Weight Loss = Portioning? Yes!!!

I remember as a young man watching a MacDonald’s commercial about how you could still feed a family of 10 for about $10! I was amazed by this but sure enough a hamburger, small fries and a small coke cost under $1.

When I left home at age 17, I ended up living on tips (I was a busboy at a local restaurant) and took advantage of Burger King’s 25 cent hamburger sale one month. That sale fed me for two months (I froze some burgers).

In this post I will try and explore some of what is making us as a society fat! I will try to place blame squarely where it ought to be and try to deal in reality for the other pesudo-issues that are bandied about such as the myth that fast food is “making” us fat. First to set the stage, take a look here or at the video of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s slide show about portioning.

For those of you that don’t remember pre-big gulp days, sodas have not always been 32 or 40 ounces. Yes I remember that a glass of beverage used to be 8 ounces.

So what is with this calories in, calories out balancing act displayed in this power point? As I recall as a small child watching a Marcus Welby episode, one cannot eat more calories than one’s body can consume in a day to maintain a healthy weight!

Is that TV doctor’s advice proven wrong over the years? NO!

Are there many more ways to skin the same cat in today’s multi-billion diet industry? Yes!

What is healthy eating anyway? When I was a kid there were four food groups. Nowadays there are about seven or eight but the advice has not changed much. One should not over indulge in fat, and the amount of carbohydrates and protein vary depending on the flavor of diet you decide to follow.

Why is fast food deemed as evil by the diet powers to be? Because of the high fat and calories (and low nutritional value inherinet in highly processed foods).

Here is an example of fast food gone wild, complete with girls in skimpy attire for you viewing pleasure (as well as an obscene amount of fatty, salty, caloric foods!)!

All I can say to this is, “Doctor, Doctor, Give me the news… I have a bad case of loving you…”

Now for a counter point before I launch into what I view as the only viable solution to fat food!

I find that I agree with the main points of this video, yes, cheap – highly available, fast food is part of our obesity problem!

Now I probably will never be able to eat at the heart attack grill because even one “regular” sized meal at that establishment would be more calories and fat than I am allowed for a whole day! But having said that, I do not think fast food is the culprit here and I would defend this restaurants right to exist in America!

I think people are responsible for themselves! If a person knowingly or unknowingly decides to become obese – that is his or her problem.

Luckily we are about to get health care that will hopefully cover people that make bad choices but the blame rests squarely with a person’s choices in life.

Now unless America decides to adopt communism as a political system, I think personal choice is here to stay. Now for the obvious solution.

Portioning!

What did I say? Portioning? Yes!!!

No one is making anyone super-size anything! You cannot blame that on hunger or a insulin rush and just make fast & junk food illegal. A person decides what to put into his or her body.

Is it hard to come to grips with reality? Sure. Do some people need help? Sure. Can web 2.0 help? Sure. Will some people fail and die? Sure.

My point is as a people or individually, we can only control so much. Why not focus on what we can control, whether we know it or not?

Let me tell you a quick story of what I have been able to do lately. I have been trying to eat right more often than not but when my wife and I have eaten out - we have controlled our portions.

Friday we (my wife and I) decided to eat out at one of our favorite restaurants, Filippis Pizza Grotto. We ordered the King large pizza and the small salad (enough for both of us).

Now in the old days when I was in my 20′s, I would have eaten two of these pizzas by myself! I ate my salad and two pieces of pizza for dinner and was totally satisfied. We took three-fourths of the pizza home and I’ve had one slice of pizza for lunch for the last two days. The dogs have helped us finish the pizza.

Now I don’t know about you but there is plenty of good tasting food in my house and about 50 fast-food restaurants in my area. I cannot get away from food. The only thing I have control of is myself. I have come to terms with the fact that I cannot eat the way I used to when I was a young man and live a healthy life.

The only viable choice I have is to control how I eat food. Portioning works good for me.

Diets Suck!!!!

Sorry for the plain talk but so long as your diet (way of eating) is nutritious - you don’t have to follow any-one’s plan. You might have to initially look at diets to learn how to eat again but once you have done that – try portioning.

I hope this was a post that helps you (if you need it). If not – I realize there are other approaches that will work. Portioning does not take much will power though and except for the extreme examples of fast/junk food, you can still eat some and come out ok. Just stay within your allowances for the whole day. That is what is working for me.

Happy Turkey Day!