Know Your Defenses for Weight-Loss Success
Kenneth Schwarz, Ph.D.
Julie Schwarz
We all use defenses in our lives. Sometimes they work well and do a lot of good for us. Sometimes our defenses are self-defeating and seriously get in our way.
The first step in changing defenses that are self-defeating is to become aware of them. You need to find out how they work, when they work, how frequently they work. See if you use any of these common defenses. If you do, you’re not alone. Many women use defenses like these so they don’t have to admit to themselves that they have a weight problem.
Denying
You simply ignore, push away or shut yourself off from your feelings about being overweight. You may eat in a way that makes you very uncomfortable, but you stay as unaware of this as possible. You may also make a constant effort not to look at yourself in the mirror so you don’t have to see your weight problem in the flesh.
Countering this defense: Set aside some quiet time to consider your eating and weight problems and what effect they really have on your life.
Rationalizing
You might tell yourself you have to eat this way to keep up your strength. Or, you might tell yourself you can’t possibly diet because you’re always making food for the family. You may feel you deserve extra food because of all the work you do. You may tell yourself you don’t have the time it takes to plan a diet and make special food.
Countering this defense: Try to catch yourself explaining your behavior to yourself in ways like this. If you can stop explaining away your behavior, you give yourself a chance to alter it.
Intellectualizing
You read a lot of literature on how women starve themselves to be thin. You can give a whole treatise on why this is no good. You proclaim that you won’t fit into other people’s ideas of what a woman should look like. You are your own woman and you won’t bend to other people’s standards. You read everything you can about how women and dieting don’t mix.
Countering this defense: Make a good case for why it’s really no good for you to be overweight.
Minimizing
You think about how it’s not a really big problem at all. People have much worse problems, don’t they? Overeating is nothing like drinking or taking drugs or gambling. It’s just a question of losing a few pounds, which you can take off any time you set your mind to it.
Countering this defense: Again, set aside some important thinking time. Consider how big the problems of your eating and your weight are for you, and how much they interfere with your happiness and your comfort level.
Blaming yourself
You turn around and blame yourself consistently. You feel it’s hopeless to try and lose weight because you’ll only fail once again. You know you have a weight problem, but you convince yourself your incapable of fixing it. This is another protection against changing.
Countering this defense: Think about the circumstances that might contribute to your periods of overeating. Don’t think that these instances are due to a flaw in yourself. Then you can try to change those circumstances and make them more conducive to eating in a way that’s good for you.
Blaming others
You have difficulty facing any shortcomings in yourself regarding your weight problem, so you displace the blame by putting it onto others. You get angry with your significant other, sure he or she makes you eat too much. You may blame the demands life places on you, which are too much and won’t let you cope any other way. Maybe you blame your kids for bringing sweets into the house.
Countering this defense: Try to determine what part others really do play in your weight problem, what part you play, and what part circumstances play. Then go to work on a plan to change the appropriate things.
You probably don’t use only one of these defenses. As you become more aware of the ones you do use, you will most likely see a consistent pattern. This realization is in itself a powerful tool for change. You are not just a victim of your defenses. You can think about them, consider whether they are working against what you want for yourself in terms of your eating and your weight. You can start with this kind of new awareness about your defenses and build from there. Thinking about the things you do that prevent you from losing weight is a positive step toward eliminating them.
© Maria's Last Diet. Maria’s Last Diet is an online weight loss support website for women. At Maria’s Last Diet, you’ll find the tools to fix the thoughts, feelings, and automatic habits that fight against you when you diet. Because it’s never just about the food. Visit www.mariaslastdiet.com for more diet tips and weight loss motivation.
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