Think-Feel-Eat | Donna Reish

Think-Feel-Eat Episode #43: What Will I Really DO to Lose Weight in the New Year?

Hi! I’m Donna Reish, IF teacher, weight loss coach, blogger, and half of “The Minus 220 Pound Pair” as my husband and I have lost over 220 pounds together (160 of that in the past couple of years through the Weight Loss Lifestyle habits and strategies I teach!).

In this episode, I teaching about new year’s resolutions and goals—and what you will really DO for weight loss/management in the coming year.

We have all heard of SMART goals. We all know that we need specific goals. We need attainable ones, etc.

There are three areas that we are often lacking when it comes to setting goals for a new year. The first one is specificity. Our goals have to be specific right down to the exact actions, times, days, and methods for carrying those out.

Then we need to be sure our goals don’t fall into one of these two pitfalls:

1) Too long of a list that we can’t attain

2) Repeating things that didn’t work for us before

I give many tips and research info about goal setting around those two issues—how we can only attain two to four new goals at once; how we stretch our attention too thin when we have too many; how willpower runs out when we have too many; and much more.

Then I move into learning from our past—what will we really do? What did we not like before? What did we not do before? Why do we think we will do it now?

And finally, I discuss some of my upcoming goals—how I know I will attain them. How they build self-integrity within me because of my constraint in choosing ones I can really do; how I am continuing previously established ones to improve them; and much more!

Think Feel Eat #43 Outline: What Will We Really DO to Lose Weight in the Coming Year?

A. About Resolutions

1. 92% gone by January 23

2. Resolutions are similar to long term weight loss statistics

3. Resolutions aren’t kept first of all because of vagueness—never make a resolution with the word MORE in it.

B. Problems With Resolutions

1. Problem #1: List is too long to do it all

a. We can’t do six or eight or ten new things at once for a long period of time

b. Brain can usually only process two to four new things at once

c. Don’t have the willpower to add so many things at once (Willpower shortage: WLL 60 and 61)

d. Put small emphasis on a many things rather than large emphasis (and willpower, grit, time, energy, motivation, etc.) into just a couple

e. Not congruent with research on habits—habits aren’t formed in mass and with big sweeping movements.

2. Problem #2: We are choosing things that we couldn’t do before, don’t like to do, will probably never do.

a. We need to learn from our past

b. We need to learn about ourselves—what will we really do?

c. We need to create protocols we can stick to—if it didn’t work before, it likely won’t work now.

C. Some Things I Know I CAN and WILL Do

1. Decide Food Ahead of Time (TFE 42)

2. Count my calories using My Fitness Pal

3. Timed eating

4. Water

5. Sleep (Get your First Four Journal Sheets here!)

6. Strength train 60 minutes four times a week

a. This was built incrementally by a 2019 goal of five days a week 20 minutes at low weights

b. Added to in 2020

c. Incrementality!

7. Low impact cardio three times a week for 30 minutes minimum (I want to do more, but this is what I have been doing and I know I can stick with it!)

8. Continue to work on my Sugar Plan (started it eight weeks ago; still creating it and seeing what works for me—not all or nothing, perfect sugar person or nothing!)

D. Get More Help!

1. Join my FREE FB group where I record videocast/podcast episodes!

2. Emails with teaching around weight management—articles, videos, free charts and booklets, and more

3. Take my month-long Intermittent Fasting course

4. Schedule a free 30 minute coaching consult! Coaching packages are on sale now through January 15th, 2021!

Think-Feel-Eat Episode #42: The Many Benefits of the First Four

by Donna Reish

Hi! I’m Donna Reish, IF teacher, weight loss coach, blogger, and half of “The Minus 220 Pound Pair” as my husband and I have lost over 220 pounds together (160 of that in the past couple of years through the Weight Loss Lifestyle habits and strategies I teach!).

In this episode, I present the many benefits of the First Four—my first steps for weight loss and lasting life changes!

There are many, many steps and stages to weight loss and weight management. To some, there are too many. To others, there are simply a couple—and anyone who says otherwise is making it too complicated.

