“New year, new you,” but how?

Happy New Year! I hope you are all doing very well, and 2015 is shaping up to be as brilliant for you as it is for me! I’ve just turned 37 years old at the beginning of the year and I’m feeling wonderful, thanks in part to my healthy LWFY eating plan!

If there’s one thing I can count on as a new year approaches and passes by, it’s people asking me which diet is “right” for them. It happens every year and I am more than happy to be considered a trusted source to provide an answer. There are so many different diets that you have surely read about in magazines, and seen advertised on television; I know it can become confusing. “New year, new you,” but how?

Here’s a tip: any diet that seems like it’s too good to be true, most likely is. Furthermore, a gimmicky fad diet…well I think you’ve tried those before. Some you’ve probably heard of include: Low Carb, Atkins, South Beach, Detox, hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin is a hormone produced by a pregnant mother after implantation), and Cabbage Soup Diet; just to name a few.

I get the appeal of the fad diet, and God knows that in the past I’ve been in such a desperate place that I’ve turned to them in times of no avail. Losing weight seems overwhelming and these trendy diets provide a seemingly easy way for you to lose. The reason that these diets don’t work is that you can’t live your life based on a trend. These diets are a band-aid fix for a problem that requires much more. Losing weight truly is a lifestyle change, a simple and easy one at that. I can teach you!

We know that calorie reduction is the scientific way to lose weight and the bottom line is that eating fewer calories results in weight loss. (I didn’t have to go to medical school to tell you that.) With that being said, I’ll let you in on a BIG secret. These fad diets are all just different ways for you to “accidentally” eat fewer calories. For instance, by restricting carbohydrates from your diet, you will undoubtedly be eating fewer calories. Pick any broad range food group for that matter and eliminate it from your diet… voilà there you have it, less calories! Of course you’re going to lose weight if you only eat cabbage, how many calories can one person consume of cabbage in a day? It’s not the cabbage, it’s the calories!

Same theory applies to the highly controversial hCG diet I mentioned earlier. The hCG diet only allows for 500 calories per day (!) coupled with hCG injections. (500 calories per day is not advised by me, it’s very difficult to achieve proper daily nutrition at less than 1,200 calories per day.) It hasn’t even been proven that the injections are responsible for the weight loss, and why would it be at such a minimum amount of daily calories. The point being that anyone can lose weight by restricting calories, you don’t have to go to an extreme, or label it with some fancy name that a company has come up with to make money.

How about simply eating healthy, well balanced meals and snacks that contain less calories and bad fats, instead of restricting yourself from potentially important food groups? Did you know for instance that the only energy source the human brain utilizes is glucose? Glucose is the form of sugar that travels in your bloodstream. Neurons in your brain cannot store glucose, therefore they depend on the bloodstream to deliver a constant supply of this fuel. Glucose is obtained from the breakdown of carbohydrates: the starches and sugars we eat in the form of grains, fruits and vegetables. Now how are you going to not eat carbohydrates, child?

If you are gluten intolerant, then that is a definitive reason to eliminate certain grain and carbohydrates. If you are interested in a vegetarian, vegan, or raw diet for whatever reason or belief you hold dear, then that is completely understandable and honorable. I do not consider these to be fad diets (if introduced for the right reasons) and have benefits as well as certain drawbacks. For the majority of my readers, these types of diets may not be the best choice for your first step in the right direction, unless of course you have already been abiding by them. Simple is best here at LWFY.

Simple (there’s that word again), healthy, properly sized portions coupled with exercise are the only real constants that work. That’s what I did over twelve years ago and I’ve kept off over one hundred pounds! I am living proof. All those other diets failed me.

I find many of my health-coaching clients and patients have a basic idea of what to eat and what not to eat. (For the most part.) It’s motivation and education combined that gets my clients and patients to where they need to be. As you know, I’m here to help and can be contacted through my website for personalized one-on-one sessions. Whether you’re right here in NYC, or anywhere around the globe, we can connect and together get you to your goal weight.

Don’t wait; it’s time to take back your life. This time next year you can have a whole new set of resolutions.

Lose Weight, Find Yourself™, I did and so can you!