So I’m on a diet. The Rainbow Plenty Diet

Wow. That actually sneaked up on me.  But I’m not going to let anyone or anything take my free will away from me. This will be on my terms.

Who woulda thought it? I was going along, happily non-dieting. A little therapy conquers my self-hatred, and then I notice I’m starting to naturally lose a little weight. First comes a cycle or two of rebound binging, then it settles into a level of eating that is almost but not quite enough to steadily and noticeably lose weight.

“Not quite enough” spurred me to experiment with hunger and fullness to see if I could make it more steady without deprivation, because deprivation always results in a binge. Binges for me seem to link onto one another, so a single binge can often start more. The last time the binge chain happened, it was about 3 days of moderate overeating before I got back into sync. I don’t believe any major weight gain occurred, but since I don’t measure, I can’t say with any accuracy.

Now I’m facing my own path. No strict diet, because it causes binges. No beating myself up, because that’s gone. No strict Overcoming Overeating (a no-diet philosophy), because it provides no tools to move from legalizing to natural eating. It’s my own path. Hmmm.  What shall I call it?

Maybe No Deprivation Diet.  No depriving myself, no pure emotional eating, no binging, no strict diet, no absolutes, just living in the rainbow area.

Or maybe the Plenty Diet.  Plenty of food, plenty of tastes, plenty of feelings, plenty or satisfaction, plenty of balance, plenty of love, plenty of pleasure, plenty of achievement, plenty of joyful work.  The rainbow area is colorful and delightful. I prefer to spend as much time as possible there.

Nah, I’ll start with the Rainbow Plenty Diet. Gag if you like at the kitschiness of the name. My daughter would prefer to call it the Evil Font of Horrible Bloody Death Diet, but then she’s borderline Goth anyway. I don’t care if my name makes her barf either.

The only rule is there are no rules. You can even break that one if you want to. I choose today to set some strong preferences that I will treat like rules, unless they violate some of the critical maxims.

Critical Maxims (Things people on the Rainbow Plenty Diet STRONGLY STRONGLY prefer)

• Prevent the BED (Binge Eating Disorder) from retrenching itself
• Giving up is not an option 
• Love yourself

My current strong preferences

• Eat small delicious portions
• Eat so that my body requires the use of some of my fat stores as well as what’s going in my mouth
• Search for an balance between hunger and satisfaction that optimizes weight loss without binging
• Measure a baseline and progress determined by body measurements and the scale
• Exercise a little each day, preferably including some weight training