TAKE CHARGE Patient Manuals

The first manual will motivate and inspire your commitment to the process of establishing weekly and daily steps that you will need to develop healthy lifestyle strategies. This manual teaches you about the Take Charge products you will be using. It also explains the importance of combining the nutrition program with physical activity. In general, this manual prepares you for some of the challenges you will face, helping you build the confidence you need to succeed.

Your Take Charge Meal Planner

The Meal Planner is bound together with the first manual because it's basic to the Take Charge System. You will begin the program enjoying two Take Charge meals per day. These meals provide a "crutch" as you learn to prepare a healthy, low-calorie third meal. The Take Charge Meal Planner makes this goal easy to achieve.

What is Your Self-Image?

Popular media images of what constitutes "youth" and "beauty" can combine with self-doubt and erase your appreciation for who you are and what you have achieved. This manual is an important and motivational reality check that will help you acknowledge your own positive qualities and evaluate your own progress against genuine standards.

Going Out & Eating Healthy

The problem of how to maintain a healthy lifestyle while going to restaurants has undone many patient's best intention for good health and nutrition. This manual will provide you with detailed, easy-to-follow and easy-to-adapt instructions on how to order in restaurants.

Body Composition

A key realization in Take Charge is that loss of mere pounds is relatively meaningless. What really counts is losing fat, improving healthy lean muscle-to-fat ratio and raising metabolism to better convert food into energy your body needs. "Body Composition" makes applying these principals clear in a variety of helpful ways.

Fats

The "Fats" manual concerns the important components of food by reiterating the importance of controlling intake of dietary fats, which is essential in weight loss and management of diseases such as cholesterol, type 2 diabetes and hypertension. It will teach you how to make intelligent, healthy choices by reading labels and calculating calories per serving.

Carbohydrates

Carbohydrates, as this manual will explain, play an important role in a healthy diet. Their popular reputation as contributors to fat is completely unwarranted. This comes entirely from fats added to certain carbohydrate dishes, such as butter and sour cream, and from processed or refined carbs. This manual teaches you how to shift your diet toward complex carbs.

Fiber

Take Charge is keyed to the vital importance of fiber in the diet, from high fiber Take Charge meals to the wonderful Take Charge snacks. "Fiber" explains the crucial importance of fiber in promoting healthy functioning and prevention of disease. This manual teaches you how to add fiber to your diet.

What About Vitamins & Minerals?

This manual explains why most of us probably need vitamin and mineral supplements to compensate for the loss of freshness in foods we buy, for the possible lack of variety in the foods we eat and for the vitamin-draining effects a stressful lifestyle has on our own bodies.

Food Additives, Featuring Sugar & Sodium

Food additives include natural flavors, baking soda and many other helpful ingredients. So, after debunking the myth that all "additives" are bad, this manual lists which additives you should avoid or treat with caution. It focuses on the two that we tend to consume most - sugar and salt - and suggests ways you can cut down.

A New Image

By this point in the program, you will be experiencing sustained success and can benefit from tips to help accentuate your new healthy lifestyle. "A New Image" also includes a cautionary explanation of the danger signs for anorexia and bulimia and what to do if someone seems to be suffering from either of these disorders.

Looking Back & Looking Ahead

This manual helps you and your provider consolidate progress by taking you step by step through your advancement since the beginning of the program. This process will give you a comprehensive look at what you have done and what you will be doing in the future.

The Take Charge Lifestyle

The last manual in the Take Charge series is part of the most significant difference between Take Charge and many other programs. "The Take Charge Lifestyle" is a concise but thorough guide for continuing progress "beyond" the formal program. It systematically reviews what you will do to maintain progress as well as exactly what steps you can take if you encounter problems. Along with the other manuals, it is a guide to living a healthy lifestyle.