First, plant yourself a crop of high grade fat…

Seriously though, I have some ideas for how I would set up and run a weight loss clinic, and today, I will share them with you.

First, it should be somewhere somewhat remote. It doesn’t have to be way out in the middle of nowhere, but it should be far enough away from the nearest town to discourage people from fleeing. After all, the likely clientele are not exactly going to be in shape for a fifteen mile hike across the wilderness.

And even if they are, think of how many calories they will burn!

The basic idea would be to have the whole thing run on a points system. ^[1] Healthy food costs nothing, or very very little. The unhealthy foods would be more expensive. and the less healthy a food is, the higher the price.

Patients would be given a small amount of points each day, which will be more than enough for healthy meals with a little slightly naughty food for dessert with dinner.

Anything else you will have to either save up for or earn.

You earn points by doing healthy things. Small amounts of points can be earned from doing small healthy things, like drinking water and keeping body and teeth clean. But if you want to get points-rich quick, there is only one way : exercise.

This is where a certain amount of fine calibration of the system will be required. The idea would be that exercising results in enough points to be motivating but not enough to earn more calories than the exercise burned.

This way, the supra-normal rewards of unhealthy choices actually work toward the patients’ health. If a patient craves that piece of chocolate cake enough, they will be willing to earn it via exercise. If not, then they have at least avoided eating dangerously unhealthy foods.

Either way, the patient’s health wins.

Towards this end, it is vital that the staff maintain an attitude of bright and friendly indifference. No pressure is to be applied to any patent towards any particular solution to the patient’s needs. This way, the patient has to find their own balance between diet and exercise, and that is exactly the lesson they need to learn.

And speaking of staffing, the staff will have to be top notch because they will be dealing with people who are, in essence, addicts experiencing withdrawal. As such, the patients will likely be experiencing a high level of emotion, the most common of which is likely to be anger. But sadness, withdrawal from social activity, hysteria, and even suicide attempts are not out of the question. These people are trying to overcome a massive problem. One must be prepared for anything.

To that end, counseling is to be available 24/7, both in the formal sense and in the “just someone to talk to” sense.

In order to put the patient at ease and minimize the feelings of deprival, there is to be absolutely nothing clinical about the facility. Instead, everything should be luxurious, comfortable, and pleasing to the eye. The facility should look more like a high class luxury resort than any sort of medical facility.

In addition, there should be a strong emphasis on pleasures other than eating. Toward that end, anything goes, as long as it’s healthy. Again, it should be like a luxury resort, able to support any sort of sport, game, or body treatment people desire.

Personally, I would also include some very deft, subtle, and skilled sex workers. If there is anything that could distract people from food cravings, it’s amazing sex. Not sure if this service should be free or cost points. I could go either way.

However, I realize that prostitution is illegal in most places, so this might not be practical. At the very least, then, there should be no rules whatsoever about the patients fraternizing with one another.

If anything, it should be encouraged. Whatever can keep their mind off food long enough for the withdrawal symptoms to die down and let them adjust to a healthier way of life.

Health should be the central focus of the facility’s mission – NOT weight loss. Weight loss has many health benefits, true, and if the plan works as well as it should, weight loss will likely result.

But there should be no weigh-ins whatsoever. There will be scales available for those who like to track their progress, but their use will be entirely voluntary and there will be no official records of the results.

A certain amount of encouragement to socialize should be available. Again, nothing mandatory, but a wide variety of functions like dances, mixers, speed dating, and lightly silly group games should always be available. There is often an element of loneliness to overeating. Socialization can go a long way to easing that loneliness.

Again, no pressure towards anything in particular. And no unsolicited advice. If a patience asks for guidance, then they must receive it. A lot of patients will feel quite lost and out of place, and they will need someone to point them in the right direction from time to time. It is very important that these people do not feel abandoned or bereft.

But there is to be no unsolicited guidance. The patient must remain in control of the process as much as possible.

Oh, and I should note that there should be a concentrated effort to find the best tasting healthy snacks and meals as possible. A top notch chef experienced in healthy cooking would be ideal. And there is to be no monotony to the healthy fare. Every effort is to be made to make the healthy foods as exciting, tasty, and filling as possible.

After all, we’re not trying to teach people not to eat. We’re trying to teach them that eating healthy does not mean completely giving up on enjoying one’s food. It just means making better choices.

There’s more, no doubt, but those are the broad strokes. Obviously, this is the ideal system. Realistically, a facility like this would be extremely expensive to build and to attend, so no doubt in the real world, sacrifices would have to be made to keep the budget down to something affordable.

Nevertheless, I think the system as described would be highly effective, even if scaled down.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.