Dieting "facts" I've had to unlearn

Last night I was reflecting with my wife on all of the nutrition and dieting "facts" that I have had to unlearn in the last two years while I have dived head first into this area. Basically everything but "green vegetables are good for you." Let's see what I can come up with:

1. Losing weight is as simple as "calories in - calories out".
2. Exercise is a necessary key component of weight loss.
3. Red meat is bad for you.
4. Saturated fat is bad for you.
5. Eating fat worsens all of the cholesterol measurements.
6. High cholesterol is a necessary precursor, and perfect indicator, for a future heart attack.
7. Low cholesterol is a nearly fool-proof protection against a future heart attack.
8. Canola oil is good for you.
9. Lard and butter are bad for you.
10. Margarine is a great substitute for butter.
11. Lots of fruit is good for you.
12. Fruit juice is good for you.
13. You need to worry about getting enough Vitamin C through fruits.
14. The RDA for Vitamin D is enough for those of us living in Michigan.
15. Fat is something that needs to be limited.
16. Protein is something that needs to be limited.
17. You need a majority of your calories to be carbohydrates.
18. Whole wheat grains (in bread and pasta) are good for you.
19. We need lots of fiber in our diet.
20. Drink lots of water on a regular schedule, even if you're not thirsty.

This is a truly amazing list. (I'm sure there are more but this is what I could come up with off the top of my head.) No wonder I get bitter when I reflect back on all of this. I was a "smart, health-conscious consumer" who paid close attention to nutrition and diet news and look what I learned: I learned how to kill myself with my daily food choices.

Persistence and consistently good decisions

A really nice article was posted today at Mark's Daily Apple entitled You're not going to change overnight. This article hit home with me because it squares so well with my situation a couple of years ago. I lost 35 lbs of fat in 5 months or so. How did I do this? Some magical diet? Some new exercise gizmo? No, and no. I did it by eating right (low carb, high fat and moderate protein), eating moderate portions (somewhere around 2000 calories daily), and weight lifting 4 days/week. And I did this consistently for 5 months. No slip-ups, just dedication to the cause.

Yes, I eat more than that now. A lot more. But I still lift 3-4 days/week (depending on my current program) and exercise another 1-3 days/week. I never looked for a short-cut when I was trying to lose fat. I knew it was going to be a long, hard process. I had taken years to put on the weight, why would I think that taking it off would be a quick affair? Every day I woke up and tried to make it through that day by making good decisions. I didn't worry about the previous day or the next day. I just focused on decisions I would make that day, and tried to focus on making that day the most effective it could be.

It wasn't easy, but it wasn't hard either. It just took a bit of persistence and consistently good decisions. And it paid off in the end.