So, when I announced this blog, I said that my premise was that the way to manage overeating is to choose to be HEALTHY. I strongly believe that this is possible.

For example, I have some vague recollections about seeing a Dr. Phil episode where he pointed out the truth that this is indeed a choice. He asked a guest to imagine something like choosing between eating crap and saving the life of her child. Yes, a loaded question (and I of course am misremembering some of the details), but the implication is clear. Most of the time we just don’t make the healthy choice. But what if we did?

Of course, many of our poor choices are basically eating for emotional reasons. That’s of course a whole other thing (I listed some tactics I like here).

But…I believe that the physiological reasons for overeating are often as strong, if not stronger, than the psychological. To steal again from Dr. Phil, it’s possible that our overeating started for feeling reasons, but our difficulty in giving it up may be another reason entirely…we may have a tough time with stopping because of what the overeating is doing to us biologically.

Many, many years ago, I began buying the premise that for some of us, there is a real link between being overweight and eating lots of carbohydrates. Since that time, I have done Atkins, Protein Power, the Zone, and South Beach (and probably others I’m forgetting) and while I’ve had mostly had good results with these carb-restrictive diets, I really have had a tough time maintaining. Mostly these diets are just too damn much work. In some cases, it’s mental energy, as you sit there considering something really low-carb and wondering if all those folks who warn about serotonin problems or reduced nutrients don’t really have a point. Or like in the Zone, when about the only easy way to get 40-30-30 meals is to buy their pre-made products with their ingredients of questionable nutrient value.

And I say this not from a “they don’t work for me” standpoint. Actually, my greatest weight loss successes have been very low-carb. I lost 75lbs while on Nutrisystem back when it was a ketogenic diet (1978) and 100lbs while doing a liquid fast (1992). I’ve heard it said that most people have only one good fast in them. That was certainly true for me. I did fab in ‘92, but a couple attempts to achieve the same results ten years or so later failed very quickly.

When I did the fast the first time, I often said it was a really humane way to diet. I had very little hunger and also very few cravings. I always thought that the ketones acted as an appetite suppressant, but that’s apparantly questionable. However, whatever the mechanism, it was true that I sailed along on just five shakes a day for something like four months. I actually maintained that weight loss courtesy of my exercise bulemia for two years. But I still hadn’t gotten a lifetime approach to eating down, and thus all went to hell after my mother died in ‘94.

Fast forward ten years and 200+ lbs. It’s not helpful for me to look at carbs the way someone else looks at crystal meth or alcohol. I have to eat. Yet I also knew that I needed to find some middle place between a lifetime of food abstinence (whatever that might be) and a “fraught-with-peril” lifestyle full of cravings induced by low-food-value products like low-fat or carb-free cakes and cookies. And when you’re looking at having to lose over 200 lbs, the prospect of years of weighing, counting, and doing calorie or carb math have very little appeal.

So, I’m currently practicing the lazy person’s guide to managing carbs. It’s so lazy, this is the first time I’ve really thought about it, much less written it down. But it’s based on a lot of reading over the years (bibliography to follow).

First, there’s something to be said for the 80-20 rule. I didn’t get to my weight eating crap four times a week; it was more like 21 times. So rule #1 is I won’t be anal-retentive about food. Doing well for the majority of the week should work fine.

But there’s a flip side to that, and it’s that being anal-retentive is a pretty good defense against the slippery slope (see Radiant Recovery’s carbohydrate continuum). It’s much easier to make good choices if you eat healthy most of the time, and not just “on plan.”

Radiant Recovery has a compelling rationale (here’s the short version; the book goes on in much more detail) for why the slippery slope exists. Of course there is the blood sugar/insulin issue along with the “low carbs may mean low serotonin” concern. But there’s also apparently a reason that a slip leads to really falling off the wagon. Basically, the idea is that those of us who have issues with carbs have screwed up beta-endorphin metabolisms. In a nutshell, when you stop eating something for a while and then eat it, you get a bigger rush than if you hadn’t stopped (she calls this “beta-endorphin priming”). This then leads to strong cravings when you stop having whatever creates the rush. It’s not a widely accepted theory, but it maps to my experience, so it seems plausible to me.

