Quick Weight Loss

The American Heart Association recommends adopting healthy eating habits permanently, rather than impatiently pursuing crash diets in hopes of losing unwanted pounds in a few days through fad quick weight loss plans.

Many of these fad diets, such as the notorious and outright silly Cabbage Soup Diet, will undermine your health, cause physical discomfort (abdominal discomfort and flatulence (gas) ) and lead to the yo-yo effect of gaining weight soon after losing it. In other words the risks aren’t worth the rewards.

Quick-weight-loss diets generally put far too much emphasis on one particular food or type of food. They violate the first principle of good nutrition which is to eat a balanced diet that includes a variety of foods. If you are able to stay on such a diet for more than a few weeks, you may develop nutritional deficiencies, because no one type of food has all the nutrients a human being needs for good health. The Cabbage Soup Diet is an example. This so-called fat-burning soup is eaten mostly with fruits and vegetables. The diet supposedly helps heart patients lose 10?17 pounds in seven days before surgery. Even if the weight loss claim were true, all the damage due to a lack of many essential nutrients would far outweigh (pun intended) the benefits of losing the weight. There are no magic beans, or magic cabbages, or miracle foods when it comes to weight loss and good nutrition. That’s why you should eat moderate amounts from all the food groups rather than cutting out everything but a cabbage and water.

These crazy diets also violate a second important principle of good nutrition which is that eating should be enjoyable. These diets are so monotonous and boring that it’s almost impossible to stay on them for long periods. Imagine eating cabbage soup, nothing but cabbage soup, for even a few days much less for a whole week. By Wednesday you’d dread meal time, and by Friday you’d never again want to hear about a cabbage much less eat the soup. If you make it to Sunday you might die of a heart attack before you ever again tasted real food.

There are many other ways fad diets aren’t good diets. Many don’t encourage physical activity, for example, walking 30 minutes most or all days of the week. Physical activity helps maintain weight loss, while physical inactivity is a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke. When you hear a diet that mentions ?no need for exercise? run for the hills, or at least run on a treadmill.

Quick weight loss sounds great. It is possible. Just don’t fall for tricks or gimmicks that might end up ruining your health.

Three Day Diet

The ?3 Day Diet? dates back to 1985 and today can be found all over the Internet and on book store shelves. The three day diet and its variants promise quick weight loss, a cleansing of the system, lower cholesterol and increased energy all through a ?specific metabolic reaction? that no version of the diet has ever explained. The diet is to be followed for only 3 days, with an off period of generally 5 days in between diet times. All the versions of this diet share in common specific steps that must be followed and foods that must be eaten in order for the diet to work. What better way to blame the dieter when it doesn’t work than ?you botched the formula.?

Breakfast on the first day begins with coffee (no sugar), one half a grapefruit, and a piece of toast with 1 Tbsp peanut butter. For lunch, you are allowed a can of tuna, a piece of toast, and black coffee. Dinner consists of 3 ounces of chicken or lean meat, a cup of green beans, one cup of carrots, one apple, and one cup of regular vanilla ice cream. The other two days of the diet are relatively similar in meal quantity, though the specifics change, for example Day 2 recommends two beef franks for dinner in place of three ounces of lean meat. The diet claims that weight loss of 10 pounds is achievable over the 3 days that the diet lasts.

Baloney! How’s that for specific? And no baloney is not on the diet. There is no evidence for the so-called ?specific metabolic reaction.? The only reason this diet would work to help a person lose weight is because of the lack of calories in the diet. In fact, because the diet is so low in carbohydrates a person could lose ten pound in three days. Of course most of that would be water weight because carbohydrates encourage the body to retain water. By the way, losing that much weight from not retaining water is dangerous as the body needs water to survive.

Once the three days are over the weight will return, primarily because it’s mostly water. But also because any weight lost from the lack of calories will be regained when the starving diet victim returns to normal, or in this case heavier than normal, eating. Deprive the body of water over three day cycles enough times and a person could develop kidney damage, dehydration, or a host of other dangerous conditions.

The 3 day diet is best treated as a no day diet. In other words, don’t do it.

Lose Weight For Free

For those who want to lose weight for free, what is the secret? Is it a mystery beyond the pyramids, UFO’s, ghostly apparitions, or the single sock? When people look in the mirror to see their fat self it may seem to be. But it’s pretty simple. Here are some ideas.

Catch a virus. No really, get sick. Serious illness is a great way to lose weight, provided there’s a recovery. Sick today, thin tomorrow is the saying. It sounds silly, and it is silly. So let’s get to some real tips.

Calorie deprivation is a great way to lose weight. That means consuming less calories than you burn. Drink nothing but water to force your body to draw on fat reserves. If you have the endurance to do this for weeks or months at a time, even better. Seriously, though, eating less than you burn is the way to go. It shouldn’t be as extreme as only water for meals, but drinking water instead of juices and soda would save the average person about 90,000 calories each year, that’s 25 pounds worth of calories. So cut down on portions and drink the water, not the koolaid.

Exercise as if the slave master will whip you if you stop moving. Keep up activity for hours and hours a day, seven days a week. Remember those Moses movies? Did you ever see a fat slave working on those pyramids? Back to reality, exercise and burning calories is important to losing weight. It doesn’t have to be hours and hours each day, but 30 minutes of aerobic exercise seven days a week is great. While seven days a week is best, if you can’t do it, go for six, or five, or even four. Try for everyday but if you miss a day here or there don’t panic.

Bigger muscles mean a faster metabolism and more calorie burning. So hire a personal trainer, preferably one that really dislikes you, and have them push you to at least three hours a day, seven days a week of gut wrenching muscle building. Become a hulk, a mass of muscles so large that you have to constantly eat just to keep up with the wild metabolism. Of course, in the real world weight training doesn’t have to be to the level of a marine drill instructor. 3-5 days a week of weight work to build lean muscle will help keep off the pounds. Muscle does mean a higher metabolism, and in the long run it means less work because you’re burning more calories even while standing still.

You don’t need miracle pills or fad diets to lose weight. It doesn’t take a lot of money, or any money. Lose weight for free with diet and exercise. Eat less than you burn.

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