Non diet approach to weight loss
This webpage has been set up to support health professionals, particularly dietitians and those in the counselling professions to learn about and start using the non-diet approach with their patients and clients. The non-diet approach to managing weight is an attuned and mindful-based eating. Dieting for weight loss and preoccupation with body shape and size is a highly culturalised phenomenon which is so widespread that it has become normative in western society. Not only has the damaging effect of excess weight often been (sometimes hysterically) overstated, but there is scant long-term evidence that traditional weight loss interventions achieve what they set out to achieve. The Non-Diet Approach shifts one from thinking about how much weight they need to lose to instead thinking more about how they can learn to love the body they have. It replicates a normalized style of eating which prevents the development of disordered and eating disorders. Frequent weight loss dieting has been associated with increased morbidity and mortality risk, reduced bone mass (even in obese populations) and increased cortisol production, and is a strong predictor of weight gain over time. As an added blow, these interventions have been shown, where investigated, to lead to exacerbated problems with body image, depression, disordered eating and weight regain for most by five years. It supports people in adopting health habits for the sake of health and well-being, rather than weight control. Office of Health Education and Promotion - Nutrition. Stopping the War on our Bodies: The Non-Diet Approach. Fatness is now assumed by many to be an unequivocal marker of health status. Some dietitians and psychologists, although well-meaning and highly trained, may be contributing to the problem. Restrictive dieting for weight loss is ineffective in the long term for 95% of people. Self-acceptance and respect for the diversity of healthy, beautiful bodies rather than the pursuit of an idealized weight at all costs. Americans are dieting at the highest rate in history.
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The Non-Diet Approach is the clinical application of the Health at Every Size (R) values. All large people MUST lose weight in order to improve their health and fitness level. The main reason people regain lost weight is THEIR failure to comply with prescribed diets or make long-term commitments to weight loss. Everyone can lose weight IF they just follow the proper diet and regular exercise program. It is impossible to be fit AND fat at the same time. It is so deeply entrenched that alternatives to weight loss dieting and studies which show a protective effect of fatness are often met with undue scepticism and sometimes outright outrage. Total health enhancement and well-being, rather than weight loss or achieving a specific ideal weight. There is also the pervasive assumption not only that weight itself is the problem, but also that dieting is the answer. The Health at Every Size (HAES) concept supports the non-diet approach and its focus on self-acceptance. People who diet restrictively tend to have concrete beliefs about the value of different foods, eating behaviours and body shape that are more extreme than non-dieters. These days weight, and what to do about it, is highly controversial. The diet industry is a multibillion dollar industry. Over one-half of teenage girls and nearly one-third of teenage boys use unhealthy weight control behaviors (skipping meals, fasting, smoking cigarettes, vomiting and taking laxatives). Please consider participating in my study - more info here. HAES is based on the simple premise that the best way to improve health is to honor your body. The Non-Diet Approach for Health at Every Size (HAES).
