Fad Diets: Let’s Talk Facts & Fiction!
Every Spring, fad diets make a comeback. Across the country, there are women who are desperate to shed a few kilos before heading off on their holidays, which is why fad diets tend to be much more common in the spring and summer months than at any other time in the year. We all want to look and feel our best, so it’s understandable that this is the case.
While in some instances crash diets can be effective, for the most part, they act as a quick fix, which is why dietitians tend to recommend that people wanting to lose weight do so by making healthy lifestyle changes, rather than doing a fad diet to achieve a quick fix.
A lot of women choose fad diets before a trip or special event such as a wedding in the hope that these kinds of diets will allow them to get to their dream weight. When it comes to crash diets like the cabbage soup diet, the aloe vera cleanse, and teadoxes, there is a lot of conflicting evidence and information about these kind of quick fix diets.
With that in mind, below is a guide to fad diets and the facts and fiction behind them, so that when it comes to choosing a diet plan to achieve your target weight and body shape, you are able to make an informed decision about the path to go down. We all want to look and feel good, but the question is, is a fad diet the way to do that?
Fact: Fad diets can offer quick loss of kilos
There is no getting away from the fact that crash diets can offer a quick loss of kilos. After just a few days following a crash diet, such as the keto diet or the aloe vera cleanse, you are likely to have dropped at least four kilos. As a rule of thumb, the heavier your weight when starting a diet, the quicker you tend to lose weight. So for someone who is heavier, they will probably lose more weight than someone who is lighter to start off with, which means that losses in the first few days of a crash diet can be as high as 10 or 11 kilos. So yes, fad diets can offer quick loss of weight.
Fiction: It’s fat that is lost
However, while these diets can offer quick loss of kilos, it’s fiction that this weight is just fat. In most instances, the weight lost at the start of a crash diet is actually water weight and not fat. So although weight is being lost, it isn’t fat loss, it is simply water weight loss. A lot of us choose to undertake quick fix diets because we believe that they actually work when the reality is that most of the time they only offer a short-term solution.
Fact: Fad diets can boost your metabolism
The fact is that any change to your diet can kick start your metabolism because you are eating in a different way to normal. This means that technically, a fad diet could kick start your metabolism and help you to achieve faster weight loss results in the short-term.
Fiction: They can boost your metabolism in the long-term
However, in the long-term, it most probably isn’t a good diet option. You see, most quick fixes require you to drastically reduce your calorie consumption which isn’t doable in the long-term. Studies have shown that reducing your calorie consumption to boost your metabolism followed by normal eating can negatively impact your metabolism’s ability to burn calories at a normal speed.
Fact: Crash diets can cause a yo-yo cycle to begin
What is a yo-yo weight loss cycle? Engaging in different types of fad diets each year can cause the body to get into a yo-yo cycle in terms of weight. What this means is that your weight will go up and down on a regular basis, which can be more dangerous in the long-term than simply staying at one heavier weight for an extended period of time. The strain put on the body when a considerable amount of weight is lost and then regained on a regular basis can have a huge impact on your general health.
So there you have it, a guide to fad diets and the facts and fiction surrounding them. For a quick weight loss of a few kilos, a crash diet might be the answer, but what about in the long-term? It’s always important to think about your long-term health before choosing to undertake any diet plan.
