My Five Biggest Diet Pitfalls

Losing weight is so hard for most middle aged women and I'm no exception. All of the pitfalls I'm going to share in this article have at some point sabatoged my attempt to lose weight. You may or may not have already had your own experience with one or more of these. Nonetheless I wanted to acknowledge these pitfalls on paper, in a way to confront my own demons. Hopefully this will help someone else in the process.

Diet pitfall #1 - Skipping or not eating enough breakfast

I've had some success over the last few years in learning that skipping breakfast does not work! I would be ravenous by mid morning and blow my diet for that day by making the wrong choices and grabbing the first thing I could put my hands on. From multiple magazine articles and such I learned that dieters should always eat a breakfast which includes 400-500 calories. Doing this deters overeating the rest of the day. The trick is to eat a balanced breakfast. Eating two frosted pop-tarts won't cut it. Instead opt for a slice of whole wheat toast, an egg, some fruit, and orange juice or coffee. Another healthy option would be low-fat yogurt with a few almonds, raisins and fruit added along with coffee or juice. So whatever you do, do not overlook breakfast, the most important meal of the day!

Diet pitfall #2 - Skipping meals

This is a pitfall that many fall into. We figure if we skip a meal, we will lose faster. After all we're cutting out a lot of calories by skipping lunch or dinner, right? Wrong! What we're doing is damaging our bodies, actually starving it or making it think it's starved. Secondly skipping a meal plays havoc with our metabolism. We lose energy and stamina and again we force ourselves into binging at the next meal. The best thing to do is to eat 5 to 6 small meals per day. In other words, never let more than 3 hours of time pass before eating something. And the "something" always needs to be a healthy choice.

Diet pitfall #3 - Eating too much after exercising

Assuming the dieter is also exercising, (which I admit I've fell off of this wagon and have not climbed back on yet), I am always guilty of this pitfall when I am exercising. After walking two miles or going to the gym, I always think "Wow, I deserve a snack or meal now" and worse I'd think I can eat anything I want. This doesn't work! Just because we've exercised, we mustn't think we can go by McDonalds and pig out. I've learned I can eat something; it just has to be a healthy choice.

Diet pitfall #4 - Weekend eating

This pitfall gets me every time! Even if I'm able to stay on my diet during the week, when the weekend comes, boom it's over. I go out to a restaurant and make the wrong choices. Recently I'm trying to look at the menu online if I know where I'm going ahead of time. This way I can plan ahead and know what I'm going to order when I get there. I'm really anxious to see if this works. Even if it is a fast food restaurant, I plan to look up the menu online and check out the calorie and nutritional information that almost every chain has on their website now. An Informed choice has to be better than making an impromptu decision upon arriving.

Diet pitfall #5- Super food craze

By a super food craze I mean that I find a food that I've read is good for you and I go overboard eating that! For example, we know almonds are supposed to be good for us, right? Right, but not eating half a can in one sitting! I've been guilty of this many times. Another example is diet cookies. They may be low in calories but still the portion size cannot be overlooked. I can't eat a whole bag of baked chips just because they are better for me than "regular" chips.

By writing down these major diet pitfalls that continue to haunt me, I hope I will remember them more easily, thus helping me to avoid them in the future. If you have encountered some of these or you have your own pitfalls I wish you luck in your own weight loss endeavors.

Source:

Personal experience