It's the Little Things: How to NOT go cold turkey.

Lindsay Chetelat, RD, CDN
Oct 17, 2014
3 min read

Many people are intimidated by the daunting task of making diet changes and achieving weight loss that lasts. All of these people have one thing in common: they are too focused on the end goal rather than the small steps that it takes to get there. As cliché as it may sound, you CANNOT go cold turkey and expect instantaneous results.

Ask yourself...

Would you skip to your senior year in high school without going through ninth, tenth, and eleventh grades?

Would you wake up one day and decide to run a marathon even though you haven’t ran in the past 6 months?

Can you get to the top of the Empire State Building without taking the stairs or the elevator?

Unless you are a teenage prodigy, out of your mind, or Superman, the answers to all of these questions is NO. The same goes for making diet changes and losing weight. You can’t expect to immediately reach your long-term goal without reaching milestones and even facing obstacles along the way.

How do I set a long-term goal?

Use this acronym I learned in college to help you:

Specific

Measureable

Attainable

Realistic

Timely

NOT SO GREAT GOAL: I want to lose three pounds.

GREAT GOAL: I want to lose three pounds in three weeks by limiting calorically dense snack foods and finding healthy alternatives.

Check out 5-Steps to Transform Your Diet under the "Tools" tab to get started on your transformation. Your goal does not have to be weight loss. You could be focused on making healthier food choices when you are stressed, maintaining your weight during the holidays, or consuming three balanced meals per day.

Here's an example

Let’s say your goal is weight loss. Think about the small substitutions and changes you can make daily to achieve this weight loss goal. (Stay tuned for the next blog post on weight loss and the metabolic changes that accompany the weight loss journey.)

I asked someone to write down what they ate for 24 hours. Below, you will find the 24-hour diet recall on the left and healthy diet changes on the right.

Breakfast: Breakfast:

Large bagel Mini-bagel

3 tbsp cream cheese 2 tbsp low-fat cream cheese

1 medium banana 1 medium banana with 1 tbsp

peanut butter

Snack: Lunch:

Hershey Milk Chocolate Miniature Tuna salad sandwich on whole

20 pretzel twists wheat bread made with olive

Caramel apple lollipop oil mayo and light tuna canned

in water

1C steamed vegetables

Dinner: Snack:

1C spaghetti with meat sauce 6 whole wheat crackers

1C apple slices

Beverages: Dinner:

2 cans of Coca Cola 1C whole wheat pasta with

1C coffee with cream and sugar ground turkey meat sauce

1C 2% milk 1C side salad with 2 tbsp olive

oil and red wine vinegar

Dessert:

2 Hershey's Dark Chocolate

Miniatures

Beverages:

1 can of Coca Cola

1C coffee with half and half

and sugar substitute

1C skim milk

Total: 1915 calories Total: 1655 calories

*Everyone has different calorie needs. The purpose of this demonstration is to show the effect of making small diet changes.

Other examples:

Sally, an ice cream fanatic, finds healthy alternatives like Greek yogurt parfaits.

Bob, a stress eater, replaces potato chips with homemade apple chips.

Kate pre-portions crackers in single serving bags, rather than eating from the family size box while watching TV.

As you can see, making small changes and substitutions can go a long way. You don’t have to adopt all of these changes on day 1 or even week 1. Make a reasonable schedule that is attainable, yet challenging at the same time.