It is not an official diet, so there is no book, website or group about it, but it is practiced by many people: replacing bad foods with better ones. But it only works when you realize why you eat the way you eat. I will explain this based on my own experiences with this adapted form of food and drink.

• Why do we eat and drink?
• Before you start
• Replacement diet
• And further…
• Results

Why do we eat and drink?

1. Because we need the energy (hunger or thirst are the signals)
2. Because we like it

In the rich Western society of abundance in which we live, the second reason plays an increasingly important role. We say “I’m hungry” but of course that’s not the case. Very few people in the Netherlands have ever really gone hungry, because generally we can eat three meals a day. The problem is that we often prefer the things that are not good for us. Manufacturers respond to this and we easily give in to the temptation of salty, sweet and fatty.But there is also another factor involved. It has become a habit for many people to have something tasty in front of the television in the evening. Sugar has a very special influence on our brains: they respond to it as if it were a reward. By opening a bag of chips or a pack of cookies every evening, your brain will make the link between the situation (sitting on the couch, TV on) and the food. You’re not hungry and your energy levels don’t need a boost, but you want to eat something. It is also not necessarily conscious; you eat it almost mindlessly and without really enjoying it. People who quit smoking obviously miss the nicotine, but they also miss something to do with their hands. This is also how it can happen with sweet addiction: you not only miss the “sugar high” if you don’t eat anything, but also the movement that your jaws make.I personally don’t believe in diets that deprive you of many things. That is far too difficult to maintain, because it ignores the fact that many people eat out of habit. If you can change that habit by replacing often enough, you can keep the number of eating moments the same, but you will consume fewer calories. It has now also been scientifically proven that the feeling of hunger is not so much influenced by how much is in the stomach, but by the chewing movements. People in an experiment had received an equal amount of calories through a tube, but at different amounts. They then had to chew cake for a minute without swallowing or chew alone for eight minutes. The amount of liquid the people ingested did not affect how much these groups ate afterwards, but chewing did. The one-minute chewers ate 10% fewer calories and the eight-minute group even 20% fewer.

Before you start

Before you start with an eating change, first determine whether you need it at all. Does your self-image match medical reality? The current ideal image for women is mainly about being very thin, while men are expected to be muscular. Whether you are healthy or not has nothing to do with the ideal of beauty.So first calculate your BMI (Body Mass Index). To do this, take your weight in kilos and divide it by the square of your height in meters. The number you then receive says something (not everything!) about the ratio between your height and weight. A healthy, adult person of Dutch descent should be between 18 and 25. The scale is different for people with a different background and for children. If you are above 25, you are overweight and above 30 we speak of obesity.BMI is not sanctifying. Muscle mass weighs more than fat, so very muscular people (think bodybuilders) have a BMI that would otherwise be considered obese. When you start training your muscles, you may look slimmer because you lose fat, but your weight will increase because the muscles develop. But despite these objections, the BMI score provides a quick, simple, but above all medical view of your weight. With a good BMI, losing weight is not necessary.

Replacement diet

If your BMI is too high, you can consume fewer calories with a replacement diet. Start by taking inventory of what you currently eat and drink in a day. What do you eat in the morning, afternoon, evening? What snacks do you regularly take? And what do you drink during the day? You can look on the packaging to see how many calories these are, but a website such as Calorieteller.nl can also help you. On the same site you can also calculate your energy needs so that you know what you need on average every day.Now that you have an overview of what you eat, you can start thinking about how you could replace the worse products. Be realistic about this. Of course you would prefer to give up that bag of chips, but it is better to persevere if you replace with a healthier product that is not that far from your original choice in taste or consistency. The latter is mainly about a comparable eating experience, so replace crunchy food with something else crunchy, soft food with something else soft, etc. We often choose a certain product because of the feeling it gives us in the mouth. Some examples:

What ultimately matters is that you are strong enough to choose the healthier product every time. Hopefully the following tips will help you:

