Experienced psychologists helping you to create lasting changes in how you see yourself and how you relate to food and exercise. Weight loss counselling with a psychologist is the perfect way to deal with the psychological baggage holding you back.

Weight loss management encompasses long term strategies that promote healthy eating and daily physical activity. Dieting is one technique but weight loss also requires a change in behaviour and understanding how to change your relationship with food and exercise.

How Can Weight Loss Counselling Help Me?

Weight loss counselling is about putting in place positive actions and goals for you to achieve. You will also learn how to change behaviours around food and exercise for the better.

With weight loss you normally know what you need to do to change but you always seem to catapult back to what is comfortable. Breaking these habits and identifying where you are on your journey towards change and understanding why you are so reluctant, are important steps to identify before you can move in the right direction.

We use Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) techniques to focus on changing how you think about yourself, how you act, and the circumstances that surround how you act. A weight management psychologist can also help you resolve any underlying emotional issues that might be driving your diet or exercise related behaviour.

We encourage our clients to also work with a nutritionist to develop a healthy, balanced eating plan. We don’t encourage dieting, we encourage long term healthy eating changes.

Is Weight Loss Counselling The Best Weight Loss Program?

Weight loss counselling identifies the underlying issues and behavioural change required to successfully achieve weight loss. It works hand in hand with diet planning and exercise.

Recent research studies have shown multi-component interventions targeting emotional, social or family processes have a greater impact than interventions that just target diet and exercise. The majority of published studies looking to find ways to address weight and exercise suggest that Motivational Interviewing has the potential to facilitate change and improve the efficacy of and engagement alongside other interventions.

Motivational Interviewing and Weight Loss

Motivational interviewing is a style of counselling developed to identify and engage your intrinsic motivation for changing health-related behaviours. It can help identify realistic goals, feasible approaches and opportunities for progress.

It is a directive person-centred approach designed to explore your uncertainty about changing behaviour and activate your motivation to change. It has been designed to enhance your own motivation to change using strategies that are empathic and non-confrontational.

How can weight management counselling help:

• Goal setting
• Planning
• Self-monitoring
• Evaluating your behaviours
• Planning what you eat, scheduling your day
• Dealing with relapses or risky situations

References:

Miller, W.R., Rollnick, S. (2002). Motivational Interviewing: Preparing People for Change (New York, Guilford Press).

Rollnick, S., Miller, W.R., Dunn, C. (2008). Motivational Interviewing in Health Care (New York: Guilford Press).