The truth is that there ARE many steps and stages—but success comes from not doing them all at once. Success comes from incremental changes that last forever. (This is the reason that people who strive for weight loss for a really long time {not stopping and starting and gaining and losing but really keep working at it consistently} eventually reach their goal. Research bears this out.)

So in today’s episode, I want to sell you on the idea of truly implementing the First Four!

1) Drinking water
2) Sleeping 7-9 hours a night
3) Implementing some form of timed eating (a definite start and stop time for food)
4) Deciding ahead of time what you will eat each day

First, I describe what those are (and give you my free First Four Daily Journaling Pages!). Then I go through the many benefits of implementing these as lifestyle changes that will lead to weight loss and eventual weight management.

There are many benefits to the First Four for life in general. Any time we make positive health changes, they have ripple effects. The First Four will impact our self-integrity, our ability to create more success in other areas, and or health and wellness in general.

They also have added benefits of being something we can do easily; something that is before us every morning in a three minute planning time; and something that can ground us when we feel scattered.

For our weight loss efforts, these four go far—water fills us up and flushes out fat and toxins. Sleep…oh, glorious sleep….helps us withstand cravings better, helps us feel rested and energized, helps us to eat fewer calories overall, and diminishes hunger.

Timed eating gives us a definite start and stop time that results in eating less. It is somewhere between an instant gratification and a delayed gratification, which helps people stick to it.

Planning our food types, amounts, and times ahead of time is an amazing help to losing weight. We can plan foods we enjoy. We know what is coming next or soon. We can balance our food for the day to stay within our deficit. And we can plan something for tomorrow that we thought we wanted today but didn’t plan for.

The First Four is the first of many incremental steps that have led to my husband and I losing 220 pounds together and keeping that weight off!

Think-Feel-Eat Episode #41: Benefits of Being Sugar-Free Part of the Time (or Always)

by Donna Reish

Hi! I’m Donna Reish, IF teacher, weight loss coach, blogger, and half of “The Minus 220 Pound Pair” as my husband and I have lost over 220 pounds together (160 of that in the past couple of years through the Weight Loss Lifestyle habits and strategies I teach!).

In this episode, I present benefits of being sugar-free or part-time sugar-free!

Many people equate sugar with weight gain. They automatically assume that you can’t lose weight eating sugar or that you will gain weight if you do eat sugar. Truth it, we lose or gain weight by undereating or overeating.

And this leads us to the first benefit of being sugar-free all or part of the time: when we have less sugar, we crave less and often eat less. And then guess what? Yep! We lose weight!

Several things happen to us regarding weight when we reduce sugar:

We possibly eat more filling foods
We reduce our over-hunger and our over-desire (TFE #29 and TFE #30)
We eat more of the 3 F’s (foods that are fiber, fluffy, and fluidy)
We eat fewer foods that cause intense cravings (Weight Loss Lifestyle #49)

Additionally, we prove to ourselves that we can do something extremely hard, lose belly fat, increase our heart health, have healthier brain function, experience less depression, and much more.

Find all of my episodes, outlines, and articles for my two weekly broadcasts:

(1) Weight Loss Lifestyle broadcast (formerly Donna’s Intermittent Fasting Broadcast)

(2) Think-Feel-Eat broadcast

Sign up for my free webinar

Think Feel Eat 41 Benefits of Being Sugar-Free at Least Part of the Time

1. Losing weight because of eating less/fewer cravings (Over-Hunger vs. Over-Desire TFE 29 and 30)

a. Over hunger will be reduced as we will eat more filling foods

i. 3 F’s =–fiber, fluffy, fluidy

ii. Sugar takes up very little space—or if we are strict with our calories, doesn’t give us a sense of fullness

b. Over desire will be reduced as we are eating fewer foods that cause extreme cravings (i.e. fewer foods with three or more of the 6 Seductive Craving Combinations) WLL 49

i. Fewer cravings/eating less sugary foods

ii. Eat less sugary foods/crave less (circle)

2. Proving to yourself that you can do something extremely hard

a. Feeling happier and less anxious

b. Waking up with a feeling of accomplishment and pride

3. Losing belly fat

a. Sugar usually means more calories

b. Eating less sugar causes the body to burn belly fat instead of the circulating sugar

4. Heart health

a. Too much sugar can cause an increase in LDL cholesterol

b. AHA recommends reducing added sugars

c. Study in JAMA: Internal Medicine, “Those who got 17-21 percent of calories from added sugar had a 38 percent higher risk of dying from cardiovascular disease compared to those who consumed 8 percent of their calories from added sugar.

