Well, most people would think so...
I was sitting in the café of a well know supermarket chain yesterday, having a cup of black coffee [1 calorie] and a slice of cheesecake [prolly 250 calories], for breakfast. Admittedly it wasn't the healthiest of brekkies, but it was just what I fancied, it was only one slice and not the whole cake, and the option of the full fried breakfast after having Chinese for our anniversary the night before wasn't going to cut it.
So, there I was, sitting happy in the knowledge that I knew that my food wasn't the greatest but hey, I run so I can eat whatever the hell I like, and more importantly, I can choose a healthy option for lunch or tea or the next day.
I just happened to be sitting on the other side of a dividing screen wall (you know the trellis type things they have in these places) with two ladies sitting discussing the calorie content of food whilst tucking into their full English & tea. From what I can gather they were in there to do some shopping for whatever diet plan they were going to be following. It all seemed to be fairly sensible stuff, but they were already looking forward to 'getting back off the plan and into real life'.
Why the hell do you even attempt to do this if you're already thinking about ditching it before you've even started. One would think that there's absolutely no way that this plan could ever have worked out for these people as there was no motivation to stay on it 'afterwards', what they needed was a bit of a sitting down and just explaining that in order to maintain any kind of weight loss you either have to a] stay with the healthy eating forever, or b] pull your thumb out and do some exercise. Preferably a combination of the two.
I was just finishing off my cuppa and preparing to leave when I heard the line that told me they were definitely doomed.
'I've got cucumbers on my list here'
'Oh don't get those, I've heard they're really fattening'
If I hadn't of been with my hubby (and didn't want to embarrass him, them or myself by putting my two peneth in) I'd have put them right. But to be quite honest I think I could have sat there for two days talking to the ladies and still not made any impact.
Health professionals, and TV programs, doctors, reports and the government keep banging on about how much of an obesity epidemic the country is in. They seem to put most of the problem at the feet of fast food chains, takeaways, and the cheap processed food which is available for pennies. It's just not the retailers fault. People have a choice with their food. They can chose to eat healthy on certain days have takeaway on others and lead an active lifestyle. There's excellent seasonal veg, meat and bread available for decent prices, it's just that people really don't know what's good for them, or choose not to learn.
I hope that whoever has set the plan for those two ladies can let them know that there's only 0.1g of fat in a cucumber, and around 8 calories, and that they'd have to eat 67 cucumbers to eat the same number of calories than in a Big Mac, and with any luck get them to realise they actually have to change their eating habits forever and not just while they're losing weight.
I'll think about these ladies when I'm out for curry tonight, and on the track running it all off on Monday.
Happy running folks!
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