Amy Hendel - The 4 Habits of Healthy Families: Everything Your Family Needs to Get Healthy and Stay Healthy for Life / Featuring the Yes, No, Maybe So Food Choice

Table of Contents

There is no shortage of quick-fix diet books, but to see how well they all work, just... look around. What does work is a thoughtful, practical, sustainable, and family-based strategy for eating well and being active. You really CAN get there from here, but it generally requires expert coaching. Amy Hendel provides exactly that coaching in The 4 Habits of Healthy Families. Insightful, compassionate, and practical, this book can make your family healthier. But only if you read itso by all means, do!

David L. Katz, M.D., Medical Contributor for ABC News and Columnist for O, The Oprah Magazine and New York Times Syndicate

Obesity threatens to reverse gains that have been made in reducing mortality from heart disease and stroke. The rates for obesity and type 2 diabetes are increasing and appearing at earlier ages. The 4 Habits of Healthy Families by Amy Hendel offers a practical plan to fight obesity by creating a useful category of food types, tips for daily eating and exercise, and many healthy recipes. Most importantly, the crucial role of the family in developing and maintaining healthy eating habits is emphasized.

Amy Hendel has written an extremely helpful book for families who are ready to make the transition from overweight and unfit to healthy and fit. This guide will truly help families create healthier habits through meal planning and exercise advice and will support them every step of the way.

This is a down-to-earth, incredibly important guide to helping families approach the epidemic of obesity. With a commonsense approach Amy Hendel combines her years of experience with patients and the media to provide a comprehensive approach to avoiding and treating unhealthy eating habits for both families and individuals. A must-read for anyone concerned about the health of their family. Excellent!

For my dad, who I believe is one of those angels put on earth, and in memory of my mom, who so struggled with her weight and her happiness, and for my grandmother, who always made me feel like I could accomplish just about anything.

There are so many people and events that shaped my life and somehow contributed to the writing of this book. I have to thank Maureen Kedes of Vertex Communications for forcing me to realize that there was a book inside of me and Boris for believing in my talents and sticking by when others would not even look my way. I also have to thank Mary for her incredible devotion, enthusiasm, warm words, and most of all for helping my written words to become a true manuscript. A huge thank you to Uwe Stender, my agent, for unbridled enthusiasm and for wanting to show the big guys how a book deal gets done. To Glenn at BenBella Books, thanks for taking on this project and making me feel like my book was the most important book you were handling. To Leah, thanks for some fine editing and some very funny comments along the way, and to Jennifer, thank you for keeping me in the loop on how a book gets reviewed by the best. To Laura, thanks for hearing my anguish and responding. To the whole team at Krupp Kommunications, thank you for helping me spread the books message near and far. To Paul, my lawyer and close friend, thank you for doing what most lawyers dont do: giving me more for my money. To Zahava, a special thanks for recipe inspiration and to Barbara, thanks for your cover contributions and your artistic input. To Judy, a client and friend who embraced the HFL program and never looked back, and who constantly gave me words of support, thank you. Finally, to my husband Eli and my children Melanie and Stephen, thank you for making my journey your journey as well.

So youre brave enough to open a book that uses the f word, huh?

F as in fat, that is.

Or maybe I should say f as in family because, in spite of all the attention being given to the obesity epidemic, family is rarely part of the story. Surprisingly little information is available today for the family who wants to develop healthy habits as a family to support healthy weight management.

And thats a crying shame, because fat is a family matter. We learn habits as a family, and if anything is inextricably linked to family traditions, its food. The habits we develop in our families today can last for generations to come. The good news is that we can unlearn habits as a family, too. We can change our family food traditions, very likely saving our families in the process. And thats what this book is all about.

If youre reading this, youre probably courageous enough to start facing the truth about your familys eating habits. You are feeling symptoms of poor health at home, and are fearful of the ramifications for yourself and your family. Youve probably already decided that fads dont work: you know they just mean an endless, frustrating, and self-defeating cycle of weight gain and loss. You know that extremely rigid or complicated diets are impossible to stick toyou lose weight but dont keep it off. You just want to be able to enjoy healthy, good-tasting food with your family, without spending countless hours cooking.

You want the best for your family, but somehow its all gotten out of controlthe TV watching, the loss of focus on nutrition, the everyone-for-themselves eating habits, the lack of family meals, the on-the-run eating, all the fast food and packaged food. Over and over again, you find yourself desperately asking, How can I get a grip on this chaos?

You may have experienced one or more of the following:

I talk to families every day who share these same challenges. I know how hard it is to climb out of that pit we call denial and start scaling the mountain of change. But I have helped hundreds of families do just that, and I can help yours.

You might be surprised to learn that some of the families I work with arent overweight. Thats because families can easily have unhealthy attitudes and habits that have not expressed themselves in excess weightbut you can be sure the negative consequences are there just the same.