My daughter's birthday is on February 13th. My son's is on September 30th. These are the two dates when I most often show up in family photographs, usually standing at the kitchen table next to a beaming child and a cake. For the longest time, I avoided having my picture taken at other times.
This year, in between these two festive occasions, I lost 50 pounds and became fanatical about my health and dietary habits in the process.
A huge amount of credit for this achievement goes to the folks at Vtrim, a research-based behavioral weight management program developed at the University of Vermont. I began an online Vtrim class in April, and it was a wonderful experience. My instructor and classmates have been a big inspiration.
I've tried other programs before and have managed to lose weight time and again. But each time, I gained the weight back - and more - within a year or two. I'd lose 25 and gain 35, lose 25 and gain 35 - the classic yo-yo dieter.
I've always felt that it takes a year for behaviors to become habits. A recent study suggests that simple habits become ingrained in 66 days, on average. However, the same study also shows that more complex behaviors can take up to 254 days to become habits. Because weight loss involves changing many behaviors, some of which are quite complex, my one year rule of thumb is probably not too much of an exaggeration.
Vtrim appealed to me because it was a six-month class, and I've always run out of steam after around three months of highly focused efforts. I hoped that six months would give me a fighting chance.
My class ended one month ago, and so far, the news is still good. I've continued to keep up with my learned diet and exercising behaviors and am still losing weight although I'm probably right about where I want to be. The best news is that my husband has come on-board and has become almost as fanatical as I am! I've also begun reading like crazy and am trying to learn as much as I can about nutritional health.
I created this blog to motivate myself and to provide an outlet for summarizing and sharing what I've learned and continue to learn. The first thing I noticed, while searching for a blog name, is that health and diet blogs are a dime a dozen! I don't have any illusion that mine will be read by a particularly large audience. I'm not a nutritionist or a dietitian. But I do think I have some worthwhile things to say, and I hope at least a few folks enjoy or learn from them.
My plan is to have a weekly health topic - or focus (hence, the name of the blog!) - and to post various entries each week based on that topic.
The first weekly topic will be "Weight Loss Plans - Seven Things That Worked For Me".
- Sue
Hi Sue,
ReplyDeleteAs you say, changing behaviors is what most of the work needs to be focused on. In my case, the big problem has always been to get home and get some food to snack on long before dinner is even started. And, now that I am counting what I deliver to my body, I know that most of the pounds were being added by "feeding" this behavior.
The major challenge for me have been to drop very old habits like the one I mentioned, while picking up new ones is a lot more interesting and, eventually, rewarding.
Hi Sue - congratulations on that very impressive loss! Vtrim didn't work as well for me (lost 10# and regained it during the 6 mos, ending up exactly where I started and where I still am). One thing it did teach me, tho, is that you have to change your habits in a way which works for YOU. I've got the same problem of late afternoon snacking - I don't think I can cut it out but I'm trying to manage WHAT I eat during it.
ReplyDelete