At nearly 13 weeks pregnant, I have gained 7 1/2 pounds. That's an okay rate -- I am supposed to gain between 25 and 30 lbs in a whole pregnancy, so I guess I'm on track for that -- but I still feel panicky every time I see a new number on the scale. I just cannot stop myself from expecting to be back at BMI = 31 six months after having this baby.
Deep breathing, don't worry about the scale, concentrate on habits. Like measuring all my food.
A friend said to me the other day as we cooked together in her kitchen that she was working on one good habit at a time, and that right now the habit was "portion control." That's a good habit for anyone to develop, especially someone nursing a brand new baby as she is -- it's a fundamental habit for healthy eating, but in and of itself it's not "dieting" and so working on it isn't likely to deprive her of the nutrients she needs to keep up her strength in such a taxing time of life.
I mused about it though -- a little bit out loud there in the kitchen as I juiced lemons and minced cilantro, and later over the next couple of days. I was thinking about it just now as I used a 2/3 cup measure to scoop out my yogurt for my midmorning snack.
"Portion control" isn't really a single habit. It could mean a lot of different habits, or some combination of them all. Think about it: You might mean that you never take seconds, i.e., you control the number of portions. Or you might mean that you know exactly how much you eat of everything (whether you stick to a plan or not). Or you might mean that you plan to eat a certain amount of everything and you actually "control" yourself so that you actually do eat that much. Or you might mean that you plan to eat a certain number of helpings of things. Lots of different ideas.
It strikes me that if you're going to work on a habit, you'd do well to abandon a vaguely worded term like "portion control." Better to sit down and write out the details of the new way you'd like to do things. A standard operating procedure, so to speak.
I will always plate my food using measuring cups and measuring spoons so that I know I have served myself an appropriate size serving for each kind of food. I will carry a set of measuring spoons and cups with me for use at restaurants.
Something like that.
There are obviously other features of "portion control" that you could include. For instance, you could decide what is the appropriate size serving of each kind of food (one easy way is to use whatever serving size is listed on the label; another is to use a published system like the one in this book). You could incorporate an actual "diet" plan by allowing yourself a certain number of these servings per day or per week, or by holding yourself to another rule like "no seconds." You could increase your awareness by keeping a food diary.
Or you could just work on the micro-habit of always transferring food from package, to measuring device, to plate, to mouth. The food has to contact the measuring device and the plate on the way to your gullet. A simple rule. You could call it the "three-transfers" rule.
Original packaging ----> Measuring device ----> Plate or bowl ----> Gullet
Notice that all by itself, this rule does away with eating chips out of the bag and licking raw cookie dough off the spoon....
I have slacked off on a lot of my habits since beginning this pregnancy. I am trying hard not to "diet," and to eat when I think I need to eat (careful! I am good at convincing myself I "need to eat" when I don't), but there are a number of habits that are harmless for pregnancy and not really linked to "dieting." This is one. I don't have to limit how much yogurt I eat, but I might as well be aware that I've had about two-thirds of a cup, you know?
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