Totoro

Lot's of people here seem to want to lose weight. Well, I've been there and done that. About five years ago, I lost 30 pounds and never put it back on. Exercise was part of it, but the secret was mainly diet. A very simple diet.

I would eat my regular meals. A good breakfast (very important), lunch (my main meal of the day), and a small dinner (sandwich, bowl of soup, etc). No change in diet there. The only thing I did was eliminate snacks altogether. Whenever I felt like I had to eat a snack (I used to eat lots of donuts, chocolate, and other sweets) I would eat a dill pickle. After a while I hated pickles. I think it was "negative reinforcement" which is a fancy term for punishment. BTW: Pickes have almost no calories. Once I had lost my weight, I never went back to snacking the way I did before.

That's it. That simple. No fancy systems, no costly guides.

bransom

<gag> That would be like the Bulimia Diet for me — I'd barf after each pickle.

Do you still do the pickle thing now when you want a snack?

Ira in Chi

That would suck, I like pickles. Actually any kind of pickled food is awesome. For instance sauerkraut. I bet Jan Ulrich likes pickled foods.

Totoro

No, no, no. That's the whole point of the pickle thing. After awhile, your body learns to not crave snacks anymore (that's the negative reinforcement part). And it doesn't make you hate other pickled things. For instance, I still like pickled Herring and sauerkraut and mustard on my hotdogs.

KrisPistofferson

How can somebody not like pickles?

Don Gwinn

You eat pickled herring, but not dill pickles? Does this diet work for people with taste buds?

sjjone

Uh, snacks are good. Every heard of blood sugar? Eating three meals a day causes all sorts of spikes and valleys that make you feel like crap. Not to mention that doesn't fit well with eating for recovery after a ride and so on.

Totoro

You're probably right. But in my case, it was the high fat, high sugar snacks, like donuts (talk about sugar spikes!), chocolate bars, potato chips, and the like that put on the pounds. I'm sure many others have put on the pounds in the same way. This is what worked for me and it might work for someone else. That's all I'm saying.

BTW: After I lost the weight, I returned to eating snacks, but they were fresh fruit and other healthy alternatives. By then I had broken the donut habit.

Medpilot

Your statement is absolutely correct concerning people on a regular diet. For those trying to lose weight on a reduced calorie diet may only get 3 meals a day. A total of 1300-1700 calorie allowance per day comes up fast when you have three, 400-600 calorie meals.

I like the negative reinforcement part. Breaking the physiological habit of over eating while on the diet is a great idea.

FXjohn

It's my experience that you have to go a little hungry sometimes if you are trying to lose weight.

sjjone

1300-1700 calories a day is WAY too low for someone trying to lose weight who is active. I burn 2600-3500 calories a day, eating 1500 is asking for a twisted intestine.

If you're eating low-cal, high fiber foods, and are well hydrated, there is no need for that gut-chewing hunger most people associate with weight loss. Staying at a healthy weight, should be the result of a long term healthy lifestyle, not a short term diet. Calorie restriction can really mess with the quality of training and performance in my experience.

Guest

I love pickles, but this diet would probably make me hate them.

I'll just exercise and eat some grapes or something for snacks.

Koffee

natelutkjohn

My thoughs exactly, even the name is funny, and we all know laughter is good for your health...pickle
pickle pickle pickle pickle pickle sounds like tickle tickle tickle tickle

Don Gwinn

I eat between 1500-2000, which in practice usually works out to just a bit above 1500. Been losing weight steadily at that rate, although I'm a lot bigger than a lot of the people here who still seem to want to lose weight.

I eat that amount because it's around the maintenance for 200 lbs, my long-term goal. Whether I'll get there this way, I don't know; I'm a pretty big body type, and even when I was running myself to death I've never been lower than 235 in my adult life. But I figure this way, if I get there, I'll have years of eating well enough to maintain it under my belt; it shouldn't be too hard at that point. We'll see.

531Aussie

I know!!! These people who take their pickles out of the McDonalds burgers....sheesh!!

Roody

For some strange reason, something sour, like a pickle, can take away the craving for sweets.

'nother

Sounds interesting but probably a bad idea for anyone with high blood pressure and salt-sensitive; they're generally loaded with sodium. I love pickles myself but have had to really limit my intake of them. I guess if it works for you, more power to you but lets see if it sticks

Totoro

I did that diet more than 5 years ago and never put the pounds back on. So I guess it stuck.

DXchulo

Just to be an annoying dork:

Negative reinforcement and punishment are not the same thing. Negative reinforcement is when you stop a negative condition as the result of some behavior. Punishment is when you apply a negative condition as the result of the behavior.

For example, my car has an annoying sound that goes off when my seatbelt isn't fastened. If I fasten the seatbelt the annoying sound goes away. That's negative reinfocement. If the car shocked me every time I didn't fasten my seatbelt, that would be punishment.

Totoro

OMG, I certainly would not advocate shocking people every time they feel like eating a donut.

dfw

Sweets are somewhat of an aquired taste. The more you eat, the more you want. If you can wean yourself off of them, eventually you'll find you don't really have cravings for them. I used to hear doughnuts calling my name if I was in a 1/4 mile radius of them. Now I can't stand them or anything that's loaded with heavily processed sugar.

Eating several small meals per day is better than 3 large ones. Each time you eat, your metabolism goes up. If you eat too much, the resultant insulin rush will cause you to crash.

kuan

I'm on a lutefisk diet. I've lost 10 lbs already.

zebano

kuan that is absolutly disgusting. I came within 30 feet of a lutefisk once and I almost barfed due to the smell.

The pickle thing might work, but I won't try it becuase I love pickles. My biggest problem right now are the $0.10 100 grand candy bars at the snack bar (10 feet from my desk). ohh 100 grand. I have found that on the days I bring fruit or yogurt in, I don't crave the chocolate...

kuan

Have you tried those new Yoplait Chocolate Mousse "style" yogurts? They're the bomb. 160 or so calories each I think. That's my treat.

No, I'm really not on a lutefisk diet. I'd starve to death!

Totoro

The oldest person in the world until August, when she died at the age of 115, said that her secret to long life was to eat pickled herring every day. Of course, now she will know join Lenin and other "pickled" incorruptables.