If you’ve heard the “news” that diets don’t work long-term and actually may make you fatter, you may be feeling really glum. It’s bad enough that you sort of guessed from experience that they weren’t succeeding, but now you know it’s not your fault and why lost weight has the tendency to creep back on. If you somehow missed this “news,” read my blog, Why "The Biggest Loser" Participants Are Now the Biggest Gainers, and these articles, After “The Biggest Loser,” Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weightand Why You Can't Lose Weight on a Diet, and you’ll be up to speed on the subject. Many clients have shared their disappointment about the failure of diets with me. They’re relieved to hear they’re not to blame for being unable to slim down or keep weight off and will now, hopefully, stop beating up on themselves for lack of willpower and self-discipline. But,...

With diet programs, plans and pills touting quick and easy weight loss, you might feel there’s something wrong with you if pounds are dropping off slowly—or not at all—even when you’re eating “normally.” The truth is that weight is easy to gain but not to lose, especially as you age. Don’t blame yourself. There are reasons behind the difficulty. A York University study described in the journal Obesity Research and Clinical Practice focused on “dietary and exercise data for tens of thousands of Americans over the past four decades. It found that even when eating the same diet with an equal activity level, “a given adult in 2006 had a higher BMI than a counterpart of the same age in 1988.” (Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 10/6/15, E48). Co-author of the study, professor Jennifer Kuk of York University, attributed the difference to several factors. Americans sleep fewer hours than they used to—“in 2013, 40%...

Though you’re aiming to become a “normal” eater, do you ever secretly consider returning to dieting? Do you envy dieters’ rapid weight loss? Or blame yourself for a lack of will power and an inability to keep weight off? If you answered yes to any of these questions, please read on to learn the scientific reasons why diets fail us.In “Why diets don’t actually work, according to a researcher who has studied them for decades,” (Washington Post, 5/4/15), Roberto A. Ferdman interviews Dr. Traci Mann, psychology instructor at the University of Minnesota and researcher on eating habits, self-control and dieting for more than two decades. Here are some of Mann’s quotes from the interview which she discusses in more detail in her new book, Secrets from the Eating Lab: The Science of Weight Loss, the Myth of Willpower, and Why You Should Never Diet Again (HarperCollins, 2015). Watch for my review...

Why should you care what color your fat is? You might be sick of thinking about your fat, period. But it’s important to understand fat composition, especially that brown fat has a positive roll in determining your metabolism and keeping you at a comfortable weight. Understanding the process of fat-cell making may help you think more about food choices and actually play a part in determining your brown/white cell make-up. “When good fat goes bad’ by Barbara Moran (Bostonia, Fall 2014, page 22) explains the function of brown fat and why we want to have more of it. “White fat looks white because it’s full of molecules called lipids, which the body uses for long-term energy storage. Brown fat has lipids, too, but it is constantly using them like fuel to stoke a fire. Brown fat looks brown because it is packed with mitochondria, the tiny cellular powerhouses that keeps us...

Common wisdom is that some people get fat because they have the “thrifty” gene, which helped our ancient ancestors survive during times of famine. It helped folks metabolize and store food more efficiently so that they were able to keep on keeping on. Now, according to “Ancient genes, modern meals” (Science News, 9/20/14, pages 18-22) come several challenges to this theory which may not help you become a “normal” eater, but hopefully will help you see yourself differently if you are large sized. Andrew Prentice of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine asserts that “food shortages affect fertility and that women with the highest body weight have greater reproductive success” and “plumpness is an advantage not because thinner members of a population are less likely to die, but because they are less likely to bear children and pass their genes to the next generation.” John Speakman of the Energetics...

Now is the time that many people start a diet, vowing that this time it will stick and be the last one they’ll ever go on. Maybe your friends, family members and co-workers are planning to be “good” around food for the rest of their lives and follow a new fitness routine. Maybe they’re under the faulty assumption that they’re going to manage to say no to all “bad” foods even though that never has happened before. Don’t be fooled by their take-charge attitude, hope, and enthusiasm. Don’t be seduced by the idea that a diet is what you need in order to lose weight. I don’t care what the media or doctors tell you. You know better. You have your own experience to go by. Sure, it can be very exhilarating to strategize with friends, relatives and colleagues about how you’ll triumph over the battle of the bulge. January, as...

Some of the best news I’ve read in a long time came out in July and didn’t make the headlines. But good news it is indeed. According to “The diet industry is dying as a new mentality takes hold in America” (Business Insider, Mallory Schlossberg, 7/10/16), Americans are shifting from a diet mentality to a healthy mentality. If you’ve stopped joining diet/weight-loss programs or buying “weight-loss” foods, you’re a part of making this happen and should be proud of yourself for taking part in this sea change. It appears that counting calories and deprivation are on their way out, and a focus on eating for health is moving in. An October 2015 report from the market research firm Mintel noted "the diet industry faces downward pressure as US adults also remain skeptical of the ingredients in diet-specific products and their effectiveness in managing weight…Though calorie restriction remained the most popular methodology...

