Diets Don't Work!
Many
Americans view a healthy lifestyle as something difficult to
attain--and
something that's not much fun.
Traditional
diets have taught us that to lose
weight, we must count calories, keep track of everythi ng we eat, and deprive
ourselves by limiting the amount - and kinds - of foods we eat.
Diets tell us
exactly what and how much food to eat, regardless of our preferences
and
individual relationships with hunger and satiety. Dieting
can help us lose
weight (fat, muscle, and water) in the short term but is so unnatural
and so
unrealistic that it can never become a lifestyle that we can live with,
let
alone enjoy!
While very few diets teach healthy low-fat shopping, cooking, and
dining-out
strategies, many offer unrealistic recommendations and encourage
health-threatening restrictions. Even more important, diets don't teach
us the
safest, most effective ways to exercise; they don't teach us how to
deal with
our cravings and our desires, or how to attend to our feelings of
hunger and fullness.
Eventually, we become tired of the complexity, the hunger, the lack of
flavor,
the lack of flexibility, the lack of energy, and the feeling of
deprivation. We
quit our diets and gain back the weight we've lost; sometimes we gain
even
more!
Each time we go on another diet of deprivation, the weight becomes more
difficult to lose, and we become even more frustrated and discouraged.
Then we
eat more and exercise less, causing ourselves more frustration,
discouragement,
depression. Soon we are in a vicious cycle.
We begin to ask ourselves,
"Why?" We begin to blame ourselves for having no will power
when what we really need is clear, scientifically-based information
that will
help us develop a healthier lifestyle we can live with for the rest of
our
lives.
Deliberate restriction of food intake in order to lose weight or to
prevent
weight gain, known as dieting, is the path that millions of people all
over the
world are taking in order to reach a desired body weight or appearance.
Preoccupation with body shape, size, and weight creates an unhealthy
lifestyle
of emotional and physical deprivation. Diets take control away from us.
Many of us who diet get caught in a "yo-yo" cycle that begins with
low self-acceptance and results in structured eating and living because
we lack
trust in our body and are unwilling to listen and adhere to our body's
signals
of hunger and fullness. On diets, we distrust and ignore internal signs
of
appetite, hunger, and our need to be physically and psychologically
satisfied.
Instead, we depend on diet plans, measured portions, and a prescribed
frequency
for eating.
As a result, many of us have lost the ability to eat in response to our
physical needs; we experience feelings of deprivation, then binge, and
finally
terminate our "health" program.
This in turn leads to guilt, defeat,
weight gain, low self-esteem, and then we're back to the beginning of
the yo-yo
diet cycle. Rather than making us feel better about ourselves, diets
set us up
for failure and erode our self-esteem.
The attitudes and practices acquired through years of dieting are
likely to
result in a body weight and size obsession, low self-esteem, poor
nutrition and
excessive or inadequate exercise.
Weight loss from following a rigid
diet is
usually temporary. Most diets are too drastic to maintain; they are
unrealistic
and unpleasant; they are physically and emotionally stressful. And most
of us
just resume our old eating and activity patterns. Diets control us; we
are not
in control.
People who try to live by diet lists and rules learn little
or
nothing about proper nutrition and how to enjoy their meals, physical
activity,
and a healthy lifestyle. No one can realistically live in the diet mode
for the
rest of their life, depriving themselves of the true pleasures of
healthy
eating and activity.
*Chad
Tackett’s article was used.
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