My Weight Loss Battle

by April
(USA)

I am now 70 years old and have weighed as little as 103 lbs and as much as 223 lbs. I am an expert on the proper diet to lose weight because I did runway modeling and was constantly watching what I ate in order to stay thin. I believe this created an eating disorder, which I still suffer from. Over the years, I have been both anorexic and bulimic and have tried every diet from the cabbage diet, to the Atkins diet, to some of the ready-made food diets. Believe me when I tell you that the only diet that works properly is the calorie diet, which means that you take in less calories than you expend. All the other diets may work for a while, but most people do not last at it because they feel starved and dissatisfied enough to begin overeating again. The other thing you must take into account is that no diet will work immediately. You must make a long-term commitment and realize that you’re in it for a while. Sure, you can lose a few pounds, maybe even five or six pounds, in the first week, but rest assured that this weight loss is water loss, not fat. I am not diabetic but I as I gained weight and aged, I developed high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Some of this was due to family history, but the rest was due to weight gain. Finally deciding that I did not want to take so many medications to control these problems, I did what I tell everyone else to do, count calories and expend calories. It took nine months to lose 43 pounds. My doctor cut my medications in half.