The New York Times today has a piece which debunks the idea that dropping one cookie a day can lead to meaningful weight loss:

But bodies don’t gain or lose weight indefinitely. Eventually, a cascade of biological changes kicks in to help the body maintain a new weight. As the JAMA article explains, a person who eats an extra cookie a day will gain some weight, but over time, an increasing proportion of the cookie’s calories also goes to taking care of the extra body weight. Eventually, the body adjusts and stops gaining weight, even if the person continues to eat the cookie.

Similar factors come into play when we skip the extra cookie. We may lose a little weight at first, but soon the body adjusts to the new weight and requires fewer calories.

Regrettably, however, the body is more resistant to weight loss than weight gain. Hormones and brain chemicals that regulate your unconscious drive to eat and how your body responds to exercise can make it even more difficult to lose the weight. You may skip the cookie but unknowingly compensate by eating a bagel later on or an extra serving of pasta at dinner.

So, while this is another “obviously” moment for compulsive overeaters, it’s lovely to see this in print.  It’s nice to see in The Paper of Record, an experience many of us have had.  Small changes are lovely, but a psychic change is really what’s required to recover from compulsive eating and maintain a healthy lifestyle.

The start down the road of that psychic change is available at an Overeaters Anonymous meeting near you or as near as your closest phone or computer.