Mark, who you will remember is a process engineer, wants me to come up with a list of rules for "loss mode" as a weight maintenance tool. He has cheerfully volunteered set up an SPC (statistical process control) chart on which I will plot my weight every morning, watching for trends. When the data indicates that I am so many standard deviations above my target, I will switch to the loss mode rules until the data returns to the target.
This is the idea, anyway. Right now I'm more than a few sigma away from that target, and so should be in loss mode all the time.
What are the rules? If I were to distill The Bearing Diet to simple, objective instructions (eschewing judgment-requiring stuff like "only eat when you're hungry"), what would it be?
The first set of rules have to do with the content of meals and snacks:
1) Breakfast is one egg and a half-glass of tomato juice, plus coffee or tea-with-milk.
2) The optional 10:30 AM snack is zero to ten nuts, zero to one ounce of cheese, and zero to 1.5 ounces fruit.
3) Lunch is a single plateful, half of which is simply prepared vegetables.
4) The mandatory 3:30 PM snack is zero to ten nuts, zero to one ounce of cheese, and zero to 1.5 ounces fruit, plus coffee or tea-with-milk.
5) Dinner is a single plateful, half of which is vegetables, plus one extra helping of vegetables or salad, if I want.
6) No solid food after dinner.
The others are general ones:
7) Always measure the foods I have trouble limiting: for me, bread, crackers, pastries, grains, and pasta.
8) Periodically, pre-plan and measure a day's meals and snacks to ensure it's in the weight-loss calorie range: for me, 1200-1500 calories.
9) Stick to one serving of alcohol at a meal.
10) Dining out or in a pinch where the other rules are tough to follow, eat only half of whatever's not a plain vegetable. Faced with desserts or sweets, the limit is three bites.*
*I think of this one as The Annie Rule, named after my stepmother. She swears by it as the single strategy with which she has maintained a healthy weight for, like, forty years.
That's it: The Bearing Diet For Not Eating So Damn Much. Does it look hard to follow? Or complicated? It hasn't felt complicated or even very difficult to me -- although the rules developed gradually. I tried some rules that I later threw out; for instance, I tried and abandoned "no sweets" and "no snacks," but did settle on "no bedtime snack."
The big question -- still theoretical, I might add -- is, how would my behavior change if I wasn't in loss mode? It's going to happen eventually -- either I'll hit my target, or I'll get pregnant. One of these things will happen. I won't be trying to lose weight forever.
I guess I'd allow myself a larger breakfast, I'd drink more alcohol, I'd serve myself bread/pasta/grains more freely. I'd still periodically pre-plan my day's meals, only for a higher calorie range -- maybe something like 1850-2150 calories (gleaned from this nutritional needs calculator that takes lactation into account, and within a couple hundred calories, reinforcing my previous engineering estimate based on my weight loss rate). I'd probably drink more milk and use more butter on purpose.
I think I'd still stick to the one-plate meals, the Annie Rule, and the fruit-cheese-nuts snack regime. They're pretty powerful at maintaining the habit of moderation.
I agree with the one plate rule, but the Annie Rule is harder than it looks.
I really wish this system would work for me like it does for so many. My problem is that I exercise too little and I often don't eat the 1700 calories I need in a day. I can maintain a weight easy, but it will take more exercise to lose the (extra 100+ pounds of) weight.
I have to laugh, because so many of us get going good on this, then get pregnant! What's that all about?
Best wishes with your trials and successes!
Posted by: Melissa | 17 September 2008 at 01:04 PM
I am thankful for this list, Erin. You really do look great, you know, and it's not just a question of being slimmer. You have a glow about you that I'd swear stemmed from...discipline? Inner peace? Joy vs. bitterness? (That's an inside joke, of course, referring to Father's talk last night.)
Anyway, please know that you've inspired me to be more conscientious. I am posting this list to keep myself honest and will be stopping by your home for my weekly weigh-ins. Do Saturday mornings work for you? :)
Also, does the "Annie Rule" apply to all of #10 or just the dessert part?
And finally, are you still nursing Mary Jane? Because your energy requirements will change A LOT after you wean her.
Posted by: Margaret in Minnesota | 17 September 2008 at 04:37 PM
Margaret, Saturday mornings work fine for me as that is my time off and I will be out for a nice breakfast by myself in a restaurant with a good book. Do knock first before entering my bathroom to use the scale, as you might surprise my husband.
The Annie Rule applies to all of number 10.
And as for weaning... I've been nursing continuously for eight years now. So far, I've managed to have the next baby born before the toddler is weaned.
(I realize that won't go on forever, but...)
Posted by: bearing | 17 September 2008 at 08:34 PM
You know, Melissa, I'm not convinced that exercise (above and beyond the level of baseline activity -- whether you're sedentary or active in your daily work) is a significant factor in weight loss. "Scheduled" extra exercise like trips to the gym, workout videos, and the like is just a drop in the bucket compared to the metabolic energy spent just living. That's not to say that it's a bad idea to get extra exercise -- it's a great idea, if anything just to lift your mood and help you live longer -- but I don't think it's ever productive to say "the problem is that I exercise too little." I worry that this creates a mental state where you can't make other changes until you've "solved" the exercise problem.
I know for me there wasn't one single "the" problem, there were a number of problems, many of them mental. The crucial connection I made was that I had to choose better habits for their own sake, and not for the sake of results they would produce.
On the other hand, I know that the act of making a commitment to swim twice a week seriously jarred me into a frame of mind where I felt capable of losing the weight I had to lose, around fifty pounds, nearly a third of my body weight at the time.
Posted by: bearing | 17 September 2008 at 08:43 PM