Benefits of being overweight

When I suggest there may be something you are getting out of your extra pounds, you may think my idea is absurd! But, as a Clinical Psychologist, Weight Loss Analyst and someone who has struggled with and survived the entire spectrum of eating disorders with over 25 years of personal and professional experience, I know this to be true.

Being overweight is not simple and generally there are at least a few hidden, unconscious agendas behind the eating behavior. Close your eyes, take a few deep breaths and think for a few minutes about the advantages you get from being overweight. Then return to the present. Write those advantages down. Perhaps your weight provides the illusion of safety. For example it can keep you from taking the risk to be in a romantic relationhip or it gives you an excuse to stay home and hide.

Now note any other, more nurturing ways you can take care of yourself and your feelings and write these down. Next, choose one area where you would like to make a change. For example, if you have discovered that one advantage of overeating has been to numb feelings of grief, you might plan to talk with a friend about your loss. In this way, you allow your feelings to surface and find expression and you no longer need food to anesthetize yourself. You can do this exercise often as a way of checking in with yourself and changing your compulsive behavior.

It works!

My best,
Dr. Denise

We Are All Works in Progress - Part II

We are all marvelous works in progress. Please never diet again and realize that life is not about being thin. It is about being healthy, loving yourself just the way you are and eating in ways that feel nurturing – not compulsive and self-abusive. My wish is that you feel healthy, peaceful and happy with yourself regardless of how many pounds you weigh. I have spent countless hours in my role as a therapist listening to my clients’ painful histories and experiences and helping them in their personal struggles to control their eating. People have come to share their stories of guilt, self-hatred, shame and frustration. In their pasts, some have lost weight, some have not. Some have developed an ability to accept themselves no matter what their weight may be, and others have abandoned hope, finding the battle against compulsive eating too demanding and discouraging.

This is easy to understand. We are bombarded daily with confusing messages about what to do, what to eat (or not eat) and how to look and act. The problem can easily become overwhelming! Many of us have tried an assortment of fad diets, weight loss gimmicks, pills that claim to melt pounds away and exercise machines that promise thinner thighs and disappearing bellies in an impossibly short time and with little effort. These attempts to control our bodies and to mold them into shapes idealized today generally end in failure, cause great anxiety and the urges to overeat become more persistent than ever.

We may never completely eliminate urges to eat compulsively. They may manifest from time to time just because we are human beings with appetites. We can, however, learn ways to recognize these urges when they surface and to choose other ways to deal with them. If we attempt to eat a healthy diet but we ignore other important needs (e.g. our need for exercise, rest, laughter, relationships, attention to our feelings, solitude, etc.) we soon find ourselves turning to food as we have in the past – to fill our needs. Food, of course, does not fulfill our real needs. We will be forever turning to food to nurture and satisfy ourselves if we don’t identify what our real needs are and discover ways to fulfill them satisfactorily.

In this blog, I share information to help you understand food control issues from many perspectives: physical, emotional, social, environmental and spiritual. I also offer suggestions to help you manage those urges to overeat. I share my own experiences where I think they may be helpful to you and draw upon the wisdom of the many clients I have worked with. I am thrilled that you are joining me here, to visit and explore this frustrating issue for yourself. I’m honored to have you by my side on this Chew Tamer’s Journey!
Do something absolutely wonderful for yourself today. Buy yourself flowers or visit a loving friend. Take a walk at the beach or in a forest. Go play. Walk barefoot on the grass. Push the envelope. Take a risk. Be silly. Go to http://www.deniselamothe.com/ and sign up for my free, quarterly newsletter. And then, subscribe to this blog (see right hand column) to receive posts in your own mailbox!

And remember, we are all one and you are never alone.

Vacations should be mandatory!

When I talk to my clients about taking care of their bodies, minds and spirits I always stress the importance of relaxing, having fun and giving themselves a break from the stressors life delivers on a daily basis. Why then, I wonder is it so hard to follow my own sage advice? I am in Acadia National Park in Maine at the moment and truly relaxing for the first time in a long while. It was hard to leave e-mail, the office and phone behind but as we progressed farther and farther north and away from from those work-related pastimes I found myself breathing a little more deeply and anticipating the adventure of a few days in "paradise" of Maine.

We did bring a lap top along and I wanted to be sure to say hello to all of you who have so faithfully been reading this Chew Tamer's blog. But... this is the only time my fingers plan to bounce over the keys. Today a small hike of about 3 miles of the most replenishing scenery on earth. I strongly suggest you visit here if you ever have a chance. There are 57 miles of carriage roads just for hikers and bikers and most have gentle uphills and downs. It is easy to walk at a relaxed pace and drink in all the delicious treats mother nature has to offer.

