to see a positive relationship between rising obesity numbers and increased spend in the diet industry? This should really be the opposite if diets really worked. If all this money is being invested in so called solutions to being overweight, why are our overweight and obesity statistics increasing every year? If diets worked there would be no overweight people in the world. One of the key reasons why dieting doesn t work is that it fails to deal with basic psychology. Dieting makes you more preoccupied with food, meaning you want it even more! Have a think about when you have tried to restrict yourself from one of your forbidden foods I bet you wanted it even more right? Not only is increased weight gain a disheartening side effect of following a strict and often deprived way of life, dieting also affects your health and your mental state. Finally, studies suggest that there may be long term physical side effects from yo-yo dieting, with woman who diet frequently being more likely to: Binge eat Purge food (vomit) Restrict food intake too much and not get the nutrients they require for good health Over exercise Have poor health Become depressed or anxious Develop an eating disorder 2 1. Kausman, R. (2004). If Not Dieting, Then What? Allen & Unwin: Australia. 2..Better Health Victoria Better Health Victoria. Body Image and Diets. Retrieved on 25th March 2012

3 A Non-dieting Approach So now that we know that diets don t work what do we do? For many of us, dieting has been part of our day-to-day lives. Dieting has been part of our identity. It provides the glimmer of hope that the latest and greatest diet will be the one that will work and save them from this uncomfortable and painful struggle they have around food and their bodies. HERE S TIP NUMBER 1: THE ANSWER LIES IN OPTING OUT OF THE DIET GAME. We are given constant messages that dieting is the only solution, which involves control, willpower and discipline. If you break a diet, you are the one with the issue. You have failed. You clearly didn t have enough discipline or willpower!!! I m here to tell you it s all wrong!! You haven t failed diets, they have failed you. Diets do not work because they don t deal with why you may not feel good about yourself, why you may be engaging in emotional eating and why you may be holding yourself back by sabotaging your best efforts. Until you can explore what s going on for you at a deeper level you will stay stuck and engaged in the struggle. I know as I have been there myself and worked with many clients who have also been there. Diets have an external focus. They are based on quick fixes and rigidity. They are prescriptive and generic a one size fits all approach.they prevent us from tuning into our needs and really trusting ourselves. TRUSTING OURSELVES TO KNOW WHAT WE NEED FOR OURSELVES IS TIP NUMBER 2. All I ask is that you consider these 3 questions. I m not asking you to make any changes. Just notice what comes up for you. Do you want to continue riding the dieting rollercoaster?

4 What would it mean if you never went on another diet again? What impact would this have on your life? What might be holding you back from really trusting yourself and your body and getting in touch with your needs at deeper level? A Check In How are your anxiety levels at the moment? I m thinking that some of you will be feeling very uncomfortable and stressed at the moment. This seems like the opposite of what you have been trying not to do for so many years. It s scary to start to trust yourself and live your life according to no rules. Many women are worried that if they stop dieting and being in control that this will force them to be completely out of control, eat everything in sight and as a consequence they will gain a lot of weight that they won t be able to lose. Many women are scared to let go of the diets, the rules and restrictions. I d encourage you to take a leap of faith. Whilst you might crave certain forbidden foods to start with, many of my clients find that in time they get a sense of equilibrium and their eating behaviour adapts and naturally regulates.

5 The Solution: Being an Intuitive Eater A non-dieting approach involves being an intuitive eater, which is the answer to getting off the dieting treadmill. This approach liberates you from rules and rigidity. Isn t it time that you stopped putting your life on hold and focused your energy on positive, life enriching activities? Being an Intuitive Eater involves 3 components 3 : 1. Eating primarily for physical hunger than emotional reasons 2. Relying on your internal hunger and fullness cues (children do this well!) 3. Giving yourself unconditional permission to eat How does that sound? Let s explore what it looks like in more detail: Step 1: Eating primarily for physical hunger than emotional reasons Every now and again, it s OK and very normal to eat for emotional reasons, however, if this is happening regularly, it is a sign that something is going on for you at a deeper level that needs addressing. Emotional eating can sabotage all of your best weight loss efforts. Overeating relieves, soothes, pushes down and anaesthetizes (Kausman, 2004). TIP NUMBER 3: YOU NEED TO BE CONSIDERING THE POSSIBILITY OF DOING SOMETHING ELSE WITH YOUR FEELINGS. Ask yourself if you did not have food to turn on, how would you be dealing with your uncomfortable feelings? Are you an emotional eater? Consider the following: Do you eat more when you re feeling stressed? Do you eat when you re not hungry or when you re full? Do you eat to feel better (to calm and soothe yourself when you re sad, mad, bored, anxious, etc.)? 3. Tribole, E. & Resch, E. (1995). Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works, Third Edition.

