Weight Loss Tip of the Day

If you want a cookie, eat a cookie. It's my opinion (and only my opinion) that most people with weight problems have a very bad relationship with food; this goes for those of us who overeat as well as those who are anorexic or bulimic. What happens it we separate foods into two categories: good and bad. Then we make a point to eat only the "good" foods and to stay away from the "bad" ones. The problem with this way of thinking is the bad foods become the only ones we want.

Anytime I've taken this tact to lose weight, avoiding the bad foods, it worked--for awhile. But eventually all I wanted was the "bad" foods and I would gorge on them: eating whole packs of cookies, cheese cakes and eating Popeyes every night for dinner (hey I'm a southern gal who LUUVS her chicken and biscuits). Of course I was never satisfied. As a matter of fact I was always disgusted at myself and my lack of self control. I would spend days beating myself up over the mounds of junk I just ate, only to repeat the cycle again the next day or week or whenever I was back to depriving my self of the "bad" stuff.

After years of repeating this vicious cycle, it finally hit me: Deprivation doesn't work. It only makes you want what you're not "supposed" to eat even more. It's like when your mother told you to leave that boy alone. And if even if you weren't that interested in him before, once your momma told you to leave him alone, he became the only boy you had eyes for. So now my philosophy is simple: If I want a cookie, I eat a cookie. Now those cravings I used to have are gone - poof - it's like they never existed. The reason being is that I know I can have a cookie (or cheese cake or Popeyes) whenever I want, so I don't have to eat the whole cookie jar at one time. Talk about liberating. I haven't felt this "free" in years. If ever.