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Healthy Connection: Think About It
By Payton Jobe
Healthy Connection
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Payton Jobe is a dietetic intern at Cox College and completed her undergrad studies in Food, Nutrition and Dietetics at Northwest Missouri State University. Payton has been on a weight loss journey for two years and has lost 60 pounds. She hopes she can help others who struggle with weight loss and be a positive role model for them as well. Payton enjoys swimming, cooking/creating new recipes, spending time with her friends and family, and playing with her dog, Brindle.
Mindful Eating for Weight Loss
Weight loss is a lot easier said than done. Many of those who struggle try fad diets and different programs with little success. The worst part about some of these dieting plans is how restrictive they can be. This can cause frustration and become hard to maintain. The truth is there is no one magical diet or method that leads to weight loss/maintenance for every person in the world. However, in this article I hope to provide you with a method for weight loss that is continuing to show effectiveness for many people. One method to help with weight maintenance/loss is mindful eating. Studies have shown that mindful eating habits can be beneficial for improving our digestive health and are often used as a tool to help control blood glucose levels in people with diabetes. There is also evidence showing it can be beneficial in the treatment of eating disorders like anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating. Mindful eating can help us reduce stress levels, especially with stress revolving around food. So, what is mindful eating and how does it work?
Mindful eating involves using emotion, instincts, our senses and thought in making decisions regarding food. It allows
you to listen and learn to understand your hunger and fullness cues and develop a better appreciation and relationship with food. For most Americans, hunger and fullness cues are something often ignored and forgotten at a young age. These cues are a crucial part of the success of the human species. Our bodies are smarter than we give them credit for. They know when we are hungry and when we are full. We have made this seemingly simple idea much more complex by
changing up the composition of foods by adding excessive amounts of sugar, salt, and other chemicals/preservatives. We have adopted the idea that “bigger is better” when it comes to portion sizes and we have taken the “you can’t leave the table till you clean your plate” to the next level. This has caused us to completely ignore our natural hunger and fullness cues and caused us to eat our way into ever-increasing cases of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and many other chronic issues. How can mindful eating help us lose weight? From personal experience, mindful eating taught me to listen to and understand my body. It also helped me gain a healthier relationship and a greater appreciation for food. This “new” way of mind uses the five senses; taste, smell, sound, sight, and touch, to make decisions on the foods we make and eat. It teaches you to appreciate every part about a food and take your time to enjoy it. It gives a value to the food beyond the cost. Slowing down when we eat has other benefits as well. It takes 20 minutes for our stomachs to tell the brain that we are full. Many people eat excessively large meals within this time. Slowing down allows us to take in only the amount of food that we need to satisfy our hunger without being overfed. Here are a few examples of how to slow down during meals.
How to eat mindfully:
1. Eliminate distractions.
Avoid TV, phones, and working while eating. 2. Eat at the table.
Always try to eat with someone (family, friend, coworker, etc.). 3. Set your eating utensils down between bites.
Give yourself 15-20 seconds between bites to reflect on the taste and smell of the food and how it makes you feel. 4. Make time to eat.
Skipping meals or snacks can lead to being extremely hungry and possibly binge eating later on.
This method allowed for me to lose 50 pounds in one year. I started to crave foods that were better for me. However, mac n cheese is still and will always be my favorite food. Before mindful eating I thought I’d never be able to eat it again because it’s “unhealthy” according to different health gurus and fad diets. Through mindful eating, I have learned that there are no “forbidden” foods. I learned to listen to my body and its cues in order to allow myself to eat mac n cheese in a healthy and respectful manner. Mindful and intuitive eating is not easy and takes continuous practice to get back in touch with your body. However, once you begin to listen and respect your body’s natural cues and needs, the results will show. To all of you who were told as a child “you must eat everything on your plate before you can leave the table”, it is okay to have leftovers. Save what you don’t eat for a snack or even another meal. If your body doesn’t need it, don’t eat it. Our bodies do so much for us; it is time to start treating them with the respect they deserve. n
“Fish Out of Water” is a 12-inch by 12-inch work of art created using colored pencil and ink on wood panel. It was attached to a vintage Melamine plate on Masonite with attached plastic fish.