6 Do you reward yourself with food? Do you regularly eat until you ve stuffed yourself? Does food make you feel safe? Do you feel like food is a friend? Do you feel powerless or out of control around food? One way to know if you are engaging in emotional eating is to be aware if the need to eat comes on suddenly, it feels like it needs to be satisfied instantly and it typically involves craving specific comfort foods. TIP NUMBER 4: TO BE AWARE OF CERTAIN TIMES OF DAY, SITUATIONS OR TRIGGERS THAT MAY SET OFF YOUR EMOTIONAL EATING BEHAVIOUR. GET is an acronym that can help you to get in touch with what physical hunger looks like. If we have been eating for emotional reasons, sometimes we can forget our natural hunger signals that our body gives us. Ask yourself if it s time to GET food? Gradually increasing desire for food versus the urge coming on suddenly Emptiness in the stomach - growling, rumbling Timing - last meal or snack eaten approx 3 hours ago. Feelings, Food & Emotional Eating Diets ignore the strong emotional attachment we have with food. We want to break the link between feelings and food, so that food is food, and feelings are feelings. Food doesn t have power over us it s our thoughts about food that gives it power. Consider your forbidden food. This is the food that occupies your thoughts, the go-to food when you are feeling stressed, angry, upset etc.

7 List your forbidden food Occasion/day/time that you crave or eat this food What is the trigger? Feelings that the food represents? For me, liquorice is my forbidden food. I observed that I would crave it when I was by myself either in the afternoon or evening. Liquorice represented the strong relationship I had with my grandmother who has now passed away. Every time I would visit her we would eat liquorice together. My cravings for this forbidden food was an attempt to try to recreate those positive feelings I had when I was feeling lonely. Recognising this made me start to recognise and be aware of my own needs and the fact that I wasn t going to get them met through molasses, wheat, sugar and preservatives! It wasn t the food I was after, it was the nurturing feeling. For one of my clients, her forbidden food was soft cheese. She has a Greek background and the cheese reminded her of her father whom she has loving relationship with. Eating cheese would remind her of this and it would make her feel good when she ate it. Your cravings have more to do with your emotional connection to the food, more so than the food itself. What are your triggers? Can you pinpoint when you crave these foods? Is it a certain time a day, when you are alone? When you are stressed? At night? After speaking on the phone to your mother?

8 What are the feelings that come up in the specific situation that trigger you to indulge your forbidden foods or engage in overeating or stress eating? What are the payoffs? (to avoid or escape an unpleasant situation/event/thoughts/feelings, to feel good or to get my needs met?) Putting it all together Being aware of our triggers allows us to no longer be on automatic pilot and to continue to reinforce the event with the usual sensation/feeling and then behaviour (emotional eating). For instance, if your trigger was speaking to your mother on the phone, in the past you might have just felt discomfort prior to, on the call and after the call. What s the best way to deal with discomfort? Eat! You might have then automatically binged on the ice cream, chocolate or wine the minute you got off the phone. It might have happened so quickly that you had eaten a block of chocolate and you weren t really sure what just happened! You might then feel worse about yourself, and then the criticism and negative self talk would come into play, making you feel even worse about yourself if that was even possible! This might lead to even more emotional eating, and thus the cycle begins. Next time you are on a call with your mother I d encourage you to check in with how you are feeling, being aware of what you are you feeling and where in your body you are feeling it. So for instance, you now have a new language around identifying what was discomfort in the past, is now anxiety and feeling resentful? You might now notice these feelings in your stomach and chest. Now, you can breathe into them, without judgement, without avoiding them, without buy into them. Just let them be knowing

9 they will come and they will go. You now can say to yourself I am experiencing anxiety and resentment which gives you a new language, and now a choice of whether you still go for the ice-cream, chocolate or wine. However, you are acknowledging what s going on for you at a deeper level. This acknowledgement is part of a healthy awareness of uncomfortable emotions. This is an empowering step to reducing or ending your emotional eating. Step 2: Relying on internal hunger and fullness cues Kausman (2004) in his book, If Not Dieting Then What? has developed an empowering approach to minimize non-hungry/emotional eating and bringing you one step closer to becoming more of an intuitive eater. He has created a key question for you to ask yourself next time you go to the fridge. Before you are about to eat, ask yourself the following question: I can have it if I want it, but do I really feel like it? Asking yourself this question is very empowering. Getting in touch with your needs and responding accordingly is the foundation of being an Intuitive Eater. By giving yourself permission to even consider eating, cancels out deprivation and the rules based approach that you might have been used to with dieting. You have the choice now, you are in charge.you can also decide to come back at any time and consider eating.awareness and acceptance are the first steps to change. Keeping a journal is another effective strategy to understand how your mood is connected to what food you are eating and when. Keeping a mood-food journal where you write down any triggers, time of day or types of food to start to understand

