How to make the switch to NOT dieting as per Jessica Cooke

[thenewaveragebear1983]

I didn’t know how to title my thread, sorry. And apologies for a lengthy post….

I guess what I’m asking is: I’ve been listening to a few podcasts recently, but one that’s really sticking out for me is Jessica Cooke. She’s quite hard lined and I don’t actually agree with a few of her values but I find her interesting. Basically her weight loss advice is:
DONT :

• count calories.
• do any kind of diet
• weigh yourself
• exercise to lose weight (as in, only do it for enjoyment) especially cardio
• have any kind of negative self talk whatsoever
• consider any foods as safe or ‘free’ or unlimited, even salad
• add extra veg or salad to meals to bulk it up
• restrict or limit any food groups or eat any foods you don’t like just because they are healthy

and what you should do is:

• trust your appetite, eat when your hungry, stop when full etc
• do strength training x 3 a week and a couple of walks a week
• use an item of clothing as a measure of weight loss and try it on occasionally

And that’s it….

now, I have listened to a few episodes now and it all sounds very motivational and healthy and positive and freeing and all that…. But how do you make the switch and trust the process and trust your appetite? I know that in the past, I’ve been much more able to self regulate, but only when I’ve eg. Cut carbs and balanced my appetite that way.

i appreciate what she is saying and can consider how wonderful and freeing it might be, but I genuinely don’t know how you make the switch.

I’m just interested in this discussion and whether anyone has actually done this, long term, and actually achieved the goals they want. (I guess also, I’m talking about people who have actually been overweight and have lost weight and not always been slim- I imagine it’s easier to not do all those things if you’ve never dieted)

if anyone would like to offer their thoughts on this over a pondering/ chat then please do join me…. ☕️

Cutting out UPFs is a good call - but unless you have an allergy or are vegan I don't think it's a good idea to drop dairy . You could limit it to natural Greek yogurt maybe .

It sounds quite similar to the Paul McKenna 'I can make you thin' approach.

exactly, I’ve had disordered eating for my entire adult life. Now, some would argue that it’s because of diet culture that i have this?

It’s possible, I see where that idea is coming from but then many of us binge eat before we ever attempt our first diet. I was a skinny and very sporty kid who binged eat intermittently from 10+ whereas I never did my first diet until I was in my early 20s when my weight went up to 12 stone (at 5ft 2).

I lost a few stone over a year through calorie counting , daily walking to work and gym 3 times a week which I maintained for over a decade through walking a lot and exercising intermittently and didn’t restrict much.

Yeah they say to log absolutely everything in your food diary including olive oil. I’d also suggest you do various measurements such as waist size and body fat because it’s possible for those to go down while your overall body weight stays the same or even increases slightly. And yes it’s not all about numbers - have an item of clothing that you measure yourself against too. I was seeing no change on the scales at one point but was finally able to get into a size 10 pair of trousers I’d bought 6 months before. Feeling fitter and stronger and being able to sleep better is also important to me on my health journey. Sleep is SO vital, if I don’t sleep well it makes it so much harder to make healthy food choices and to exercise.

I had such good results and felt amazing when I did a very strict, no UPF, no dairy etc plan, and I did experience food freedom and I did lose weight- but I need a good headspace to actually do that and i’m not quite there

I know what you mean, if I could just go off to SE Asia for 6 weeks I’m convinced I’d adopt the no UPF, no dairy etc for life and the weight would fall off while I’m there so I’d just have to maintain when I’m back!

It’s harder to incorporate some changes if you’re not in the “perfect” headspace/environment. I guess that’s why some people go to fitness boot camp & health retreats. The challenge is integrating those principles into our everyday life.