Of course for those of your who prefer more rugged terrain, there is plenty and I generally do choose more difficult trails. I am learning, however, that it is fine to simply breathe, relax and enjoy. I am delighting in having unstructured time and not being in a rush about anything. I am cherishing every moment, staying in the present and I will return to New Hampshire at the end of the week refreshed and eager to immerse myself in my writing, speaking and meeting with clients with renewed zest and enthusiasm.

I hope never again to wait so long to give myself a break like this and I hope this little message serves as a reminder to you to do the same. Life is too short! Vacations will do more to stop emotional eating and promote healthy weight loss than any diet ever could -- they should be mandatory!

Are Your Good Intentions Gone?

Have you ever had this experience? (I have hundreds of times!) You wake up in the morning regretting the way you ate last night and decide that today will be different. You set your intention firmly. Today you will remain conscious and choose foods and beverages that will foster health, energy and maybe even weight loss. You will be vigilant, aware, and you know that you will feel great about yourself as you move through your day making one self-loving choice after another.

You start your day with a wonderful, health-promoting breakfast – oatmeal, yogurt and fruit perhaps. You feel fantastic knowing that this day is truly a new beginning and today is your chance to turn things around. As you face the stressors of the day, however, your resolve weakens and you start slipping into the wasteland of unconsciousness and emotional eating. This means that your fantastic intentions are fading quickly into the background and your awareness is now off of your best interests and on to the problems and distractions of your routine.

By afternoon, your “best laid plans” have evaporated and the good intentions of the morning have been abandoned. As you reach for a “pick me up” of caffeine and sugar in the waning hours of the afternoon, you may make a quick decision to try again tomorrow if you even remember that you did start out with some really good ideas about how to take loving care of yourself all day. More likely, however, you are unconscious by then and won’t really notice and revisit the issue until tomorrow morning when you awaken regretting your behaviors of yesterday and once again resolving to make today the day you actually remain conscious and attend to your real needs.

So what happens between the morning yogurt and the evening bowl of ice cream? Why did you venture so far your path? How did you slip so easily from mindful to mindless without even noticing? These are worthy questions for you to ponder. It is easy to collapse into mindlessness and many of us have been doing that repeatedly for years. Now is the time to do something different. Now is the time for you to make yourself #1 all day long.

Here are a few suggestions. You can get a buddy to check in with throughout the day and ask each other how you are managing your stress and reminding each other to be gentle and loving with yourself. You can carry a small journal around with you and make a brief entry each time you feel like grabbing more snacks. You can schedule short breaks into your day when you can sit quietly and take deep breaths for a few moments. These are some ways to keep on your personal path.

You can also use The Bach Flower Remedies found in the emotional eating support kit – cherry plum, crab apple and chestnut bud. These can help you enormously as you learn to treat yourself and your body with care, stay in control and stop the frustrating cycle of overeating, feeling awful and overeating more to medicate yourself. I have been amazed at how helpful these little drops have been for my clients. You may find they provide an effective means of stopping the mindless eating and staying more conscious of yourself.

My very best wishes,
Dr. Denise

What's Your Commitment?

What’s Your Commitment?

Having been emotional eating expert for many years I have had the opportunity to speak with thousands of people who sincerely profess their desire to stop overeating, to take better care of themselves and to finally create the body they have been wishing for – a body that is radiantly healthy, slender and attractive. These desires are expressed with passion and power and are often dramatic. It is clear that they have suffered and worked hard and made many heroic attempts to lose those extra pounds that are keeping them unhappy and frustrated. Attempts at weight loss, however, are never easy and often end not only in failure but also in creation of a higher number on the scale and even more pounds to lose.

With so many people struggling and working hard to overcome overeating why is the success rate so small? One reason is that the intentions, however sincere, must be followed by true dedication and often are not. Let me explain: If you want to accomplish anything, you have to dedicate yourself to it and make a full commitment. Parenting is a good example of this. When you have a child, you make a commitment to caring for it. You don’t make decisions all day long about whether or not you will parent. You just DO it because you have committed yourself to doing so. If you are running a race you must commit to that to do well. If with every step you are thinking about whether or not you will take the next step, you will certainly turn back and fail when the going becomes challenging.

People who have achieved greatness, mountain climbers for example, have done so by committing themselves to the task at hand. Can you imagine setting off to climb Mount Everest and spending each hour of your climb debating whether or not to turn around and give up? No! To reach the summit you have to set your focus there, keep it there and remain true to your vision of achieving your goal. So here is the good news and the bad.

The news is that in order to accomplish your goal of vibrant health, the body you aspire to and creation of a life of joy, you have to make a firm commitment to doing so. This is both the bad and the good news. You can choose it to be either. On the “good” side, it is possible to achieve your goal. On the “bad” side it will take work. Did you think you could lose weight and achieve the body you desire with no effort? If you did then consider this a wake-up call and start now deciding what you want to commit to. You can acheive greatness!