WEEK 1 = 1+1
•
Don’t cut anything from your normal diet.
We add before we take away.
•
Make sure that at least ONE of your meals or snacks each day is made up of serotonin or dopamine booster foods.
See Part
II to determine whether you are serotonin deficient, dopamine deficient, or both. If you need to replenish both types of brain chemical, alternate, adding a serotonin booster meal or snack one day and a dopamine booster meal or snack the next.
•
Add ONE booster activity each day.
Based on your findings in Part II as to whether you are serotonin deficient, dopamine deficient, or both, booster activities will replenish the neurochemicals you need most. If you need to replenish both serotonin and dopamine, alternate, adding a serotonin booster one day and a dopamine booster the next.
WEEK 2 = 2+2
•
Don’t cut anything from your normal diet.
•
Make sure that at least TWO of your meals or snacks each day are made up of serotonin or dopamine booster foods.
If you need to replenish both types of brain chemical, add one serotonin and one dopamine booster meal or snack each day.
•
Add TWO serotonin or dopamine booster activities each day.
WEEK 3 = 3-3
•
Limit your pitfall foods to no more than THREE servings per day. The rest of all meals and snacks will be made up of booster foods.
Favor boosters tailored to your brain chemistry, but now that your brain chemistry is beginning to be balanced, any booster food will start to be beneficial. A pitfall food serving is around 300 calories at most, so you’re going for a maximum of about 900 calories from pitfall foods.
•
Add THREE serotonin or dopamine booster activities each day.
See Part II to determine whether you are serotonin deficient, dopamine deficient, or both. If you need to replenish both types of brain chemical, alternate between adding two serotonin boosters and one dopamine booster and adding one serotonin booster and two dopamine boosters.
WEEK 4 = 4-2
•
Limit your pitfall foods to no more than TWO servings per day. Everything else you eat should be boosters.
Favor boosters tailored to your brain chemistry, but now that your brain chemistry is beginning to be balanced, any booster food will start to be beneficial. Remember, one serving of a pitfall food is about 300 calories, so you’re looking at a maximum of about 600 calories of pitfall foods.
•
Add FOUR serotonin or dopamine booster activities each day
. See Part II to determine whether you are serotonin deficient, dopamine deficient, or both. If you need to replenish both types of brain chemical, add two boosters of each type every day.
MAINTENANCE = 4-2
•
Limit your pitfall foods to no more than TWO servings per day. The rest of all meals and snacks will be made up of boosters.
Favor boosters tailored to your brain chemistry, but now that your brain chemistry is beginning to be balanced, any booster food will start to be beneficial. Remember, one serving of a pitfall food is about 300 calories, so you’re looking at a maximum of about 600 calories of pitfall foods.
•
Maintain FOUR booster activities each day.
Favor booster activities tailored to your brain chemistry (low serotonin or low dopamine), but now that your brain chemistry is beginning to be balanced, any booster activity will start to be beneficial. Low serotonin types may want to add a few dopamine booster activities, especially when they feel like they need an energizing lift. Low dopamine types may want to add a few serotonin booster activities, especially when they need some peace and calm. Dual-deficiency types can continue to add from both dopamine booster and serotonin booster activities lists.
One of the simplest and clinically most effective ways to lose weight is to keep a food journal. You will be adding accountability to each meal and snack by writing down everything you consume, helping you to become more mindful and less likely to choose impulsively.
The Diet Rehab journal has some other key elements. First, you will be tracking booster activities in addition to your food. You will also be writing about the way your daily efforts to balance your brain chemicals positively affects your mantra and your mood. This improvement in the way you feel is the ultimate reward, and this positive feedback will help you to keep your life going in the upward spiral you’ve created. If you’ve felt that your mood is entirely out of your control, writing about your activities and their results will give you a sense of hope, as most of your mood is actually in your control, based on your daily choices to take care of your health, your body, and your life.
Join Our Online Community!
Knowing you’re not alone and getting support from others can help you keep going and also turn struggles into triumphs. That’s why I created the Diet Rehab Community on my website,
www.drmikedow.com
. Visit the site to post some of your favorite booster food recipes or to read some from other members of our community. Share your experience, hear stories of hope, and get tips from others who know what you’re going through. Visit
www.drmikedow.com
, and get connected!
The Diet Rehab Plan: Frequently Asked Questions
Q. What if I really love pasta?
A.
No problem! Just make it the old-school Italian way, where at least 20 to 30 percent of the pasta dish is actually booster foods like tomatoes, artichokes, garlic, and herbs with a sprinkling of extra-virgin olive oil. Add a salad or a portion of green vegetables that is as big as the pasta dish to really maximize the satiety of the meal. And swap your white-flour pasta for boosting whole-wheat or high-protein pasta. If you’re stuck somewhere eating the pitfall version of this food, just count each serving as one of your pitfall servings for that day.
Q. Which vegetables are pitfalls and which are boosters?
A.
Potatoes give you a quick, addictive rush of serotonin, so they are the only vegetable classified as a pitfall food. All other vegetables—including sweet potatoes—give your brain a healthy, sustainable dose of serotonin, so they are all booster foods. Vegetables also have a high-satiety value, so they’ll help you feel full. Make sure you’re opting for veggies that aren’t fried or cooked in a lot of butter or oil. A deep-fried vegetable counts as a pitfall food.
