Taexalia

wild.life

I am not on a diet

Diets don't work. If they did then millions of women around the world would not be constantly on them, repeatedly. Diets are a way to sell books, charge membership fees and a leg trap that keep women constantly feeling bad about themselves as they strive to achieve the perfect weight and body shape.

I have only once gone on an actual diet. I amazed myself by diligently following the meal plan without cheating. I lost weight. In fact I lost quite a lot of weight and did, in fact, fit into those purple PVC trousers I love.

The problem with the diet was that once the weight was off there wasn't much of a follow through - nowhere for my eating self to go other than back to the patterns she knew before. And what happened then was that more weight piled on as if my body was making sure it would never have to go there again. An added factor in this was a big lifestyle change going from a very active job to easily inactive self-employment.

I've figured out, with the help of some reading, that finding health isn't just about losing weight and that losing weight isn't just about eating less. Unfortunately I've also discovered that stress is a major toxic factor and I have no idea when I will be able to eliminate my specific stressor from my life... so I'm working on all the other things I can do for now. Aside from stress, the five major toxins seem to be:

  • cigarettes
  • alcohol
  • caffeine
  • salt
  • sugar

So for the last wee while I have been looking at cutting them out. I had a head start because it is several years since I smoked a cigarette :-D I don't add salt to my food and I don't usually eat a lot of processed food or crisps, so I don't think salt is a biggie. I cut sugar out of my coffee weeks ago. I am not even sure why I started putting it in there again - probably as some sort of feel-good treat in a very dark year.

Moving into the new year I have now chopped caffeine out. I haven't had a cup of coffee in 2009. I Googled "quitting coffee" and found some really interesting theories not at all related to weight loss - quitting caffeine actually increases productivity and decreases procrastination. We shall see. Right now I am right on track with the withdrawal symptoms - a minor headachey yuk and a cup of cold herbal tea.

As for alcohol, well the last wee tipple was taken as the bells rang in the new year, but I am not going to lie to you - I like a glass of red wine. I am planning to have one tonight with dinner actually. I figure the wine goes last :-P

So I'm not on a diet and I'm not seeking the perfect body - because if you spend five minutes critically reading the tripe that the media feeds women every day you will discover that there is no such thing as a perfect body. There is simply a constant hounding of women not to look the way they look today, a constant comparison of one woman (body type) with another woman (body type) that simply attacks self-esteem and puts pounds in the pockets of the diet industry. And the chocolate industry.

Of course the biggest challenge is deciding what to do with the small mountain of nutritionally challenged foodstuffs that Santa left behind. Luckily @ is famous for having two mouths.

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Posted on January 3, 2009 in Day Zero, Health.

One Response to “I am not on a diet”

  1. Mike says:
    February 28, 2009 at 7:14 pm

    You have the correct attitude. If we pursue progress, rather than perfection that we can see change. You’re right, look at the TV set every day, perfect bodies, perfect homes, perfect lives.

    What’s the problem with that — the problem is it’s “Perfect Lies.”

    Nobody has a perfect body, and nobody has a perfect life.

    And if you do remove the stresses from your life as you say, and maybe, just maybe. That’s the perfect life.

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