Fad Diets / Healthy Diets

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I've seen "healthy" diets that aren't necessarily healthy at all. An unbalanced diet, and/or one that's excessively low in calories, can also trigger cravings for sweets and other junk food. A red flag goes up whenever someone tells me that they eat "clean" or "healthy" - without offering any details. More often than not, I end up recalling Inigo Montoya's (Movie quote : Princess Bride) immortal words: "You keep using that word...I do not think it means what you think it means."

Here is an excellent article on the problem with Fad Diets from the university of Pittsburg Medical Center.

There are some things that they all have in common.

1. They are out of balance. Usually they base the entire regimen around a singular nutritional item. Low carb, no fat, and protein only diets are all examples of this. Without balance, something can’t really be healthy.

2. They focus on the short term. Statistically people who lose weight quickly are unable to maintain the regimen that got them there.

3. This leads us to focusing too heavily on scale weight loss. A healthy lifestyle often leads to the loss of fat and the gain of muscle. This is great progress, but isn’t reflected by much of a scale weight change.


A healthy lifestyle is achieved through education, planning and consistency. We benefit most when we learn what is healthy, plan our days to act on what we have learned, and consistently adhere to this plan.

Be healthy guys.

[Minx1969]

Great topic Leaf.

Did you see Larry King live on CNN last night with Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Bob Greene, Lance Armstrong and Deepak Chopra?

Deepak was literally glowing with good healthy. Amazing.

I loved what he had to say that he does not eat anything with labels on it.

Only freshly prepared items.

And Sanjay said he didn't care what anyone ate as long as they first ate one of every color of the rainbow.

It's true that diet and exercise can prevent most heart disease and lots of cancers.

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Cool Minx,

I have to try to see that episode.

You are correct at how important a healthy regimen is.

The problem is that we as a society (Americans for the most part) are constantly looking for shortcuts.

The diet/nutrition/fitness industry has become a multi-bazillion dollar shortcut.

There are no shortcuts.

There are no magic pills, concoctions, juices, etc...

All it takes is some education, commitment and hard work.

[Velvet]

If you are like millions of Americans, you're probably on a budget. Eating healthy is important. Eating healthy is much more easier when you are single, living alone. Buying only items without labels is fine, but will get expensive and you will be at the grocery store every other day, to get it fresh. If you are only shopping the organic store, you better have a thick wallet. Having the time to prepare them when you're juggling kids, sports, working two jobs, cleaning, doing laundry and running errands is almost non existant. I try to fix the best, healthy meals that I can, for my family. Sometimes it just doesn't happen. I quit buying junk food. I buy alot of vegetables and fruit. But I'm at the store twice as often, now. My son has lost 20 pounds from cutting out sweets, chips, sodas, etc.
Fad diets are always gonna be around. My friend did the cabbage diet, lost 30 pounds. While doing that she also did some reading and learned how to manage what went into her body. She hasn't gain any weight back and looks great. Sometimes all people need is a jumpstart with a fad diet, to get their bodies moving and their self esteem boosted. Then they learn what to eat and are successful.

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Originally Posted by Velvet

If you are like millions of Americans, you're probably on a budget. Eating healthy is important. Eating healthy is much more easier when you are single, living alone. Buying only items without labels is fine, but will get expensive and you will be at the grocery store every other day, to get it fresh. If you are only shopping the organic store, you better have a thick wallet. Having the time to prepare them when you're juggling kids, sports, working two jobs, cleaning, doing laundry and running errands is almost non existant. I try to fix the best, healthy meals that I can, for my family. Sometimes it just doesn't happen. I quit buying junk food. I buy alot of vegetables and fruit. But I'm at the store twice as often, now. My son has lost 20 pounds from cutting out sweets, chips, sodas, etc.
Fad diets are always gonna be around. My friend did the cabbage diet, lost 30 pounds. While doing that she also did some reading and learned how to manage what went into her body. She hasn't gain any weight back and looks great. Sometimes all people need is a jumpstart with a fad diet, to get their bodies moving and their self esteem boosted. Then they learn what to eat and are successful.

Large warehouse stores like Costco and the freezer have become my friends Velvet. These help with my budget and my time.

I have 3 kids and I really hear you on the juggling a healthy diet with family activities. It would be so easy if I was single.

There has become a Sunday night tradition in my house in which my wife and I cook and freeze things for the week. Chicken and vegetable dishes make great freeze meals and taste really good when reheated.

Sometimes you have to get creative, but being too busy is never an excuse to abort healthy eating.

A fad diet isn’t really a good jump start for most people statistically. People who go on them tend to have weight swings and rarely keep the weight off (your cabbage eating friend being the exception ).

Tying one’s self esteem to a scale weight is pretty solid set up for disappointment.