95% of Diets Fail

There is a widely quoted statistic out there that "95% of Diets Fail". A little bit of research will uncover that this fact comes from a small study of 100 people done in 1959 by  Dr. Albert Stunkard and Mavis McLaren-Hume.

This statistic is absolutely everywhere in the current dialogue on weight, and the study is anything but strong scientific evidence. 

However, just because the study isn't suitable for the massive citation it receives, does not mean that "Diets don't fail" or indeed that we have any idea how to lose weight or change bodies on a grand scale.

The many wonderful ladies in the Health At Every Size movement have excellent insight into this.

They point out that while the statistic is based on just one small study, there is absolutely nothing out there to refute it. In decades and decades of research, we have yet to produce ONE large scale "weight loss success" story to refute the claim that diets do not work.

It would be more apt to say that "We have no idea". We have no clue how to lose weight.

Pretty depressing.

But what about the people we know who've lost weight and kept it off? The inspiring stories of people in the National Weight Loss Registry?

Its easy to write them off as a statistical anomaly, as a collection of "freaks of nature". Its even more fun to silence those voices by dismissing them in this way.

If you know me in real life, or from my youtube, you know how irritatingly positive and optimistic I like to be.

As far as I believe? I'm not willing to use the fact that no one has succeeded yet as a way to claim that losing weight & keeping it off is impossible. I'm not even willing to say its improbable. Instead, I believe that we have yet to figure it out. OR that the way to lose weight exists, has been found, and has been discarded.

Why discard it? Duh, what if its completely impossible to turn a profit on it? What if its not something that can be neatly packaged for the masses? What if real weight loss is not only one of the most difficult endeavors, but also so complicated, so specific to each unique individual, that we can't possible make billions off of it?

Who is going to shout about THAT from every billboard? Yeah, nobody.

No, I'm not going to say weight loss is possible for everyone. I'm not inclined to believe anyone will find a way to make it easy, simple, and accessible to all. But I also refuse to say weight loss is impossible; only that we haven't figured it out yet.

From all the stories I've read, the people I've spoken with, and the research I've sifted through, I'm still not convinced its out of reach. I think the way to successful weight loss is likely to be super boring, extremely slow, and impossible to turn into a profit.  

~Love Tiff

Further Reading:

Do 95% of Dieters Really Fail?

95% Regain Lost Weight. Or Do They?

My daily walk: An abundance of Heaven

I originally intended to write about why I go on my daily walk for mental health (I've got the depression!) and  physical health reasons. I was prepared to share how my walk is my own little slice of Heaven, but after paying special attention to today's walk I believe it would be much more apt to describe it as an Abundance of Heaven.

The marsh I walk around every day is positively VIBRATING with life!

I saw...

Milkweed and Cattails

A young Doe in the woods (she was not particularly impressed with me I don't think)

A baby bunny sunning in a patch of dirt

A cardinal singing on top of a light post (He was really loud! I could hear him way before I spotted him)

A red-winged black bird swaying on his reed perch (I saw dozens actually, they are my all-time favorite bird!)

A crow eating a mouse in a field (I could see it squirming! His crow buddies seemed jealous that they didn't have mice to eat)

Thistle and Clover in bloom

An abandoned bird's nest

Three gold finches in a tree

A raspberry bush just beginning to grow fruit

A lady grackle squawking at her man grackle

A little blackbird collecting straw for her nest

A squirrell with a ratty tail running across the crosswalk

More swooping barnswallows than I could count!

I also ate two very tart red grapevine 'Y's, yum!

~Love Tiff!

What is a Grackle?

Walking: Trim your waistline, improve your health

Forget the gym - why a brisk walk is really the best workout

Proven Health Benefits That Come with Walking Regularly

Exercise and Depression

The following link is BY FAR the very best reference on walking I've found on the web:

Walking: Your steps to health

Tiffany's Epiphany 1: Why I started my Weight Loss Journey

Who am I and What led me to starting my weight loss journey?

Let us create the historical documents of Fatty Fatty No Friends!

I'd like to start by introducing you to Tiffany Sudduth in the spring of 2011. She weighed about 250-260 lbs, but she hadn't stepped on a scale in a couple years. She had gone to college for 5+ years, but she hadn't finished her degree. She'd met hundreds of people, and made hundreds of friends, but she had lost contact with almost all of them. She had a cute loving mom and dad, and two derpy brothers, but she was angry with her parents, and estranged from her family. She had just turned 24 years old in February, and after a long and complicated battle with depression that had raged since she was 10 years old, she was beginning at last to heal. She was a young woman who was raw, scared and still very sick, but the sky was lightening in the horizon, and dawn was finally on its way.

Of particular importance was her age: 24 years old. The thought occurred to her, and began to nag at her, that she had never imagined she would be alive at 24 years old. For quite a long time she had internalized, at the deepest level, a belief that she would not live past her very early twenties. Yet there she was. Alive, and still fighting.

When you're severely depressed, you spend a lot of time in the company of your own thoughts.

In the spring of 2011 I was at a distinctly turbulent place in my own Tiffany-universe. I had decided to fight the depression, and I had decided I wanted to beat it. I spent long hours wondering if I wanted to live or die. Not thinking about the issue in despair, but giving honest thought to it. Okay, so I had committed myself to taking medication, to focusing on my sluggish foe, what did this mean for my life? Well, I had to conclude that this meant I had decided to live. I looked at the options to live or to die. I thought of them without fear; objectively and calmly. I was not afraid to die, but I was quite afraid to live. Filled with a tense anticipation, I turned my thoughts towards my future. If I wanted to live my life out, what did that mean about HOW I was living it?

This was new to me. This planning, this honest analysis of myself, my life. My habit had always been to hide in fantasy and daydreams, constructing microcosms of people and places in my head in which to live. I was not accustomed to being "real" about myself. To looking at who I was in this world, what I was doing, and what life I was leading.

Looking back, the next step was really obvious.

If I was going to live; to really CHOOSE life, there were things I wanted to do, and being overweight was in the way of many of those things. There were things I wanted to do!!!

If I was going to be alive, I wanted to go skydiving, running, swimming, biking, rock climbing and hiking. I wanted to have the energy to do those things! I wanted to dress in pretty clothes, and put together fun outfits. I wanted to wear shorts, short sleeves, and dresses. I wanted to be blissfully in love. I wanted to experience intimacy on a level I hadn't ever sought before, and I wanted to have really good sexy times!

In the spring of 2011 I was raw, scared and sick, but I was healing.

I chose to live, and in so choosing I set out on a journey to transform my body to be a tool that would fit the life I wanted to live.

There were things I wanted to do!