Weigh down Diet » (Reprint)

Gwen Shamblin is a registered dietician with a master’s degree in food and nutrition, and was a full-time faculty member at the University of Memphis for five years. She worked as a nutritionist for the state health department and has focused her consulting practice in the area of weight control since 1980. In 1986 she founded the Weigh Down Workshop, Inc., which is now in all fifty states, Canada, and Europe. She and her husband, David, and her children, Michael and Michelle, live in Nashville, Tennessee.

Isn’t your desire to overeat really spiritual hunger?

“I can stop in the middle of a candy bar and have no desire to eat the second half if my stomach is not calling for it.”
- Gwen Shamblin

Do you eat and eat and never feel full? Rise above the magnetic pull of the refrigerator and turn to the bounty offered to thousands who have embraced a liberating weight-reduction program in churches across America. The Weigh Down Diet gives new hope to millions who have failed on conventional diets and guides readers to the richer satisfaction that comes not from food, but from faith.

Gwen Shamblin’s The Weigh Down Diet is a groundbreaking approach to weight loss. People who have known no end to their hunger and who have no control over their late-night binges have learned through the Weigh Down Workshop that they can remove the irresistible desire for food. This is not a diet like others, because it is not food-focused. It contains chapters such as “It’s Not Genetics or Your Mother’s Fault,” “I Feel Hungry All the Time,” and “How to Eat Potato Chips and Chocolate.” So, as you can see, here is a very different approach to weight loss. Weigh Down gives back hope to dieters who will learn that God did not put chocolate or lasagna on Earth to torture us – but rather for our enjoyment!

Publishers Weekly

Shamblin is the founder of the Weigh Down Workshop, which holds weight-loss seminars in more than 10,000 churches across the country. In this book, she takes a common approach to losing weight-eat only when you're hungry and only until you are full-and adds a spiritual dimension. According to Shamblin, most overeaters eat to fill a void in their lives, and some develop a real passion for food. She suggests that if they fill the emptiness with a passionate relationship with God, food becomes just a source of fuel for the body. Although trained as a dietitian and nutritionist, Shamblin does not advocate a low-fat diet. She claims that our bodies crave a variety of foods, including high-fat treats, which were created by God for us to enjoy. In fact, she recommends eating our favorite foods first at any meal, since we may not get to enjoy them if we stop eating when we are full. Using testimonials from satisfied customers and information for those interested in joining Weigh Down seminars, Shamblin combines the superficial nutritional advice of diet gurus such as Susan Powter with the evangelistic fervor of savvy televangelists such as Jimmy Swaggart to produce a book that is little more than an infomercial for the Weigh Down Workshop. (Mar.)