Book Review: The Diet Trap Solution

With so many diets on the market, why do so many still struggle with weight loss?

The culprit could be hidden saboteurs lurking where you least suspect them, warn University of Pennsylvania Clinical Associate Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry and Beck Institute for Cognitive Behavior Therapy President Dr. Judith S. Beck (media appearances include THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, HEALTH, COSMOPOLITAN, and more) and Beck Institute Diet Program Coordinator Deborah Beck Busis, co-authors of the forthcoming  DIET TRAP SOLUTION: Train Your Brain to Lose Weight and Keep It Off For Good (HarperOne; May 2015). 

  

Dr. Beck and Busis are available to discuss the top diet traps people fall for – and how to beat them – including:

Internal Traps: How We Trap Ourselves

Stress Traps

1.     The Too Busy Trap – Your life feels too packed and stressful to make time for healthy eating

2.     The Unreasonable Rules Trap – You create overly restrictive rules for yourself that lead to stress

3.     The De-Stress with Food Trap – You eat to relax after a stressful day

4.     The When Things Calm Down Trap – You think it will be too difficult to work on healthy eating during a stressful time

Emotional Eating Traps

1.     The Trying to Numb Pain Trap – You believe it’s not okay to feel negative emotions

2.     The No Alternatives Trap – You believe that if you’re upset, the only thing you can do is eat

3.     The Entitlement Eating Trap – You believe you deserve to comfort yourself with food

4.     The Killing Time Trap – You turn to food when you’re bored, tired, or procrastinating

Interpersonal Traps: How Others Trap Us

Food Pushers Traps

1.     The Chronic Hard Sell Trap – People keep pushing you to eat even when you say no

2.     The Passive Pushee Trap – You wait for the pusher to stop pushing rather than just refusing

3.     The Buzz Kill Trap – You feel responsible for making other people feel better about what they’re eating and drinking

4.     The People Pleaser Trap – You’re concerned you’ll disappoint food pushers by turning down their food

5.     The Illegitimate to Say No Trap – You feel it’s not legitimate to say no to food pushers

6.     The Willing Accomplice Trap – You don’t put up much of a fight because, truthfully, you want to eat!

Family Trap

1.     The Criticizer Trap – You have unsupportive family members who make negative comments

2.     The Rebel Trap – You revert to old behaviors when interacting with your family

3.     The Can’t Deprive the Family Trap – You keep tempting foods at home because you don’t want your family to “suffer”

4.     The Me-First Mule Trap – Stubborn or controlling family members don’t want to make changes

5.     The Me-Last Martyr Trap – You feel unentitled to ask family members to make changes

External Traps: How Special Circumstances Trap You

Travel and Eating Out Traps

1.     The 24/7 Treat Trap – You think every meal out should be “special” – even when you eat out all the time

2.     The Clean-up Crew – You eat food from other people’s plates.

3.     Limited Food Options Trap – You don’t have control over your food while on a trip

4.     The Vegas Mind-Set Trap – What I eat on vacation stays on vacation

5.     The Unreasonably Strict Eating Plan Trap – You make eating plans that are too difficult to follow

Holiday Traps

1.     The YOLO (You only live once) trap – You use holidays as an excuse to eat whatever you want

2.     The Wall-to-Wall Treats Trap – You can’t avoid holiday foods in the office kitchen

3.     The Fit-In Foodie Trap – You tell yourself it’s okay to indulge because everyone else is doing it

4.     The Before the Big Day Trap – you get loose with your eating even before the holiday starts

5.     The Perfectionista Trap – You spend too much time and energy making everything “just so”

6.     The Big Day – You overeat on the holiday itself

7.     The Post-Holiday Trap – you have trouble staying on track when the holiday is over

Universal Traps: How We All Get Trapped

Psychological Traps

1.     The Discouragement Trap – You want to give up when dieting becomes difficult

2.     The Deprivation Trap – You feel resentful for having to restrict what you eat

3.     The No Willpower Trap – You believe you can’t resist overeating

4.     The Feeling Overburdened Trap – You get tired of focusing on and putting effort into weight loss

5.     The I Don’t Care Trap – Momentary feelings of apathy sap your motivation

Getting Off Track Traps

1.     The I’ve Blown It! Trap – You tell yourself you will get back on track tomorrow.

2.     The Self-Criticizer Trap – You beat yourself up about making a mistake

3.     The Overcompensating Trap – You make a mistake and decide you won’t eat anything else for the rest of the day

4.     The Stuck Off-Track Trap – You have a tough time restarting your diet after you’ve gotten off track

5.     The All-or-Nothing Thinking Trap – Once you eat something “bad” you tell yourself you’re “totally off track” and give up entirely

My Thoughts

I really enjoyed this book. It was packed full of information and after reading this, I have been able to change my way of thinking. This book isn't just another book to tell you how to diet, instead it goes into situations that we face everyday and shows us how to deal with it. Anyone who has every needed to lose weight or tried, is going to relate. The author does a wonderful job writing this book. It's easy to follow and not full of terms that I have to later look up.

Once I started this book, I was able to read through it fairly quickly. It has definitely changed my way of thinking and I even used some of the things I learned this past weekend when in a social situation.

I think anyone who has dieted and will continue to diet in their life should pick this book up. There are a lot of tools in this book for you success and to keep you on the right path so you don't become and on again, off again dieter.