Tag Archives: weight

Rethinking How You Think About Eating


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How many times a day do you hear “I should…” statements run through your head? Everyone always wants to tell us what we “should” and “shouldn’t” be doing in literally every area of our life. 

Our moms, our relatives, our friends, our co-workers, complete strangers, our health-care providers, the media… 

What we should do with our life, what we should weigh, what we should eat, how we should raise our kids, how we should look, who we should be, what we should know, how we should take care of ourselves, what skills we should have, how we should age, how we should dress, how we should do our hair or our make-up, what things we should care about in life, how we should have sex or “please our men”, how we should decorate our house, what we should read, what we should think, how we should act… 

We get programmed by outside influences to believe all these things we “should” be doing and then we obsessively remunerate over them — usually while flogging ourselves because we haven’t or don’t.

There’s literally a “women should” piece of advice for EVERY single aspect of our lives, they usually differ depending on who you talk to and we often we tend to carry way too many of them with us every day, as though constantly reminding ourselves is going to make us do them. 

Then, we judge ourselves accordingly based on how we think we’re measuring up - or not. Usually not.

And we wonder why we walk around with guilt, shame, anxiety, depression & obsessed with food every day? 

Should statements” are all of those things you’re telling yourself you “should” be doing every day — but don’t. 

They’re one of many cognitive distortions (or negative thinking patterns) that contribute to stress, fear, worry, guilt and shame. 

“I should be eating better and losing weight and I can’t ever stop reminding myself of that every single day until I die — because then I’ll never do it.” “Ugh, the house is such a mess, I should be cleaning it. What’s wrong with me? Why I can’t I just make myself get up and clean the stupid bathroom?”

“I’ve been so busy lately, I haven’t spent enough time with the kids. I should be doing more with them. I’m the worst mother.”

The next time you hear an “I should” thought run through your head or statement come out of your mouth, stop. 

Notice what happens next. How do you feel about yourself in those moments? Empowered, happy and good? Or hopeless, helpless and bad? 

And do you immediately follow that statement and those feelings by doing that thing you’re telling yourself you “should” be doing? Or not? See, the reason they’re problematic is they almost never result in more positive choices or the outcomes we want. 

Rather, they make us feel badly about ourselves and often more hopeless about actually being able to do that thing we’re telling ourselves we “should” be doing.

“I should be eating that…” usually results in NOT eating that thing because we start thinking, “why can’t I have more self-control with food? I know what I’m supposed to be eating, why can’t I have some willpower and do that?”which reinforces feelings of being helpless to our circumstances and our choices not being within our control.

“I should be exercising more…” usually results in NOT exercising more because we follow it with, “but I’m just so lazy. If only I had more motivation.” which again, reinforces feelings of the choice being out of our control and makes us feel hopeless about changing it. We “should” be… but we’re just too lazy, we believe. So we carry around this belief that we’re unworthy or that we’re destroying our health because we’re too lazy to do the exercise everyone tells we “should” be to be healthy, or hot or skinnier or stronger or whatever.

And should statements aren’t limited to just what we eat and our exercise habits. We use them for everything - our parenting: “I should have more patience with my kids”,our homes: “I should be a better housekeeper”, our relationships: “I should be a better wife, mother, daughter, sibling, friend”… etc. Should statements are just one of many cognitive distortions that contribute to depression, anxiety, panic and can even keep us stuck in the weight & food battle. 

And cognitive distortions often don’t act alone. Should statements, all or nothing thinking, and labeling/mislabeling can, and usually do pile on top of each other in one nasty thought bubble whenever we “fall off the wagon”. 

“I should be eating salad but I really want pizza. Screw it, I may as well just have the pizza. I always just end up screwing up eventually anyway.” which then leads to “I may as well have a beer with it, and some chips and ice cream for dessert since I already ruined today. I’ll just start over tomorrow.” which then leads to “God, I’m such a pathetic screw up. I always do this. What’s wrong with me?”

That’s a should statement, all or nothing thinking, and labeling/mislabeling - a common threesome of cognitive distortions that often results in overeating (or in some cases a full-on binge) in people who struggle with weight & food all because they just wanted a piece of pizza.

Cognitive restructuring is a helpful cognitive-behavioral technique that I’ve incorporated in The Cognitive Eating Academy. It’s designed to help you overcome should statements and other cognitive distortions that keep you stuck in these faulty and self-destructive ways of thinking - and as a result, behaving.

