Hi Again!
This is the final week in October and we made it through together!
This past week I have had two McDougall friends message me on Facebook because they are struggling to stay on track and are just so tired of struggling. These are people I know IRL but originally met via some sort of McDougall social media or event. They’ve been
cyclically or
intermittently eating this way for way longer than the 3-5 years that I’ve know them and yet haven’t been able to make progress. I love these women...much how I feel about all of you here (this is interesting to me that I can feel this way about virtual friends - it seems common goals and struggles, common ethical and dietary values and just plain time interacting appear to have worked their magic on me, but I digress
).
How can any of us help/support someone who has the knowledge of what they need to do but just can’t seem to play the game long enough for a win? I ask myself this question quite often when I am reshuffling my deck of strategy cards to see if the new hand I’m dealt will be any more successful than the last. Sometimes I get a great hand (and lose a bunch of weight); more often it’s just run of the mill (and I’m maintaining) and sometimes I’lI get a few really crappy hands and think the game is sunk (meaning gain back some weight).
But the key to winning any game is to keep playing even when you’re not winning and to figure out how to play smarter.
The Ace in this game is your
personality. The value of very high conscientiousness and not so high openness cannot be overstated as the easiest means of sticking to the guidelines. If this is you, congratulations, I am envious and I say that with a complete lack of sardonic inflection. But this is not something we can control and most of us just don’t have quite enough of it to rest on our laurels, so it’s folly to bank on this strategy alone. You will just end up draining your willpower each and every day into frustration.
The King in the game is your motivation. Oh that fickle King. When motivation is strong it can take you further than you ever imagined; but it can wax and wane depending upon your current circumstances. A bad lab result at the doctor’s office can temporarily scare some motivation into you, as can a recent breakup. But for many the fear fades and the poor dietary choices creep back in. The best way I have found to navigate the sometimes intermittent nature of attempting to leverage motivation is to be ready for it when it appears.
The Queen in this game is your
environment. Mastering this is difficult but you can absolutely drive changes there. Major sustainable changes. Since many of us live with and/or work with others, even great mastery of your pantry and office snack counter can hit snags when you don’t hold an Ace in your hand.
Thus, to navigate when face cards are in short supply use those workhorse strategies that I refer to when I say
be ready. Keep food prepped and ready to be eaten. Keep checking in with your accountability system. Keep journalling your choices. Keep measuring your progress (or lack thereof) in as comfortable a way as possible. Keep your goal on your mind. These represent your Jack, 10, 9, 8 and 7. You always have a couple of these in your hand. These give you many small wins that add up over time. This is how you win the game of weight loss. XO.
I write this for those 2 friends: thank you for lurking here and for giving the ultra simple version of the guidelines a shot. Here is the next level up in simple MWL meals for you to try.
Jeff Novick’s Fast Food Handout.
Have a lovely week everyone! I’m sorry to hear that so many of you are under the weather. Whatever is going around, I’ve got it too! My plan is to lay around snuggled in blankets until the coughing stops and the fever brakes and sip
Heavenly Vegetable Soup.
Here are the results for the fourth week in October:Next Weigh-In is on Friday, November 1st, 2019Total group loss reported in 2019: 414.22 pounds
October 2019 Weight Loss Group :: Monthly Weigh-In Results
Total group loss in January 2019: 140.53 pounds
Total group loss in February 2019: 78.64 pounds
Total group loss in March 2019: 7.4 pounds
Total group loss in April 2019: 33.55 pounds
Total group loss in May 2019: 38.2 pounds
Total group loss in June 2019: 13.4 pounds
Total group loss in July 2019: 37.3 pounds
Total group loss in August 2019: 23.8 pounds
Total group loss in September 2019: 19.3 pounds
Total group loss in October 2019: 22.1 pounds Week ending 10/25/2019: 10 participants reported a total loss of 2.7 pounds
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AnnetteW - 0.5
Sirdle - 0.2
Artista - 0.4
Belana - 3.1
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Total gains: 4.2
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LauraG - 0.0
Deweyswakms - 0.6
Vegman - 0.7
ShortnSweet - 0.9
Stillcrazy - 0.7
Moonlight - 4.0
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Total losses: 6.9
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Total group loss in October 2019: 22.1 pounds
Week ending 10/25/2019: 10 participants reported a total loss of 2.7 pounds
Week ending 10/18/2019: 10 participants reported a total loss of 4.6 pounds
Week ending 10/11/2019: 10 participants reported a total loss of 13.3 pounds
Week ending 10/04/2019: 9 participants reported a total loss of 1.5 pounds
Laura - I’m sorry to hear that you’re having trouble logging in. Thank you for still trying to check in with us. If it continues, please send a PM to f1Jim and maybe he will be able to help you. Your soup sounds lovely and very soothing to a sore throat.
Annette - I hope you feel better soon. Being sick is the pits! Keep doing what you are doing - making changes towards better adherence slowly and maintaining like a pro interspersed with a loss here and there. It will get you where you want to go too. With regards to the book and quote that you mention, I will admit that I haven’t read it (or even looked it up), however I think a slowdown in weight loss is most likely correlated to 1) If still significantly overweight someone may be eating more calories that they realize (or to put it in
our terms which don’t involve calorie counting, they are eating a higher calorie density then they realize) 2) When approaching a healthy weight for your height your calories in and out reach a bit of an equilibrium and weight loss will slow or stop. I hope you find your signature inspiring, I sure do! Way to go.
Marsha - Great loss! Do you do any batch cooking? I find it works well for stews and bean dishes as well as for veggie bean burgers. I still have 6 more in the freezer from the last batch I made. Let me know if you find a good squash recipe. I bought one recently thinking I’d make it for Thanksgiving, but I never did.
Sirdle - Stable is good! Thanks for checking in.
Vegman - Ya!
ShortnSweet - Awesome!
Vee - Enjoy the potato mini! Let us know how it goes.
Moonlight - The silver lining of being sick! Hope you feel better soon.
Artista - Thank you for checking in. Best wishes this week.
Belana - Weight gain feels awful, but thankfully you know what needs to be done and when you finally hit a number that changes the cost benefit ratio of the drinking, you will be motivated to stop. I’m glad you’re able to do food prep, because going completely off the rails is even more difficult to recover from (but still totally doable!). Here’s an article that Jeff recently posted on Facebook
Alcohol: 16 Reasons to Rethink Your Drink by Dr. Thomas Campbell. Best wishes...let me know how it goes with your mom. Maybe try being there for her, but also giving yourself as much space from her as reasonably can. If your interactions with her are increasing your desire to drink, it may be best to try and minimize those in the kindest most unnoticeable way possible.