Testimonials

First of all, congratulations to each of you for meeting your own personal healthy-eating goals. Doesn't success feel great?

I was looking forward to sharing my thoughts with you, because I truly believe that Gail's Weight Loss Centre has been the main, constant, supportive influence in my life that has helped me to maintain a healthy weight and gradually break free from the hold that dieting and bingeing had on my life.

I was lucky as a child. I was always a healthy, natural weight without any conscious effort on my part. I would think of food when I was hungry, or even just for fun... but the majority of the time there were SO many other, more interesting, things to think about and experience. It wasn't until I left home and moved to Saskatoon to attend University that food started to also become love, comfort, recreation and a stress-reliever.

It started when I gained a few pounds on a ski trip because we were eating out at every meal and therefore I was simply taking in more calories than I normally would. I didn't like the puffy feeling, plus my boyfriend at the time made a few comments regarding my tight jeans. So after I returned to University after the ski trip, I was determined to lose the excess weight over the week before I saw him again the next weekend. Since I was (and still am) a little bit of an all or nothing personality and also had very little knowledge at the time about how the body works regarding the effects of crash dieting. I ate very little that week. I was thrilled when I was back to my pre-trip weight by the weekend. "Wow, that was easy" I naively thought. Unfortunately, over the course of the weekend, I also though, "Boy, does Mom's cooking EVER taste good. Am I ever glad I can eat whatever I want now that I am back to my normal weight!"

So began a cycle of filling up on my mother's love and food on the weekends and making the extra weight "go away" during the week while I was back in Saskatoon. Soon, food became the way to celebrate the weekend, a complete assignment, finishing writing an exam.... anything, and everything. It also replaced the love and company of my family, my best friend, and my boyfriend who I left behind every week when I returned to Saskatoon. Within a few months the effects of this erratic eating was not able to be erased within a few days and the extra weight became permanent and climbing. I remember walking in between University classes one day and realizing how important food and my weight had become in my thoughts. I remember thinking, "You know, I am always eating or consciously not eating". Oh, how I wished for the normalcy of my younger years.

I soon sought out some counseling, which was, thankfully, free to students. Through the next couple of years, it varied between anti-depressant medication through a psychiatrist and behaviour-therapy with a psychologist. The anti-depressants worked fora few months, but then the preoccupation with food and my weight started to creep back. In response, the psychiatrist increased my dosage, but I became very ill from the higher doses and was cut back to lower doses. Also, at this time, classes were finished for the year, so my treatment was stopped. The next year I was referred to a psychologist and was progressing very well for a few months. Then I had to move away to complete my internship and the therapist moved to the United States, so again my treatment was stopped.

After I convocated from University, I tried to find help through free group counseling through the health care system and reading a variety of books. The group counseling focused mainly on anorexia and bulimia, which helped in the sense of making me grateful that my behaviour had stopped short of becoming quite that extreme. However, the group support was, therefore, focused on issues that I could not relate to. The books I read all basically pronounced one of the two opposing theories, either "you'll be better if you eat ANYTHING you want" or "you'll be better if you don't EVER eat _______ or _______", which led to more confusion. I later went to a psychologist for ONE session, which cost $100 and was basically told to eat three normal meals and only eat carrots and celery in between meals. Since I no longer knew what a "normal meal" was any more, I quickly calculated that I could not afford the number of sessions that I would need with a one-on-one therapist (at $100 a pop).

I also tried a certain weight-loss centre at the time, but you had to buy their food, which I didn't like the taste of, so you can guess how well that turned out. The one silver lining in that brief experience was that I met a counselor there named Gail, who I sensed truly cared about me and understood what I was going through. A couple of years later I passed Gail on a sidewalk and she recognized me and asked me how I was doing... and more importantly, I could tell that she really wanted to know. She told me that she know I could be happy again, and told me about her own weight loss centre that she had started. Gail said that she was focusing on teaching healthy eating with real food, while addressing the reasons why we reach for food when we are not hungry.

