The Eden Diet: You Can Eat Treats, Enjoy Your Food, and Lose Weight
The Eden Diet: You Can Eat Treats, Enjoy Your Food, and Lose Weight book cover

The Eden Diet: You Can Eat Treats, Enjoy Your Food, and Lose Weight

Paperback – December 15, 2009

by
Price
$29.99
Format
Paperback
Pages
224
Publisher
Zondervan
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-0310328087
Dimensions
5.98 x 0.59 x 9.02 inches
Weight
10.7 ounces

Description

Finally a weight loss program that is as sound physiologically as it is spiritually....best of all you get to eat carbs again! Clark Gerhart MD This book frees its readers from the roller-coaster of dieting. Cara Brown, MD --TheEdenDiet.com Not eating when you're not truly hungry...eating smaller portions...eating treats occasionally...exercising more. Who can argue with those things? Dr. Hancock's method works. Gary Ratliff, MDInternal Medicine --TheEdenDiet.com The Eden Diet will help you to recognize true hunger and become known as the one that can walk away from the buffet. Steve Cox, DO --TheEdenDiet.com Afterxa017 years as a registered dietitian, I found her principles to be refreshing and the most effective method I have ever found for losing weight and maintaining that loss. Debbie Leonard, MSRegistered and Licensed Dietitian --TheEdenDiet.comThe Eden Diet: You Can Eat Treats, Enjoy Your Food, and Lose Weight advocates a simple technique -- the Apple Test -- to help decide when it's actually time to eat. The idea is when you are physically hungry you will eat anything -- even an apple- and it uses this and other visualization techniques to modify and identify real hunger and need versus habit. A fine behavior modification approach to dieting, this will earn its place in any culinary library -- The Midwest Book Review ( The Midwest Book Review ) From the Publisher This edition replaces and improves upon a prior, self-published edition of Dr. Hancock's book from 2008, which went by the same name. Dr. Rita advocates a very simple technique, called The Apple Test, which can help you decide when it's time to eat. The premise of the test is that when you're physically hungry, you'll eat anything--even an apple. If you crave a particular food, like the chocolate cake on the cover of this book, imagine it sitting on a plate next to a beautiful, shiny, perfect, bright red apple. Ask yourself, "Am I hungry enough to eat the apple?" If the answer is no, you don't get to eat the cake. You may want the cake, but you're not actually physically hungry for it.Inside, you'll learn many more techniques like this to recognize and fight the temptation to eat when your body doesn't actually need food. Dr. Rita Hancock is a Christian physician with Ivy League nutrition training and studies of obesity psychology. She draws upon her faith and her personal success overcoming childhood-onset obesity, in to help those in bondage to food, eating, and dieting lose weight and keep it off permanently. She lives in Oklahoma City with her husband and children. Read more

Features & Highlights

  • (This product is not affiliated with or endorsed in any way by Eden Foods Inc.)
  • According to Rita Hancock, author of The Eden Diet, you can have your cake and eat it too, even on a reducing diet. When you eat your treat in small portions, without guilt, and in response to true, physical (not emotional) hunger, a little cake goes a long way to satisfy you. Attuning to your body’s hunger signals also helps you respond to its instinctive call for healthy food to balance out the occasional treats. Dr. Rita’s approach is based on her Ivy League training in nutrition, physiology, and obesity psychology, but is reframed in her strongly Christian convictions about how to live the way God intended—physically healthy and free of the cultural obsession with food, eating, dieting, and thinness.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
30%
(105)
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25%
(87)
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15%
(52)
★★
7%
(24)
★
23%
(81)

Most Helpful Reviews

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Should be titled "the God Diet"

The blurb to this book looked interesting, so I ordered it. I got it and boy was I suprised to open it and see it was nothing that I expected. The description of this is mis leading. This book would be better placed under the Christian section rather than diet/health because it's not a diet book. I thought by the title Eden that the book would be about going back to whole, simple organic foodstuffs. i was wrong, this book focuses on religion as the basis of making better food choices.

The book is VERY Christian, nothing wrong with that but no where in the description does it say that. As someone who isn't Christian I find the constant bible and religious references cloud the message of the book. I agree with some of her thoughts about recognizing your own personal hunger signals and eating when you really want to eat rather than because you are bored or emotional eating etc.. However I was really turned off by her suggestion that one way to beat overeating was to "pray to God". How about doing exercise or maybe some nutrional counseling?? I am a believer in the power or prayer but not as a way to lose weight. I want to reply to that in terms the author would understand "God helps those who help themselves, not sitting there eating cheesecake and asking him to make them thin"

At one point in the book the author suggests "i you are not Christian you should probably put this book down" Nice, eh? I think not.

I would have thrown the book away at that point, but since I am reviewing this for Vine I had to read thru the entire thing. I can respect the authors devotion to her faith, but I can not recommend this book.

I hope Amazon moves this book from Diet to Christian devotional section. The author has clearly stated she doesn't want non Christians to read this book, so it should be in the category of its intended demographic.
14 people found this helpful
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Amazing insight!!!

Rita Hancock's The Eden Diet is a concept that makes perfect sense and actually works!! I love the fact that there are no 'off-limits' foods, no calorie counting and no regime. The only requirement is that you pay attention to your body's signals and avoid emotional eating. I LOVE the apple test. What a concept! It has helped me tremendously to realize times when I am not really hungry but only searching after some sort of comfort from food. Thank you, Rita Hancock, for sharing your God-given wisdom with the rest of us!!!
4 people found this helpful
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FINALLY!!

