Volume 5, Issue 1

Spring 2013

BDS  

beckdietbook
 

Welcome to the Beck Diet Solution Newsletter

Welcome! With summer right around the corner, we hope this newsletter will enable you to approach it with a helpful mindset and give you tools to stay in control and feel great all summer long.

Beck Diet Solution Workshop for Professionals

Learn how to use a cognitive behavioral treatment plan for weight loss and maintenance through an experiential two-day workshop designed for individuals who work with dieters. In this workshop, which is based on The Beck Diet Solution and The Complete Beck Diet for Life, participants will learn evidence-based strategies aimed at facilitating change in their clients' thinking and behavior so they can make permanent changes in their eating.
 

Beck Diet Solution Workshop for Dieters

Have you ever had trouble consistently sticking to a diet? Have you ever struggled to lose weight only to gain it back?  The reason you haven't been able to do this successfully is because you don't know how. In this one-day CBT workshop, which is based on The Beck Diet Solution and The Complete Beck Diet for Life and is designed for dieters, you will learn how to make permanent changes in your thinking so that you can make permanent changes in your eating.

 

Click here to register for our September 30th Workshop

In This Issue
Losing Weight for Summer
Response Cards
Spontaneous Treats
Best of Facebook
We Want to Hear from You!
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Ask the Diet Program Coordinator:

Losing Weight for the Summer

Deborah Beck Busis

Q: Summer is approaching and there are a lot of things I want to start doing but I'm not yet where I should be in terms of my weight. What can I do to reach my goal before summer?

 

 A: I have two pieces of advice for you.  First, don't do anything drastic now to enable fast weight loss (like cutting calories too low or exercising too much) because if you lose weight doing something you can't maintain, the weight will come back.  Have you ever had the experience of doing things you can't keep up, like cutting out entire categories of food from your diet, losing weight, and then gaining it back when you inevitably started to eat those foods again?  If so, you're like many of the dieters we've worked with. And what we've found, over and over again, is that making short-term changes to quickly lose weight is a recipe for gaining it back (often everything you've lost and then some).  In our minds, it's simply not worth losing weight in this way because you will ultimately end up back where you started and twice as frustrated.

 

So what can you do instead?  Focus on gradual weight loss. Work on having a healthy diet (one that includes your favorite foods) and being in control of your eating.  While this may mean that you don't reach a certain weight by summer, it does mean that when you do get there, you'll be much, much more likely to be able to stay there.  Also, it's important to recognize  just how good being in control of your eating feels. I've worked with many dieters who, although they don't reach the weight they had originally envisioned, still end up feeling great about themselves and their eating. Why? Because they feel in control and they feel confident that the skills they've learned will allow them to stay in control indefinitely. It's quite possible that by working to consistently control your eating now, you'll be in an entirely different place and feel much better than you had imagined by summer, regardless of how much weight you've lost.

 

My second piece of advice is to get out there and do everything you want to do, even if you haven't yet lost all the weight!  So often we hear from dieters that they'll start engaging in activities such as going to the beach, playing tennis, or taking a dance class once they've lost weight.  We always tell them: "Don't wait! Do it now!"  The more you enrich your life, the less you'll rely on food as a source of entertainment or satisfaction,  and the easier it will be to stay on track with your eating.  Make a list of everything you want to start doing this summer, and instead of thinking, "I'll be able to try these things once I've lost weight," remind yourself, "I don't need to lose weight in order to do these things, and in fact, doing these things will only help me continue to lose weight. Life's too short to wait around. I need to get out there and start living my life now."  Then make another list of the steps you need to take to start working on at least one of your new activities.

 

*For more segments of "Ask the Diet Program Coordinator," visit our Beck Diet Solution Blog

 

Do you have a question for the Diet Program Coordinator?  E-mail us at:  info@beckdietsolution.com! 

Response Cards
Response Cards are an integral part of the Beck Diet Solution program. We have found that it is not enough for dieters to simply create a response to a sabotaging thought. If their goal is to combat sabotaging thoughts so they don't fall prey to them in the future, they need to write down their helpful responses and read them. It is only in the continual rehearsal of these responses that new ideas sink in and have a strong enough impact.

When a dieter tells me about a diet mistake, my first question is always, "What was the thought you had that led you to eat [this food you hadn't planned to eat]?" My next question is always, "What do you want to say to yourself or remind yourself the next time you have that thought?" We write these important ideas on Response Cards for the dieter to start reading every day.

For example, I recently had a session with a dieter, Jennifer. She told me that on Friday night she ate five cookies for dessert instead of the two she had planned. I asked Jennifer what thoughts went through her mind after she had eaten the two planned cookies that led her to go on and eat three more. Jennifer thought about it and responded that she was thinking, "I had a really hard week; I deserve a treat." Jennifer didn't respond to that thought so no wonder she gave in and ate more. I asked Jennifer how she felt after she had eaten five cookies. She told me, "I felt guilty and sick to my stomach." I then pointed out to Jennifer that while she had tried to 'treat herself' after a hard week, in actuality what she did was make herself feel worse, which is the opposite of a treat. We then discussed what she could do after a hard week that would feel like a treat, both in the moment and afterwards. She realized that she could do many other things and she made the following Response Card:



