Customer Reviews

BodyFueling: Stop Watching Your Weight, Start Fueling Your Life

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I highly recommend this book. I picked it up during a period when I was having a lot of headaches, fatigue and dizzyness. I suspected it was connected to my diet because the symptoms seemed to get worse after I ate. This book offers great information as to how your body actually metablolizes carbohydrate, protein and fat-in layman's terms-and it's fascinating. The author makes a very convincing case for the importance of eating frequently and plentifully (and how/why NOT eating will make you fat). While I don't subscribe to the bread and pasta she advocates, the book helped me understand how my body worked and the source of my problem-too much high glucose food. Like just about everyone else in this country, I thought bagels, pasta, fruit juice, etc. make a healthy diet. Once I changed my eating habits, using the information from this book, my symptoms diasappeared. Also, while I was never overweight, I lost ten pounds and virtually ALL the cellulite I'd had on my body. I wish I'd read this book as a teenager-and would recommend it to any parent with a teenage daughter who has issues with weight control/diet. Another excellent book about nutrition is Bob Arnot's Revolutionary Weight Control Program.

I'm a pasta and bread sorta person. While listening to my friends complain about headaches and always being hungry while they went the avoid carbs and heavy-on-the-protein diet route, I followed Ms. Landis advice. One year of lots of pasta and bread and munching on carbs whenever I felt hungry, I feel great and look great too! What more could you want? Okay, so I lost a lot of weight, too, without the hunger or the headaches! I'm 32 pounds lighter and gone from size 18 to 14. Next year, maybe size 12, hm?

I also recommend: Eat More, Weigh Less by Dr. Dean Ornish

After reading book after book looking for the magic "plan" I finally came across Body Fueling. I wish I had read this book 30 years ago before I started the diet roller coaster, I would be way ahead of the game...plus I would have established a happier and healthier relationship with food. Robyn has a great way of explaining food and fueling for life. Her emphasis on setting a vision or goal more encompassing than "losing 20 pounds" or "wearing a size 8" creates a psychological foundation for long term success. Best of all her approach is so freeing. Two months into applying her principles has made a wonderful difference in my life...this is really a sustainable solution for long term results.

This book should be read by anyone who has been on a diet or watches their eating habits. The author clearly describes what food and excercise does to our bodies (good and bad). It is amazing how much we understand how our cars or computers work, but not our own bodies. Amazing!! A Must Read!!

The author is passionate about her subject, and her premise -- that dieting actually causes the body to store fat in an evolutionary response to famine -- has merit. Her observations of 'disordered eating' in our culture certainly ring true -- how many of us know people who regularly skip meals and then can't understand why they collapse with fatigue? The idea of "bodyfueling" brings a realistic slant to this issue: what is food at its most elemental but a means of providing energy to the body? However, the author's decision to omit any references for the facts she cites is a serious flaw in this book. Providing scientific references would have empowered readers who wish to research this subject further, as well as giving credence to Landis's arguments. In addition, the author's involvement in her subject at times gets in the way of objectivity, and the tone occasionally becomes too emotional for a subject such as this. If you're looking for a critique of the dieting industry, Laura Fraser's excellent book "Losing It: America's Obsession with Weight and the Industry That Feeds On It" is far more comprehensive, but if you want a new approach to dealing with weight and bodyfat issues, "Bodyfueling" is a good place to start.

If I ever had the opportunity to meet Robyn Landis, I would hug and kiss her! That's how grateful I am for her liberating me forever from diets, scales, fear of my own appetite, and for offering me a sculpted silhouette that fits nicely into size zero jeans. For years I had been trying to maintain my weight by trying an array of diets, mostly of a low carb nature, but I could not understand why I still carried around 10 stubborn pounds that I was unable to get rid of. I had also tried behavior modification programs that intended to make amends with food, such as French Women Don't Get Fat and Geneen Roth's ideas, with limited success. My life and thoughts kept revolving around food, and I was feeling insecure because I wasn't sure for how long I could stretch the limits of my willpower to stay slim.

Enter bodyFueling. This is a concept unrelated to programs, plans, and other "diet talk". By giving you a rock solid background of basic human biology, Robyn Landis explains clearly why your body thrives on carbs, needs frequent feedings, and needs limited amounts of protein (for "repair work") and very little fat. She also refreshingly points out that problems with "overfat" (not overweight) are not that much psychological as we've been led to believe, but mostly physiological. Eat plenty of what your body needs and have the right mental perspective, and you'll be getting closer and closer to your personal goal of losing body fat.