5. Brain function/focus

a. Refined sugars can impair brain function

b. Can exacerbate symptoms of depression

c. “Brainberries”!

6. Others?

a. Cance

b. Obesity

c. Better sleep

d. Skin improvement

7. Saving money —

a. Debate on whether eating healthy is less expensive or more expensive

i. Overall research is mixed

ii. Does show that eating things from scratch is healthier/less expensive if you don’t buy special ingredients (i.e. flour, sugar, rice, potatoes, apples, etc.)

iii. Losing weight is the best way to save money on food

1.) We have lost 220 pounds together

2.) 220 pounds is 2200 calories per day

8. Get More Help!

1. Join our holiday weight loss challenge

2. oin my FREE FB group where I record videocast/podcast episodes!

3. Emails with teaching around weight management—articles, videos, free charts and booklets, and more

4. Take my month-long Intermittent Fasting course

5. Schedule a free 30 minute coaching consult!

Think-Feel-Eat Episode #40: Ten Factors for Protocol Choosing

by Donna Reish

Hi! I’m Donna Reish, IF teacher, weight loss coach, blogger, and half of “The Minus 220 Pound Pair” as my husband and I have lost over 220 pounds together (160 of that in the past couple of years through the Weight Loss Lifestyle habits and strategies I teach!). In this episode, I present ten things that we will want to consider in choosing/developing our own food protocol for weight loss/management.

I have uncovered ten important factors that we should consider in creating our food protocol if we want to lose weight/maintain that weight loss.

These factors do NOT include—what worked for my best friend, what made me lose fast before (if it was sooooo good, you would still be on it!), what we see advertised, or what people in a FB group tell us.

The ten factors, which I unpack one factor at a time in today’s broadcast, include:

1. Deficit: You must believe a deficit is needed

2. Sustainability: The protocol must be sustainable (these are top two for sure!!) TFE 16, 17, and 18

3. Food enjoyment: Must contain foods you like

4. 3 F’s: Must contain foods that are 3 F’s at least in part: fluidy, fluffy, fibrous. TFE 29 and 30

5. Volume: Must contain foods that meet your personal volume desire (i.e. liking to be full vs. fullness doesn’t matter to you as much—this is a thing…my husband and I are opposite!)

6. Cravings: Protocol must not induce cravings/preferably will reduce cravings TFE 7, 8, and 9 and TFE 35

7. Complexity: Protocol needs to be at your level of complexity (i.e. brainpower in its approach—some like to think a lot about protocol; others don’t want to think about all the details of foods’ macros, micros, weight, etc.)

8. Cost: Protocol needs to fit your budget (lots of specialty foods vs. not as many specialty foods)

9. Execution: Protocol needs to be at your execution level—how much cooking, dishwashing, food prepping, shopping, etc., on a daily basis do you enjoy?

10. Availability: Protocol should contain foods easily available to you.

Find all of my episodes, outlines, and articles for my two weekly broadcasts:

(1) Weight Loss Lifestyle broadcast (formerly Donna’s Intermittent Fasting Broadcast)

(2) Think-Feel-Eat broadcast

Sign up for my free webinar

Think Feel Eat 40: Ten Factors for Choosing Your Protocol

A. #1: You Must Believe a Deficit Is Needed

1. Creating a deficit

2. If you don’t create a deficit, you will always fall back on the “as long as I eat this way (keto, low fat, vegan, whole 30, etc., etc.), I will be fine.”

a. You won’t lose weight on any type of eating protocol unless it creates a deficit

b. It’s unusual for a strict food protocol alone to create a deficit that leads to weight loss all the way to goal

i. Too hard to stay on

ii. Eventually, the foods on the list or the amounts of those foods no longer create a deficit

iii. People who do not count anything but lose all the way to goal with narrowed foods only are nearly perfect on that food protocol.