So aside from the perils of the “what-the-hell effect” when going off-plan (which is really psychological), there’s also the prospect of actual physiological cravings. It’s sometimes enough to make abstinence look appealing.

Yet, I think that slipping down the slope isn’t necessarily the end of the world. I’ve done it three times since February. But I think it’s probably better to stay at the top of the slope than to try and recover, so my rule #2 is for now, I mostly choose healthy food and drink.

I think that why this works for me is that I’ve also adopted the Abe Lincoln philosophy of life: when I do good, I feel good.

Wayne Dyer talked about something similar when he explained in the PBS version of Power of Intention why he was a “camel”:

Most of you know that I’m a camel, and a camel is an animal that starts out every morning on his knees and he can go 24 hours without a drink. And that’s something I do every day. I go 24 hours without a drink.

And it isn’t because I label myself as an alcoholic or anything like that. I was told by a very powerful and important teacher that “if you want to reach the levels that I would like you to be able to understand, where you can literally do a somersault into the inconceivable and see yourself as capable of attracting and healing and being able to create abundance; if you want to be able to be all that you can be, “ he said, “you’ve got to stop putting substances into your body that are deteriorating the body and deleterious to the health of your body,” and he said alcohol just happens to be one of those things.

So I don’t take a particularly moral position on it. I did it because I didn’t want [to put that negative] energy into my life.

So I’m really pretty grounded in eating good stuff not just as something I have to endure to lose weight, but rather something that I choose anyways since it makes me feel better.

That doesn’t mean I never have less healthy food (see rule #1). But most of the time a piece of cake at a work event or even a family one isn’t worth the risk. When I do indulge, I try to keep it a minimum; a taste rather than really overdoing it.

Adele Puhn suggests that you can moderate the physiological response of food with supplements; i.e., she takes more of whatever when she’s going “off-plan.” Interestingly, that’s 180 degrees opposite the Radiant Recovery approach, which is that “taking something” like excessive vitamins is a symptom of the problem, not the solution.

Dr. Phil’s version of this is described as high-response cost, high-yield nutrition. Well, I agree with the latter, but I must admit that so far, I’ve chosen low-response cost (foods that are convenient and accessible). I guess that’s rule #3: when in doubt, make it easy.

This is the same approach I’m taking with the exercise. I’ve got a long way to go. Making it harder on myself than I can take now is unnecessary. I’d rather adapt as I go along. In a short period of time, the lack of regular exercise will be a bigger problem. But right now, I’m doing all I need to do to keep the overeating at bay. Later, when I’m operating from a better place (less weight, more confidence, etc), I can decide to go for the next level.

BTW, one of the side-effects, for me, of rule #3 is that I’m pretty much doing just three meals a day. I believe in the whole metabolism-revving aspects of eating 5 or 6 smaller meals, but just find that eating three is much easier.

Here’s what this looked like today (sorry, no measurements; I don’t measure):

breakfast: oatmeal w/ raisins and brown sugar, cantaloupe and blueberries, and light yogurt
lunch: grilled chicken, steamed cauliflower, asparagus, and couscous
dinner: Chipotle fajita burrito in a bowl

I get breakfast and lunch at the cafeteria at work during the week. These aren’t expensive foods (breakfast cost me $2.30 and lunch $4.30) so I’m pretty lucky that way.

So I guess that’s it. Three pretty simple rules:

• I won’t be anal-retentive about food.
• I mostly choose healthy food and drink.
• When in doubt, make it easy.

I’m finding that I’m getting by pretty well here (the real test comes when I travel again in two weeks, and then again over the holidays with the f-word…family). Of course, you should count on it being different for you. One size does not fit all.

BTW, here’s something out of Ask and It Is Given, a book I came across while reading reviews for Power of Intention. The former is a bit too new-agey for my tastes (it’s written by someone who claims to be channeling). But Dyer did the forward, so I picked it up, and am doing the 12-step thing with it (take what I like and leave the rest). I like their rule of thumb:

If you believe that something is good, and you do it, it benefits you. If you believe that something is bad, and you do it, it is a very detrimental experience. There is nothing you can do that is worse for yourself than to do something that you believe is inappropriate, so get clear and happy about whichever choice you make.

All I’ve really wanted is to end the struggle. Eating crap, and then hating yourself for doing so is not a fun way to live. Life is much easier taking the position of choosing health.