I have been watching a series on you tube called “Secret Eaters”

It’s pretty interesting and would be good for people that either can’t seem to lose weight or don’t know why they have been putting on weight.

It’s about people contacting the show, they have been eating “healthy” according to them but cannot work out why they have been putting on weight and can’t seem to lose it. Most of them felt like they didn’t over eat. So they hook up cameras in their house and also have a surveillance team to watch their every move. What they found absolutely had all these people in shock. These people had no idea how firstly what healthy meant, no idea about what a portion size is. Eating some healthy foods does not negate all the junk they had in their diet.

And eating healthy foods you can still put on weight if you are eating more than you need, very easy with fats as they have twice the calories as protein and carbs. Yes fats are good, to a point! If you want to include plenty of fats, it needs to be balanced out overall with everything else, or you will put on weight or won’t be able to lose it!

This was all a massive reality check, they found out where they were going wrong, some really upset with themselves. You have to know where you are going wrong to be able to fix it, and you also have to be honest with yourself. They did a diet diary where their calories were added up, but what they said they were eating did not explain their weight gain. When they added up what they ate from watching them and adding everything up, perhaps everything they dismissed, forgot about- you could then see what they said they were eating was WAY off. In some cases was twice as much as they needed for them. The biggest things were alcohol calories, processed sweet/fatty snacks, portion sizes from eating out and also serving sizes at home, and most of them, if not all of them had no idea about the amount of calories in their food, no idea! They grossly underestimated the energy density that food had.

They ate that much not because they were necessarily hungry but because of habit, boredom, convenience (grabbing high calorie snacks on the run). There was a lot of mindless eating in front of the TV, mindless eating at work, eating on the run.

So when everything was revealed to them and it hit home, they could see exactly where they needed to make changes. They had an eating plan laid out, not a diet, not deprivation at all, because they were overweight the diet consisted of the calories that were needed to maintain a normal weight, which was 1600-2500 depending on sex and height.

They were followed up 4-6 weeks later and they all lost weight, and they found it pretty easy once that awareness was there, no one felt deprived or hungry!

Now from watching this program you might get some clues to where you are going wrong, or where some little changes can be made. Writing a food diary and logging EVERYTHING and using an app like my fitness pal it may become clearer for you.

Especially when it comes to alcohol, snack choices and portion sizes and knowing where your calories are coming from because it seems that not many people know the energy density of foods or what the right portion size (for them) entails. They severely underestimated what they really ate and were in denial and not honest with themselves. They learnt a lot and having the right information got them losing weight and feeling good!

Awesome outcome!
Are you a secret eater

Dinielle

If you are not happy about something in your life and it is in your power to change it, do it!

How do you know you are truly ready?

That is the question you need to ask yourself and you have to be as honest as you can with yourself.

Firstly what is truly stopping you?

Quite often you can be your own worst enemy and you can self-sabotage yourself!

Do you know what you need to do to get there? If not do you know someone that can help you?

It doesn’t matter how slow you need to go, either way whether you do something about it or not the time is still going pass, so you can either work towards where you want to be or stay where you are. Get the help you need to make it happen.

The reminds me of when I first was deciding whether to study or not, yes I could tell myself all the excuses in the world why I couldn’t do it, like I don’t have the time, I don’t have the money, I’m not smart enough, it will be too hard, what if I’m no good at it? But do you know what? The more I was thinking about it the more that idea was in my head until eventually the thought of not studying and being a nutritionist was worse than the thought of doing it!

Meaning I had come to the point of no return, I could see the future and what I wanted for that future and that future was me being a nutritionist, I didn’t want to stay doing what I was doing, even though not doing would have been the easiest option for sure!

Yes it took hard work, persistence, mental blocks of it being hard, but in the end underneath it all I believed I could do it, I had to do it, not doing it was not an option anymore.

If you want something enough you will find a way to do it. You owe it to yourself to push the excuses aside that you tell yourself and make a start!

Overcoming food habits, wanting to lose weight or to improve your health, getting a job, getting fit, even just cleaning the house! - all these things won’t change if you do nothing, and in the end you might just surprise yourself, because you can do anything (in your power) if it means enough to you and you want it bad enough. Where there is a will there is a way, isn’t there?

If you would like to work with me, feel free to drop me a line for a chat :)

Dinielle

A lifetime of habits seem so hard to change, habits feel as natural as breathing, your habits are a comfort to you, its familiarity and they are so difficult to break. New habits that replace old habits are hard work and you consciously have to make yourself do it, you have to push and it does take all your effort, it doesn’t feel natural to you, it doesn’t feel part of your routine…yet….but if you keep making the changes one day you won’t have to think about it anymore, you won’t call your diet “A healthy diet”, it will just be called “ This is what I eat” this is my diet that just happens to be healthy (But still not depriving yourself of your favourite things).

This is what happened to me many years ago when I started thinking more about a new healthier lifestyle, I remember thinking to myself everyday….oh today I was good and I ate healthy, but most days was not like this! I just couldn’t seem to eat healthy most days…To be honest it just felt like hard work and seemed all too hard because there were many aspects of my diet I wasn’t happy with, as well as issues with my weight. My weight came on while I had spent some time travelling overseas. I remember I was in Thailand and I stepped on a scale outside the shop and was horrified and I actually thought there is no way that scale is right, it has to be wrong!

In retrospect it must have be right but I was in denial and not facing the reality. I had been eating way more than I normally would, as you do while travelling so how did I think I wasn’t going to gain weight? The amount of walking I was doing did not negate the amount of food I was eating! The truth hurts, but not realising is not a great way to live and doesn’t help you. How can you change what you don’t acknowledge?

So I guess back about 10 years ago I started making small changes, making it more nutrient dense, adding in some exercise here and there, really looking at snacking and portion sizes and I learnt about the amount of calories in food because they do matter, it is helpful to know where your calories come from. It’s just being aware, so you can look back on your diet and you can see where it is you might be going wrong. I find that the amount we eat is really underestimated, and especially when it comes to junk food. Also alcohol and other liquids like juices and soft drinks, they are in addition to meals not instead of (usually!).

The real passion came in 2006 and this is when I decided to become a nutritionist and I was working out regularly because I was working in a gym (as a massage therapist at the time). Of course over all this time my weight was coming down to a point where I was happy, but it’s weird though because even though I knew I wasn’t overweight anymore I still had “fat” days where I still felt I was bigger than I actually was. I think for some people you just will never be happy with your body, especially women. We are soooo hard on ourselves! Somehow you have to learn how to be happy with your body –no matter what weight you are. But if you want to change it doesn’t just happen, you have to actively do something.

The change has to come from you and no one else, sometimes people even get that light bulb moment where you are just like:
That’s it!..enough is enough I can’t continue like this, because even though change is hard, not changing and staying the same might be even harder! I need to make some changes TODAY, not tomorrow, not next week, not after that birthday….TODAY!! Now what will my plan be? How will I get there? It will be hard but I really really want this, and not doing anything is not an option for me anymore.

If what you are doing right now is not getting you the result you want then do something else, try a new way, get some help with someone who can give you insight. You cannot expect a different result by doing the same thing over and over again-that is the definition of insanity right?!

Does any of this sound familiar?
Comment below!