~ Day One ~

Today is Day One of the weight-loss adventure. I will write about several tips and tricks that I try and how they work.

To begin with, I am going to follow the SELF thirty-one day "Jump Start Diet". Before starting this, I have to find my eating personality. This was tricky for me. You are given three options: 3-squares-a-day eater, Steady snacker, or Evening eater. I would have to say that for the most part I am all three rolled into one. However, if I had to pick just one, I would vote for the Steady Snacker.

STEADY SNACKER: You graze all day on whatever is easy to grab, often processed bites. Frequent eating can stoke your metabolism, but snackers also risk:
Fat and calorie overload. Mini-meals may max out calories. Processed eats can be high in fat, the most caloric part of food.
Hidden extra servings. Many of the prepared snacks you eat come in larger portions than you need to tide you over.
Negative nutrients. On-the-fly snacks like chips pack empty calories, so you might miss out on vitamins and minerals.

So, DAY ONE, of the Jump Start Diet:
Log Your Bites.
The pen is mightier than the fork. "A food diary forces you to focus on what you're putting in your mouth," says John P. Foreyt, Ph.D., professor of medicine and psychiatry at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. Keep it for a month and the last entry will read: "Dear Diary, I've lost a dress size."

So folks, you can check out my daily food diary here. I will have an entry titled with the date and that will be my food diary. During the day, I will keep a paper diary so that I can keep an accurate track of everything that I put into my body during the day. And then at some point, I will transcribe the information onto the blog.


All of the information from the SELF Jump Start Diet can be found in the January 2008 edition of SELF.