The Behavioral Path to MWL Success - November 2022 Group

[Ejg]

@beth, hard JUST this time of year? I felt similarly the last few winters but decided this year I'm going to just lean into it: keep a busy schedule and plenty of time outside despite awful northeast winters. Since summer bodies are made in winter I also plan to continue to lean heavily into the MWL thing so I'm nice and svelte for pool season next year. Good luck

[JeffN]

We talked about this forum on the Starchivore Wednesday meetup on Zoom for McDougall graduates. Mark Cooper and everyone on this forum in invited to stop by Zoom at 8 a.m. Pacific Time on Heather McDougall's Zoom link

Hi Ellen. Good to see you. Just to clarify. This forum/group is open to everyone who is willing to follow our guidelines and we welcome those who have graduated from the 10 day live in program and the 12 day virtual program or not. It’s a great place to get support and feedback for those following the 10-Point checklist in an official moderated McDougall forum.

The Wednesday meet ups on Zoom are for the 12 Day virtual program graduates only. It is part of their ongoing support for having been through the program. The email with the information on how to join the weekly zoom is sent out in an email to the graduates and is posted in Kajabi.

Thanks and have a great week!
Jeff

[wildgoose]

Does anyone have any specific food plans for Thanksgiving food? OMG – it is coming up quickly! I’ve been asked to bring hummus / veggie tray to event – hummus is MWL ok (except have to be conscious of sodium in the hot sauce – TJ’s has a good low sodium one…). Was thinking to do a tray of potatoes or sweet potatoes as well. Maybe I will bring fruit too

Stephanie, I really like doing Tami Kramer's Fruit Turkey Tray. Never fails to impress. A bit fiddly to make, but really impressive if you take your time positioning the fruit.

You can always make your own hummus. It’s what we're going to do for our veggie tray. I keep mine simple — chickpeas, lemon juice, garlic (a lot of garlic ), all blitzed in the food processor. Thinned out with chickpea cooking liquid (or reserved liquid from drained canned chickpeas) if necessary.

Glad you liked the Bob's Red Mill Creamy Buckwheat. I think it’s a great alternative when you don’t feel like oatmeal.

Goose

[Noella]

Hi Mark, Jeff, Wildgoose and everyone participating on the behavioural path to MWL success forum,

I continue to be excited about MWL! My commitment is stronger than ever.

Earlier this week, I enjoyed making a Moroccan spicy roasted squash stew; today, I made the most delicious soup: roasted kabocha squash, carrots, onion, celery, garlic, thyme and nutmeg.

I went for a beautiful fall drive to a rural farm market and bought 100 pounds of potatoes, 50 pounds of onions, and 25 pounds of carrots. Very economical for just $35 (Canadian dollars)!

1. Start each meal with soup and/or salad and/or fruit. Yes...ALWAYS!
2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals. Yes...ALWAYS! I balance the starchy with the non-starchy!
3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts too. If either is troublesome for you, you can stop them. Sugar: Yes...NEVER add sugar or salt while cooking; ALWAYS use a reduced amount of salt at the table.
4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood). Yes...NEVER eat dairy, meat, seafood or eggs.
5. Eliminate all higher-fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy). Yes...NEVER.
6. Eliminate any added oil. Yes...NEVER
7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods, including flour products (i.e. bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit. Yes...NEVER
8. Don’t drink calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages). Yes...NEVER
9. Follow these principles, eat whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself, and don't stuff yourself. Yes...ALWAYS
10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking). Trying to do something each day, and I'm doing a bit better


Best regards,
Noella

“These good results encourage greater compliance, which leads to even better results. In this way, the positive cycle is perpetuated.”
― John A. McDougall, The McDougall Program for Maximum Weight Loss

[MakeHealthLast]

For 11/11/22:

Hope you all had a wonderful week!  A big thank you to any of you who have served our country, hence serving us.  May we honor your service not only on Veteran's Day (Remembrance Day for our friends to the North), but every day.

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.---Still struggling with this one.  I think this week I'm going to really try to focus on having some cut up raw veggies more at the ready.  Or I can always have an apple that we got at the orchard.  Whatever I have, it definitely needs to become more of a pattern.

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.---Never had fruit for dessert, but almost all my meals were 50/50.

3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.---Yes, except for some honey roasted peanuts.

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).---Yes.

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).---Had an individual tube of honey roasted peanuts and an individual tube of roasted + salted cashews.

