The Myth of Crash Dieting
by Dr Jeremy Sims
There are many diet fads around. We see them come and see them go. But there is one strategy that probably every woman has turned to who has ever tried to lose weight the "Crash Diet".
At the time, "crashing" might seem a good idea stop eating, stop putting in the calories and wait for the pounds to drop off. However, we may lose the desired weight but throughout the ordeal we feel utterly dreadful, and furthermore, what happens when we start eating normally again? The pounds creep back on and more.
The bottom line is this: crash diets never work!
And there are very good physiological reasons why not.
We may think we can fool our bodies but we can't. Millennia of physiological evolution mean that the human body has well-honed strategies for coping with "crash dieting", or, in other words, starvation.
- When we starve ourselves, the body becomes much more efficient at laying down fat as a defense mechanism.
- When you lose weight rapidly, the body responds by tightly conserving the few calories that are provided.
- During starvation our metabolism slows progressively, conserving energy.
- When we return to eating normally, the body continues to conserve energy and efficiently store fat. The result: our weight returns to its previous level plus some "interest" in the account.
© HealthChat 2000.
Dr. Sims is the Medical Director of FitStop, the UK's foremost group of health and fitness centers, and an expert on matters relating to fitness of body and mind. Having trained as a GP, he now works full-time in health promotion and has written extensively on the subject, including a monthly medical column in Mensa magazine with the TV psychiatrist, Dr Raj Persaud. Dr. Sims was the original Virgin.Net online doctor.
Article courtesy of MediaPeak