Portion Teller Plan The No-Diet Reality Guide to Eating, Cheating, And Losing Weight Permanently

Introduction I've been on a constant diet for the last two decades. I've lost a total of 789 pounds. By all accounts, I should be hanging from a charm bracelet. -Erma Bombeck When I started counseling people on how to lose weight in the late 1980s, I heard many diet war stories. The same complaints came up over and over again: The food is boring. I feel hungry. I feel deprived. There are too many rules. The most common lament was: How can I possibly follow all these rules for the rest of my life? I saw firsthand that no matter how suc'cessful a strict diet is in the short term, it rarely works in the long run. At the same time as I was learning these stories of dieting failures from my clients, I started noticing something going on around methe size of food was grow'ing. I noted the extra mound of pasta at dinner, the increase in the diameter of a pizza, the ballooning of bagels, the upward creep of all fast-food and restaurant portions. This change was pretty gradual, so most people didn't pay attention. It wasn't until recently, when the word "supersize" became part of the vernacular, almost a cliche to describe overgrown portions, that peo'ple started to realize what was happening to their foodand to their bodies. Along with the supersize culture came a supersize America that has collec'tively gained weight at an unprecedented rate in the past few decades. As I gathered more information about the growth of portion sizes for my Ph.D. at New York University, I knew that any weight-loss program had to take into account two things: (1) a realistic, personalized eating plan that works for life, and (2) an education in exactly how large portions had be'come, retraining perceptions. Instead of seeing just another muffin, I wanted my clients to see a huge muffin. And then smartsize it! I developed this program because I didn't think that the diets out there were realistic. Not only are they hard to follow, but they seem to ignore how large our foods have become. Look around you at the diet programs today almost all of them are based on the idea that you have to cut certain foods, or even entire food groups, from your diet. They claim that it's the carbs, the fat, or the sugars that are making you fat. The entire diet industry seems to focus on what we put in our mouths rather than how much of it we consume. They focus on which foods are good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, a "diet" food or a restricted food. This approach is at odds with how people really eat. It's not the carbs or the fats that are making us gain weight. It's not what we eat, it's how much we eat. It's portion size that is making us fat. Did you know that a typical bagel today has almost the same calories and nutrient value as five slices of bread? You probably wouldn't think twice about having a bagel on the run, but you would know you were overdoing it if you grabbed five slices of bread on the way to the office. Once you know what a bagel is "worth," you'll see your breakfast in a new way. You won't need calorie charts, weights, scales, or calculators to understand what a healthy portion is. There's no getting around it: In order to lose weight, you have to limit calories. But on this program, you won't have to count them! What you'll do is develop portion-size awareness. You'll get a basic under'standing of what your body needs and how much of it you should be eating. Armed with this awareness, you can go anywhereout to dinner, an all-you-can-eat buffet, a cocktail party, or a home-cooked mealand know exactly how much you're eating. All you need to do is to smartsize instead oYoung, Lisa R. is the author of 'Portion Teller Plan The No-Diet Reality Guide to Eating, Cheating, And Losing Weight Permanently', published 2006 under ISBN 9780767920797 and ISBN 0767920791.