Tuesday, April 14, 2009
My long view on weight loss: the food diaries
My poor, neglected blog. My business blog is getting updated all the time, but getting the time to create posts for myself always seems to fall by the wayside. Hmm, a metaphor for my life, perhaps? Anyhow, here’s my attempt to not only revitalize my blog but express myself on a topic that is on my mind all the time. You know how it’s said that men think about sex all day long? Well, I think about weight loss all day long. I almost said I think about food all day long - it’s the remnant of an eating disorder spawned as a child (more about that in some other post) that I’ve managed to get a handle on, more or less - but I don’t think about food the way most people think about it. My wife, for instance, will wake up in the morning having dreamt up a new recipe, and say something like “I think I’ll roast a chicken today, with a what’sitmadoodle marinade.” No, I think about food in terms of “will I feel icky tomorrow if I eat this today” (food sensitivities) and “what will happen to my body if I put this in my mouth” (weight gain) and “if I feel hungry, am I really hungry, or just pseudo-hungry?” (emotional eating) and “if I’m truly hungry but eat something at this time of day, what will I feel like in the morning?” (weight gain).
It’s said that people on weight loss program will have a 50% greater chance of success if they keep a food diary. Well, I’ve tried that. It’s a hopeless pain in the posterior. So until I can team up with someone to program a smart phone/iphone app that has the design aspects that will make it actually usable, (instead of throwing in the towel after a week because I’m too busy to update the darned thing), this will be my food diary. It’s a different kind of diary, but I’m hoping it will allow me to vent when I’m frustrated, celebrate my accomplishments, and generally put my thoughts out there in a way that is completely frightening but perhaps helpful to my fellow dieters.