Finally!! I have found the missing link! I have been successful at losing weight on all of the popular diet programs but have been unable to keep it off. I browbeat myself for being so weak and not having the will power to keep the weight off. For the last three years, I have been 30 pounds overweight and am unable to participate comfortably in my hobby. My two nieces had told me about this book two years ago and they both had lost weight and have kept it off. I have been searching my soul as to why am I always so hungry? Even after I have sat down and ate a full meal and can physically not fit another spoonfull of food in my stomach, I still am hungry. I am never satisfied. After realizing that this is an emotional hunger and not a physical one, I got Dr. Hancock's book.
I now realize the root of my lack of satisfaction. I had a hole in my heart and was attempting to fill it with food. My personality was bitter and coarse, and that is not who I am. I was unhappy that I was weak with food and weak with worship of the Lord. Currently, instead of trying to control and direct my consumption of food, I am able to listen to my body and recognize the signals God gave me, and eat to the glory of God.
3 people found this helpful
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Saving Souls!

Fantastic book. Was reading this when I got saved. I am free from the bondage to food/diets/body image that has plagued my whole life. Thank you Dr. Hancock...
1 people found this helpful
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Great book!

I read it twice and then wrote out my 30 day plan and by giving God control, lost 5 lbs. my first month of following. Great book with great advice and some humor as well.
1 people found this helpful
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Psychological Bait And Switch With Food? Sounds Crazy!

Okay, so here's yet another "diet" book claiming to have the secret to weight loss and health success. It's all about fooling yourself into eating well. Techniques from obesity psychologist Dr. Rita Hancock are designed to help you enjoy food as God intended rather than falling prey to the traps of restrictive diets. While I can appreciate trying to help people find ways to beat their poor food choices, it can be dangerous to tell a diabetic or someone with some sort of metabolic disorder that they can consume foods that will spike their blood sugar. And the temptation of putting a slice of chocolate cake in front of someone like this, for example, is probably stronger than it was for Eve to eat that apple in the Garden of Eden. Do I believe God and prayer can help with an effective weight loss plan? Absolutely. But you do need some practical guidance about what foods are nourishing and what is not.
1 people found this helpful
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A Christian-based Anti-diet Diet

The premise of this book is that people are made with an innate hunger sense which, when properly utilized, will maintain an optimal weight. It's fairly simple: you eat only when you're physically hungry, and only eat until you feel some food in your stomach. The author says that giving just that advice to most men is enough - they will lose weight. I believe it.

For women, coming off a lifetime of dieting and guilt over eating, it's a little more complicated, and takes a bit more explanation and assistance. Thus, the need for a whole book rather than a pamphlet.

I like the premise a lot, and I think it is sensible and holds a lot of promise, but I suspect it is a bit too simplistic as well. The author says that no diet is for everyone, including this one, but I fear there are still a few big facts being overlooked. The biggest one, IMO, is the effect of modern foods on appetite.

As noted, this book is told from a wholly Christian perspective. In that context, overeating is considered an effect of sin - gluttony, specifically. I am Christian as well, and generally agree with this concept, except for one thing: obesity did not become widespread until the 1980s. I do not believe we suddenly became more prone to sin and gluttony then. I think our foods changed.

In that vein, I always suggest people read [[ASIN:1605297852 The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite]] before starting any diet. It's hard to prepare for battle when you don't know what kind of forces you're going up against.

As for The Eden Diet, I recommended this book if:
- ' You're Christian, or at least open to the ideas of Christianity.
- ' You don't have a lot of weight to lose. I'd say 30 lbs or less.
- ' You mostly eat home made or equivalently non-processed foods.
- ' You've found that restrictive diets don't work for you, you don't like the idea of banning specific foods, or reducing diets cause a rebound where you wind up overeating in reaction.

-or-

You're at the tail end of a diet and wondering how to maintain from here. This is where I think the book's concepts really shine.
1 people found this helpful
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Awesome!

I really enjoyed reading this book and believe in the principles here. Eating when you are hungry, stopping when you are full and working on all the other reasons we turn to food. Dr. Rita, thank you!! I would highly recommend this book if you want to be FREE from any bondage to food and release weight!
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Absolutely wonderful!!

I think this book/workbook set is one of the BEST I have read on the subject...and I have read plenty ;0). Dr. Hancock is funny, straightforward and to the point. The material is easy to read and understand. I am almost finished with the 7 day challenge, and am looking forward to the workbook. The Godly affirmation audio cd's are also wonderful! I have recommended this to several people already, and a family member is just starting her book today! A wonderful investment in your spiritual, emotional, and physical health!!!!
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The Eden Diet - Dr. Rita Hancock

In the Eden Diet, Dr. Hancock offers hope to the hopeless for those who have tried and failed at other diets. This is not just another fad diet, but a lifestyle that works! No one wants to be on a diet for the rest of their lives. I, for one, have a bookshelf full of diet books that may work for temporary weight loss, but do nothing to determine the cause for overeating! Dr. Hancock's book examines the reasons for overeating as well as offering healthy changes for a healthier lifestyle.

I appreciate the fact that this is a tried and true method. Dr. Hancock is not just one more person writing a diet book. She has implemented this in her own life and found it successful as a weight loss program as well as a successful maintenance program. She has also seen success in countless numbers who have tried the diet.

I would not hesitate to recommend this book to anyone who wants to improve their health, lose weight, develop a healthy lifestyle, and feel better about themselves.

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