3. All weight loss protocols that take people to goal and keep them there create a deficit

a. Current sized body –calories to maintain weight you are at

b. Next sized body—calories to go down by ten more pounds

c. Right sized body—calories needed at your goal weight

B. #2: It Must Be Sustainable

1. Once a deficit is made, the primary thing is sustainability/compliance

2. Six protocols and what they take to maintain them (Pick a Protocol Chart; TFE # 16,#17, and #18)

3. “If you keep falling off of your weight loss wagon, you need a better wagon” (for you!)

4. Compliance is everything!

a. Can you comply with the protocol, food rules, amounts, fasting hours, etc.?

b. Can you do this “forever”?

c. If not, either the protocol is flawed, or you are jumping to too much of a deficit too quickly or your food choices are too strict, etc.

C. Next THREE: Foods

1. #3: Foods You Like

2. #4: 3 F’s—Fluidy, Fluffy, Fibrous (TFE #29 and #30 Over-Hunger and Over-Desire)

3. #5: Volume

D. #6: Cravings Induced or Reduced

1. TFE 7, 8, and 9 Urges

2. #35 Reducing Cravings

E. Next THREE: Complexity, Cost, and Execution

1. #7: Complexity of counting, measuring, etc. (brainpower)

2. #8: Cost

3. #9: Execution—how hard is it to live with in your daily life (food prep, too many dishes, too much time, etc.)

F. Number Ten: Availability

G. Get More Help!

1. Join our holiday weight loss challenge

2. Join my FREE FB group where I record videocast/podcast episodes!

3. Emails with teaching around weight management—articles, videos, free charts and booklets, and more

4. Take my month-long Intermittent Fasting course

5. Schedule a free 30 minute coaching consult!

Think-Feel-Eat Episode #39: How to Fix Your Sleep Problems (II of II)

by Donna Reish

Hi! I’m Donna Reish, IF teacher, weight loss coach, blogger, and half of “The Minus 220 Pound Pair” as my husband and I have lost over 220 pounds together (160 of that in the past couple of years through the Weight Loss Lifestyle habits and strategies I teach!).

In this episode, I present the second part of two on how to fix your sleep problems.

Low sleep (under seven hours) has been found to cause an increase in the hunger hormone ghrelin; a decrease in the satiety hormone leptin; a decrease in fat loss (in part due to raised cortisol levels); a lack of impulse control; and more.

How can we skip something that is so amazingly wonderful (oh I love sleep)?

It oftentimes isn’t for lack of wanting!

Going to sleep is as much a discipline problem as getting up. (And if we fix going to sleep we will often fix the getting up part!)

But there are many factors that come into play that cause us not to be able to sleep.

I tackled many of these last week in TFE #38: lifestyle issues; planning your day around light and darkness; moving more at the right times; and more.

In this week’s episode I finish the fix your sleep advice with some of the following areas:

1) Insomnia causes and solutions
2) Insomnia and fasting
3) Caffeine
4) Blue light
5) Magnesium
6) Hunger

I have worked hard on my sleep—literally creating rules and protocols, developing new tiny habits incrementally, and making sure I get my 7.5 hours almost every night. It has made such a big difference for me!

Find all of my episodes, outlines, and articles for my two weekly broadcasts:

(1) Weight Loss Lifestyle broadcast

(2) Think-Feel-Eat broadcast

Sign up for my free webinar

Think Feel Eat #39 How to Fix Your Sleep Problems (II of II)

A. Review

1. Effects of too little sleep TFE #34

2. Fix Sleep Problems (Part I): TFE #38

3. Stress and Cortisol

a. #36: Stress and Cortisol I

b. #37: Stress and Cortisol II

4. Sleep affects weight loss, hunger, appetite, cravings, satiation, and urges (plus more!)

a. Weight loss hormones ghrelin and leptin—hunger and satiation

b. Decreased fat loss

c. Lack of impulse control

d. Food cue responses

e. Holding on to fat

B. Insomnia General and Fasting

1. General

a. Anything that interferes in circadian rhythms

b. Circadian rhythms control our wake and sleep cycles plus other functions throughout body and brain