• Just eat dinner like you always did. Of course, try to use enough vegetables and avoid frying more than once a week. It is my experience that it is more pleasant to have a moment in the day where you can let go of the focus on healthy eating and just eat what you feel like.
• Get as few bad products as possible and as many good ones as possible.
• Try to stop eating as an activity, but if this doesn’t work, have alternatives available. For example, I enjoy nibbling on iceberg lettuce. That would easily fit a 200 gram bag, but that is significantly better than the same amount of chips: 200 grams of lettuce contains 16 calories, and 200 grams of chips has more than 1000. What I also do is buy sunflower seeds that are still in their shells. to sit. You can find this on the oriental shelf of the supermarket or at an Indonesian or Chinese store. You spend so long trying to get every seed out of the peel that you end up eating very little. And this constant nibbling on the kernels keeps your jaws busy without you eating anything. Please note: sunflower seeds have more calories (especially fats) than the same weight of chips.
• If you do have something sweet, take a toffee or a sour that will last a long time and so you can taste the flavor for longer.
• Raw carrot or cucumber are very tasty and are increasingly offered at parties. Then try to focus on that instead of the containers with nuts or toast with cheese.
• If you are tempted by the offers in the canteen at school or work, bring your own food. Don’t go into the sales area. Also take your snacks with you (e.g. a fruit bar, gingerbread) so that you are not tempted to buy a Mars or a piece of pizza. And if you do buy a can of drink, choose the light or zero variant.

Make sure that you always consume sufficient fiber, vitamins, proteins and carbohydrates.

And further…

Everyone will know that a healthy weight is related to a healthy lifestyle: drinking enough fluids every day, eating fruit and vegetables, eating little fat and sugar and exercising for 30 minutes every day. You can only maintain a good weight if you manage to change the way you eat. What is described here can work as a first step in the right direction for people with weight problems, because it actually tries to find a way to change the behavior.I sometimes engage in psychological warfare with myself. When I enter a store and see all those goodies , I think about those nice pants that I want to be able to wear again or that too high number that the scale showed the other day. I then buy a healthy snack and am proud of myself that I was able to resist the temptation. And with every small victory I achieve, I get closer to a healthy weight and closer to a structural change in my diet.I have now managed to go to the gym on fixed days for group lessons. By taking classes at fixed times for a number of weeks , it has become part of my weekly routine and it also feels like a loss if I cannot go due to circumstances. I can’t bring myself to stand on a treadmill by myself, but doing exercises to music in a group is also fun. I am lucky that there is a nice gym almost around the corner that is also only for ladies. You will certainly see slim ladies who come here for their exercises, but also sturdier and older ladies who participate in the class according to their own ability. And on those rainy days when I come home tired from work, I pick myself up and tell myself, “Get off that chair and go. If you sit here, you’re more likely to snack. If you just go , you feel better about yourself, you exercise and you don’t eat anything while you’re there.”Anyone who really has a lot of problems with his or her weight should seek help other than an article on the internet. Go to your doctor and be referred to a dietician. This can be reimbursed by insurance.

Results

Anyone who tries to adjust his or her diet in this way will be able to lose a lot or a little weight. Suppose you normally consume 3500 calories per day while your energy requirement is 2500, then you will gain weight. If you suddenly go back to 2000 calories per day by replacing it, the effect could be quite strong in the beginning. If you suddenly drop a lot in your intake due to replacement, as in the example given, consider being less strict. Not only will it be easier to maintain it, it is much better for you to lose weight slowly. If the difference between your normal intake and the intake after replacement is less dramatic, you will also see a much smaller effect. Don’t let this discourage you, because ultimately it’s all about slowly but surely adjusting your entire diet, making eating fatty or sweet products less common.At the beginning of my own dietary adjustment, I lost three kilos in the first week. That’s way too fast, so I adjusted my assumption for the second week. For example, I ate that delicious chocolate dessert or ate a fruit bar and a slice of gingerbread as a snack instead of just one of those two. That second week I lost half a kilo, which is a much healthier reduction. I am now trying to maintain this trend, which means that I do not replace all the worse products.

read more

• Healthy eating without nonsense: myths and misconceptions
• Healthy exercise: myths and misunderstandings
• Why women want to lose weight