A Better Tomorrow

The following article written by Paula Spencer was published in A Better Tomorrow magazine.  Below are excerpts from that article.

… Jamie Branch never thought of herself as fat.  But after each of her three children were born a few extra pounds clung to her figure. Like many women, by her late 30s she mysteriously began to retain an additional pound or so year. As she faced her 60th birthday, she was carrying around 20 pounds more than she wanted…

…. Through a new Christ-centered weight-reduction program…, she has not only lost the weight; she doesn’t worry about backsliding. And she’s done it without a prescribed diet or exercise plan.

Sounds like a miracle?  Only the miracle of faith, says Gwen Shamblin, M.S., R.D., who founded and directs the Weigh Down workshop Church Ministries that Branch and thousands of others have participated in since 1991. “We teach you to replace your relationship with food with a relationship with Christ,”…

..Jamie Branch first heard about the workshop when a friend told her that her church was starting a new weight-loss program.  Why didn’t she come along? “We went to an orientation and I signed up on the spot,” she says.  She liked that idea that studying scripture was part of the program and figured she had nothing to lose… To her surprise there were no diets explained, no list of “forbidden” foods handed out, no weekly weigh-ins.   Weigh Down’s focus was not on food or even weight, she learned, but on an individual’s submission to God’s will…

…“Head hunger” – the urge to eat when the body is not calling for it – is not true physiological hunger, but rather spiritual hunger. Traditional diets preoccupy a person with food – what to eat and what not to eat – rather than on the root causes of why we eat. It’s possible to lose weight without following dietary rules (such as eating low-fat high-fiber or low-calorie “diet” foods) because the food content isn’t what needs to change, you are…

…“We focus on spiritually clogged arteries,” says Shamblin who developed the Weigh Down concept while working on her master’s degree in foods and nutrition.  She’d become convinced that genetics, metabolism, and behavior modification alone could not explain why some people were thin and others battled the Bulge. One day while leading a weight-control class in her Memphis counseling center, she pulled out her Bible and told the class, “If you’re not really hungry, don’t eat.  Do something else.  Go to God and let him fill you up.”…
….Though Branch only wanted help with moderate midlife weight control, many men and women in the Weigh Down course have lost 50 to 100 pounds or more.  But ironically their weight-loss success doesn’t depend on self-denial.

“Chocolate is one of my favorite things,” says Branch and her soft drawl.  “I love snickers.”  And she still eats them whenever she gets the urge.  “But Weigh Down teaches you to eat only when you’re hungry and only what you really want, and then to stop when you’re full.
“I used to think I had to eat three meals a day, but that may not be what my body truly needs.  It’s very liberating.”  She doesn’t worry about nutrition because she found that after the initial adjustments, her body began craving foods that were good for her – not unlike the eating patterns of young toddlers, who tend to eat only when they’re hungry, and who naturally self-select the foods their bodies need…

…“The trick is to not be enslaved by food.  If we behold and adore food, we will become like a refrigerator.  If we behold and adore Christ, we will become like Christ.”…

…Some Weigh Down participants report curbing harshness toward children or friends; others are able to overcome overindulgence with compulsive behaviors such as alcohol or smoking.  Branch discovered that she uses her time more wisely now and it’s more careful in her financial practices, thinking twice before getting carried away on spending sprees just to make herself feel good.

“You’d think someone as old as me would have learned these things back when I was 30,” she says with a laugh.  It’s maybe harder now, because so many bad habits have been grooved in.  But it’s never too late.”…

…For more information about the Weigh Down Workshop ministry program call 800-844-5208…