6. Eliminate any added oil.---Yes, except for the above mentioned nuts and a single serving bag of potato chips.

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.---Had 1 white flour, no oil French roll.

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).---Yes, did not have.

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.---Yes, for the most part.

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).---I didn't do as well with this point as I usually do, but I am confident I can resume my usual walking pattern...maybe wirh some added layers of clothing.

Victories, comments, concerns, questions:

---I know I'm on a journey to better health via better eating (MWL). I'm trying to be okay with hiccups, and not let them derail me. The perfectionism (on-plan or off-plan/all or nothing mentality) rut is very, very, very deep. But with God's help, and thanks to all of you, and especially Mark (your links, questions, encouragement), I know I will get there. I'd write more, but I better post before it's too late. Blessings!

[Mark Cooper]

The window for reporting this week's behavioral results has officially closed.

My replies and the weekly summary will follow.

[Mark Cooper]

BambiS - Nice! It seems like you are moving right along. Do you have any plans for an adjusted routine to support your adherence and accommodate the return to the office?

Rebecka22 - Considering this week felt really hard for you, it looks to me like you managed pretty well overall! I know it probably sounds weird, but when I want a warm drink, I actually sip a mug of hot water; for me, it satisfies the need for something warm to drink.

Good planning, setting up my environment and giving myself grace are my best strategies at the moment for this.

I think you have this exactly right. Dr. Lisle's lecture, The Story of Willpower – What it Is & How it Works, is a great resource for understanding "willpower" and includes some strategies to bolster that resource. My go-to comforts for self-care tend to be physical: getting a massage, going for a walk, float therapy, or even just laying down in bed with a good book.

Hjklost55 - Great progress! All adherent foods for 11 days running is awesome! Nice work eliminating the Kombucha. Otherwise adherent seasonings (I'm not sure whether "Everything But The Bagel" has any non adherent ingredients) that include salt can be acceptable if used in the manner Jeff recommends.

In regard to added salt and added sugar, we recommend buying and preparing food without either and if any are to be used, to add them at the table on the surface of the food. If either one is troublesome and create uncontrollable cravings for you, then leave them out.

That "Bountiful Basket" sounds delightful! In regard to posting images -

I use flickr for my photos. You can get a free account (if you don't already have one) and then upload the images you want to share. For a specific image, if you select the share button, then BBCode, you can just cut and paste the code for the image into a post here on the forum. (You may know all this already, but I thought a quick primer might benefit everyone ).

The code to embed an image looks like this

Code: Select all

[img]URL for your picture goes here[/img]

VegSeekingFit - Three Cheers for feeling very positive, Stephanie! Another great week on the books. My wife, daughter and I are visiting my mother and brother for Thanksgiving (first time since before the pandemic started). Since we'll be away, and I'm the only one who practices this way of eating, I'll be cooking just for myself; my meals will probably look very much like what I would have normally. However, I am contemplating having some Okinawan purple sweet potatoes sent to my mom's house. They are my favorite! Hummus, potatoes / sweet potatoes, veggies and fruit sounds like a lovely spread for your event. Enjoy!

Gimmelean - Needing a new, smaller, fall / winter wardrobe is one of those "high quality problems" to have, right? It definitely took me a while to get used to not wearing (or not needing to wear) oversized clothes. I hope you are able to have some fun and enjoy picking out a few new things for yourself. That Romanesco sounds fabulous; in fact, all the food you prepped for this week seems really appealing. This time of year can definitely be replete with temptations and challenging scenarios, Halloween being the first of many. I can definitely remember experiencing the sort of "chain reaction" you describe more than once, and it took ongoing awareness, adjustment and, most of all, time to be able to break that chain. I think each experience like this that we have, when we are able to stay mindful of the results (and how it feels afterwards), can move us closer to the position of avoiding similar traps in the future.

Makes me realize just how vulnerable I will always be when I let go.

I think this is an important realization. Coping with challenging food environments gets easier with time and adherence, but we will never be invulnerable, so it behooves us to recognize that and, when possible, take precautions. We keep learning, and all of us will always have new things to learn, yes?

