Good Housekeeping

The following article by Laura Muha entitled, “The Weight-Loss Preacher” was published in Good Housekeeping.  Below are excerpts from that article.

“God made our bodies, and He created a signal within us to tell us when to eat and when to stop,” says Gwen Shamblin.    “All a person has to do is listen to it.”  A registered dietitian, Shamblin…is the founder of The Weigh Down Workshop, a Christian-based weight-loss program that’s offered through more than 13,000 churches nationwide. Instead of preaching calorie-counting, Shamblin teaches program participants to identify God’s special signal…

…“People think broccoli is righteous and fudge brownies are a sin. But God did not put chocolate on earth to torture us. He created it, He threw in the fat, He stirred in the sugar. So I praise Him when I eat it!”…

…A devout Christian since childhood, Shamblin developed her weight-loss theories in college while fighting her own battle of the bulge. She put on 15 pounds and couldn’t lose them, no matter how many diets she tried. “I looked like I had three tires around the middle,” she recalls.  “ I had to safety-pin my pants together.”…

…Finally, desperate to figure out what she was doing wrong, she asked a skinny girlfriend if she could spend a day with her and watch what she ate. First stop was a local McDonald’s, where the friend ordered a Quarter Pounder and ate half of it. “What’s the matter-don’t you feel well?” Shamblin asked her.  “I’m fine,” said the friend. “I just feel full.”  At that moment, Shamblin says, it was as if a light went on: “Hunger and fullness were the key.” As soon as Shamblin understood that, the pounds came off. Wanting to spread news of her success, she eventually opened her own counseling office, and, in 1992, started conducting her workshop in churches. In recent years, an estimated several hundred thousand people have…gone through the three-month program, which includes audiotapes and weekly discussion groups.  That so many participants not only take the weight off but keep it off doesn’t surprise Shamblin. “What God does, He does permanently,” she says. “Isn’t that neat?”