The right mental perspective means, start visualizing the wonderful activities you'd like to fuel with your eating, long term. The writer has a sharp sense of humor that I found appropriate and heartwarming when dealing with such a personal, human subject such as eating. She does not preach, but makes it clear that this is the information you need, and you may assume responsibility for your habits and priorities. I also loved her smashing all guilt regarding food. She says if you're hungry, you should eat, and she describes her own generous meals. She also gives emphasis on maintaining health, even though she is not condescending towards those striving for aesthetically pleasing results.

As for me, as soon as I finished BodyFueling, I stopped weighing myself and gave myself license to eat, modifying at the same time the amount of fat I was using (mindlessly) when cooking. My husband was delighted when he discovered fresh breads, baked potatoes, warm pastas, homemade cheese, smoked turkey and mushroom pizza, angel food cake and other yummy carbs waiting for him on the table. Perplexed, he said that he was hoping that "this diet" would never end! And I confess that eating this food after all this time without guilt gives me warm fuzzies, as I love to eat!

After about two months, I have dropped two dress sizes and even though I had been working out religiously for two years, now is the first time I'm actually seeing definition. Scale only shows a 6 pound loss, so don't rely on it to draw conclusions about your body composition!

I'm very happy I read this book, not only for the physical results which I found very motivating, but mostly because it relieved my anxiety and stress regarding eating. Not only was I choosing the wrong foods that I also disliked - I adore carbs, who doesn't? - but also I have stopped trying to suppress my appetite. I consistently eat about 2200 calories a day, and exercise with light weights for 45 minutes a day - and I'm in the best shape of my life.

I owe a big, heartfelt thank you to Robyn Landis for the clarity of her explanations and solid rationale. I had read similar nutritional suggestions before, but the presentation was vague or diet-oriented and did not convince me. Robyn Landis is the only nutrition expert whom I have managed to trust completely due to her down-to-business, sober, logical approach. The program she provides is only a set of brief, generic outlines that you can tailor according to personal preferences and needs, so don't expect meal plans and exchange tables or recipes. You can expect the scientifically sound outline of an intelligent way to nurture your body - generously, painlessly, comfortably, and with the results your heart desires!

I bought the earlier version of this book in 1994, after gaining 30 lbs during the first 2 years of college. The author's use of fitting metaphors helps her to clearly explain, in lay terms, how the body processes different types of food and nutrients. This is not like so many of those weight loss "plans" that are difficult to maintain long-term. Rather, the book provides information that empowers you to make life-changing alterations to the way you live. After reading the book the first time, I lost the 30 lbs and 3 sizes. My copy has since yellowed with age, and I'm ready to buy a new copy and read it again, to help me get back on track after a year of working & the accompanying lifestyle changes that has brought about. I highly recommend it to everyone.

I read this entire book and even though it makes sense somewhat, I believe eating everything in moderation. I eat when I'm hungry and stop when I'm full. That works for me. I finally stopped dieting and decided enough was enough and ate when I was hungry and stopped when I was full.

I'm not gonna lie I did gain a little weight at first but that was due to my starving myself for quite some time and that caused my metabolism to slow down. Eating was the only way to get my metabolism back to normal.

I realized that my metabolism finally returned to normal because my weight leveled off and I started losing weight at an average of 1 to 2lbs a month.

I ate breakfast lunch and dinner plus snacks.I never skipped a meal. Even if I wasn't hungry I would eat because I didn't want my body to go into starvation mode again. I would always make sure that my calorie intake never went below 1500 calories.

I'm not sure how many calories I consumed a day ( although I know for sure it wasn't less than 1500 calories) and I lost weight.

I was able to eat fast food and/or healthy food.

Do I exercise??? Yes I walk. Not because I have to but because I want to. I enjoy walking and for me it's not exercise. I do it because it gives me extra energy. I walk about 30 minutes 5 times a week. Thats it. No huffing and puffing just a regular comfortable walk.

As for my weight (110lbs from 138lbs) I've been this weight give or take 3lbs more or less since 1992 ( which is the year that I that I decided to start eating normal again).

The Author Robyn Landis of the Body Feuling says basically to stay away from Fat or don't add fat ok... maybe that works for her but in the real world .. whats wrong with McD's every now and then???

I still say if you eat in moderation .. eat when your hungry and stop when your full YOU WILL LOSE WEIGHT!!!