c. The “master clock” tells the 37 trillion cells what to do

2. Insomnia and fasting

a. After a couple of days, you should sleep BETTER with fasting

b. When you start burning fat instead of sugar at first, you release a hormone that stimulates wakefulness

c. Insomnia with fasting WILL go away as your circadian rhythms catch up to the new eating times, hunger goes away, your body goes seamlessly into fat burning (rather than that big jump from sugar burning to fat burning each day during the early days of fasting)

d. It will be similar to adapting to a new time zone after flying—but will even out quickly

e. Food affects circadian rhythms’ many clocks—like the sun keeps track of the sleep time, your first bite of food and last bite of food set your new “food” circadian rhythms….so everything might feel out of whack for a couple of days

f. Fasting usually causes more happiness, better mood, and great sleep once you’re into it several days—causing a more pronounced circadian rhythm due to food intake being restricted to certain times of day

g. When your eating is done well before bed, your digestion and food processing is over at bedtime

h. Melatonin is released better when insulin isn’t released—so no food at night causes melatonin to be even stronger; low insulin is linked to higher melatonin and better sleep

C. Causes of Insomnia

1. Caffeine

a. Raises cortisol level–80% of people drink coffee in US

b. Caffeine’s effects on sleep

c. Has half life—at the 4-6 hour mark, you still have half the caffeine in your system

d. Some people seem unaffected but may be affected after all

e. 200-400 mg per day maximum

f. Each medium cup of coffee/most teas have 90-100 mg each

2. Blue light

a. Controls melatonin secretion

b. Artificial blue lights (lightbulbs, computers, devise etc.) all suppress melatonin levels at night when they should be increasing

c. Hungry Brain: “Your body’s 37 trillion cells don’t get the message that it’s nighttime until you turn out the lights—several hours after the sun goes down. This pushes your biological wake-sleep cycle back by a few hours relative to the day-night cycle of the sun, desynchronizing the two.”

d. Thus, time to go to sleep—body isn’t ready; time to get up body isn’t ready.

e. Cortiosol 40% higher in mornings after being exposed to blue light 30 minutes before sleep (even if you slept okay!)

f. Blue light blocking glasses .

3. Magnesium deficiency

a. Leg and foot cramps, muscle cramps, headaches, insomnia, anxiety, and depression or “the blues” are signs of magnesium deficiency

b. Happens during fasting due to mineral imbalances, eating less, etc.

c. Magnesium blocks the release of cortisol in the brain (less stress more sleep!)

d. Magnesium supports the release of melatonin…..more, longer, faster sleep!

e. Get more magnesium!

i. Supplement

ii. Mineral water

iii. Epsom salt baths—do give magnesium but not easily assimilated into the skin layers—might be good for relaxing but don’t count on it to help with a true magnesium deficiency

4. Hunger

a. Especially early into fasting

b. Work on timing your fast to fall asleep before you get hungry at night (I used to end my eating window at 7 or so…now I end it between 8 and 9 so I don’t get hungry from 9 to 11 when I have time to be with my husband/to relax.

c. Satiety vs satisfaction

i. Might need more fat as it will stay in your body longer (satiation)

ii. Might need more carbs for satisfaction or slow carbs for satiation

D. Get More Help!

1. Join our holiday weight loss challenge

2. Join my FREE FB group where I record videocast/podcast episodes!

3. Emails with teaching around weight management—articles, videos, free charts and booklets, and more

4. Take my month-long Intermittent Fasting course

5. Schedule a free 30 minute coaching consult!

Think-Feel-Eat Episode #38: How to Fix Your Sleep Problems (I of II)

by Donna Reish

Hi! I’m Donna Reish, IF teacher, weight loss coach, blogger, and half of “The Minus 220 Pound Pair” as my husband and I have lost over 220 pounds together (160 of that in the past couple of years through the Weight Loss Lifestyle habits and strategies I teach!).

In this episode, I present the part one of two parts about How to Fix Your Sleep Problems.

In episode #34 of Think-Feel-Eat, I described the negative effects on our weight, belly fat, cravings, hunger, energy, and more that come from sleeping under seven hours a night. (Super interesting studies—go check them out!)

