Hi to everyone on the discussion board. Greetings from Australia . If you struggle at times staying on the McDougall program and have tried willpower and everything else to avoid relapsing, this may interest you.........
I am new to the forum but have been a Whole food plant based eater for about 4 years now. In that time I have lost over 20 kg (44lbs) going from 105kg down to about 83kg and I find it quite effortless these days to keep it off....... with one noticeable exception, which is when I get stressed and indulge in comfort food eating to numb emotional pain.
I have recently been in direct email discussion with Dr McDougall and he suggested the forum may be the place for this.......
I am currently undergoing the Certification process for EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) which is an Energy psychology technique that is very successful in assisting with various complaints such as anxiety, depression , phobias and weight loss. I am passionate about helping people adopt the plant based eating style and in particular the McDougall version based around starches. However, for many people, all the knowledge and willpower in the world is sometimes not enough to stay on the plan long term.
My personal experience and my observations have been that when strong emotions like anxiety or depression kick in, it is easy to turn to the worst comfort foods like pizzas, burgers, deep fried junk and high sugar foods and undo all the good. These foods can be as addictive as many drugs and succumbing to them is easily done when our emotional state is poor.
As part of my training and to further develop my skills in EFT in the area of weight loss and changing to plant based eating, I am looking to work one on one at NO COST with a few individuals who are committed to changing to the McDougall Program but struggle to do so at times and, who would meet the following criteria:
• have full knowledge of what the McDougall program is, (preferably done the 10 day program or has the certification)
• has a strong desire to implement it and has good reason to such as a chronic illness or excess weight.
• has a menu plan / recipe plan available
• has the skills to implement the plan such as the ability to prepare the food and eat it on an ongoing basis.
• Has the home / kitchen environment available to implement the program
In other words, the client has all the necessary tools and skills to put the McDougall Program into practice but is still unable to.
I would suspect a client like this will have some emotional /psychological barrier that defies logic and therefore an approach such as EFT, that is not based on logic but emotion, may remove the barrier and allow the client to successfully adopt the program.
I know in my own case and in the case of some clients I have worked with here, that until emotional blockages were addressed, it was a case of constantly ‘falling off the wagon’ despite the best of intentions. At this point I have not been able to work with a client in Australia who has all the attributes mentioned above, so thought the forum may be the place to find a few. My role is mostly focused on overcoming the emotional causes of struggling with the program rather than being focused on coaching about what to eat (even though I have good knowledge of that aspect).
If anyone was interested in volunteering, I'd love to hear from you via this forum.
The method would be by Skype and at this stage I could work with 3 people for up to 3 x 1 hr sessions over about 3-4 weeks.
As previously mentioned there is no cost as I will benefit greatly from the practice sessions and gain hours towards my certification. There are no doubt some US based EFT practitioners who could do this but I am yet to find one who also believes passionately in the plant based whole food eating program and unfortunately there are quite a few influenced by some of crazy diets like lo-carb and paleo.
