The Dieting Dilemma

The Dieting Dilemma:

The Atkins Diet, the Scarsdale Diet, the Beverly Hills Diet, the Grapefruit Diet, the Cabbage Soup Diet, the Sugar Buster's Diet -sound familiar? They all promise short-term dramatic results. However, fad diets like these are often very restrictive and monotonous, and they don't teach you how to permanently change your lifestyle to promote long-term healthy eating and regular physical activity.

Like many Americans, you've probably lost and gained hundreds of pounds over the years but find yourself fatter than ever. That's because dieting, done the wrong way, can lead to:


•A reduced metabolic rate - If you reduce your calories below 1,200 a day, your body's metabolism slows to conserve energy so you use only that amount of calories a day to maintain your weight. It's a survival mechanism we have inherited from our ancestors who experienced periods of "feast or famine."

•Lost muscle mass - Your body will hold on to fat until you absolutely need it for survival. With most diets, the weight you initially lose is typically from the loss of muscle and water. This loss of muscle mass is absolutely detrimental to your weight control efforts, because muscle is metabolically active tissue. It requires energy for its survival so when you lose muscle, you slow down your metabolism even further. In fact, for every pound of muscle you lose, you lose the ability to burn about 50 calories. Last time you dieted, you may have lost 15 lbs, but it's likely that six pounds of your weight lost was muscle. That means you may have lost the ability to burn 300 calories per day.

•Regain of fat weight - Because you've slowed your metabolism down by cutting calories and losing muscle on an unhealthy diet, when you stop dieting and return to your usual eating habits, weight regain is inevitable. And the sad part is not only have you gained the weight back, but you've gained it back as all "fat weight". Yes, you've actually made your body "fatter" as a result of dieting.

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