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The Weight Control Battle

Being overweight can lead to a multitude of health and emotional risks. Some well-known examples are increased risk of diabetes, fatty liver disease, coronary heart disease, and many forms of cancer.  And as many parents know firsthand, the impact is more than physical.  Overweight adolescents and young adults are much more likely to experience social isolation, depression, and poor academic performance.

To read more about the emotional, social and economic impact of weight, click here.

Here is the good news: Losing even 10% of one’s body weight can yield significantly beneficial health effects. So whether or not you choose Wellspring Hawaii this summer, overweight or obesity is a factor to be taken seriously and acted upon now.

Wellspring understands that weight control can be a complicated struggle and that overweight people are up against many discouraging factors. Overweight teens often face social challenges that others don’t face, as well as a host of physical ailments (such as fatigue and sore joints) that complicate the weight loss process.

Wellspring’s solution to the many issues that complicate long-term weight loss is a cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) clinical program integrated into the camp experience.

Clinical Program

Wellspring’s clinical program utilizes CBT, dietary training and physical activity to train campers with the skills they will need to be successful, as well as to bolster commitment and improve frustration tolerance and stress management skills.

Wellspring Hawaii campers are trained on a specific set of behaviors that have been proven to sustain lasting weight loss. Self-monitoring, journaling, goal-setting, and contracting become second nature to campers and are integrated with Wellspring’s nutrition and culinary training. The work is conducted by each camper’s Behavioral Coach (BC), a Masters or Doctoral level psychologist or social worker. The Behavioral Coach encourages the camper along the journey from novice to successful long-term weight control while working closely with him/her to overcome any barriers to mastering the behaviors.

CBT sessions in individual and group settings reinforce this training. CBT employs goal-setting, stimulus control decision counseling, relapse prevention training, rational emotive therapy, positive focusing, improving frustration tolerance, and stress management. Campers learn to apply their knowledge to challenges in life. Wellspring Behavioral Coaches are trained in applying learning, memory, emotions, and physiology to weight control, and the CBT sessions strengthen campers both mentally and emotionally.

CBT helps overweight teens effectively manage their weight and the barriers to long-term weight control. CBT teaches campers to become self-regulators who can set attainable goals, be mindful of their actions, and stay committed to health and long term weight control while managing the stress that we all face in day to day life.

A group CBT session at Wellspring generally goes as follows:

Overview of each student’s accomplishments since the last meeting

• Integration of a CBT/weight control topic such as coping mechanisms
• Discussion of how students are doing in the program
• Quiz on reading assigned in previous section
• Assignment of new reading
• Goal setting and behavioral contracts

Individual sessions are similar in that they review progress, but also provide an extended opportunity to focus on the details of each student’s progress.

As the scientific research demonstrates, long-term weight control is a manageable athletic challenge. In other words, if someone is a serious runner, he or she will adhere to a fairly rigorous lifestyle and regimen. A serious runner probably keeps a log of progress, thinks about the foods he or she is ingesting, sets goals, discusses progress and advice with others, and adjusts daily routines accordingly; he or she is probably very focused on success. We know that successful weight control requires the same focus.

If weight control were easy, nearly 1/3 of our children would not be overweight or obese. So Wellspring treats weight control as an athletic challenge; we are overcoming the biological resistances and transforming our bodies with a fitness and weight loss approach thousands of others have shown works. This requires a very strong commitment, but one that is fostered and solidified through Wellspring Hawaii’s clinical program.

Wellspring Hawaii Behavioral Coaches are Masters- or Doctoral-level clinicians under the supervision of licensed professionals, and trained by Dr. Daniel Kirschenbaum. Dr. Kirschenbaum is a Professor at Northwestern University Medical School and a leading expert on weight control. To read more about his work, click here.