Diet advice for older woman

[Inklingpot]

Not me, but a relative in her late 70s. She’s been dieting all her life and imho her eating is quite disordered but I think it’s too late to change her habits.

She’s currently doing SW to try and lose a stone or so but I’m a bit concerned about her protein and calcium intake - she’s vegetarian but I think restricts her dairy intake due to SW. She doesn’t drink.

Are there any other diets she can try which are good for protein and dairy but are ‘healthy’ as opposed to specifically being about weight loss?

She’s not very receptive to advice but I think if there were some options which appealing and looked like she might still lose some weight she might be more up for those. Thank you for any advice!

Will have a think, but what's SW?

Eat a balanced healthy diet 5 days a week. Fast on the other two. Best diet ever imo.

The only way to lose weight is to go gently IMO. Adding in fun foods and creating a VERY gentle calorie deficit. I was a yoyo dieter for over twenty years and finally managed to maintain my healthy BMI after going to cognitive behavioural therapy for weight loss. I had loads of self-sabotaging thoughts which got in the way and the therapy really helped to uncover them.

I was going to suggest the Mediterranean diet but it's more complicated for a vegetarian. Pulse are good for protein but not always digestible when older. But lentils cooked down in soup, chick pea casseroles, hummous and crudités - more ideas here:

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/collection/vegetarian-mediterranean-recipes

SW is Slimming World.

@Fishpawsandchips She likes that kind of thing so that might be a good idea. Thank you.

At this stage, therapy isn’t an option. She’s very stubborn and totally in denial about her eating issues. I gently tried to suggest that she looked great and didn’t need to worry about losing more weight and got shut down immediately.

I’m not particularly looking to interfere, more that I realised she was eating not very much protein and dairy which made me concerned about bone density so I thought I’d ask and see if anyone had any suggestions of a diet I could recommend to her to try and address this.