Ejg - Congratulations on your progress, Eric! Commercial dressings can be evaluated using Jeff's Rules & Guidelines for Reading Labels. Do you think citrus juices are likely to spur the same reaction as the vinegar, or have they been OK in the past? Jeff's recipe for his favorite salad dressing is here, and here is a Citrus Dressing from Dr. McDougall's website. Keep in mind, too, that salads are not required for success, as Jeff discusses in On Salad, Soup, and Success. In fact, there is research that indicates vegetable soup as a preload can work even better than salads. If you can't find a dressing that works for you, don't feel like you are stuck - maybe experiment with some calorie dilute soup (and that is coming from an all-time salad-lover ). Keep your positive momentum rolling; you are doing great!

Ellen Withrow - You are making progress with the recommended behaviors! Nice work phasing out the sugary soft drinks. Keep aiming for improved adherence where you have the opportunity to do so. The more you can ensure that you always have adherent starches (in particular) and other adherent foods ready and easily available, the easier it will be to practice the recommended pattern of behavior. Including plenty of starch in your meals is a great way to bolster "willpower", as Dr. Lisle explains. Traveling away from home is a challenge that comes up in this thread quite a lot; are there any things you think you would do differently the next time you have to make a trip? Just to clarify, smoothies are not recommended for MWL; the recommendation would be to eat the fruit itself.

Lizzy_F - Great progress, Beth! Hooray for the system you are employing for intentional exercise and for feeling good about moving without that feeling "hard." Adjusting and arranging your environment to serve and support the pattern of behavior you are trying to achieve is among the most powerful tools available, and taking advantage of that should serve you well. It seems to me that there are many different reasons why this time of year can be difficult and adherence might feel more challenging to maintain, many of which you mentioned. Speaking for myself, I really noticed an effect from the time change this year: it took me almost the whole week before I stopped feeling groggy when waking up in the morning. Let's aim to keep our trains on the track as best we can!

Noella - That is a great-looking self-assessment for the week! Awesome! Moroccan spicy roasted squash stew sounds amazing to me; what a haul from the farmers' market!

MakeHealthLast - You are definitely making progress in implementing the recommended behaviors! When "hiccups" happen, if you are able, try to learn something about why they occur and adjust where appropriate, but try not to dwell on them. Don't frame a lapse or a stumble as a failure; but rather, try to see it as an opportunity to learn, adjust and be better prepared going forward. The context that surrounds a "hiccup" can tell us a lot. Your point about honoring service each and every day is both well made and well taken; thank you for sharing it. Ever onward!

[Mark Cooper]

One more week practicing MWL recorded in our collective histories! Laudable efforts all around, everyone! For those of you who expect to be celebrating Thanksgiving, now is a great time to start putting together a plan to navigate that experience with equanimity and aplomb. Mary McDougall has some great tips to offer for holiday meal planning and recipes, many of which are suitable to MWL, or could be made so with a few adjustments.

This week I want to highlight this wonderful thread discussing Compliance on a Healthy Diet. If you have the time and you haven't seen it already, I would really encourage reading the whole thread; it is filled with remarkably enlightening information.

A few highlights -

The discussion of self-efficacy

Words of wisdom from a McDougaller with 30 years of success

The 3 most important things Jeff recommends for the best chance of success

Know thyself

The study cited in that last link, with emphasis added by me:

Forman EM, Schumacher LM, Crosby R, Manasse SM, Goldstein SP, Butryn ML, Wyckoff EP, Graham Thomas J. Ecological Momentary Assessment of Dietary Lapses Across Behavioral Weight Loss Treatment: Characteristics, Predictors, and Relationships with Weight Change. Ann Behav Med. 2017 Oct;51(5):741-753. doi: 10.1007/s12160-017-9897-x. PMID: 28281136; PMCID: PMC5591758.

Abstract
Background
Adherence to dietary prescriptions is critical for successful weight loss and weight loss maintenance. However, research on specific instances of inadherence (lapses) is limited, and findings regarding the frequency, nature and causes of lapses are mixed. Additionally, no studies have examined lapses over the course of a weight loss program.

Purpose
In the context of a reduced calorie diet prescribed as part of a behavioral treatment, we aimed to characterize lapse occurrence, examine lapse frequency across treatment, examine predictors of lapses, and assess the relationship between lapses and weight loss.

Methods
Adults (n = 189) enrolled in a 12-month behavioral weight loss program completed ecological momentary assessment (EMA) at baseline, mid-treatment, and end-of-treatment. At each EMA survey, participants indicated whether a lapse had occurred, and responded to questions assessing situational, environmental, and affective states.

