The Great Weight Debate

Recently, I read an article in the September issue of MORE Magazine about dieting and whether, regardless of its wild popularity in the U.S., it was actually useful or not. The article was leading towards the not. Of course, I was interested as I’ve been struggling with my weight for the past twenty years. 

My disability is a mental illness but the six medications I must take for it have ruined my metabolism.  The medications’ affects aside,  I have suffered from depression over the years and always turned to food for comfort. At my highest weight, I totaled 340 lbs. As of this week, I have lost 100 pounds from that unfortunate benchmark. By dieting. I don’t want to hear that it doesn’t work.

But did you know (and now I do from MORE) that only 5% of weight losers keep their weight off after a few years? They tend to put it all back on and then some. Also I found out that, strangely enough, that fatalities from heart disease do not necessarily correlate with excess pounds. Studies have shown as well that one is more likely to die from being sedentary than from being an overweight woman who walks for exercise every day. The MORE article concluded that we accept the size we are when it comes to diet but keep moving.

I have added stationary biking to my fitness routine because it doesn’t put much pressure on my severely arthritic feet. I walk with a cane and cannot walk any distance at all, unlike the days back in the 90’s (before my rheumatoid arthritis) walking with my mother around her neighborhood, kicking the colorful leaves up as we strolled at this gorgeous time of year.

So if it’s all about exercise for health, why am I still dieting? Because it’s what I know. Because it’s worked for me. I am a member of a twelve-step group for food addicts. “Hi, my name is Cindy, and I am a compulsive overeater.” That’s the truth. Bring a box of candy into my apartment and watch it disappear in ten minutes. On the plus side (no pun intended), I am also a foodie who now scours cookbooks for healthy dishes to prepare. I have lost those 100 pounds by my own version of dieting:

1. I never order delivery pizza no matter how much I yearn for pepperoni
2. chocolate is okay if it’s as small as a Hershey’s Kiss per day
3. a breakfast of yogurt and fruit or oatmeal and raisins every day is key
4. cutting down on the diet soda and replacing it with sodium-free seltzer is my new habit.

In general, more fruit, veggies, fish, whole-grains, yogurt and low-salt soups. You know the drill. When I can’t get to the stationary bike, I get down on the floor and bicycle in the air, lift 5 pound weights, do crunches. For 15 minutes a day. It may not be the hardest weight-loss program, but hey, slowly but surely, it’s working.

Take it from one of the future 5%!

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 Cindy Battles is a freelance writer based in Rutland, VT, winner of the National Disability Institute’s 2008 Blog Contest and a regular contributor here on the Real Economic Impact blog.