After reading a NYT blog entry about assessing 2007, I made a list of all the things I’ve accomplished. The things about which I’m most proud are finishing my second novel and entering it into the Romance Writer’s of America Golden Heart Contest, and maintaining my 2006 weight loss.

Let me say up front, I hate dieting, I hate the idea of dieting, and I LOVE food. If I haven’t spent half my day thinking about what I’m going to eat, driving to get food, or eating, then it hasn’t been a good day. Now I realize that’s a problem - my life should have some OTHER focus, but there you are.

After making up my mind and going on the drastic diet last year, 800 low-fat, low-cholesterol, high carbohydrate, high protein diet, I was able to lose a lot of weight quickly. But I was starving all the time. Not necessarily hungry per se, because the sloshing water belly kept me pretty full, but I was CRAVING real food.

2007 was about marrying my love of food, and my desire to remain svelte. The biggest eye opener was reading Nina Planck’s book, Real Food.   It talked about healthy eating, living on the foods that I loved.  No more chicken breasts (I’ve always HATED them) for me.  I switched to raw milk (though California’s trying to take that away), real butter, real cheese, and meat with the skin, and the fat.  Most weeks I eat bacon, eggs, and all of the above.  The best part, I’m not hungry most of the time, which makes me, according to my DH, a much nicer person.  Plus I’m satisfied.

The French do not have a paradox, Americans do.  Despite all their sugar substitutes, low fat cookies, and muffins, and endless vegetable oil, they’re getting fat by ‘eating thin.’  I’ve given up the American diet and it’s the best thing I’ve ever done.