The day I gave up should’ing myself to death was one of the best days ever. Now, when I hear myself thinking or saying, “I should…” before something, I next ask myself, “says who? Who says I should be doing that? What do I WANT? What does MY body need? What’s best for me? What do I need most right now?”

Rather than making ourselves miserable by trying to live up to what everyone else determines we “should” be doing, this switch gives us our power back. It gives us the power to start learning what makes us happy, what’s best for our own mental, emotional and physical health - and how to follow our own hearts, minds, bodies and dreams. And if you need it, I created The Cognitive Eating to help.

Roni Davis

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Why do so many people struggle with weight loss or eating healthier? Guest Post by Roni Davis

What I used to think:There’s so much wrong information out there, most people just don’t know what they’re supposed to be eating and when. I have found the clean eating answer that everyone needs!

What I now know:Knowing what we’re “supposed to” be eating is soo NOT the problem. There are literally billions of pieces of nutrition and healthy eating content in the world and hundreds of thousands of people sharing their recipes and magic secrets about what they believe is the healthiest way to eat (and have you noticed, they all contradict each other?) – but most people still just aren’t doing it with much consistency.

Lack of information is not the problem. 

How many times have you “started over” vowing to “be good this time” only to end up “screwing up again” and keep saying to yourself, “Why am I so stupid? Why do I keep doing this? Why do I keep screwing up?”

You have all the information you need. Even if someone has literally told you exactly what to eat, how much and when to eat it …but you’re not doing it. Why?

What is the problem? What’s driving the consistent self-sabotaging behaviors? 

Disconnection from the wisdom of our own bodies, habits that have been hard-wired into our brains and the relationship with have with ourselves and food.

Those are the reasons behind why we eat the things we eat, the way we eat. Those are the things driving our choices. You can start a new miracle diet with different food rules every single day from now until the end of time but if you just don’t care enough about yourself to change, or if you’re using food to punish yourself or to numb emotions or to try to control everything around you, nothing is ever going to change about the way you eat because you’re not changing the WHY, you’re not changing the subconscious driving forces behind your choices.

One more time to let that sink in: KNOWING what we’re “supposed to” be eating isn’t the problem – the subconscious driving forces behind our choices is the problem.

That’s the key we keep missing.

Changing hard-wired habits and the relationship we have with ourselves and food, is the key to changing the way we eat.

Dig into your own whys with Mindful Movement or Cognitive Eating, two new programs available through Stone’s.

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My 11 Commandments of Weight
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The first of January inevitably brings on a list of common resolutions among your patients as well as yourself as a professional. Most of these are directed towards what we perceive as something that will lead to a healthier, if not happier life. With any luck it results in both.

A while back I wrote an article that explained how a popular weight loss program (Ideal Protein) worked. I still believe it to be the best we have available to safely lose weight, both in scientific background and in personal clinical results. It stands as our most popular blog to this day. Many key points however are often lost on the patient we help to lose weight and both the patient and the clinician MUST regularly remind themselves of these points. Failing to do so steers us and the patient gradually away from reality, and more towards a route that can often result in disappointment.

I have found these so vital to the understanding of the concept of weight that I have pinned them on the wall of my consultation room. In a time when our patients are bombarded daily with the best ways to lose weight and how to eat healthy and “clean”, I’m a big fan on grounding them with a few simple concepts:

 

  • Weight is not a measure of health
  • Suffering yourself down to a goal weight that you will suffer to remain at results in no quality of life
  • Your weight is not as directly under your control as some will have you believe
  • There are unhealthy thin people and healthy overweight people
  • Extremist forms of eating that are difficult to maintain will result in a waste of your time and money
  • If your excess weight is determined by your doctor to be detrimental to your health and quality of life, then an overall change in your lifestyle is required
  • Typical exercise that 99% of us do, does not result in lost weight (It will help with blood glucose, lung capacity, joint mobility, cholesterol, mood, cardiovascular health, and make it more difficult to gain weight however)
  • It is estimated that 80% of those that lose weight will gain it back
  • Eating food is not only cultural, but it should also be enjoyable. Eating in moderation and doing your best to avoid added sugars and any trans fat is recommended.
  • The weight you are at is not as simple as calories in vs calories out
  • There are many ways to lose weight that are effective and safe. If you decide to lose weight, pick one that is sustainable for you and ask your healthcare professional for advice.

 

Graham MacKenzie Ph.C.

Stone’s Pharmasave

Baddeck, N.S.

@grahamcmackenzi

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