Weight Loss & What You May Be Ignoring
Dr. J offers his irreverent, slightly irrelevant, but possibly useful opinions on health and fitness. A Florida surgeon and fitness freak with a black belt in karate, he runs 50 miles a week and flies a Cherokee Arrow 200. Dr. J and I are tag teaming again. I am using the picture from my last Wednesday post with Dr. J cause I love it so much! It is actually a ceramic sculpture Dr. J did called "pushing the envelope." And per Dr. J, it is "self portrait." I LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There still seems to be probs over at CalorieLab so.... I am thrilled to have Dr. J here!
So, I have done quite a few post on portion control. My last one was Weight Loss Tips and had a pic from Lori's blog on 70 calories worth of chocolate chips. Click on the previous link to see what 70 calories of them look like AND read what I had to say if you missed it. Lori also had an interesting post on Habit Energy that talked about portion control in a different way.
I commented & said this: Like that habit energy stuff! Lori, you know me & I am with you as I have been posting about this little bit here & little bit there of food since I started blogging & how it adds up, people don’t pay attention to it OR they just ignore it as it was just a bite but then 30 plus bites by end of day times days on end… what do you have – weight on in a year & you ask yourself where did it come from! I know, I just posted on this not too long ago with your choc chip example but I may do it again as it is powerful!
Well I am posting again as I do think it is powerful but letting Dr. J say it his way!
Portion control by Dr. J
There may be several ways to lose or maintain one’s weight that will work. It is very common to hear the expression, “you have to find your own way that works for you.” Although that may have some truth to it, I would like to suggest if you are still in the circuitous process of looking for your way, that in the meantime before you find that holy
grail, that you borrow someone else’s way that has been shown to be effective.
I would like to suggest the approach of:
1) Portion control
2) Low fat diet
3) Exercise
That is guaranteed to work. Will I refund your money if it doesn’t? I have mentioned previously that I take Paypal, so if any funds happen to show up from you after you have read this column and you are not satisfied with the results of dutifully applying this approach, I will
refund every cent.
Of this mighty triad, in my opinion, portion control is absolutely the best dieting friend you can ever make. It doesn’t tell you what you can or cannot eat, it doesn’t require writing everything down, and it doesn’t prevent you from the social experience of eating with others. All you have to do is control and limit the portions of what you want to eat. Now I would suggest that you apply a volumetric method to your eating, with maximizing low calorie; high volume foods, but you do not have to. All you have to do is control the portion size of the calorie dense foods just like you would control any other portion. Sure that may mean the tinniest hot fudge cookie, but you are the one that says you want to lose weight, right?
The world will not make this easy for you. Actually, it will make it as hard as it can to prevent you being in portion control. I just discovered the Campfire Giant Roasters marshmallows http://www.campfiremarshmallows.com/whatsfresh_viewarticle.asp?News_ID=13!
They are over four times the size of a regular marshmallow, with 22 grams of sugar
http://www.sparkpeople.com/myspark/Calorie_Finder.asp?FoodID=37850862 in each and every one. Two of those and you are over your recommended 40 grams maximum portion of added sugar in your day. Truthfully, I can’t imagine wasting 25 calories on one regular marshmallow. If I’m needing a S’more, I would spend my portion on the chocolate and be done with it, but then I didn’t get past second class in The Boy Scouts. Morse code did me in, so what credibility do I have?
Perhaps this bit of depressing information on standard serving sizes will be useful:
Some examples of a single serving size, according to the United States Dietary Association:
1. Vegetables or fruit is about the size of your fist.
2. Pasta should be equal the size of an ice cream scoop.
3. Meat, fish, or poultry should be the size of a deck of cards
4. Snacks, such as pretzels and chips, should be the size of a cupped handful
5. Apple the size of a baseball
6. Potato the size of a computer mouse
7. Bagel the size of a hockey puck
8. Pancake the size of a compact disc
9. Steamed rice the size of a cupcake wrapper
10. Cheese the size of a pair of dice or the size of your whole thumb
I don’t see the Campfire Giant Roasters marshmallows being the size of your average human head on the list.
