Prairie Purrs- Completely get that word "diet" out of your head! This is not a diet you are going to do but a whole new lifestyle change for a healthier YOU! What you are going to be doing is making better choices... What you will be saying instead of "I am on a diet now"... is "I am making better choices now" This is what one of my guys does since he also said he has failed at many diets over the years.

What I did was tell myself, "I can have THIS or I can have THAT, but I can not have both" and I would pick the healthiest.... OR, if I have been strict to my diet, I could have the not so good choice. I sat my goal of what I HAD to eat that day.. I HAD to eat a 12 ounce bowl of beans and a 12 ounce salad at lunch and supper, I HAD to eat my oatmeal and a banana for breakfast and throughout the day, I HAD to have at least 5 pieces of fruit. During the season of fresh fruit, I would eat sometimes 10 pieces of fruit a day while it was so good. I was always eating, never got hungry either. Once a month I treated myself to eating out and could have what I wanted... ANYTHING I wanted... IF I had remained faithful to my eating right.

Both my guys on the boat have a free day where they can eat anything they want, including desert and what surprises me is they don't eat anything they want all day long but just at one meal! Once they get started and start loosing that weight, they get excited and start setting more rules on themselves.

One thing I showed them both last trip that surprised them was to use Picante' sauce instead of salad dressing. It is chocked full of GOOD stuff and it is SOOOo good... not a bit of fat in it either.

Watch out for food or drinks you eat that make you hungry! I found that when I ate carbs or drank a soda, the next day I couldn't get enough to eat. That guy who failed on so many diets before did good on his diet until he got his sugar free soda's on the boat. The next day he was complaining he had been starving ALL DAY LONG and couldn't figure out why. I sweetly said "you got your soda's yesterday, how many did you drink? Didn't I warn you they would make you hungry?"..

So, keep a log of what you eat and if you had been doing good, then suddenly find yourself unable to control your appetite, go look at what you ate the day before!

I ate fish and boneless, skinless chicken once a week and one of my choices was steak day.. I could have a steak or hamburger... the hamburger won out every time.

I also only ate what I cooked. That way, I knew what was in what I ate and I still pretty much stick to cooking my own meals. Batch cook and freeze in single serving size. I still do that since it saves time and $$$$. I completely avoid processed food but since I am a cook, that is easy for me.