BYU professor touts the “Eat whatever you feel like eating†diet
It’s making worldwide headlines today. BYU health professor Steven Hawks is promoting a “diet†that helped him lose 50 pounds and keep the weight off for 5 years. The plan sounds simple enough: Eat whatever you are craving but stop when you aren’t hungry anymore.
The first part sounds great, but the second part is the catch.
The reported benefit of the “diet†is that the traditional guilt of breaking diet rules by pounding a bunch of Shock Tarts (or Chewy Spree’s … Mmmmm) goes away because no food is off limits. If you want a bowl of ice cream for dinner then have at it.
The obvious weakness is that this plan relies on a person being able to stop eating as soon as they are not hungry. It seems to me that this is a massive obstacle for a lot of people. Not only does it pit the overweight person against the multi-billion dollar food industry which has made it a goal to get consumers to consume more and more food, it also puts people up against deeply ingrained resistance to “wasting foodâ€. You know — the old “clean your plate; there are starving children in [insert country/continent here]†syndrome.
But I can attest that the plan can work. I have a family member who has been eating chips and candy for years instead of big “healthy†meals. She is very slender. The difference between her and me is that she can sit down at Claim Jumper and stop eating that delicious oversized meal when she is no longer hungry and then box up the rest for later. I have a great deal of difficulty not completely stuffing myself in an attempt to keep the good times rolling…
So while I think the “only eat when you are really hungry†style of diet will work for a lot of people, I’m not sure a lot of others have the discernment to know when they aren’t hungry anymore and I’m not sure others have the ability (or at least training) to refuse to eat food that is on the plate in front of them.
What do you think?
I’ve had a number of conversations with my wife regarding the fact that we have been trained to eat what’s on our plate, eat and get the best value for our buck, rather than eat to be satisfied. I don’t know how many times I’ll eat 85% of my plate and be perfectly satisfied but of course I don’t to waste so I end up stuffing myself.
I’m starting to work on changing my paradigm to understand the dining experience as one of being satisfied rather than filled. I’m eating a lot less these days and am enjoying my meals a bit more as well.
Comment by Rusty — December 5, 2005 @ 12:13 pm
Also add in that we are bombarded with messages that we don’t eat enough fruit/fiber/vitamins/calcium, or whatever. These messages may be true, but they don’t help in refusing food.
Comment by Jared — December 5, 2005 @ 12:54 pm
All “diets” sound suspicion. The best diet is lots of exercise, healthy high fiber foods, low fat, and self-control. That always works.
Comment by Clark Goble — December 5, 2005 @ 12:55 pm
Clark: The best diet is lots of exercise, healthy high fiber foods, low fat, and self-control.
Drop the “healthy high fiber foods and low fat” requirement and you have the same diet plan that Hawks is pushing Clark.
Rusty and Jared: You have hit on the two primary obstacles that I see — learning to stop eating when you are not hungry and resisting the powerful programming we have received our entire lives from the food industry via advertising. I suspect these two are intertwined.
Comment by Geoff J — December 5, 2005 @ 1:32 pm
210 lbs is fat? I must be a porker then.
FWIW, I follow his diet. I don’t worry about what I eat and I only eat when I am hungry (which is actually fairly often. I am actually starving right now despite my breakfast of fruit, toast and eggs and a mid-morning fruit snack). I rarely gain weight and my cholesterol is so low that the last time I got it checked it didn’t even register with a count, the display simply said “Lo”.
Comment by Kim Siever — December 5, 2005 @ 1:43 pm
The difficult part of this is that many obese people are dealing, according to recent research, addiction. Telling an addict to stop when they are sated is ridiculous.
I agree with clark, Though I don’t worry to much about low fat. Now Trans fats really are evil, but that is a different conversation.
Comment by J. Stapley — December 5, 2005 @ 1:53 pm
CBC Radio has picked up this story — they’re going to interview him tonight on “As It Happens” (starts 6:30 p.m. EST)
Comment by kris — December 5, 2005 @ 4:51 pm
I wonder if this would work with sexual appetites too.
Okay, that was a joke. But I do remember learning in World Religions class at BYU that some version of some eastern religion used something beyond this to get over sinful desires: give in without restraint until you were so sick of it that you never wanted to do it again.
Comment by Christian Y. Cardall — December 5, 2005 @ 8:09 pm
Christian, I’ve tried that with chocoloate chip cookies. It doesn’t work.
Comment by meems — December 5, 2005 @ 10:52 pm
Sorry for the typo in “chocolate.” I was eating at the keyboard and my fingers slipped.
Comment by meems — December 5, 2005 @ 10:57 pm
I guess I don’t see what all the media hype is about. Isn’t everything he is saying pretty obvious? I have no idea what his credentials are, but this “diet” he’s come up with is nothing more than common sense. It won’t work for most people though. If fat people could stop eating as soon as they were no longer hungry, there wouldn’t be fat people. For most fat people (and I’ve been fat, thin, and everything in between), eating doesn’t have much to do with hunger. It has to do with appetite (which is different), cravings, enjoyment of the act of eating, emotions – all kinds of things.
And speaking as someone with major food issues, there are many people who are basically food addicts. Trouble with food “addictions” (so to speak) is that you can’t just quit eating. (Actually, that’s not true. In fact, I’m great at fasting. I can fast forever, but that becomes a problem. Or I can binge for days and days. It’s trying to find moderation that is hard.)
Comment by Sue — December 6, 2005 @ 3:10 pm
What Sue said.
I don’t see how this is a new idea. It’s implementing it that would be tough for people who already have a weight issue.
Comment by Laura — December 12, 2005 @ 12:14 pm
I’m with you Sue and Laura. This isn’t the approach for anyone with serious weight issues. But it seems that it could help all those folks that are just a bit overweight and have had trouble figuring out a good ongoing eating strategy. This idea of his certainly isn’t earth-shattering but perhaps the perspective will help some people who have been dazed and confused by all the food and dieting marketing messages we are constantly bombarded with nowadays.
Comment by Geoff J — December 12, 2005 @ 2:53 pm