What ‘diet’ should you be on?
What diet should you go on?
Just give me the floor for a second for a quick rant🙃 isn’t it crazy that the majority of people who decide they want to lose weight will first think ‘which diet shall I go on?’ And then go on to debate against the library of ‘diets’ we’ve been hounded by all our lives? I don’t understand how we’re not taught about this in school, the law of thermodynamics, energy balance, it’s actually mind blowing. Just in case you’re someone who needs to hear this, let me explain what some of the popular following fad diets do;
🙃The 5:2 diet - restricting your calories to next to nothing for 2 days out of 7, putting you in an overall calorie deficit
🙃Slimming world/Weight watchers - using ‘points’ and ‘syns’ to restrict calorically dense foods, helping you stay within a deficit (also contributing to poor relationship with food as you start to demonise foods and consider the foods you love as a SYN, don’t get me started)
🙃Atkins/Keto - cutting out an entire macronutrient (carbs) which will inevitably lead to eating less calories, putting you in a deficit, whilst also starving your muscles of any water storage (hence the name, carboHYDRATE, also hence the usual rapid decrease in your weight on the scales, it’s water. Eat a banana or a sweet potato it will arrive right back)
🙃Juice cleanses/Slim fast - well you’re only drinking liquid. So be pretty impossible to go over your daily calorie intake this way.
I also just want to reiterate something - unless you can eat that way forever there WILL be an inevitable failure point. Are you going to have a slim fast shake for your Christmas dinner? Or go to Italy and ask for a low carb pizza? Absolutely not. Plus it’s completely unnecessary.
It is said that 80% of people who partake in these fad diets will regain all of the weight they lost, plus more. (please don’t be naive to think you won’t be in that 80%) there are 2 main reasons why these diets will not work for you in the long term;
Metabolism - no, you can’t '“damage” your metabolism, but your metabolism WILL adapt to meet the energy it is being given. If you’re only feeding your body 500 calories of just juice per day, it will run as best it can off those 500 calories. aka Metabolic Adaptation. Your systems will slow down and adapt in order to keep you alive. So when your ‘diet’ ends, your BMR (basal metabolic rate, aka the amount of calories your body will usually burn at complete rest) will be significantly lower, making it extremely easy for you to be in a calorie surplus once said fad diet is over, therefore gaining significantly more weight as a result.
Unfortunately when being in a calorie deficit of any kind, your body doesn’t just burn fat as a means of energy but also uses your muscle stores. When partaking in any fad diet (Especially those low in protein like a juice ‘cleanse’) your muscle mass will be much lower as a result. The more muscle you have, the more calories you burn at rest, which is another reason why it is a lot easier to gain significantly more weight once you inevitably revert back to your usual eating habits, as you now have less muscle mass. (Side note: if you don’t lift weights, that does not mean you don’t have muscle mass!! Muscles are stimulated through, walking, carrying your food shopping etc)
That’s just a handful of ‘diets’ picked at random but I could go on. There are so many.
I’m so happy that I’m qualified to coach people in nutrition, I would love to make teaming up with me be the last bloody DIET you ever go on! Get in touch via the contact me page :)