I am fond of saying (among other things, like 'Eat the 49 weeklies, for the love of Pete!'), that 'This is not not NOT a starvation diet! It's a sensible, healthy eating plan that encourages you to be more active and choose your food wisely, while still allowing you to eat the foods you love.'


The occasional binge - provided you point and track every last morsel and assess the damage - is not going to bring you to a shuddering halt. Or it shouldn't, anyway. If you really need to eat something, eat it. Denying a craving tends to make it so much worse, and leads to Going Off the Rails Syndrome. Better by far to indulge from time to time. Better still to eat a bit of what you fancy when you fancy it, and factor in a few points a day to do just that with.


Hungry? Why? Eat fruit, have a salad, have some cheese or ham or a hard boiled egg. Get some protein down you, you'll feel fuller for longer! Eating regularly keeps your metabolism revving, it will do you no harm at all.


Exercise like a demon? Not me, sorry. I like a good walk. I like to try to run a bit, but at the moment my body dislikes it. Knee is still nipping, before that it was my hip. All will be well, eventually. Just my body getting used to being a lot lighter and moving differently, and maybe a touch of arthritis in my right knee. The joys of having been huge for years!


There's no need to pretend you're on Biggest Loser and work your **** off in the gym. If you do feel the need to, though, make sure to eat some of your activity points. You'll need them to keep your loss up. 


More later - heading out the door again!


(Some hours later....)


MEN! Eh, I dunno. Now, where was I?


Oh yes.


Simple fact: a healthy weight loss is from 1 to 2 pounds a week. That is what WW is designed to result in. So, for those of you down in the dumps because you 'only' lost a pound, er...why? Biggest Loser strikes again, I reckon. You know what I am going to say now, right? It didn't go on overnight, and it sure as brown and smelly stuff ain't going to come off overnight! Slow and steady wins the race; a slower rate of loss gives you more time to get to grips with eating this way for the rest of your life. Plus, your body has time to adjust to being lighter along the way, so it is more likely to stay off long term.


I was, quite frankly, incredulous that Jillian Michaels actually managed to find former Biggest Loser contestants who hadn't regained all that they'd lost and more to appear in her exercise DVDs! But she did! That's because they have continued to eat healthily and to exercise regularly, just not as obsessively as they did while on the programme. There's a lesson for us all there - they continued to lose weight, albeit more slowly, after the programme finished or they were voted off, using the food and exercise guidelines they'd picked up.


What this all boils down to is this: be sensible. Eat what you enjoy. Eat when you are hungry. If you fancy something, and you have the points for it, have it. Whatever it might be. If you don't have the points, go for a long walk or a bike ride or go swimming or chase the kids/dog/husband round the park for an hour. Anything that will earn you some activity points so you can eat whatever it is!


You don't have to starve. You don't have to exercise for five hours a day. Chill. Relax! Enjoy the journey, because it is a journey and it is a long journey for most of us, at that. If you have a week or two on the scenic route, so be it. That's life! 


Here endeth the lesson for today. ;
)