Moran on ABCDEF

[Guest guest]

Have you fallen off the non-dieting wagon? What does it mean to fall off the

wagon when you're not dieting to begin with? What wagon is there to fall off

of? Or maybe you've never really caught on to non-dieting to begin with.

Either way, I have a secret for you. It's something not always taught by the

non-dieting gurus.

If you've ever caught on to normal eating, then gone back to dieting, you

know about this wagon. When you fall out of it, you fall hard. Here are

three of dozens of events that could dump the wagon:

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1. You find your weight loss stalled or you even gain a little at first.

That voice in your head says " You just gotta give it a kick start with a

low-cal diet " or " Who am I kidding? I'm stuck with diets for life. This

normal eating is a pipe dream. These people are just telling me what I want

to hear, which is that I can eat any food I want and still lose weight. "

2. You feel more uncomfortable than ever in public. Your friends stare at

you as you unabashedly pour gravy on your mashed potatoes, and as you pick

at a forbidden slice of cheesecake. They say " Off the diet? " You can't stand

the stares. You're thinking you might rather return to having folks pity you

as you down a large salad with fat free dressing, and order the one item on

the menu that's doled out in " points. " You liked it better knowing that

everyone realizes you're at least trying to lose weight. You think, If

others fail to understand normal eating, then maybe you shouldn't be doing

it. After all, pleasing others reigns supreme in your mind.

3. You've been feeling great about your normal eating, but something

stressful comes your way, such as a visit from a relative who pushes your

buttons, and the next thing you know, you're back to your old binge habit.

Why try to eat normally in between " you think. " I'll be as big as a house! "

So you decide that in-between the binges, you had better go on a strict 1000

calorie diet.

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You can probably think of other reasons or triggers causing folks to return

to dieting. But notice something they all have in common. They all involve

thinking certain things are true. They all involve beliefs that didn't

change when you ditched the diet life. Go back and look at the list. The

beliefs and self-talk are highlighted in bold.

You embraced non-dieting to begin with because somewhere along the way, you

realized how irrational dieting really is. But distorted thinking and

self-talk lead to irrational actions. In the case of the list above, the

uncorrected thinking eventually leads back to irrational actions--dieting.

Now that we understand why the choice to live more rationally can go by the

wayside, what can we do about it? We can add the one ingredient missing in

the normal eating way of life. It's called cognitive therapy, and you can do

it without a therapist.

Consider this--non-dieting gurus write books telling you it's better to

learn normal eating. Some of them even admonish you to learn to love

yourself, in the hopes you'll do the right thing for yourself. These books

make you feel good, and give you a path to follow.

You're convinced. You want to imitate thin, normal eaters. You make all the

necessary technical changes (external changes), and you do great for a

while. But thin eaters don't think the way you do. They don't harbor secret,

irrational beliefs like the ones highlighted above. Eventually, those

beliefs take over again.

You learned so much from the non-dieting experts, but it's time for the

final missing piece. It's time to learn how to use cognitive therapy on

yourself. No need to buy a book. We'll explain it here.

Using Dr. R. Edelstein's model, we can break it down into six easy

steps, called the " ABCDEF " method. You'll need to do some journaling for a

while--it's important to see your own irrational beliefs on paper. That's

because you're so accustomed to your distorted thinking that it's hard to

recognize it as such. Seeing your thoughts on paper offers objectivity, and

often, a little chuckle.

In the course of your day, pick a time when you've got about fifteen minutes

or so to be quiet with a pen and paper. Using your day's events as fodder

for your writing, or anything you've recently read on non-dieting such as

the Diet Survivors newsletter, start writing an " ABCDEF " list.

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1. Activating Event: This is the event you didn't like, such as you just

overate, and now you're disappointed and even disgusted with yourself. You

thought this was over. Disappointment is understandable, but disgust is

quite extreme. The disgust leads to more overeating.

2. Belief: Here you identify the belief behind the disgust, such as " I look

awful at this weight, and I can't believe I did this to myself again. I'm a

failure. " Or " It's really gross to overeat. I'm just a pig. I can't seem to

love myself enough not to do it. I knew I was going to do this because I've

never been successful at weight loss before. Why should it change now? "

3. Consequence: Now you look at the consequence of your faulty beliefs . The

faulty beliefs led you to feeling a very extreme feeling of disgust. You're

accustomed to numbing such strong feelings, as they feel unbearable, and so

you overate to numb the feeling. In addition, the disgust led to more faulty

thinking. The further irrational thinking helps justify the overeating. What

a mess!

4. Dispute: Now you pick apart each faulty belief (highlighted in bold above

to help you see each one). For each faulty belief or distorted thinking, you

question its validity, and allow for the possibility there's a real truth to

replace it. Use your scientific mind as best you can in this process. Use

intellectual words such as " What is the likelihood? " and " what is the

evidence? "

Here's an example. If you're disputing the statement " I can't seem to love

myself enough not to overeat " you can ask yourself if it is really so that

you don't love yourself. After all, overeating has long been a means for you

to try, to the best of your ability, given the information you had a the

time, to take care of yourself. But has overeating really worked for you?

Not really. It temporarily worked because it numbed ugly feelings, but

long-term, it certainly wasn't a way to take good care of yourself. You

ended up overweight, less healthy, and upset with yourself.

Perhaps you do love yourself. Perhaps you simply haven't found the best way

of showing it. Is it possible, then, that all you need to do is change the

way you show yourself love? To change the way you think about the value of

food in your life?

You can do this same kind of rational disputing with every belief you

identify.

5. Effective New Thinking: As a result of disputing a few beliefs, you start

to think in a new way. Your thinking somehow seems a little more clear. It's

not black and white. It doesn't contain promises to yourself or " musts " or

edicts. Instead, it contains " strongly prefers " as in " I would strongly

prefer to learn a new way to love myself. " It contains scientific words such

as " I think I have a good shot at this. I'll take a risk and give it a go. "

6. Feeling: New feelings arise as a result of your effective new thinking.

Your strong feelings of disgust fade away, making room for a little hope.

You get the spring back in your step. You're still a little concerned about

your future weight loss, but you're not overwhelmed anymore. You're not mad

at yourself anymore. You're a little nervous perhaps, but there are no

feelings right now that you can't handle. The future looks bright. You once

again feel optimistic about normal eating. You laugh at your own foibles a

little bit. You might even feel a little more accepting of your current body

image. You're ready to move on.

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Perhaps you never learned this final piece of the puzzle before. There's so

much to learn, and even more to un-learn, and all the non-dieting authors

and gurus have important contributions. All that you've learned so far is

valid and important. Now you're ready to complete the puzzle.

Or perhaps you've already heard about the final piece because you've read my

book or you've read R. Koenig's book, or you've read the Diet

Survivors newsletters, but you haven't buckled down yet. Yet it's the key to

unlock true, lasting recovery so that you'll never have food issues again.

It's worth the work. You'll see.

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