Do you fear the word “diet”?

Then why are we required to see “diet-icians”? I’ll tell you why, because the true definition of diet is a personal style of eating. Either you have a good diet, or you have a bad diet – but most think of it as being on a diet, as in eating horrible, boring food for a set period of time, only to go back to one’s old way of eating which sadly is usually not healthy.

The dietician teaches us a healthy – guess what word I’m going to use next – diet. It includes all of the basic food groups, proteins, fruits & vegetables, carbohydrates that are high in fiber and other nutrients our bodies need to survive, dairies, fats and let’s not forget WATER. There are other groups but are usually lumped into one of the major groups, such as legumes are considered either proteins or sometimes good carbs. Anyhow, you get what I’m saying I hope – that our diet is just that – our means of eating to survive.

Good diets… what can we do to avoid using the word diet without causing a panic? We should set our diet in a healthy way. Why? Because to see the word diet and understand that it is a lifestyle change to make our bodies healthy and happy is the only way. It’s for life, not in the temporary sense.

• Choose meals with as close to clean and basic as possible. Lean proteins, keeping colorful and fresh fruits and vegetables around, carbohydrates that are high in fiber, dairies that are low in fat, and fats that are high in the Omegas and low in saturation.
  
• Look on the internet or ask friends for good healthy recipes! This helps to keep the stigma of boring out of your vocabulary. I’ve had a fish meal in about a hundred different ways, and many different types of fish so I never get bored! It doesn’t always have to be baked and bland. Explore seasonings that are low in sodium and dress it up with some cook-able fruits and vegetables. You will be pleasantly surprised at how tasty a “boring diet” can be. It’s definitely something you can continue on forever and have a healthy diet.
  
• Keep a log of what you are eating and if you notice that you are eating something too often, change it up. Keep it off your “To Cook” list for a few weeks. Boring diets can become a problem and make you crave foods that are not healthy for you. You don’t have to eat chicken breasts every day to be considered a good bariatric patient. There are many cuts of protein that you can make in a healthier way.
  
• Which brings me to the next bullet point – you can basically eat any cut of meat you prefer. They all have B-12 which our bodies LOVE obviously. Not only that, beef is very high in iron, pork is considered the other white meat (just be sure to trim the fat!) and best of all most bariatric folks get fuller faster and stay satiated for a longer time on these cuts. Ensure you are chewing very well with these cuts and are far out enough from surgery to not get “stuck”. Not only that but eat slowly and judge each bite to recognize your full signal.
  
• Always choose all different kinds of fruits and vegetables and get a minimum of 5 servings per day. A serving of fruit is one half of a medium sized fruit. Get plenty of vegetables of all varieties. Yes greens are awesome, but many other vegetables get ignored simply because they are of a different color, but yet they are packed full of vitamins that are hard for us to get otherwise. We will forever be bound to the supplement, but we shouldn’t ignore this group because we get it in a pill. They are very tasty too, some are sweeter and some are full of vigor but any will dress up a meal!
  
• Drink plenty of water. I don’t think this is a shock to anyone! Water will make you feel energized and alive during the weight loss process. It does also constantly flush your body of toxins, sodium and water weight (I know it seems like it would be opposite but it’s not) which shows up nicely on the scale. As bariatric patients we no longer are able to get our H²O from foods we eat, because we simply don’t eat enough. I’m telling you that 64 Oz per day should be anyone’s goal. If you can get in more great, if you’re not getting that in – time yourself. 8 Oz every hour for 8 hours, or for myself I do one 16.9 Oz bottle every 2 hours.
  

Now for the evil bad diets…

• Just don’t do it.
  
• If you must have a snack that is not healthy, limit yourself. You never need more than one serving of anything bad. Bad is considered high in saturated fat, refined sugar, added sugar, high in sodium, and high in calories that might put you over your daily limit.
  
• When partaking in eating non-nutritive foods, enjoy it! Sit in a quiet spot and truly taste your food you have chosen.
  
• Do not mindlessly eat it; you will just keep going back for more to try to fulfill the desire. Sad to say it usually never registers.
  
• Think about what you just ate, and judge it. Was it as delicious as you envisioned it in your mind? If so, what was good about it? If not, why did you eat it? Will you eat it again?
  
• Do not allow non-nutritive foods become a regular part of your diet. They should be a treat, once in a while. Remember our stomachs can only hold so much nutrient dense food, but non-nutritive foods usually come without capacity. The further out from surgery we get the more “bad diet” we can fit in and if you don’t teach yourself limits this WILL become a problem.
  

When you hear someone say, I don’t diet – I am doing a lifestyle change, that’s really great. But all they are really saying and doing is changing their bad diet to a good one, permanently.

Thanks for posting. I do not fear the word diet, and it drives me a little crazy when people are so offended by it.

Great article, Irene! Thanks for posting.

Great article! I am going to share with my non-Bariatric patient friend who was just asking me today about a diet plan she saw at Costco. I advised her to just focus on eating healthy and track everything. This will be good coming from another source

Great post!

I do not fear (diet) as I have learned from being a former professional (dieter) now retired btw, that dieting does not work...the only thing I fear now is losing my ability to walk...that was a major reason I sought WLS because I let my self get so big..that I could hardly walk...that is my fear.......and that fear keeps me from backsliding or falling into the ( what am I doing wrong, I cant eat this BS and I am in a stall nonsense).....keep doing what is needed to be done.....eat, exercise and LIVE.......

when you cant walk.......or clean yourself.....that to me is fear

sorry, didn't mean to ramble....but this article touched me..thank you for posting...

Cg great affirmation of your goals!

@@☠carolinagirl☠ I too have lost my total mobility. I loved to run and in the past year have been forbidden to ever do it again with the threat of having a double total knee replacement within ten years. I also have been forbidden from squats, kettlebells and anything that places too much stress on my knees. I see it for what it is and it took me a little while to get over it, but I now just need to find workouts that can burn significant calories without too much stress on the knees. Not only that I am far more in tune with the realization that I cannot sustain a healthy weight without healthy eating.

Good luck to you!

Well said. Its really all one big diet, either a bad one or a good one. When working in the hospital, Id ask people what kind of diet they were on and mostly they would say "whatever I want". then they would follow up with "I try to cut out salt and cholesterol filled foods and try not to eat many fats". LOL, then I'd say "so you're on a Low Na, Low Chol, Low fat diet?" They would counter with something like "No, I really just don't want that stuff anymore" Won't it be lovely when we just don't want it anymore?