In this episode, part one of two parts on How to Fix Your Sleep Problems, I delve into the Daily Choices that we can make in our lives to influence our ability to fall asleep, stay asleep, and sleep well. (Next week I will look more into insomnia as well.)

This week I describe many daily lifestyle activities and choices that can keep us from sleeping well, including:

Seeing sleep as a habit and a discipline that we must work on in order to overcome difficulties
Consistently getting up and going to bed at similar times each day and night
Movement and light first thing in the morning
Morning routines
Nighttime routines
Working with our daily arousal system and our daily sleep system
Melatonin
Working out, exercising, and movement
Napping and daytime lethargy
And much more!

Find all of my episodes, outlines, and articles for my two weekly broadcasts:

(1) Weight Loss Lifestyle broadcast (formerly Donna’s Intermittent Fasting Broadcast)

(2) Think-Feel-Eat broadcast

Sign up for my free webinar!

Think Feel Eat #38: How to Fix Your Sleep Problems (I of II)

A. Review of Sleep Deprivation and Weight Issues—see what happens when we don’t sleep in TFE #34!

1. Sleep deprived means more cortisol

a. TFE Stress and Cortisol episodes: TFE #36 and TFE #37

b. Cortisol is a hormone that rises with stress

c. Cortisol causes many issues, including holding onto fat, increasing hunger, increasing cravings, etc.

d. 1-2 hours a day less sleep results in 24-30% more hunger

e. Another study shows those who regularly sleep fewer than seven hours have 26% more hunger than those who sleep eight hours per night

B. Sleep Is Influenced by Daily Choices

1. “A good tomorrow starts tonight!”

2. Going to sleep is a discipline!

3. Bad sleep habits are just that—habits…and can be undone/new habits learned the same way the current ones have been learned!

4. Getting up consistently early

a. Try moving your rising time incrementally by 15-30 minutes a day

b. Get up and open blinds, turn on overhead lights—tell your body it is daytime!

c. Movement is good first thing

d. Morning routines with times help—don’t sit as this is still a tired position.

e. Brain has huge effect on sleep—arousal system that creates wakefulness/alertness, etc., so work with this arousal system

f. Definite arousal system vs. sleep system—they work opposite of each other; when one is active, the other is shut down

g. Must have a strong signal to kick one out of one state and into another.

5. Sunlight and groundedness

a. Getting outdoors will help you sleep better

b. Sunlight first thing in the morning helps with depression, cortisol, serotonin, etc., but also has an effect on circadian rhythms and how you sleep

c. Sunlight helps melatonin cycle so melatonin is reduced in the morning and starts to be released at bedtime better

6. Melatonin

a. Hormone—not just an herb

b. When we can’t make enough of it ourselves, we can supplement with it

c. Take as little as absolutely needed to get the job done!

d. I use dissolvable ones from Amazon as they’re easy to break in two and start working faster since they dissolve

e. We can help our own melatonin production by letting light in first thing/getting light, waking up earlier, winding down in the evenings, etc.

7. Working out

a. Definitely helps you sleep better in the long run as the brain responds to how long you’ve been up, how active you are, etc., causing the sleep cycle/sleep center to start up.

b. Watch for exercise times

i. Morning exercise is thought to help with appetite during the day and sleep later that night

ii. Exercising too late at night can be a problem

1.) Can increase hormones that can keep you awake

2.) Some need to exercise no sooner than two hours before bed

8. No naps if they interfere in your sleep

a. Lounging too much, not enough movement, and sleeping during the day are some of worst offenders for good sleep at night

b. If naps don’t interfere or you absolutely need one, take a 20-30 minute one and don’t lounge afterwards. Move so body knows it isn’t wind down time!

9. Bedtime routine

a. Too much or too early of resting in the evening without movement makes body think it’s time to rest, but we don’t sleep, so it gets our melatonin production and sleep off

b. Lights

c. Same routine

d. Wind down

C. Get More Help!

1. Join our holiday weight loss challenge

2. Join my FREE FB group where I record videocast/podcast episodes!

3. Emails with teaching around weight management—articles, videos, free charts and booklets, and more

4. Take my month-long Intermittent Fasting course

5. Schedule a free 30 minute coaching consult!