Bournemouth Relationship Counselling

Healthy Eating

What does healthy eating have to do with counselling?

For people suffering from stress or depression, healthy nutrition and improved self-image through weight loss are highly beneficial.

Mensa sana in corpore sano —A healthy body in a healthy mind!

Let’s be clear—I am not a nutritionist.

Also, if you have any serious illness such as, for example, heart disease or diabetes you should discuss your diet with your GP.

That said, here’s my suggestion, for you to consider and see if it works for you.

First off, study after study has shown that short term weight loss diets, including those that exclude or limit one food group, do not work long-term.

Yes, to lose weight you must eat the right number of calories but compulsive calorie counting doesn’t work.

What also doesn’t work is crash dieting by dramatically reducing your calorie intake. Your body switches into “starvation imminent mode” and guess what it does next? - it starts storing as much fat a possible for a rainy day—leaving you without any energy and demotivated because you are not losing weight!

So I recommend the GI Diet.

So why am I saying diets don’t work then recommending one to you?

Because GI isn’t so much a diet as a long term guide to what you should or should not each, and how much. The author of GI says “the GI diet is not a diet of deprivation” - i.e. you can eat quite a lot of the right foods and, indeed, are encouraged to eat six times a day. Check out Useful Books for GI cook books.

GI refers to the Glycemic Index—

”Not all carbohydrate foods are created equal, in fact they behave quite differently in our bodies. The glycemic index or GI describes this difference by ranking carbohydrates according to their effect on our blood glucose levels. Choosing low GI carbs - the ones that produce only small fluctuations in our blood glucose and insulin levels - is the secret to long-term health reducing your risk of heart disease and diabetes and is the key to sustainable weight loss”.

The GI diet teaches you to eat low GI and low fat.

Tips:

· For a couple, remember you are likely to have different approaches so each adopt your own strategy and be tolerant of your partner! With diet as with everything in life you cannot force someone to do something they don’t want to do.

· If you decide to try GI, keep your expectations realistic—this is the route to gradual change and improvement.

· GI places foods in three categories: red—do not eat; yellow—eat occasionally; green—eat plenty. For example, cheese is a red item. Now you’ve probably been eating and enjoying cheese all your life—so it’s unrealistic to expect to give it up over night. Reduce your cheese intake, switch to low fat cheese e.g. on home made pizza. Aim to eliminate cheese  over time. Similarly with white bread you need to be switching to granary—this will take time!

· Your choice in most restaurants and cafes will become very limited—just try to eat as low GI as you can. 99% of Chinese food is out—Chinese food is high GI which is why you feel hungry shortly after eating! Curries that are not cream based are possible, with care, i.e. do not chose fried side dishes. Fish and chips—don’t go there! Pizza—cook yours at home with granary flour and small quantities of low fat cheese—served with a generous salad! If you like a full English breakfast switch to large flake porridge with skimmed milk and some honey, or fruit and low fat yoghurt.

· A side effect of GI is that you will increase your fibre intake which aids weight loss and promotes health.

· You’ll almost certainly gradually need to reduce your alcohol intake as alcohol is loaded with calories, vitamins and minerals but not much else.

· You will need a period of adjustment but as you start to know which foods to avoid and which are recommended your eating style will gradually change. Think of this as a long term strategy not a short term route to immediate weight loss.

· I you are inclined to weigh yourself, once a month is as frequent as you need.

· Be kind to yourself if you occasionally slip.

· Ultimately your body weight will change according to the calories you expend and the calories you eat—so build exercise into your life to complement GI.