Swap Dinner Plate for a Salad Plate

As a fitness instructor, I meet a lot of people who want to lose weight and live a healthy lifestyle.

I watch people work out for weeks, take the weight off and sometimes put the pounds back on.

So when I meet someone who’s managed to lose 50 pounds – and keep it off for a long period time – I have to know how they did it.

For my new friend “Terrie,” it was simply a matter of watching how much she ate.

She decided the only way weight loss would work for her was if she didn’t have to change what she ate – just how much.

That way, she wouldn’t gain weight if she stopped eating a certain brand of diet products.

Terrie began her weight loss quest with the dinner plate. She swapped it for a salad plate. Everything she ate for breakfast, lunch or dinner had to fit on the salad plate. Even her kids knew. When they set the table, they put out regular plates for themselves and a salad plate for their mom.

I know what you’re wondering. Couldn’t she just fill up her salad plate with second or third helpings?

Yes, she could have. But Terrie told me that by the time she finished her salad plate, she wasn’t hungry anymore.

She paid attention to that key physical signal that so many of us have a hard time noticing.

She stopped eating when she was full.

And after a year, she lost 50 pounds and fit in a size 6 pair of pants.

Now, Terrie also has something else working in her favor. She loves to garden and eat natural foods. It’s a healthy eating habit that she’s sharing with her children, too.

Does she sometimes eat pizza?

Yes. But, Terrie says, it has to fit on the salad plate.

Alice Warchol is a freelance health writer and fitness instructor.

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