Many people are like the cat in this picture in that they become fearful and depressed when they are faced with small portions of food.

Dieting is "a regimen of eating and drinking sparingly so as to reduce one's weight". It is the process of eating fewer calories than we use as energy in the hope that our bodies will consume themselves and become smaller.

Our Culture generally finds Dieting to be positive and acceptable behavior.  It pours billions of dollars each year into the Dieting Industry, but strangely enough, everything is focused on MORE. Buy more. Get different and additional food, supplements, books, slimming club or gym memberships, personal trainers, equipment, therapy, medical treatment, etc.

MORE is the successful marketing message, but the secret of successful dieting is LESS. The truth is we have to eat less. To lose a lot of weight, we have to take in a lot less food than our bodies use up.

Our MORE culture says … eat less, but just a little bit less… and be sure to eat MORE of this, and do MORE exercise, and buy MORE of this or that.  Drag it out, take it slow.  Make sure it is a "HEALTHY" diet. Do what we say, we'll tell you just what to eat. You need to buy THIS and THIS... you need MORE. If you just eat less, it won't be enough AND it will be the wrong thing. "It's not safe; you'll starve; you'll throw your body out of balance; you'll lose your health; you'll lose your muscle; you'll get an eating disorder; you'll become anorexic; you'll die."

Starving to death takes a very long time for people who start out with a BMI of anywhere from ranges in the middle-of-normal, overweight, obese, severely obese, morbidly obese, or super-obese. Also, people simply don't develop a mental disorder known as "Anorexia" by going without food. The world is full of mirrors, everyone wears clothing, and almost everyone lives among other people. It would be very difficult for a normally functioning human being to be unaware of the fact that they have become underweight. If it happened, there is a quick and easy remedy.
Begin eating more. 
If there is food available, people who are not mentally ill, can easily start doing that.

The problem with dieting, and eating less, is that we like food, we like eating, and society tells us to do it…. together with those extra messages of: "don't get fat" and "you must eat THIS way".

My own small, inactive, elderly body doesn't require much food to maintain a BMI near the border of "normal" and "overweight".  It requires even LESS food to drop my weight anywhere below that number. So if I choose to work at accomplishing such a task, I have to eat very tiny amounts of food.

This section entitled "Delicate, Dainty Meals for an Exquisite, Elderly Lady" is designed to demonstrate what tiny meals look  like. For more information about that concept read more of the posts within this Blog Category.

 I have recently begun an experiment with my own version of a modified 5-Bite Diet. I've found the unmodified 5-Bite Diet to be a bit too restrictive for my personal situation.

My own concept is to eat 3 tiny meals, each of these meals consisting of approximately the same small total volume. The amount of this total volume is approximately 5 normal bites, or between ¼ to ⅓ cup. These meals can consist of any food substance that appeals to me, but whether it is candy or cucumber, the volume remains the same.

Within this plan, outside of these 3 daily meals,  I drink only non-caloric beverages, such as water, black tea, up to 16 oz of crystal light, up to 2 diet cokes. I also allow myself up to 6 oz of tomato juice and 2 cups of clear bouillon for additional sodium and potassium. Artificial sweeteners are acceptable, and I allow myself up to 2 small containers of sugar-free jello, and up to 2 sticks of sugar-free gum per day if I wish.

I haven't yet decided how long this experiment will run, and while I will be sharing some of the dieting BEHAVIOR, I will not be sharing the dieting RESULTS here at DietHobby - including any weight-loss, or weight-gain - while the experiment is taking place.

Here are some specifics about a few of my tiny meals.

BREAKFAST TWO
Estimated calories 144

Contents and Calories
⅓ cooked original pork sausage patty - Jimmy Dean - 45
3 mini pancakes - frozen - Krusteaz - 55
1 tsp butter - 34
2 Tb Mrs. Butterworths sugar-free maple syrup - 10
…….Total = 144 calories

LUNCH ONE
Estimated calories 144

Contents and Calories
½ slice wheat bread - 45
2 thin sliced deli select roast beef - 30
1 tsp light mayo - 12
1/6 avocado - 40
1 Tb alfalfa sprouts - 1
1/10 oz plain potato chips - 16
…….Total = 144 calories

LUNCH TWO
Estimated calories 89

Contents and Calories
1 Teriyaki Chicken Wing - 48
1 bite Blackberry cobbler - 41
…....Total = 89

Dreams can be fragile. They begin in the heart and mind. Those who achieve great things start with a dream.

Whatever it is, it's YOUR dream, and bringing it to life depends on the specific realities of YOUR situation; PLUS what YOU think; what YOU feel; and what YOU do.

Yesterday I answered a question from a member of a forum that I frequent.  I'm doing that again today. 

         Forum Member Asked:  

"What percentage would you say .. of those with above-normal BMI's are seriously obese? I'm pretty sure the morbidly obese comprise under 10%, but would you include others in the seriously obese category?"

 I found this an interesting question.  I thought about it; did some research; made some rough calculations; and came up with the following answer. 

There are "official" stages of obesity, using the BMI. 

Stage 1 is 30 - 34.9 BMI -- obesity

Stage 2 is 35  - 39.9 BMI -- severe obesity

Stage 3 is 40 - 49.0 BMI - morbid obesity

Stage 4 is 50 and up BMI - super obesity

Personally, I would include most of the Stage 2, severe obesity people into what I term the "seriously obese category", depending on the number of years they've spent above Stage 1.

About Percentages … roughly based on a 2010 survey of the US population,

73% of the US population is overweight or obese. 

The Percentage breakdown for women over the age of 20 is: 
 

64% of women over 20 - either overweight or obese 

36% of these women - are obese. 

The Percentage breakdown for Obese women over the age of 20 is: 

36% Obese. with …  

Stage 1 --Obese = 17%

Stage 2 -- Severely Obese = 11%

Stage 3 -- Morbidly & Super Obese  = 8%

However, note that these are the percentages of the overweight and the obese women within the general population.

When considering only the Diet Community population,  the Overweight and Obese breakdown is approximately 100% of the diet community population, rather than the 64% that is within the general population.

Of that 100%, there is no way to actually KNOW the breakdown between overweight and obese.. but common sense and my observational skills tell me that most women who join dieting communities are commonly near or above the obesity borderline, so the percentage of those obese dieters joining diet communities is higher than the 56%  which would be allotted through changing the 64% to a 100% breakdown. 

Assigning percentages of those obese dieters to stages 1, 2, 3, and 4 would merely be further guesswork.  However, if we based percentages proportionally.. which, of course, would be inaccurate…. Approximately….

47% of these obese people would be stage 1 - obese,

30% of these obese people would be stage 2 - severely obese

22% of these obese people would be stage 3 or 4 - morbidly or super obese

Dragging this out to absurdity…

the percentage of the dieting community which is obese .. rather than overweight.. could be at least  two-thirds (63%) or higher..more than one-half (52%) of that two-thirds would be severely or morbidly obese. ..meaning about 33% of 100% would fall into the category of severely obese or above. 

The absurdly-inaccurate general calculations above support my own personal estimate which is that probably about one-third or higher of the diet community population consists of women who I would term as "seriously" obese.  

 Twenty-two years ago, my own highest BMI was 52.9 which placed me into the Stage 4 category - super obese.  However, my lifetime of continual dieting allowed me to spend the majority of my years between the ages 20 and 50 with a BMI from 35 to 39 -- within Stage 2, the severely obese range. It has only been within the past 9 years that I have been in the "normal" BMI range.