I understand what it is like to struggle with your weight. I know what it is like to lose weight and then gain it back. And I know what it is like to diet but not lose any weight.
In this house I use a term to describe my husband and that is "carboholic." I love you "amor" but I hope that you are not reading this. I am two years into my food transformation. That is, for the last two years I have been learning how to cook food and I have stopped buying anything pre-cooked or ready made. I feel healthy. I am proud that my girls will gladly have roasted beetroot, cabbage and olives for dinner and I really hope that I can expose them to all sorts of fruits and vegetables so that they develop a healthy palate.
But what I have come to realize is that we eat too many carbs and too little fruits and vegetables. Alot of us grew up eating tons of carbs and our bodies now tell us that we need them. We quite literally hunger for them. We quite literally carry them as extra-fat on our bodies. Those of us wanting to lose weight and keep it off need to re-learn how to eat.
I bet you didn't know that a healthy serving of pasta is 4 ounces (1/2 a cup), which is a very small amount. The reason is that a well-balanced dinner, includes pasta with 3 oz of chicken, 3 ounces of steamed vegetables, 3 ounces of raw vegetables. The tendency these days is to have 12 ounces of pasta and NOTHING MORE. Hint - those meals at Cheesecake Factory are far too big.
My husband raves about my cooking and loves vegetables but he always complains about the portions I give him of rice and bread, often asking "if there is a second course." He too, like many of us has grown to depend on carbohydrates.
I found this website offering sample healthy meals. http://www.choosemyplate.gov/healthy-eating-tips/sample-menus-recipes.html
Now, I am not a fan of strict and unhealthy dieting, but I am a fan of having well-balanced meals and healthy snacks. My girls are big snackers and instead of going for a slice of toast or a cookie I offer them assorted berries and cucumbers and they love them. They don't know any better for the moment and I am quite pleased with that.
The truth is: We are getting fatter. This is not about looks. This is about health. Those of us who are overweight shorten our lives. Being overweight for an extended period of time is worse than smoking. Those of us who are obese will live 10 years less than our slim/average peers.
This is an incredibly sad reality.
We exert energy at the gym and money on personal trainers, lose a bit of weight and then gain it all back. To make long-term changes we need to change our lives, the way we see food.
Here are some links on the studies I was reading.
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