When the going gets tough... things are easier

I find myself staring at a loaf of bread. Trying to decide whether to eat it or hurl it across the kitchen. I put it down and back away. I’ve had the exact same emotions looking at a bottle of ketchup, a carton of soup and a packet of smoked salmon earlier in the week. All because I’ve decided to give up processed sugar for February. I’m barely half way through the month and I’m struggling. Do we really need sugar in bread? Or pasta sauce, or yoghurt, or in tins of sweetcorn?

And I’m not alone with my struggle, I managed to convince a group of nine friends to join me, even set up a WhatsApp group for encouragement. We’d all gained a bit of seasonal weight over December and January and this would be our ‘quick fix’ to get back into shape alongside our usual exercise regimes. You see, we’d all realised that ‘New Year, new you’ doesn’t want to kick in for anyone in Dubai until at least February.

With many of us spending Christmas in a cold country, just trying to get through each day without getting chilblains, or staying put in Dubai with the headache of organising an extended family’s lives for a good few weeks, we’re not going to celebrate the arrival of a sunny, family-free January by going on a diet... no, no, no. We’re going to celebrate with brunches and baked goods, the sort of foods we’ve spent the best part of December letting our tastebuds get accustomed to. And only when we’ve exhausted every possible option of French toast in town are we ready to say ‘enough’s enough’ and welcome a positive diet change into our homes.

So, there we were, ready for the ‘no sugar challenge’ on February 1st. By February 4th, the fun, encouraging remarks of the first few days were replaced with ’this is too hard’ type comments. ‘You can do it’ style mantras became murmurs of ‘just do the best you can’. The addition of one cheat food a week did little to raise morale. But weirdly, as the days passed, we realised that the moaning was helping, as most of us were actually sticking to the ‘no-sugar’ diet.

Constantly acknowledging how hard it was and reminding ourselves we’d see results in the end had actually helped make it doable. Which got me wondering… could this be a thing? Could accepting out loud that some things are just hard override the sometimes bullish ‘yes you can,’ voices we’re all used to, and actually help us succeed?

Well, actually yes, there is some truth to this according to a study published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition last month. Psychologists from Drexel University in Philadelphia studied weight-loss subjects over the space of three years, and found that continuously explaining how difficult the process of losing weight is, along with the long-term benefits, actually helped with the weight loss.

So, could this approach help in other aspects of our lives? Could spending ten minutes acknowledging out loud that a work project is going to be really tough make you more likely to do a good job of it? We’re not really encouraged to admit things are difficult or indeed ever told to slow down, especially in a fast-paced place like Dubai, but maybe a more measured and realistic approach to work, exercise, finding love even, might help us succeed?

Also read: How to eat carbs and lose weight

With that in mind, I’ve decided to tell my group that the ‘no sugar challenge’ is being extended to the rest of the year, with the more measured and realistic two cheat foods a week. I’m hoping that the slow and steady approach (no doubt with the cries of it being ‘too difficult’) might mean that this time next year our bodies won’t need such a punishing diet change!

Devinder Bains is a journalist, personal trainer and co-founder of fitsquaddxb.com. Find her on Instagram and Twitter: @devinderbains