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Fad diets are on the rise these days. According to the Boston Medical Center, about 45 million Americans diet every year. Let’s take a brief look at some common fad diets and why they are not such a great idea. You’ve probably heard of at least some of these- the Lemonade Diet, the Twinkie Diet, and the Cabbage Soup Diet. These diets are pretty self-explanatory. They all have you eating a few types of foods in weird and irregular quantities.

For example, take the Cabbage Soup Diet. It has you make a concoction of cabbage and other vegetables and then you can eat as much of this as you want. Stuff yourself, even. You can eat any fruit you want on the first day, EXCEPT BANANAS. NO BANANAS. On the forth day, however, you may eat up to eight bananas. And don’t forget to eat your cabbage soup! This is only one example of many diets people are using to lose weight. No one wants to eat like this! (Faddiet.com)

Many diets allow for processed foods and lack nutrients essential for health. The main problem with dieting in the ways that I’ve just talked about is that most diets do not teach people to eat right for long term health benefits and weight loss success. Even though these types of diets may cause people to lose weight initially, they do not provide them with a plan to actually maintain their weight goal after its reached.

How about those expensive “magic weight-loss pills” that guarentee major weight loss in a short period of time? Many of these pills are diuretics, meaning that they have a dehydrating effect on the body. Water is heavy, these pills pull water from the tissues and eliminate it, and volia!, it causes weight loss. Very temporary weight loss. When taking a dieting pill, people know that they’re losing weight, but they don’t know what they’re losing. Fat? No. Muscle? Probably not. Water? Very likely. Extensive dehydration can lead to internal damage and health complications.

Remember the advertisement for losing 30 pounds in 30 days? Sure! A person will certainly lose weight following a food restricted diet. But what happens when a weight goal is reached using these kinds of diets? According to KC Craichy in his book Super Health Diet, a shocking 95% of these of all dieters end up gaining all their weight back again.

Why does this happen? Why do so many people gain back all that weight they lost while dieting? A common characteristic of all fad diets is the use of severe calorie restriction with unbalanced nutrition. When majorly restricting calories by dieting, you just pushed you body’s survival mode button. It cannot discern the difference between a diet and a full-fledged famine. Your body attempts to make up for this lack of fuel by slowing your metabolism waaaay down, which in turn burns fewer calories. After a grueling several weeks or months of dieting, you may find yourself lighter in weight and even smaller in size. Of course, you simply cannot eat like this forever. When you finally return to your normal eating habits, your body grabs all that extra food and quickly converts it to fat, trying to prepare for the next “famine” you assault it with. This is NOT what you intended for your body to do, but nevertheless, all of the weight that you “lost” is found again. (Craichy 127-129) Ugh! How utterly frustrating is that?! Diets of this nature simply do not work for sustainable weight loss and health.

Sources: Craichy, KC. Super Health Diet. Florida: Living Fuel Publishing, 2011.

Faddiet.com “The Cabbage Soup Diet and Recipe.” Faddiet.com (2011). Accessed 11/14/11 from [http://www.faddiet.com/cabsoupdiet.html]

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To begin with, there is a growing problem of weight gain in America. Why is it that 7 out of 10 people in America are overweight? The answer begins simply with the fact that in general we are a sedentary culture.  In the past centuries, people worked by manual labor to make a living. They chopped wood for warmth in the winter, they worked in the fields growing crops, they washed clothes by hand, and their main source of transportation was walking.

As modern technology improved, the invention of various household utilities replaced work that had before been done by hand. In addition, forms of entertainment, such as the TV and radio, grew to become so popular that people spent more and more time sitting rather than engaging in an active lifestyle.

The second part of the problem of being overweight in America is the fact that in general, we eat too much of the wrong foods.  Again in centuries past, people worked to raise animals on farms for meat and diary products, and they ate from the produce of their own gardens and orchards.

As time progressed, sugary and fat-laden processed foods became popular with the invention of preservatives. Fast food restaurants popped up everywhere, offering high-calorie, nutrient deficient foods.  Why are so many people overweight in this country?  The two primary reasons are the influence of sedentary jobs and lifestyles, and the high quantities of processed foods that Americans eat.

In his book Eat to Live, Joel Fuhrman states that almost 90% of the calories that Americans eat come from refined and processed foods, and animal products (Fuhrman 58) These types of foods are extremely high in fat and sugar. Have you ever eaten a meal at Colton’s Steakhouse and ordered cheese fries? A single serving of cheese fries contains a whopping 2,862 calories! According to University of Iowa Healthcare, the amount of calories that the average woman should be consuming daily is about 1,600 – 1,800 calories. So these fries, at almost 3,000 calories, contain almost two day’s worth of calories!

This is just one example of many foods that have such concentrated, empty calories that causes people to gain weight. By “empty” calories, I mean sugar and refined foods which lack nutrients.  Americans consume these foods in excess, causing weight gain. Research indicates that more than 75% of all Americans today are overweight. (Fuhrman 157) Being overweight increases a persons risk of heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, and stroke and joint issues just to name a few.

Source: Fuhrman, Joel. Eat To Live. New York: Hachette Book Group, 2003.

Hi there! For those of you who have been reading my blog for a bit, you may remember when I posted a paper I had written for an English assignment. I called it “Thinking Beyond the Wrapper“, and I wrote about Artificial Colorings, Preservatives and Trans Fats, and Artificial Sweeteners.

I would like to post another series from a platform speech I wrote last year while doing competitive speech and debate. It is about the problem of weight gain in America and the solution to losing excess weight. Two years ago I wrote and delivered a speech on white vs. whole grain breads, which I would like post sometime as well.

The speech I’m going to share here is titled “Change Your Lifestyle”, and I’ll be posting it in three sections. Please note that I am NOT an expert on the subject, and what follows is simply the results of my research. I found it to be absolutely fascinating, and I hope you do too!

Several weeks ago I was shopping at the grocery store. In the check out aisle, I read on the cover of a magazine “lose 30 pounds in 30 days!”. “Wow!” I thought, “that’s amazing!” But upon further consideration, I began to rethink my initial response. How could someone lose 30 pounds in 30 days?  If it’s even possible, is this a healthy way to lose weight?  And after losing this much weight so quickly, could a person even maintain his weight loss? After researching this surprising statement on a magazine cover, I found the answers to my questions. Technically yes, you could lose 30 pounds in 30 days. But there is so much more to the story, and that is what I will tell you today. Essentially, I will share with you some truths about weight loss.

First I will talk about the growing problem of being overweight in America, and why this problem is increasing. Next I want to tell you of the unsuccessful attempts of Americans to fix this problem of weight gain. We’ll look at a few of the popular fad diets and why these diets simply do not work. Finally and most importantly, I want to give you a healthy and long term solution to weight loss. I will show you the most successful way to lose weight, to keep excess weight off, and to enjoy a healthy lifestyle.

I’ll be posting part 1 shortly, so check back soon! :)