Her caring words gave me hope and I tucked the knowledge away into the back of my mind for the day when I "could afford it". In the mean time I met, married, and had two children with a wonderful loving man who fell in love with the chunkier version of me. Ironically, going through the experience of two pregnancies actually made me a few pounds lighter. I had been making an effort to regularly eat healthy foods (even if I occassionally binged) and to NOT crash diet because I wanted each baby I was carrying to get a healthy start. However, a few months after my second child was born, my weight started creeping up again because my bingeing/dieting cycles became worse. I became concerned that my erratic eating would become obvious to my children, so I decided to give Gail a call, even though I "couldn't afford it."

With the constant support and encouragement of Gail and her staff, I religiously stuck to the program and for the first time in about 15 years I managed to get back to a healthy, slim weight while eating regular, healthy meals. Since this was about 7 years ago, I don't remember if I took out the maintenance program right away or a bit later, but either way, I DO remember that I started slipping back into old habits, trying to "fix" any binges with a few days of eating very little. Over the next few months, I did not turn to Gail for help because, depending on the day, I either thought "I'm fine, I don't need to spend money on that any more" or "I can't go back and face Gail right now. After all her hard work with me I can't show her what a failure I am." Finally on a particularly bad day, I swallowed my pride and went to see Gail and explained everything I had been going through. She admitted that she had been worrying about me during my absence. I took out another very short program to take off the extra weight I had gained and then either finally purchased the maintenance program or just finally stuck to it, I don't quite remember.

For the last seven years I have maintained my healthy weight and kept in constant touch with Gail and Tony, thanks to the maintenance program. Sometimes it's only once a month, sometimes it's once a week, but as long as I maintain my weight I am able to access their support and resources as I need. This open, long-term support has been crucial in my being able to slowly change my relationship with food. My own personal learning curve has been rather up and down, due to my occasional "detours" with new ideas of "ways to eat" that are finally going to make me "not want to binge any more". But Gail and Tony have always been there to smile and nod and wait for me to "learn another lesson" without pressuring me to "stick to the program." They showed me respect by truly listening to my new "theories" I had read about and being open minded to my personal discoveries of "what works for me". This constant support and open acceptance has enabled me to discover so much about myself.

Over the last year, I have focused on striking a comfortable balance with all foods ("good" and "bad") through Gail's food exchange program and on becoming more aware of emotional eating through Gail's publications, CD, and "talks" with Tony. As a result, I have experienced my best, most "normal-feeling" year by far. I highly recommend incorporating ALL types of food (healthy and not so healthy) in moderation into your eating plan, while staying aware of the emotional triggers to eating when you are not hungry. Also I am a big believer in exercise and eating plenty of healthy oils, but that's another story.

In closing, I would just like to say that the keys to putting food back in its rightful place in your life is MODERATION and EMOTIONAL AWARENESS. The only way to reach these elusive goals is through long-term learning (and re-learning), and practicing (and failing) and continually getting back on track with the next meal. This all takes time, because in the middle of all of this self-discovery we are also LIVING.... getting married, raising a family, going to work, changing careers. We are MORE than our food and weight issues and we need to take it at our own pace.

If I had paid a therapist by the hour for the support I have received from Gail and Tony, I would be in debt up to my eyeballs, or more likely, I probably would have stopped a long time ago due to financial constraints. The fundamental difference with Gail's program is that you are basically "paying" with your effort. Once you reach your goal weight and take out the maintenance program they will be there as much as you need them, as long as you do the work, take it seriously and stay within a certain range of your goal weight.

You're not going to immediately permanently change your behaviour and never overeat again, but by keeping your weight in check, you won't ever procrastinate your way back to ahving to battle a 10, 20 or 30 pound weight-gain ALL OVER AGAIN. You have worked hard to be where you are. Protect your success and reward yourself with the life-long support you deserve and that Gail and Tony are offering you.

I am so glad that I did.