Michele DeSutter
“Kung Pao Chicken” is a colored pencil and ink piece created on a wood panel and attached to a Melamine cup. This is one of DeSutter’s favorite works because of her son’s input.
Michele DeSutter
Local Artist Spotlight
Art surrounds us. It’s in advertisements flashing on screens; it’s in children’s work brought home from school; it’s in outdoor murals painted on vintage buildings across America’s small towns. For some people art is more than a fun hobby — it’s a passion. French impressionist artist Edgar Degas said, “Drawing is not what one sees, but what one can make others see.” Local artist Michele DeSutter is using her passion to create art in unique and nontraditional ways. Originally from Jefferson City, DeSutter has made Monett her home for the past 30 years. As a child she loved art and started drawing as soon as she could hold a crayon. “I took all the art classes I could in high school (Jefferson City High) and got a bachelor’s of fine art degree from Central Missouri in Warrensburg. My degree had an emphasis in illustration,” said DeSutter. “I like to tell a story in my art.” After graduating from college, DeSutter worked in graphic arts. She explained that the job was to pay the bills, but that she always wished she was painting full time. “After many years of graphic arts, I quit my job and started my own business, Mixed
Media Studio. That was over 20 years ago,” said DeSutter. Over these past 20 years she has created her own art studio on her home, sold and marketed her art, exhibited in galleries, won an international art show, and “lived my dream of being an artist full time.”
facebook.com/Michele.DeSutter.Art
Artist Michele DeSutter uses mid-century elements to create unique art pieces
A display of one step in the process of creating “Three Times a Week, Treat Yourself to Dessert.” The antique head vase served as inspiration for the main subject of the piece.
The finished piece “Three Times a Week, Treat Yourself to Dessert.” Created with pencil and ink on a wood panel, this 9-inch work of art is adhered to an 11-inch vintage plastic plate.
DeSutter is a fan of many artists that have influenced her work, which include Andy Warhol, Chuck Close, and Jeff Koons — all pop artists. She explains that her heart is still in illustration. “My all-time favorite book as a kid was Where the Wild Things Art by Maurice Sendak. As I grew up, my love for his books and illustrations only grew.”
As for her own work, her inspiration comes from other artists, people, and her personal experiences. “I love to visit museums and galleries,” said DeSutter. “Being around other creative works and people feeds my creativity.”
DeSutter’s current works are created entirely in colored pencils and ink on wood panels. For almost eight years, she has been making what she calls “Plate Paintings.” Inspiration comes from vintage head vases, which have been the main subject of many of her paintings over the past two years. “I use a head vase that I love and make a painting of it, giving her a background or maybe an occupation and name.”
DeSutter has created 138 plate paintings. She collects vintage Melamine plates from the 50s and 60s and hand cuts a piece of wood to fit the front or back of the plate. Next, she draws and colors in the artwork on the wood, coats the finished piece in a UV varnish, assembles the piece, and makes it ready to hang.
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When asked about the favorite piece of art she’s created, DeSutter had trouble choosing one. “It seems like each one is my favorite until it sells or until I start on the next piece,” she said. “If I had to pick only one, it would have to be ‘Kung Pao Chicken’ because my son helped me brainstorm and prep the piece for that paining. It’s just a fun piece too. I love the expression on the chicken.”
Outside of painting, DeSutter enjoys spending time with her husband, Steven, and looks forward to calls from her son, Wyatt. He’s grown now and lives in Columbia, Missouri. DeSutter noted that COVID has made it tough to visit her family living in Linn, Missouri, but looks forward to seeing them and friends again when it’s safe to do so. When not with her family or creating art, DeSutter enjoys yoga, which she taught at the Monett YMCA for 15 years. She also loves to read, shop for antiques (especially anything mid-century), and collects head vases.
To see more of DeSutter’s art or follow her on her artistic journeys, she can be found on her Facebook page: www.facebook.com/Michele. DeSutter.Art. On her page she posts videos, work in progress photos, answers questions from her fans, and sells her work.
Famous English author Neil Gaiman said, “Life is sometimes hard. Things go wrong, in life and in love and in business and in friendship and in health and in all other ways that life can go wrong. And when things get tough, this is what you should do. Make good art.” Art surrounds us. Michele DeSutter is one of many local artists that are making good art and creating more glimpses of beauty in this unpredictable world. n
