The "D" Word

Let's talk about the "D"word. You know the one I'm talking about. That dreadful little four letter word that even has the word "die" built right in? Yep. Diet. I have come to loathe the word diet. Why? Because it carries such a negative connotation. Going on a diet is something people dread having to do. It is something no one looks forward to. We view being on a diet as punishment, as a sacrifice, as a chore. It's no wonder it is so hard to stick to a diet if it seems like such a terrible thing! Personally I also tend to connect the word diet to be just about losing weight. And while I would like to lose weight, I am finally at a point in my life where it is so much more than that. I want to be healthy, and being the ideal weight doesn't mean you're automatically healthy. There are those lucky skinny people out there with a great metabolism that can eat whatever they want and stay skinny. But that doesn't make them healthy. Their food choices can still contribute to high cholesterol, high blood pressure, heat disease, diabetes, fatty live disease and so much more. Going on a diet doesn't seem a like a permanent thing either. It gives the idea that it can be temporary, or used just to get whatever your desired results are. But as I am sure we have all experienced, not matter how successful you are on your diet, once we stop it, all the weight comes back. Yet we keep trying over and over, thinking each time, will be the one. The one time it actually sticks. See what I mean about the word "diet," it seems like an impossible dream! Always making us feel bad about ourselves when we aren't successful. 

Well, it has taken me a long time, but I realize that I don't want to be on a diet. I just want to be healthy and take care of myself so that I live a long life to spend with my son and husband and the rest of my family. So if I am thinking that far into the future, it doesn't make sense to pour my efforts into a temporary diet. I need something that is going to get me healthy and keep me healthy for the rest of my life! And think about most of the fad diets you have heard of. When you really think about them, do they seem like something practical to stick with the rest of your life? They don't to me. So I like to think of my new ways of eating as just that. I am not on a diet. It is just a new way of life, a new way of eating. Yes, I have said that I am following the Mediterranean Diet. But that is really more of just a label. If you read up on it and research it, and join some of the support groups, you will see it really is just a mindful, healthy way of eating. And that is what they call it too: "Way of eating," or "WOE." It follows how people in the Mediterranean naturally eat everyday. Everyone over in the Mediterranean is not on a diet! It is just the way they eat normally! So if I eat that way, why is it a diet? Just because I don't live there it is now a diet if I eat the same way in the U.S.? I don't think so! I am just eating the same foods they eat. And to prove it is nothing like a typical diet, it is really simple. There are no counting calories, no counting carbs, no counting fat grams, or macros, or points, or weighing food or anything like that! Just eating whole, natural foods that haven't been processed. That seems much more sustainable for life to me! It is so simple to follow. It really makes me mindful of what I feed my body. If I want to be healthy, it makes sense not to fill my body with chemicals and bad fats and things I can't pronounce on the ingredient lists! 

It has taken me a lot of years to realize this. But having this mindset has made it much easier to stick with this way of eating this time around. How can I quit a diet or fall off it, if I'm not on one?! Realizing that whatever I put in my mouth will affect my health in either a good way or a bad way, has really helped me make better choices. And those times where I may eat something that isn't good for me, it doesn't make me feel guilty, because I know it isn't the end of the world. Especially whenever everything else I eat is so good for me, I know that one little thing isn't going to undo all the other good stuff! And we all know it happens once in a while, because we are human and this is real life. So this way of eating is for life. Not just a "diet" to go on and off of.