I know this dieting stuff can be tough, and at times want to make you scream for help!
I’d send out an SOS http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMCZqKowlzM&feature=related for you, but I’m Morse code deficient.
Again, I respect all of you out there whether you are doing Intuitive Eating, WW or whatever. I just want to point out again that we all have this way of "taking bites" but them not counting them. It all adds up! Your thoughts???
PS: I will have Part 1 of a guest post over at Sensei Talks tomorrow, Wednesday!
Categories: Fitness, Health, Motivation/Support, Tips, Dieting, Weight Loss
Tags: Weight Loss Diets challenges fitness Dr. J Finding Radiance portion control Tips
"Of this mighty triad, in my opinion, portion control is absolutely the best dieting friend you can ever make."
So very true Sir. I know many people who exercise a great deal and still struggle with their weight because of how they eat.
Conversely, I also know may people who don't exercise at all, and practice portion control -- they do not struggle with their weight, though they often struggle with strength and stamina.
Going forward, you shall be known as VOR = Voice Of Reason...
When Jody and Dr. J team up, we ALL win!!!
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Roy, you are too much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! No prob on the double.... I have done that myself!
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"Of this mighty triad, in my opinion, portion control is absolutely the best dieting friend you can ever make."
So very true. I know many people who practice portion control and do no exercise whatsoever -- they are not struggling with their weight.
Conversely, I also know may people who exercise relentlessly but still struggle with their weight because of how they eat.
With friends like portion control, we can all win this battle!!!
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I love Dr J.
and I grow depressed at the paltry portion sizes.
even just reading about them.
I find FORMEFORME! that I DO intuitively follow them for complex carbs---but never for proteins.
life is all about finding what works for us, huh?
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It is all about that.. what works for you! I am more careful with my carbs too. The thing about food.. we can gain weight on any food if we eat too much so looks like you found your balance!
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I agree with Emergefit! When Dr. J and Jody team up..we ALL win! The most eye opening portion for me, WHICH I still am working on is the meat, fish, and poultry. A deck of cards...Yep, I learned that a couple of years ago...but it is slowly being put into practice..
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Jules, your steps are all moving forward!
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I couldn't agree more about portion control. It explains the success of the Weight Watchers program. It's ironic that Dr. J and you are talking about this today. Just this morning I was getting a cup of coffee and nearly grabbed a box of whipping cream left over from a dessert I made my husband last week instead of my usual half and half. I looked at the label and noticed that the whipping cream had 45 calories/tablespoon. Half and half has 40/2 tablespoons. That can really add up if you have several cups throughout the day.
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It all adds up. We just have to count it vs. ignore it!
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Always great to land at Jody's excellent web site and visit with all y'all!!
Just to be clear on serving sizes. I am not saying that you can only eat one serving size of something. I use serving size to help me keep track of the amount of calories I am eating. If, for example, 3 ounces of Filet Mignon is 175 calories, you can eat a lot of cow before you go over your calorie portion for the day
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And I love having you here!
I AGREE! I may eat 1, 2 or even 3 portions of something but the key is I know what the portion size is, what the make up of that food & portion size is AND I know it can fit it into my day without creating probs for the overall food plan for me.
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the advice of eat less, move more.....so simple but yet so hard!
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good post and so true!
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Portion size is really important to know, whether you choose to have more than one portion or not, at least know how much you are taking in. It's one thing to write down what you think you are eating and another to write down exactly what you are eating!
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Lori, thx for the inspiration for these posts!
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Some great tips here as always from Dr. J. I knew most of these, particularly the cupped hand measurements, but wholly hell I did not realize the pasta portion size! I suppose it is a great idea I try to stay away from pasta in general, huh?
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I am lucky. I am not a pasta fan!
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