What Else Is in Store?

Bob Greene's Total Body Makeover
by Bob Greene

(Page 2 of 10)

As part of your preparation for the 12-week program, I'd like you to put your intentions into writing by signing a contract with yourself. If you're familiar with some of my other books or if you've seen my work with people on The Oprah Winfrey Show, you'll know that I often ask people to sign contracts with themselves. Why? For the simple reason that it can really make a difference in the way you approach change. Putting something into writing gives what's being promised greater weight, especially when the person you are making the promise to is you. Signing a contract also creates something tangible that you can drag out and put on the table as a constant reminder that you are committed to making your body over. You probably wouldn't break a contract you had with someone else; my hope is that you'll also be true to the contract you make with yourself.

In January 2003, O, The Oprah Magazine published a contract I designed (similar to the one in this book) that challenged readers to commit themselves to regular exercise, healthful food choices, and nutritional rather than emotional eating. The idea was to take people a step beyond the usual "Yeah, I'm going to do something about my health." Thousands of women (and men) sent in contracts, and while I can't claim to know how it worked for all of them, many followed up with letters telling us that signing the contract had been a turning point in their lives and that they'd gone on to keep the commitment. They proved that making a promise, in writing to yourself, can be a positive catalyst for change.

I also want to talk a bit about emotional eating. In a perfect world, everyone would eat just enough to fuel them through their day and provide them with a nice amount of sensory pleasure. As it is, many people eat for emotional reasons — boredom, stress, anxiety, depression, a void in their lives. If you're one of them, it's important to identify and acknowledge the emotional trigger points that send you running to the refrigerator or the cupboard. This, too, is about telling yourself the truth. What are your real feelings, and why are you trying to mask them with food? In chapter 3, you'll find some tools to help you answer these questions and avoid burying emotional issues under boxes of cookies and cartons of ice cream. For many people, simply eliminating emotional eating can be the difference between weighing 250 pounds and 125 pounds, no dieting involved.

If you do end up going on a diet, it's crucial to pick the right one. I don't believe in one-size-fits-all diets. People are different. Some need a lot of structure; some need a little structure or none at all. But one thing is true for everybody: in order for a diet to work, you have to stay on it, and in order for you to stay on it, it has to realistic and within your capabilities. It has to suit your tastes, your lifestyle, and your resources. Not your sister's, a friend's, or some movie star's, but yours. And since only you can know what type of eating plan will fit you to a T, I want you to be in charge of selecting your own diet — though I've done some legwork to help guide you toward one that will safely allow you to continue your body makeover process.

In chapter 5, "Making the Transition to Real Life," I'll take a look at popular eating plans: What do they really ask of you? What are their advantages and disadvantages? Who will they probably work best for? I also want to give you the option of developing your own plan. If you already know what type of eating plan works for you, and as long as your self-devised diet isn't drastic or unhealthy (an earlier book of mine, The Get With the Program Guide to Good Eating, can help you establish some parameters), go for it. What counts is that it be a plan you can stick with.

Keep in mind that the science of nutrition and weight loss is relatively young. We are always learning new things about the body and how it reacts to food and exercise, so the definitive ultimate diet is probably quite a few years away. That said, there are some fundamental truths about becoming healthier and slimmer. One of them is that not everybody has to follow the same exact diet plan in order to succeed at losing weight. In fact, different people respond differently to different diets, although nobody is exactly sure why. Some people, for instance, feel energetic and full of life while following a low-carbohydrate diet, while others feel as though they can barely muster the energy to get off the couch. Some people feel hungry all the time on a low-fat diet, while others feel perfectly satisfied. Some people drop a ton of weight when given an exact menu for every meal; others, oddly enough, end up gaining.

That said, bear in mind that the formula for weight loss is fairly simple: When the calories coming in (what you eat) are fewer than the calories going out (what you expend through exercise, basic body functions such as your heart beating and eyes blinking, and unstructured activity such as brushing your hair out of your eyes), you will lose weight. No matter what eating plan you end up choosing, that's the bottom line.

Tawni: The Amazing Woman on the Cover of This Book

If you need a muse to get you started on the road to total transformation, I recommend Tawni, the incredible woman I am posing with on the cover of this book. I'll let Tawni tell you her story in her own words, but let me preface it by saying that she is proof of that old saying "Where there's, a will there's a way."

A Lightbulb Goes On
Tawni's Story

Like a lot of people who struggle with their weight, I had been heavy most of my life, having had only a brief period of "normal" weight during high school. But the way I stayed thin back then was hardly normal: my mom sent me to a "fat farm," where I lost a bunch of weight, and then I kept it off by forcing myself to vomit after eating binges. During my senior year I kicked the purging habit, but the binging continued. Eventually I gained 50 pounds.

After high school and throughout my twenties, I turned to food for comfort. I was depressed and lonely, and food soothed me. But it was a vicious cycle. I'd feel depressed, eat, then feel depressed about eating. By the time I moved to San Francisco in 1994, I weighed almost 185 pounds, quite a bit for someone who is only five feet, three inches tall.

To make matters worse, while I was in the process of moving I was carjacked. Everything I owned except for the clothes on my back was taken, and I had to start over from scratch. Add to that the fact that I was in a new city where I knew no one, and the loneliness was nearly intolerable. Again I turned to food for solace. That first year in San Francisco, I gained more than 100 pounds, hitting 295.

Change eventually started to come, but it came slowly. I began to get my bearings. I bought clothes and furniture, and started to rebuild my life.

