Tips & Tricks
Have short periods of discipline:
From meal to meal: Nothing else than fruit and vegetables in between, and look forward to the next "big"meal
From week to week: Have a day a week when more than usual is allowed.
From month to month: Your goal for a certain weight should be for some occasion once a month, more or less.
Be very conscious about feeling satisfied, often it takes some minutes after eating to feel it. I know it's very difficult.
Make a diet sheet on the computer. Mine looked like that:
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Day |
Food |
Drink |
Exercise |
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6.00-9.00 Rise: |
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9.00-12.00 |
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12.00-17.00 |
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17.00-24.00 Bed: |
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Like that you can learn what you really eat every day and be more concious about it. I was surprised how little I drank before I started to write it down and change something.
More idea for plans: I was a co-therapeut at my university for a BED-group (binge eating disorder). There we had some more information in our plans for our patiens: Time, Food and Drink, Place, Was it a binge?, Stategies against weight gain afterwards, Feelings, Thoughts before, while and after eating. I think that knowing about one's feelings must be also very useful.
After half a year of my a little less exact plan I have an "advanced" one now: Only day, weight morning and weight night. I became conscious about eating with the plan I had before. Now the plan is in my head.
I tried for a while the "Morganic System": A friend of mine, Morgan, checked once a week my diet plans: what I ate and if I lost weight. This was quite a challenge because I had to show my results to someone. And it was 1. not a girl so I might have been embarrassed because of concurrence and 2. it was also only a buddy but not the most important guy in my life, so again, I didn't have to be embarrassed. It's maybe the same thing when having a weight loss group. Everyone knows the problem, but still you have some pride to show that you can do it!
Always have a bottle of water around you, preferably already a full glass.
Move whenever possible. If you even make special exercises or sports and it'0s very difficult, think: Even half an hour of jogging is better than nothing! Even one floor taking the steps is something! Even circle your feet now 3 times when sitting in front of the computer is something! It adds up! I heard that studies showed that skinny people don't do more sports (yes I saw that when I asked around... they are definitely all very lazy!!) but they are more active all day long with little things. Just moving a little bit more. When sitting for example.
Another tip from my therapy experience: If you're not hungry but only have a strong desire for eating, do something that takes some time, andask yourself later on if you still want to eat it. There's a peak of desire and ALWAYS it decreases after some time.
Go to bed a little bit hungry... it's not good to eat before sleeping anyway andthere will be a nice surprise for the next morning's weight-in.
Don't have sweets at home.
But instead, have lots of different fruit, like watermelon, peaches, apples, and kiwis and some vegetables like cucumber and tomatoes (with salt, NO dressing!) and peppers if you like it.
When you cooked too much pasta for example, put half of it already before starting to eat in the FRIDGE! (Don't even think about getting a second serving...) I saw that the big portion problem was quite an issue in my therapy group. You have to be very careful when you cook and you are hungry. Learn that even little is enough.
Don't count calories, but inform yourself about the fat, carbs and protein foods contain. Avoid fat, and eat every day enough carbs and protein.
Start over again and again if you eat too much. You can have always to possibility to start anew. The only condition is: The start has to be serious and you are convinced that this was your last start. It's good to change something else too to mark this start. To know why it should work this time and not like before. My last one was a new goal: Ok, in one month there's vacation, I can do now a stricter diet and until then I can do it!
Give yourself something nice when you lost weight. For example, get a smilie on your diet plan or one of Lissa's cool blinkies!
I'm sure I will find lots of more tips! It's the motivation that is the most important thing in a diet!
