If you are thinking of going on a diet, it’s important to consider what you want the diet to do. If you are going on a diet to trim off a few extra pounds (think less than 10) then chances are you will be successful. If you are considering long-term weight control; a diet is a short-term, not a long-term solution.
Most diets, if followed exactly, will certainly prove to make you somewhat lighter on the scales. However, most of the weight you lose in the initial stages of any diet is water weight. If you are using a crash diet without any exercise components, you are also likely to lose muscle weight rather than body fat. While muscle weighs more than fat, what you want to lose is fat and not muscle.
Diet shock is one of the primary reasons many diets do not work. Your body will go into starvation mode. This primal mode of survival is a useful tool our biology employs when we face famine and drought. This cuts back on the energy intake, lowers the metabolic rate and ultimately reduces the amount of fat your body can burn.
The moment we enter diet shock, a more insidious event occurs. Our body begins to crave the high-energy foods. Foods loaded with sugar and fat. The exact foods that we are supposed to be cutting back on in order to make our diet effective.
If you’re now wondering what the heck the point of dieting is, you are not alone. The sad fact is – repeated dieting makes it harder to lose weight. The reason for this is largely based on the fact that people diet only for a certain period of time and then resume their old eating habits.
For a diet to be effective, you need to effect lifestyle and habit changes. Diet is a four-letter word that needs to mean a lifetime commitment to healthier eating habits rather than a short-term crash and burn that will reduce our weight for a few weeks before putting it back on.