Dieting on Empty: The Problem with Diet Mentality

I recently helped my patient Melinda sift through her New Year’s resolution, coaching her on diet mentality and how to make healthier food choices to quiet her binge eating. She is a voracious dieter, never trusting herself to put together an eating-for life formula to compliment her lifestyle. In short, she had all the makings of another New Year’s resolution diet fiasco—or so I thought.

Melinda didn’t stick with her diets, and after scrutinizing her timeline of expectation—lose two pounds a week on a 1300-a-day calorie diet—I can understand why.

It looked nothing like my own food-for-life formula, which offers a satisfying mix of balanced meals, exercise, meditation and prayer from an assortment of personal experience and quality recommendations from  patients I’ve spent years curating and tweaking for 23 years.

Melinda’s diet left her hungry, weak, and craving sugary and salty foods.

My patient could have groomed her assortment of diet rituals, but why should she? Like many patients, she was open to try a new diet with the promise of quick weight loss, but not especially determined to stay on it, and her initial experience failed to deliver the promised weight loss in a more efficient way.  The time and emotional energy she’d invested in it hadn’t convinced her on the positive results, and she wasn’t motivated on investing more time.

One of the greatest strengths of investing in balanced meals, exercise, meditation, and prayer is its ability to free the binge eater from diet mentality. For some it’s a way of making peace with years of on-and-off dieting and to release weight for once. For others, it’s a new full-proof formula encouraging food as fuel, exercise as energy booster, meditation and prayer to feed the spiritual hunger.

What  jumping off the diet-merry-go-around amounts to—weight loss, self empowerment, spiritual food, peace of mind—depends entirely on what lifestyle balance you prescribe.

Yes, embarking on clean eating and spiritual practice also poses problems for some. Learning to “feel” emotions rather than eat them requires a closer look at daily issues that were numbed by food. Jumping on a balance life  style formula is like winning the lotto—only instead of getting a pile of green cash—the winner pays taxes, learns of “family and friends” she didn’t know she had and the expectancy to clear everyone’s debt. The experience might be a pleasant one, but it takes work.

This initial flood of emotions and the effort required to address it stands between the dieter and the healthy formula it needs to make peace with diet mentality.

The list of successful patients continues to grow.

For dieters to turn over a new relationship with food, emotions, and experience a thriving, successful lifestyle, they must do the legwork. They must begin with a balanced breakfast, lunch, metabolic boost, and dinner; incorporate with daily exercise, meditation and prayer.

But no doubt people will lack the perseverance to trust that their body and emotions will respond. People lose patience when rapid weight loss doesn’t come, instead a slow and steady change of body, mind and spirit evolves over time.

Next New Year there will be no need of a New Year’s resolution promising to eat a meager 1300 calories only to give up due to starvation. Instead, Melinda will ring in the New Year with a svelte body and a clear mind and have no need to make a resolution at all because she adopted a lifelong plan that she can live with one day at a time.

Photo Taken By: Dr. Lisa Ortigara Crego

A Day at the Beach...

A Day at the Beach...


Today was one of those incredible days. I took a long bike ride along the beach in total awe at the magnificent purple and peach hues peeking through the cluster of white clouds as a backdrop to the crisp shades of blue that twinkled off the sea. With each press down on the pedal I gave thanks for all my blessings that continue to flow into my life. I remember a time when cycling was quite difficult for my 234 pound frame to have enough stamina to make it over the bridge without an abrupt stop to walk the incline.

This very shoreline in Hollywood, Florida is no strange place to me. Yvonne, my very best friend, and I were in our mid and early twenties respectively when we managed to scrape together enough money from our income tax return and jumped on a plane from Chicago and headed to what I refer to as paradise. I fell totally in love with Florida years before when I was only twelve and promised to one day return. I did.

Now, I fast forward 31 years on this very beach that brought me joy back then and today (though much has happened) with the birth of new memories, though I cling to what was. At 44 years old Yvonne passed away unexpectedly in her sleep but I hold on to the ten years of reminiscence when we flew back and forth from Chicago until I finally took the plunge and moved here permanently. So our giggles, tears, and serious talks live on in me and the beauty today I am so blessed to embrace is still the same.

Many a bike rides, power walks, and baby carriage strolls I indulged on this very beach. In my twenties with Yvonne I was knee-deep in my food addiction with a preoccupation with food and my body weight. Back then, I thought I didn't have "will" power to maintain any kind of diet to earn a "respectable" body size. Today I know it had nothing to do with diets or will power and everything to do with a chemical imbalance when I ate certain foods. I didn't have a clue that I couldn't tolerate sugar, flour, and wheat. I wish I did.

All I knew in my younger years was that I had uncontrollable cravings and never had enough to eat and lived life in shame. I thought there was something wrong with me because I had no control over my food while Yvonne couldn't care less about when, what, or how we ate as she pranced about with this amazing body tucked in a teeny tiny bikini and I hid behind an oversized t-shirt.

Today, as my strong lean legs gracefully pump the pedals with such ease the warm ocean breeze cools my face. I am alive and free. I'm liberated from the pain that comes from binge eating addictive foods. I am in such a different frame of mind compared to those yesteryears. Daily, I practice active recovery from food addiction.