10 your eating patterns can be powerful. It s a great way to get to know yourself more intimately and understand your relationship with food. I recommend that you keep your journal private. Start to identify themes and trends to see if any overwhelming mood or emotion has triggered any disordered eating episodes (such as bingeing, purging including engaging in excessive exercise etc.)? Hunger-Fullness Scale A simple tool called the Hunger-Fullnes Scale is an effective strategy to help you to check in with your bodies needs. Often we eat mindlessly, meaning we aren t aware of what we are eating and how much we are eating. This can result in eating excessive calories. Have you ever started eating a bag of chips in front of the television and all of a sudden you have finished the whole packet and you can t really remember eating all of them? This is an example of mindless eating. The idea of mindful eating is to start eating at a 4 out of 10 on the scale below which is when your hunger awakens, and then stop eating at a 5 or 6 when you are satiated rather than stuffed. Mindful eating is a strategy for you to be really aware of what you are eating, and to really taste and savour the experience rather than shovelling food into your mouth whilst doing something else at the same time. Getting to know your hunger and fullness signal is a critical step in mindful eating. Taking 3 full deep breaths in and out and conducting a quick body scan prior to eating can be a very effective tool that can help minimise overeating. FULL HUNGER 0 EMPTY 1 RAVENOUS 2 OVER HUNGRY 3 HUNGER PANGS 4 HUNGER AWAKENS 5 NEUTRAL 6 JUST SATISFIED 7 COMPLETELY SATISFIED 8 FULL 9 STUFFED 10 SICK Working towards eating more in the grey area (from 4-7) will help with portion control as well as blood sugar balance and energy level

11 Step 3: Giving yourself unconditional permission to eat Remember no rules or rigidity, so eat what you truly want to, not what you think you should eat. Give yourself permission to have what you feel like. Eat mindfully and stop when you are satisfied. I m not asking you to change your eating, just to be aware and mindful of what s going on for you. An example is, if you wake up and truly want lasagne for breakfast, then have it. That s what your body is telling you it wants, but just before you have it, pause and ask yourself what am I feeling? Am I hungry?, Do I really want this?, If I m not hungry for food, what am I hungry for?. It s also important that you don t deprive yourself. Deprivation sets off the in control part of us and initiates a cycle that can bring on a binge session. If you really feel like chocolate, have it, but eat it mindfully and stop when you are satisfied. This may be at 2-3 pieces instead of the whole block. Many people think that they should have a lettuce leaf when they feel like a piece of toast. When we don t listen and respond to our bodies needs, we then end up overcompensating. So we end up eating the whole loaf of bread instead of a piece of toast! So the message is if you want the piece of toast, have the piece of toast! Self compassion is your key to success. Many women put a lot of pressure on themselves believing they have to look perfect and be perfect to be acceptable and loved. We frequently compare ourselves with some impossible standard set by the media and feel there is something wrong with us if we fall short of these unrealistic, and usually, impossible standards. We then tend to turn this on onto ourselves and project it onto their bodies, never questioning whether this is appropriate for us or our lives. This sets up the cycle of body dissatisfaction. Perfectionism is not the same as striving to do your best. Perfectionism is the belief that if we live perfect, look perfect and act perfect we can minimize or avoid the pain of blame, judgment and shame. It s a shield. (Brown, 2010). We think it only keeps out pain, but it also keeps out joy.

12 Self Criticism does not work Many women believe that they need to exert more self-discipline and self-criticism to lose weight or improve their appearance to ultimately see results. This self criticism might involve being hard on yourself and beating yourself up with negative self talk, such as Whilst I am fat, I will always be single. Many think that this self-talk will provide them with the much needed motivation to go to the gym or start dieting tomorrow. Research has shown the opposite, that in fact self-criticism relating to managing weight and appearance actually led to emotional eating. Self Acceptance is key What s the opposite of self-criticism? Self-compassion. At the heart of selfcompassion is self-acceptance. This involves embracing all facets of ourselves and not just the parts we like! We can recognise our weaknesses, limitations but this awareness does not interfere with our ability to fully accept ourselves. It s only when we stop judging ourselves that we can re-direct our energy into more positive areas of our lives and feel free and at peace in our bodies. The good news is that self-compassion can be cultivated. The challenge is believing that you are worthy NOW. Worthiness does not have any pre-requisites or conditions (Brown, 2010). It s not saying I ll be worthy when : I lose 10 kgs I find a partner I earn $100K We need to let go of the ifs and whens. We can only change what we accept. This sets us on the path of transformation. A life of condemnation, criticism and control creates high anxiety and prevents us from enjoying and savouring the moment and our lives. Every person is entitled to feel at peace and free in their body, regardless of her shape and size. Weight loss tends to occur naturally as a result of women feeling good about themselves on the inside. There is an alternative to yo-yo dieting, deprivation and constant anxiety. It s called self-acceptance and working from the inside-out to make permanent changes which will lead to a more fulfilling and satisfying life.

13 About Georgie Beames Georgie Beames is a Psychologist and the creator of the Freedom e-course. Georgie has a private practice focusing on women who don t feel good about themselves and their bodies. She works with women of all ages, shapes and sizes who have one thing in common they struggle day to day with food & their body. Her purpose is to normalise this struggle and to help and support women to transform the relationship they have with their body and their being. Georgie has taken everything she knows that worked for her clients in her private practice and created her FREEDOM E-course so it is accessible to many more women around the world. To check out more information about the Freedom online program please visit georgiebeames.com RESOURCES Brown, B. (2010). The Gifts of Imperfection. Hazelden: Minnesota. Kausman, R. (2004). If Not Dieting, Then What? Allen & Unwin: Australia. Tribole, E. & Resch, E. (1995). Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works, Third Edition. Better Health Victoria Better Health Victoria. Body Image and Diets. Retrieved on 25th March