reawaken your appetite for good food

I grew up during the diet revolution. I remember my mother saying she had never dieted as a child. I went on my first diet before I was fourteen. In retrospect I was never fat, just a product of media hype and a mother who started to diet seriously in her thirties and is still (occasionally!) denying herself cream cakes and counting calories today. Personally, I have tried, Weight Watchers, the Cabbage Soup diet, the Hip and Thigh diet, food combining, and endless others. Several eating disorders later, I found myself thinking if someone would just tell me what to eat, I would eat it.

In reality I had forgotten how to eat. You too may have. You may be flummoxed as you go round the supermarket, your trolley invariably full of water, wine, detergent and very little food. An uninspirational tour de force of the aisles that leaves you reaching for something you can jam a fork into and pop into the microwave. Once you too realise that years of dieting render you unable to eat anything without an unhealthy fixation with the fat content and what it would do to my midriff and thighs, you can book a visit to a professional nutritionist.

food is your friend

An initial appointment lasts an hour and I go through the questionnaire with you, discussing different areas. There is no need to feel nervous, but you must be very honest and it is important to tell all. I promise I won't bat an eyelid at any of the less appealing dieting habits and won't be at all judgmental. Finally you're given an appropriate diet, or food regime, as I like to think of it; the word diet has such horrible connotations. A mere six weeks on and many clients report they feel trimmer, fitter, happier, their skin is clearer and they look younger. You can really see and feel a difference at three months. Your regime will be just a programme of three very healthy meals and three healthy snacks and thus is easy to follow. The greatest lesson you'll learn is to consider food as a friend that will make your hair shine, nails grow, give you energy and keep all you organs healthy. Instead of seeing food as a terrible foe which could wreak havoc on your figure. Succinctly good food is good for you, and only bad food makes you fat.

As a Personal Trainer and Nutritional Therapist, I try to teach my clients to make better food choices. For starters, I show them how to read a food label. One of the interesting things that I've learned is that people really don't know what they're looking for when they read a label. A lot of times, they think they should just be looking for the nutritional breakdown. I instruct them to read the ingredients first, and then look at the nutritional breakdown. Sometimes a food will only have two grams of fat, but it might also have sixty grams of sugar. I also encourage people to look at the ingredient list because it's listed in order of quantity. If the first or second ingredient is sugar, then you might want to avoid that item. I also try to keep my clients away from overdoing the carbohydrates. I'm not saying no carbs, but some people get carried away, and there needs to be a balance.

A good reason to learn about the nutritional content of foods is that it allows you to go out to dinner and make the right choices from the menu. The less sauce being used, and the less cheese, for example, the better. I think a lot of people get confused about fats. They might say that avocadoes are fattening, but what they need to understand is the difference between "good" and "bad" fat. The fat in avocado offers a host of benefits, like improving your nails, your hair and your skin. It's key to educate people about these important differences, such as eating avocado versus eating mashed potatoes that have been prepared with butter or cheese. The fat in butter, when consumed in excess, can contribute to heart disease.

Something else to be aware of is portion size. The size of our portions has become distorted in the United States, and it's about having more and more. In France, for instance, many meals are high in fat and still prepared with butter, but when compared with America, the population is not nearly as obese. It may be because they don't eat three and four helpings and they don't eat the huge quantities that we consume.

Plus, many French people do not eat all day long as many Americans do. Instead, they have regimented meals and they tend to eat slowly. One way to keep yourself from feeling deprived when you're trying to lose weight is to eat smaller, more frequent meals. The most effective way to really boost your metabolism is to eat five or six times a day. And, finally, if you need to keep yourself motivated, it's okay to reward yourself with a treat. Some of my clients say, "On Sunday mornings, I have a couple of bites of pancakes with my eggs because I want them." It helps to keep them on course. But if you're going to do it, make sure it's worthwhile. Don't blow it on a low-quality chocolate bar! Go for a piece of fine, Belgian chocolate. And if you're going to eat pizza, have a great pizza.

magic pills

You can find these in any women's magazine, or in the circular for your Sunday newspaper. Advertisements showing how Jane Doe lost 40 pounds without dieting and felt great, just by taking these little magic pills. Results guaranteed! How could you go wrong? Well in most cases, the magic pills contain an appetite suppressant, and some form of caffeine. Together these serve to rev up your energy level and somewhat dull your hunger. To lose weight, though, you still have to follow the little diet plan that is almost always included with the pills. Typically, these plans lay out some basic healthy eating hints and a recommended diet plan allowing about 1,200 calories a day, and encourage you to drink lots of water and exercise regularly. Can you lose weight? Absolutely - you would lose weight by eating only 1,200 calories a day anyway, though, especially if you exercise regularly. Some of these appetite suppressants work; however, the contents may actually be dangerous for some people (Ma Huang/ Ephedrine usage, for example, can cause cardiac arrhythmia, cerebral haemorrhage and even cardiac arrest). Some people may find that the appetite suppressants help them decrease their eating habits; however, it probably won't help those that are impulse eaters. The bottom line? Most of these are basically an extremely expensive form of Dexatrim. Anyone with any heart condition should avoid ephedra-based products, anyway. Sure they're guaranteed - but the manufacturers are banking on the fact that most people won't save their empty bottles and mail them back in time to collect their money when the product fails.

Basically stay away from diet pills or any other quick fixes. The only way you're going to reach and maintain a healthy weight and body image is by following a healthy, nutritional plan -like the one I put all my clients on!