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Super excited to be starting up a series around The Well Path by Dr Jamé Heskett!

I recently read The Well Path: Lose 20 Pounds, Reverse the Aging Process, Change Your Life. I came across a review of it from Hello Nutritarian, and I was really compelled by the idea of simple lifestyle changes that improve  your overall healthy and life! 

Dr. Heskett is a physician and anti-aging expert with an office near where I grew up in New York. I’ve never seen her myself! (Though apparently Christie Brinkley and Jane Seymour have, if that sways you!) But I was really compelled by the idea of a detailed week-by-week or even day-by-day calendar of small changes. 

My mom was a binge dieter when I was growing up, and getting a balanced relationship with food intake has never been easy for me. I have a really difficult time with my mindset around food. I do better than my mom did in not doing any flagrantly unhealthy diets or limiting calories to the extreme, but I struggle with her same all-or-nothing mindset and the sense of failure at not not eating and looking perfect. 

So my general health is a little better, but my mindset and happiness practice still need work. 

What is The Well Path book about?

And this is where I hope this book comes in — Dr Heskell’s code is focused not only around weight loss (though that’s first in the title, I guess because it sells books). It’s a sixty-day plan with lots of small, holistic changes that can be adapted to your individual needs. So rather than following some radical new approach every six weeks (hello me) it’s an opportunity to make several small changes per week over the course of a couple months. 

So, here’s my Well Path book review.

I feel like this is a new window for me into what a healthy set of behavior changes would look like — rather than making vast, sudden changes to every aspect of your life and turning on “diet brain”, you’re looking at a couple of areas of change each week. And they’re not all dietary — she also focuses on the importance of sleep and social interaction to our overall wellness and stress levels. 

Dr Heskett doesn’t prescribe a specific workout plan or exact meals — it’s more of a holistic lifestyle plan that you can adapt for yourself. She talks a lot about finding your own well path, meaning a road to vibrant health, anti-aging, effortlessly reaching a healthy weight, and finding space for yourself. 

I initially took this book out of the library, but I did end up buying a copy so that I could reference it during the plan.

Week 0: Prep Week

The plan starts with a “prep week” that is supposed to help short-circuit the diet mindset of “we start today” (which usually leads to…we fail by tomorrow.) Instead, you buy a few prep materials that you’re going to need (probably totalling about $30) and prepare a couple soups for your lunches. 

Dr. Heskell….loves soup. A lot. I also like soup so I’m planning to go with it, but I anticipate that there are going to be days this summer that are just too hot for soup, so I’m going to keep salad on hand too! 

I want to be respectful of the book’s copyright and not give every detail of the plan here, but here’s what I’ve been working on this week: 

• I made one soup — the smoky vegan corn chowder from The First Mess — and purchased one from my favorite pasta shop. Next week I’m going to try to make both.I’m also going to explore canned soups that might be able to live in my cubby at work once school starts again.
• I attempted the hunger awareness activity and was surprised at how infrequently I feel real hunger. More on that in a minute.
• I modified my typical breakfast of “carrot cake oats” — recipe below! The plan is really big on making small changes to existing dishes to make it more nourishing than it would have been otherwise. 
• The plan also talks about selecting an exercise practice that you think will be positive and fun for you, and going with a buddy. I’m already very active in things that I enjoy, and I have friends in those classes. So I’m putting this one on ice for me for now. (I didn’t work out at all this week, because I did that triathlon that I blogged four weeks of training for before deciding that the training itself was time-consuming enough!) But I’ll be back to Pilates tomorrow. 

Prep Week – Hunger Diary

Week 0 has you do a hunger awareness activity/”hunger diary” where you log every time you feel hunger for the week on a scale of 1-5. I have found this very difficult to do! 

I spend the first two-thirds of my day teaching high school, where the day goes by in such a flurry that I sometimes forget to eat. Then, I walk out in the early afternoon ravenous and ready to eat a whole pizza. 

I found it very, very difficult to check in with myself during this time. In the five days of school this week, I don’t think there was a single one where this activity even crossed my mind. 

And I know this is an unhealthy stress response! The last week of school is really hectic and emotional, but this is more common than not for me. So I’m not sure that I got too much useful insight into my hunger patterns…but I got some insight into one of the ways that I’m not taking care of myself as well as I should be. 

Which is still learning! The Hunger Diary continues into Week 1, so I am going to try to stick it out. The kids finish school this week, so I won’t spend all of Week 1 in this tizzy. 

And my nutrified carrot cake oats recipe:

(I am not a food blogger! But I did my best for you.)

Recipe makes 5 breakfasts.

• 8 cups water
• 2 tbsp cinnamon
• 2 cups steel cut oats
• 1 cup buckwheat
• half a bag of shredded carrots, chopped
• 5 oz pineapple, mango, or apple (or a combination)
• 1/4 cup raisins, finely chopped

at serving time:

• 1 tsp maple syrup 
• 2 tbsp nuts, finely chopped

Bring the water to a boil in a medium pot. When it boils, add the steel cut oats and buckwheat, stir, and reduce the heat to a simmer. 

After 15 minutes, add the carrots, stir, and re-cover.

After 5 more minutes (20 minutes total cook time), remove the pot from heat and stir in the chopped fruit and the raisins. 

Allow to cool, and portion out into 5 containers. 

To serve: add maple syrup, stir, and place in the microwave for 1:00. Stir again, and microwave for a further 90 seconds. Top with chopped nuts and enjoy! 

This has more calories than what I used to eat–quick oats with chopped apple. But it’s also got more fiber, more nutrients, and it keeps me comfortable full for a long time. 

(and this shouldn’t matter, but my coworkers are wildly envious of it. So many have asked for the recipe!)

So, I hope this Well Path book review sparked your interest. I’ll see you next week with my Week 1 log!!