Q. Which fruits are pitfalls and which are boosters?
A.
Any fruit that has not been tampered with is a booster, except for serotonin-spiking dates, pineapples, or watermelon. All other fruits may be fresh, cut, or frozen. They must not have added sugar, oil, syrup, not juiced, not preserved, not dried, and not canned. I keep frozen organic blueberries and raspberries (with no added sugar) in my freezer at all times, as they are a fantastic addition to oatmeal and my favorite nonfat Greek yogurt. As an added bonus, the skins of apples, pears, plums, and peaches are high in fiber and therefore high on the satiety index.
Q. What if I don’t have time to cook?
A.
I know what you mean—I don’t either! Check out my favorite booster food recipes in Appendix A, where I share a week’s worth of meals that take less than twenty minutes to prepare.
Q. Shouldn’t I be exercising, too?
A.
Our bodies were made to move, and I’d like you to exercise yours. But unless you’re already engaged in a satisfying exercise program, I’m suggesting you start slow, because you are just beginning to heal your brain chemistry—which is why you add only one booster activity in week 1 and then four per day by week 4. You’ll notice that many of the booster activities on pages 208 and 223 are physical, and as you start to feel better, it will become easier and easier to add more forms of booster exercise to your day.
Q. Do I have to give up drinking?
A.
If you have a problem with alcohol, you must first seek the advice of your physician before beginning this program. Diet Rehab is not designed to treat alcoholism. Otherwise, I encourage everyone to limit their daily alcohol intake, to about one serving for non-alcoholic women and two for non-alcoholic men. At these numbers, you are reducing your risk of many major diseases. Anything more than this and you will actually increase your risk of many major diseases, not to mention putting you at risk for alcoholism. Alcohol contains a huge amount of calories (big frozen drinks can sometimes pack about 500), and drinking lowers your inhibitions around food, making you more likely to snack when you’re not hungry. Of course, count all sugary mixers such as tonic water or juice as a serving of pitfall food.
Ever notice how you crave salty, fatty snacks when you have a drink? Alcohol is also a pitfall in that it overstimulates your brain chemistry, leaving you in a slump the next day, leading you to consume more pitfall foods in an attempt to soothe your frazzled nerves and lift yourself out of depression.
In general, I advise my patients not to drink their calories. It’s not satisfying to drink a milk shake and be told you just had a whole day’s intake of fat, or to overdo the wine drinking and realize you just took two steps back on your feeling-good mission.
Q. I’m never going to give up red meat.
A:
And you don’t have to! You can find cuts of beef that are at least 95% lean. You can also always have that burger or hot dog at the baseball game that are more than 5% fat. Just count that small burger or hot dog as one serving of a pitfall food.
Q. I’m on a special diet: diabetic, gluten-free, kosher, for food allergies, vegetarian, vegan . . .
A:
No worries. You may have to choose from a somewhat more restricted list of choices, but you can definitely find booster foods that will fit the limits you’re working within.
Q. What about salad dressings?
A:
I recommend a teaspoon of healthy extra-virgin olive oil (a fantastic booster food) mixed with as much vinegar (I recommend balsamic, white, red, cider, or champagne vinegars) or lemon juice as you like. Remember that most store-bought and restaurant dressings contain huge amounts of sugar and unhealthy fats.
Q. Why don’t I have to think about calories?
A:
Lean proteins, non-starchy vegetables, and whole fruits have fewer calories per ounce than starches or fatty meats. If you focus on consuming lots of boosters, you’ll fill up on healthy food that supports your brain chemistry and satisfies your hunger and you’ll automatically and naturally be consuming fewer calories. The amount of food you will take in will begin to self-regulate once you are feeling better and have let go of your food addictions. Our bodies were meant to be hungry for the amount of calories they need. We just need to start listening to that physical hunger.
Q. What about diet soda and juice?
A:
Vegetable juice is great since it has a fraction of the serotonin-spiking sugar that fruit juice has, so it’s a booster food. Juice—even all-natural fruit juice—has a high concentration of sugar, which floods your brain with serotonin the same way sugar in soda can. As for diet soda, it may not have calories, but it does calibrate your taste buds to a super-sweet level that leads you to shun natural sweetness and causes you to crave sweet, starchy foods. If you need a replacement to wean yourself off diet soda, look for stevia-sweetened sodas. Better yet, choose flavored sparkling waters, flavored teas, or coffee. Count fruit juice, soda, and diet soda as pitfall foods. The only exception to this are stevia-sweetened fruit juices and sodas which count as booster foods.
Q. What about artificial sweeteners?
A:
There are two artificial sweeteners classified as booster foods, and they are xylitol and stevia. Hopefully you will use these only occasionally because you’ll become more tolerant of the natural sweetness of whole foods. If you are a honey, maple syrup, or preserves person, there are some xylitol-based varieties of all three. Let them be a little treat, as too much can also cause digestive problems. If you are a need-five-Splenda-in-my-coffee person, as I used to be, stevia is a great option: it’s not as sweet as other artificial sweeteners, and it will help you to recalibrate your taste buds baby step by baby step. Hopefully you will eventually like your coffee black or with just a splash of skim milk like I do now. And when you are looking for something sweet, you can go right to the grocery store and load up on all your favorite booster fruits.