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Made a resolution to drop a few pounds this year? If you followed a popular, highly-marketed diet -- say, one that basically encourages you to buy sugary milk that could be contaminated with diarrhea-causing bacteria -- you've probably given up by now.
But the year isn't over, and you still have a good chance of keeping your resolution, the healthy way. Try one of these eco-friendly lifestyle diets to reach your weight loss goals -- and to fulfill a second resolution to live greener:
For cyclists: The Car-Free Diet. Paula, a.k.a. Righteous Velo-Metal Broad ditched her SUV -- and saw the pounds drop off. She shared her experience in an interview:
When I got my SUV, I started going to the gym, and in that ENTIRE YEAR of driving, I only lost 20 pounds and it was VERY hard (and expensive). I figured getting out there and walking and bicycling is just a more healthier option. Well, right after kicking my ex out and deciding to get a divorce (it took nearly two years to get a divorce), I lost 60 pounds. That was just from taking the bus, walking and riding an old target bike just a couple of miles a day.
Now, to be fair, Paula biked a lot: 15 miles each way to get to and from work. But she also didn't pay or make time for a gym membership! Paula's since moved from the L.A. area to Santa Barbara, Calif., and has a shorter commute -- a hilly 4.5 miles each way -- which she still covers on a bike!
For sleepyheads: The Sleep Diet. Save energy by turning out the lights early, and lose weight effortlessly! Fellow BlogHer Contributing editor Beth Terry, a.k.a. Fake Plastic Fish, recommended this Glamour article, but unfortunately Beth hasn't had success with this diet -- yet: "I've never been able to get enough sleep to test it out." I can't try it out either, because I've pretty much always gotten eight hours of sleep.
For frugal detox seekers: The Unprocessed Diet. When Jessica Kohler, who blogs at I'd Roll Need, left a comment on my blog saying she lost 10 pounds "instantly" after nixing processed foods like Hot Pockets from her diet, I had to find out more. Jessica says she went from 120 to 155 lbs in about a year and a half when she transitioned from "student to sedentary cube monkey." So she and her new boyfriend (now husband) decided to tackle their unhealthy lifestyles together:
We couldn't afford gym memberships at the time, so we started with diet. We stopped buying the "helper meals," totinos, and pizza rolls. We bought lots of fresh greens, lean meat (mostly chicken and fish) and cooked at home. We brought whole wheat sandwiches and yogurt to work for lunch and stopped eating out. The culmination of that coupled with a more active lifestyle (at the time, taking walks) saw an easy 10 lb. weight loss in close to 3 weeks. That may not be "instant" enough for a lot of people, but I quickly learned that weight loss and good health is a lifelong endeavor, and I've learned that it only works long-term when coupled with activity.
Why does cutting out processed foods help you lose weight? Jessica explains -- in a post with a photo-illustrated recipe for making your own healthy pizza at home -- that "when you eat boxed meals, you can eat and eat and eat, and you never really feel that full, or oppositely, you feel sick. That hasn't happened since taking a more natural approach to our meals."
Cutting out processed, packaged foods was not the end-all for Jessica. "There is no magic fix and the weight on the scale can definitely NOT be the only measure of success or you won't succeed long term." Still, cutting out processed foods "was the first step (of many) that changed everything about how I live now," Jessica says. "I read every label. I cook every meal. I work out. I set goals." Jessica's since joined a gym and is back to around 120 pounds, down to a size 2, and training for a 10K!
For the traveler: The Poverty Diet. Vanessa Barrington writes at EcoSalon about how she lost seven pounds during her vacation by living with a family in Guatemala, where she was studying Spanish. The family had enough food -- just not an overabundance, like we