The White Paper below explains the importance of language in talking about eating disorders, especially about weights at the higher end of the spectrum. Read it over and see what you think and talk with your health care providers about it. WHITE PAPERThe Language of Eating Disorders: What the ED Professional Needs to KnowAddendum: Language Directed to Binge Eating Disorder (BED), CompulsiveOvereating (CO) and People of Sizehttps://www.iaedp.com/Language_of_EDs_Addendum_BED_17.pdf PurposeThe purpose of this addendum is to increase the awareness and educate theprofessionals who work with, treat, or educate, patients with BED, CO, and people of size on the “language” appropriate for this population. Note: The above diagnoses are clearly defined and the professionals working with these patients should be aware of and understand these clinical parameters when using terminology within the patient conversation with insurance reviews, general writing, article submission and presentations at all levels. IntroBinge eating disorder (BED), compulsive overeating (CO), represent the largest population...

Of all the discussions I have with clients, the most difficult for both of us, it seems, is talking about their desire to lose weight. The topic comes up often—for some clients, in nearly every session—and its exploration never gets any easier. I sometimes feel as if I’m being drawn down into a quagmire with every word I utter and believe that my clients feel similarly. Why is it so tough to talk about the perils of a weight-loss focus? First off, clients seem to feel as if I’m trying to snatch something away from them. I even get the feeling that they think I’m a little crazy to be suggesting that weight loss isn’t a great long-term motivator or goal. After all, their doctors and doctors’ nurses, dieticians and, well, just about every health professional they encounter is telling them just the opposite. And then there are the barrage of daily...

Every time I attend a performance by Sarasota’s Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe, I’m impressed by the dexterity, prowess, and showmanship of their dancers. And I’m struck by the fact that if you passed some of them on the street, you might not imagine that they’re the excellent performers that have been wowing audiences since 1999. Rather than being willowy or svelte, several of the dancers are what our weight charts would probably call fat or overweight. Their size certainly doesn’t stop them from singing and dancing for nearly two hours straight (okay, there’s a 15-minute intermission) and entertaining audiences with some complex maneuvers—nothing you’d ever want to try at home. As a tap aficionado myself, I know the intense, sustained energy it takes to do my 45-minute weekly advanced beginner class routine. I can’t imagine doing swing or Broadway show dancing or the like for going on two hours with only a...

Most of you know that I deliberately don’t focus on weight loss in my books. Teaching intuitive eating and improving life skills has a far better long-term payoff, and weight-loss goals function as a barrier to enduring health and fitness. However, I recognize that many troubled eaters wish to shed pounds and that the majority of my blog readers are probably weight conscious. I imagine that a subset of these people are part of a couple who are trying to lose weight and thought an article I read might shed some light on this process (“A few ground rules for weight-watching couples” by Jae Berman, Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 2/28/17, E24) The article makes some great points. Don’t compare weights. If you and your partner are looking to lose weight, don’t compare pounds shed if you’re of different genders because men tend to lose weight more quickly than women do. If you’re a...

For my new book due out in January, Helping Patients Outsmart Overeating: Psychological Strategies for Doctors and Health Care Providers, my co-author, Paige O’Mahoney, MD, and I struggled to find the best ways to describe the patient population we were writing about as well as their concerns. We received input from the Health at Every Size movement (found at HAES) and sought out current research on the subject. One study, “The impact of weight labels on body image, internalized weight stigma, affect, perceived health, and intended weight loss behaviors in normal-weight and overweight college women” (Essayli, Murakami, Wilson, and Latner, Am J Hlth Prom 1-7, DOI: 10.1177/0890117116661982, ajhp.sagepub.com, 2016) explains that there has been a substantial scientific challenge to use of the BMI-related weight labels of “normal, overweight, and obese” because “it does not reflect differences in muscle mass, age and race.” The study’s “results provide initial support for the hypothesis that...

It’s about time that we start to see articles in major newspapers like this one by Carrie Dennett in The Washington Post, “Does obesity automatically mean poor health” (10/4/16, http://www.heraldtribune.com/news/20161004/does-obesity-automatically-mean-poor-health). We’ve been scolded for decades about fat equaling an unhealthy body and mind and putting those of high weights onto a path that leads to an early death. That’s mainstream media for you, often lagging behind reporting on cutting edge research (described in Body Respect by Bacon and Aphramor or Secrets from the Eating Lab by Mann) that draws surprisingly different conclusions. Dennett writes: “For every study suggesting that as body mass index increases, the risk of chronic disease and early death also increases, there are others demonstrating that people can be healthy—or unhealthy—at almost any body weight.” One such study describes how “‘metabolic health’ was more important than BMI when it came to estimating future health risks.” The truth is that...