Each time you weigh yourself, it’s important to use the same scales, and to weigh yourself at about the same time of day. This will prevent inaccuracies and also limit false weights from changes in fluid balance – we can weigh up to 4lb more at one end of the day just because we are holding more fluid – so same time, same equipment is a golden rule. When it comes to setting long-term targets for yourself, there are literally hundreds of options. We’ll look here at a few of the most important.
Weight Loss for Health
If you are quite overweight – let’s say your BMI is over 30 and you are dieting primarily for health reasons – then to set a goal of reaching a BMI of 20 might not be realistic. It may also be a goal that seems too far away right now, so it may not be that helpful in keeping you motivated. What might be more achievable would be to aim first of all to reduce your weight by 10 per cent. Let’s say you currently weigh 16 stones (224lb or 101kg). A 10 per cent weight reduction would be 1½ stones or 21lb or 10kg. The 10 per cent bit is very significant: good-quality studies have shown that reducing your weight by as little as 10 per cent significantly reduces your risk of heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and some cancers – not to be sniffed at. Once you get to 10 per cent, aim for the next 10 per cent and so on. The health benefits just keep on coming.
Measurements
Measuring your waist, hips and bust or chest is another great way to chart your results. Fat carried around the tummy or abdomen is a key indicator for an increased risk of heart disease and diabetes. Aiming for a waist circumference that reduces your risk is a fantastic goal.
| Increased risk | Substantial risk | |
| Waist circumference: | Waist circumference: | |
| Men | 94cm (37 inches) or more | 102cm (40 inches) or more |
| Women | 80cm (32 inches) or more | 88cm (35 inches) or more |
We’ve also included a measurement chart for you to complete, below. This will be particularly useful if you think you’d like to continue the diet for a few weeks. It’s a great motivator to let you know everything is moving in the right direction.
If you’re not sure how to take accurate measurements then have a look at our tips on page 39.
Other Measures of Success
As far as other measures of success go, the key is to record where you are right now, before you even start the diet, and then make appointments with yourself to revisit your list and review your progress. You can do this for feelings, emotions, confidence and a whole host of weight-connected issues. There’s much more to finding Diet Freedom than just what the scales tell you. You can score these feelings and emotions in a variety of ways. Words are good but if you find that difficult, try using the smiley face score or the scale of 1 to 10.
Smiley Face Score
Use the faces to represent how you feel for each feeling or emotion in the table below and watch your score get more and more smiley!
Scale of 1–10
Imagine a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 being the least confident or optimistic and 10 being the most confident or optimistic you could feel. Then give yourself a score for how you feel at that moment, and revisit the score table next week and the week after, and so on.
Scale of 1–10 for how you feel
1–2–3–4–5–6–7–8–9–10
1 = lowest
10 = highest
Keep a record of how you feel here:
Recording things other than your weight and physical measurements is a really motivating and important part of keeping you going. It might seem a bit strange to start with, but the more you do it, the easier it will become.
KOKO – Keep on Keeping on!
We’d love to take the credit for this phrase, but sadly we can’t. It started with our army of Diet Freedom Fighters who keep each other motivated and share tips on our website forums. They are a great place to start when it comes to KOKO. Dieting can be a lonely old business and it’s inevitable that you’ll have good days and days when it all seems a bit too much. Those can be really negative and send your motivation into a downward spiral. Sometimes a trouble shared really can be a trouble halved, and you can bet that someone else is either feeling exactly the same as you, or has been there before and can give you just the words of wisdom and encouragement you need to get you back in positive mode. We regularly call in to the forums to update everyone with new information and encouragement, so please do join us and meet some new friends to share support and ideas with.
A Lapse is a Slip, a Relapse is a Return to Old Ways …
Lapsing, ‘having a bad day’, ‘losing your focus’ or ‘falling off the wagon’ – whatever you want to call it – is a perfectly normal part of changing. It’s human nature to forget to have your morning snack occasionally, and end up choosing something unhelpful at lunchtime – that happens because you got too hungry to make a sensible choice, not because you have no willpower. Likewise, going to someone’s house for dinner and eating a meal which doesn’t quite fit in with low-GL principles is being polite, not weak willed. I have never worked with a patient who hasn’t had the odd slip here or there, and I don’t expect I ever will. If it were that easy to be perfect all of the time I doubt any of my patients would bother coming to see me, and you wouldn’t have bothered to buy this book!
A lapse becomes a problem when it triggers all kinds of negative thinking, feelings of hopelessness, complacency and guilt:
I’ve never had any willpower.
I always give in to temptation.
I’ve blown it.
I’m miserable – let’s eat – I’m even more miserable – let’s eat some more …
One biscuit won’t hurt.
That’s just the time when a lapse is in real danger of turning into a relapse, and within minutes you can be right at the end of that diet-trap cycle all over again. These are just the kinds of trick our negative dieting