Jeremy, another dieter I'm working with, struggles with leaving food behind on his plate.  In session, Jeremy told me about a time when he finished all his food at a restaurant, despite knowing that it was truly too much food.  I asked Jeremy what thoughts he had had at the restaurant. He told me he had thought about two things: first, he remembered how,  from a very young age, he was taught not to waste food because there were starving children in the world, and that idea had really stuck with him. He also thought he didn't want to waste money by not eating everything he was served.  In session Jeremy said to me, "I know that eating everything on my plate probably won't really help any starving children, but it's still in my head."  When I asked him how eating everything on his plate could possibly benefit a starving child anywhere, Jeremy was unable to come up with a single idea. He then made the following Response Card:



Jeremy and I then addressed his second sabotaging thought - that since he was paying for his food, he had to eat it.  Jeremy and I discussed this notion of "cost" and what it would cost him to leave food on his plate versus what it would cost him to eat everything.  After thinking it through, Jeremy realized that the cost of eating everything on his plate - gaining weight, reinforcing bad habits, feeling overly full and guilty - was far greater than the cost of leaving food on his plate.  Jeremy made the following Response Card:

 
Again, it's not enough for Jennifer and Jeremy to come up with these responses.  In order for them to effectively respond to their sabotaging thoughts and avoid setbacks, they need to rehearse these helpful responses over and over again.
In Session with Debbie:
Spontaneous Treats for the Family

This week I had a session with my dieter, Maria.  Maria takes a lot of pride in caring for her family and likes to do special things for them, like buying treats for them to enjoy.  Sometimes these treats are special desserts she sees in a bakery, new kinds of bread, or fresh pies from her local farmer's market.  Her purchases tend to be impulse buys when Maria is out shopping and sees something she predicts her family will love. 

 

One of Maria's biggest difficulties is that she usually ends up eating a significant amount of the special treats. Because she purchases them on impulse, she doesn't first figure out when and how much she will eat and therefore, she puts herself at risk for overeating.  Maria told me that the day before she had been out to lunch with a friend whom she hadn't seen in a very long time. She had a great time and was feeling really happy. On the way home, she  passed  a new bakery and saw cupcakes that she knew her husband would really like.  Maria decided to buy some, although she also decided that she, herself, wouldn't have any.  

 

However, in the car on the way home, Maria was still feeling keyed up from lunch with her friend.  She began thinking about the cupcakes on the seat next to her and developed a strong craving to eat one.  After a few minutes of a back and forth struggle ("I really want a cupcake." "But you know you're not supposed to have any." "Just one won't make a difference." "No, you bought them for your family and not for you; you're not having any." "But I really want one, and besides, it would help me calm down."), Maria eventually gave in and had a cupcake, and then another, and then another.  Regret and self-recrimination immediately kicked in.  


Maria and I discussed this situation and we reached two important conclusions. First, Maria was still feeling emotionally (though positively) aroused after lunch and part of her desire to eat was to calm her arousal.   Second, once Maria broke down and had a cupcake, she said to herself, "Since I'm not going to have these again, I might as well have more right now because this is my only chance." 

 

Maria and I discussed her two options: to lose weight she could either stop impulsively buying treats for her family or she could learn to control herself when she does.  Maria decided that she didn't want to stop treating her family and therefore she needed an effective plan. Like most dieters, Maria has a much harder time making healthy food decisions in the moment.  We concluded that the best course of action would be the following: Every time Maria spontaneously buys a treat for her family, she will first put them in the back seat (or trunk) of her car so she's not constantly tempted by looking at them. She'll then immediately, and in writing, make a plan for how she will (or won't) incorporate it into that day's eating.  I pointed out to Maria that she didn't always have to decide to have none. It is perfectly reasonable to enjoy a treat if she plans it into her day.  The written plan will decrease her struggle and will allow her to enjoy the treat without guilt. And she will be able to eat the treat slowly and mindfully, while maintaining a sense of control.

  

Maria made the following Response Card:

 

  

Best of Facebook

 

It's not about the calories, it's about the habit. Every time you give in to a craving and eat something unplanned (whether the food has 50 calories or 500 calories), you reinforce the habit of giving in, making it more likely you'll give in the next time, and the time after that.

 

~

 

If you think, "Everyone else gets to eat normally, why can't I?" Remind yourself that you ARE eating normally for someone trying to lose weight (or keep it off)! It's important to change your definition of 'normal' eating and remember that your eating is 100% normal for someone with your goals. 

~

 

Remember, when you say "no" to eating something, you're also saying "yes" to even better things: losing weight, better health, increased self-confidence, feeling proud of yourself, and more. 

~

 

On-track eating days aren't perfect days! In order to lose weight and keep it off, you don't need to be perfect.  No one is perfect 100% of the time. What you do need is to accept your mistakes, not beat yourself up, and get right back on track.

 

~

 

Sabotaging Thought: I'm too tired/stressed/busy to exercise today.

 

Response: Exercise will actually help with these things, not make them worse! If I'm tired, it will give me more energy, if I'm stressed, it will provide a productive outlet, if I'm busy, it will be a necessary break to focus on myself and my needs.

  

 

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We Want to Hear from You!

We are always so inspired by stories of people finally finding success with the help of the Beck Diet Solution, and we know others are, too. If you have any inspirational stories, pictures, or thoughts about what worked best for you, please send them in to us (dietprogram@beckinstitute.org). Also, make sure to include whether or not we have your permission to reprint your story and if so, whether or not we should print your full name, first name only, or change your name. Thanks!