Results
Lapse frequency showed a curvilinear relationship over time, such that frequency first decreased and then increased. More frequent lapses at baseline were associated with less early and overall weight loss. Lapses occurred most often at home, in the evenings, on the weekends, and entailed eating a forbidden food. Greater overall levels of assessed affective and environmental triggers predicted lapses; greater momentary hunger and deprivation, and the presence of palatable food also prospectively predicted lapses.

Conclusions
In addition to characterizing lapse frequency, the current study identified prospective predictors of lapses across treatment. These findings support the importance of lapses to weight control, and provide insight for potential targets of intervention to prevent lapse occurrence.

If you want some extra reading after all that, here is another great thread on People and non-compliance.

Enjoy!

Have a great week, take care & be well!

[Ellen Withrow]

Thank you for the clarification, Jeff. I think it's great that the whole world has access to this forum. Welcome to all. Dr. McDougall, Jeff Novick and team are the best! I am so thankful that I found them.

[Hjklost55]

WOW….. what an amazing group this is. And ALL the information shared. I have reading material ALL week. Thanks again everyone.

To our health,
Holly

[VegSeekingFit]

Hi All,

Wildgoose --- THANK you so much for the fruit tray turkey link -- awesome! YES, totally doing that!!! Will try to remember to take a pic... (maybe I should practice?)

This is my party hummus recipe that I am planning to bring. It is a bit fussy - so doesn't get made often by me!
* Roast a bell pepper and jalapeno on parchment paper in oven - 425 degrees for maybe 25 min
* Blend the following:
*2 cans Great Northern Beans
*1 T smoked paprika
* 1T lemon juice
* 4T Hot Sauce (check the label -- some are much worse on sodium, TJ has a nice hot sauce with lower sodium)
*1 T water (or to thin to your preference)
* Garlic!! I use a couple of spoonfuls of the minced refrigerated stuff.
* The roasted peppers.
* Can top with minced green onion, parsley, smoked paprika, etc.

Beth --- I am with you on the change in weather and less light being a bit of a downer. I think I always include my complaints in response to #10 on checklist.... Hopefully, gets a bit perkier with the holiday season upcoming...

Noella --- Amazing haul that you got of food --- crazy cheap!!! Did the math for US peeps - CAD to USD spot rate hovered around .75 last week so roughly $35 CAD equates to $26 / 27 USD based on FX exchange last week. Unbelievable!!! (Do you see me green with envy here?)

Gimmelean --- Have fun getting rid of your clothes that you will never fit into again. I did this recently too - very freeing!!! I LOL'd at your comment on pants that you said you wouldn't have been able to get a leg into at your start.

Mark -- Thanks as always for awesome support and for posting great material!!! I remember that I had intended to read (at least some) of the attached studies on behavioral interventions back a few months ago and never circled back. Hoping to better understand some of this. Glad you get to see family for the holiday. We are also going (local though) to event which has not happened past 2 years...

Hope everyone has a great week! Stay warm and dry!!!

Cheers,
Stephanie

[Greens]

Hello! I would like to be part of The Behavioral Path to MWL Success group. I have read the orientation post and think I understand the plan. I attended the online program last February. I thought I was following MWL until i started writing a food diary and could see that I have some noncompliant foods there, more than I was conscience of. Thank you. I would appreciate feedback and accountability.

[Mark Cooper]

Hello! I would like to be part of The Behavioral Path to MWL Success group. I have read the orientation post and think I understand the plan. I attended the online program last February. I thought I was following MWL until i started writing a food diary and could see that I have some noncompliant foods there, more than I was conscience of. Thank you. I would appreciate feedback and accountability.

Welcome! I'm glad you found this group and I'll look forward to your self-assessment report on Friday!

[louie3084]

Hi Mark and others, I'd like to rejoin and really commit to this. Other times I've found that I'm so busy with work and kids that I just don't get time for this.

I'd love to hear what others do to really make this work. Should I print things out and put them on the fridge!? As a reminder to stick to it.

Thanks

[Mark Cooper]

Hi Mark and others, I'd like to rejoin and really commit to this. Other times I've found that I'm so busy with work and kids that I just don't get time for this.

I'd love to hear what others do to really make this work. Should I print things out and put them on the fridge!? As a reminder to stick to it.

Thanks

The primary tool I used to keep myself accountable and track my progress was my journal; it really helped me to habituate the recommended pattern of behavior.