Making Your Friends Fit Your Diet

I had a few people come up to me who read my previous article about how the studies showed that having overweight friends could make you gain weight (Do Fat Friends Make You Fat). Yes I knew that article was going to be controversial but I just put it out there anyway. Just read another article today about how eating out with friends causes you to gain weight -- whether or not they are overweight. I have written about this previously -- Weapons of Mass Creation.

On average, if you dine with one other person you will eat about 35 percent more than if you were alone. (Spouses don't have this effect because couples tend to get into a regular eating pattern and consume about the same amount.)

If you eat with a party of seven or more, you will gobble up 96 percent more, or nearly twice as much. Sound like Thanksgiving? And if you get a table for four, you will end up right in the middle, eating about 75 percent more calories than if you dined alone. (MSNBC:Make Your Friends Fit Your Diet -- Not Blow It.)

What's the solution?

Decide how much you're going to eat before the meal instead of during it. Some other suggestions:

1. Try to be the last person to start eating.
2. Pace yourself with the slowest eater at the table
3. Avoid the “just one more helping” request (and temptation) by always leaving some food on your plate, as if you are still eating.
4. Preregulate consumption by deciding how much to eat prior to the meal instead of during the meal.
   

Links For the Day:
360TotalFitness: Weapons of Mass Creation.
MSNBC: Make Your Friends Fit Your Diet -- Not Blow It.