In 1996, I was on a business trip in Arizona. When I got back to my hotel room and flipped on the TV, The Oprah Winfrey Show was on. It wasn't the first time I'd watched: I'm a huge fan of Oprah's, and I had a habit of taping the show every day. On that particular afternoon, I stayed put and watched the show, which was about the launch of Make the Connection, a book that Oprah and Bob had written together.

I sat in that hotel room and couldn't believe what I was hearing. Oprah gets up at 5 a.m. to exercise? I bought the book and stayed up all night in my hotel room reading it. The book appealed to me because it wasn't a diet, it was a way of life. It was about working from the inside out, and it dawned on me that that was always the way I had known I was going to lose weight.

What happened in that hotel room is that I had an honest conversation with myself. I admitted to myself that if one of the most industrious women in America was making time to exercise, my own excuse was lame. After some soul-searching, I owned up to the idea that I didn't need a magic diet; I needed something that would help me address my emotional eating.

When I got back to San Francisco, I bought a treadmill, put it right in front of the TV in my tiny apartment, and started walking every evening after work while I watched a tape of Oprah's daily show. That was in September. By December I'd lost 20 pounds.

Then, on December 4, I got up early to do my walking routine outside for the very first time. (I'd never stopped thinking about Oprah getting up at five and wondering if I too could become a morning person.) Luck wasn't with me: I was hit by a car and spent the next six months in a wheelchair while going through rehab.

It might have been a serious setback, but this time, unlike after the carjacking incident, I decided to come out better, not bitter. I was feeling good about the 20 pounds I'd lost and didn't want another 100-pound gain. I'd been honest with myself about my past behavior and was successfully using it to predict — and prevent — my future behavior. (Because, for instance, I knew I tended to overeat when stressed, when heading into a stressful situation I'd bring baby carrots or celery to munch on so I wouldn't make a beeline for the vending machines.)

In addition, I had founded a support group for people struggling with their weight, and I was the leader. I needed to set a good example; I didn't want to let the group down. Something else was also different this time around. While in the beginning, losing the weight had taken a lot of willpower, now the things that had allowed me to succeed — lots of exercise and retooling my diet — had become habit. I was in the habit of healthy living.

My group helped me as much as I helped them. Through the power of the group and my conviction that I wouldn't be a victim this time around, I didn't gain an ounce during the six months after the accident. As soon as I got out of the wheelchair, I picked up with my walking right where I'd left off. Three months later, I did my first 5K run.

By 1998, I had lost more than 100 pounds. I weighed 175 and was proud of it. I'd done it slowly and consistently by cleaning up my diet and exercising. Ironically, although I'd gone through years of therapy to combat depression and even tried antidepressants, exercise turned out to be the best drug for me — and all the side effects were positive ones.

This isn't the end of my story. I won my weight loss battle because I made a commitment to myself to not let anything stand in my way — and I held to it. Last year I even renewed my commitment and signed the "Contract with Myself." [The same contract you'll find on page 58.] My goal this time was to lose enough weight to run the Chicago Marathon in October in under five hours. Today, I have 30 marathons under my belt and weigh 140 pounds.

This process took me eight years. I had my setbacks and even some tragedies in between. But it has all been worth it because I have changed not just my body, but almost every aspect of my life. While I've always been an overachiever, before this transformation, my personal life was out of control. I always initiated contact with both men and women friends, and I'd jump through hoops to please them. Underneath there was a lot of envy and resentment in these relationships. Now I have healthier, more balanced relationships. Whereas I used to never take time for myself, now I make it a priority. I'm asked to do fifty million things a day, but now before I say yes I look at how it's going to affect the things that I have to get done for me. I'm no longer last on my list.

Another big change in my life has been a newfound ability to speak my mind. It used to be that if my husband's socks were on the floor, I'd get resentful and go eat a bowl of ice cream. I never made the connection that I was eating because I was upset. Now instead of eating I just say, "Would you pick up your socks?" I stand up for myself and say what I think. If I'm uncomfortable with something, I say so. If someone hurts my feelings, I tell them. I also now use exercise as an outlet for my feelings. I used to be an emotional eater; now I'm an emotional exerciser. I even keep an emergency pair of shoes in my car so that if I get stressed out I can pull over and walk instead of pulling into the closest drive-through. I used to nervously eat, now I nervously walk.

I've learned to set new boundaries and make decisions that aren't always popular. Before I was married, my friends weren't too happy when I told them I couldn't go out to clubs because I had to be asleep by ten so I could get up early and exercise. But that's all part of it. I worked hard for every pound I lost, and I still do. Along the way I discovered tjoy in life is helping others find the same happiness I have. Through two Web sites that I run (www.nomoreexcuses.net and www.connectingconnectors.com), I have become part of a whole new community.

You might say that Tawni is a marathoner in more than one sense of the word. Just as she has run races, taking them step by step and staying the course, so has she improved her life by changing it bit by bit and hanging in there over the long haul. Like marathoning, making your body over is a test of endurance and one that you can succeed in only if you are willing to keep chugging along. The next 12 weeks will be a little bit of a sprint, but they're just part of the training for an ongoing process. When you cross the finish line, you'll be fitter than ever — and ready to stay on the path to a new life.

Copyright © 2005 by Bob Greene Enterprises, Inc.

About the Author

Bob Greene is an exercise physiologist and certified personal trainer specializing in fitness, metabolism, and weight loss. He has been a guest on The Oprah Winfrey Show. He is also a contributing writer and editor for O, The Oprah Magazine, and writes on health and fitness for Oprah.com. Greene is the bestselling author of Get With the Program!, The Get With the Program! Guide to Good Eating, The Get With the Program! Daily Journal, and The Get With the Program! Guide to Fast Food and Family Restaurants.