Yes, it's true: the results of a 10-year study just published in the New England Journal of Medicine show that after losing 10% of their body weight, people actually expended 15% less energy than expected! In other words, your body has a certain ideal weight- it wants to maintain, and diets do not work.
If this news makes you panic, get yourself a copy of Hirschmann and Munter's new book. These two psychotherapists say they are "at the forefront of the anti-diet movement." With eating disorders rampant among young women and female models growing thinner and more waif-like every day, it is time we all joined this movement.
Through their books and workshops, Hirschmann and Munter teach a radical technique to overcome food obsession: stock your house with lots and lots of your favorite "binge" foods and give yourself permission to eat whatever you want, whenever you want.
Sounds weird, but the authors say that "legalizing" food is a step in the process of learning to listen to our hunger and satisfy it, instead of denying this biological urge. The book also talks about how to accept and love our womanly bodies.
One of the authors' most important points is that when women have spells of hating their bodies for being too fat, weight is not the issue. The issue is some other stress in the woman's - such as a strong feeling, like anger, or a forbidden wish that, as women, we feel we should not be having. Women Stop Hating Their Bodies is full from women sharing how they figured out the real stresses in their lives and, i of putting themselves on another diet, made some long-term changes in their liv
One of the questions the authors ask participants during the work-shops is, &qu would happen if all women stopped hating their bodies?" "We would ta the world!" one participant said. So what are we waiting for?
--Jyotsna Sreenivasan