As long as I eat three balanced meals at the same time each day and a metabolic snack, free of sugar, flour, and wheat I am good. I don't need anything more or less. I operate at an optimal level and all guilt and shame is completely wiped away. My body is a "normal" weight, and on and off diet mentality is no longer the way I live my life. Instead, I adopted a healthy lifestyle where I walk, bike, meditate, play, pray, eat healthy "real" foods, all sprinkled with spiritual balance as my base.

Today was one of those incredible days I wished to bottle forever but thunder in the background shook me from my daze and pushed me to a Lance Armstrong pedal pace to beat the storm. I'm grateful and thankful for a beach day and to you Yvonne for insisting we spend our money and make Florida an annual trip when we were young girls with crazy dreams. Without your nudge I wouldn't live in paradise blessed with a healthy body and a healthy mind where dreams do come true.

Life is good! I am thankful...


Photo by: Dr. Lisa Ortigara Crego

Spiritual Being....

Another day is about to unfold. I always look forward to the treasures of life that await me. This morning I rode my bike along the Hollywood, Florida Inter-Coastal and up the bridge and along the sea side. What a view! As I pedaled with energy and enthusiasm I thought about how I used to feel exhausted and full of dispair. I have come a long way from the overweight girl with body, mind, and spirit deficits to living my best life.

After swinging from one diet to another my food addiction made me so desperate that I fell to my knees in hopelessness, and then I began to carve out a God. God can be a gentle breeze, the sun, or light. What you call this great energy doesn’t matter. You could call it God, Lesley, Sam, or Toto—a name is simply that, a name. God is bigger than what you call Him/It. He is consciousness—a higher self of me. He was in me all along. Sort of like the situation of Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. She had everything she needed within herself, and it only took the wizard to point her in the right direction to learn what she had within all along.

Tap deep into your own desires and you’ll find what it is you’re looking for. God may show up for you while you pray, sleep, dance, swim, or when you’re in a compulsive eat-frenzy and can’t stop. You’ll find Him through your understanding of what He is. People are often confused about the difference between religion and spirituality.

Religion isn't necessarily a context for the spiritual. Religion can be defined as a (mental) belief in and reference to a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe. It’s an institutionalized or even personal system grounded in such (mental) belief and, ideally, worship—which consists of a mental/emotional turning to that supernatural reference point. Religion generally includes a set of credos, values, and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader. It is a cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion and/or mental allegiance.

Religion, hopefully, encompasses an increasing experience of the spiritual reality of one’s relationship with God. Over the years, my own spiritual practice evolved into honest conversations with God, meditations, rides along the ocean, silence, and letting go of my silly mind chatter. From these efforts and spontaneous arisings, I felt an inner transformation and an overall improved sense of well-being emerge. This process of frequently turning to the greater power in all sincerity brought me closer to a spiritual connection I couldn’t find with my religion alone. Thus, I have come to see a difference between religion itself and the spirituality it may or may not foster.

Yes, another day is about to unfold. I always look forward to the treasures of life that await me. This morning I rode my bike along the Hollywood, Florida Inter-Coastal and up the bridge and along the sea side and I saw God's art work splashed in hues of orange, purple, and shades of green behind white puffs of clouds. What a spectacular view! I have grown spiritually, emotionally, and physically from the obese girl I was.

Balance...

A day in the life of Dr. Lisa!

I woke this morning at 7:00 to the sound of birds chirping and the sun blaring in through the cracks of the drapes...and my day began.

After morning stretches, eight minutes of weight lifting, and meditation, I jumped on my bike and pedaled down Hollywood beach taking in all the magnificent morning from the glistening ocean, children playing in the sand, to seagulls flying over head. What a magical sight.

Home one hour later I began my breakfast preparations and made fresh blueberry pancakes topped with Greek yogurt. Does life get any better than this? And while the pancakes cooked and filled the air with the most delicious home baked aroma—taking me back to six years old as I recalled my great grandma Baba, who served the most delicious blueberry pie—I smiled. Of course my pancakes are sugar, flour, and wheat free.

While my pancakes cooked I prepared lunch: 4oz of roasted chicken, 2 cups of fresh steamed whole green beans topped with olive oil, freshly squeezed lemon and a pinch of sea salt and ground pepper. Then, I moved on and made my later afternoon snack of sliced yellow apples and 2 oz strips of sirloin steak—all to tote with me to work.

My day is off to a perfect start...

As I ate my breakfast, I began the rush of answering e-mails, writing something for my blog, a few tweets and a hello on facebook.

Okay, time to jump in the shower, primp, and get dressed—and off to an eight hour work day with eight patients to discuss their eating disorders, depression, and whatever life challenge is offered up at that moment.

Ah…not done yet. Once finished working with patients I hop in the car for a twenty minute drive west to teach psychology with a group of awesome students at DeVry university.

Finally, I find my way back home around 9ish at night and take a short bike ride with my husband to catch up on our day—followed by dinner preparations (Broiled Salmon, Sweet potato, tossed salad with olive oil and vinegar) and then back online for more checking on emails, grading student's work, a tweet or two... and yes, finally bed.

Ah...in the life of Dr. Lisa...ya never know what's going to happen.

How do I keep balance? Well, I retire for bed near midnight and get up at 7:00 a.m. every day whether I am on vacation, home, or at a conference. My body is conditioned to expect seven hours of sleep. My food is natural and free of sugar flour and wheat. I exercise an hour daily and make time to pray, meditate, and sit still. I nurture my loving relationships with my husband, sons, and sweet fur child Sage.

Balance is key. I work hard, play hard, and live life as a prayer.