Fad Dieting: The Long Road to Weight Loss

Something that I have written about extensively is fad dieting. Fad dieting involves going on a highly restrictive diet for a short period of time in order to achieve massive amounts of weight loss.

Fad diets come in all shapes and sizes. There are protein shake diets, vegetable diets, soup diets, straw diets, liquid diets, fruit diets, “straw” diets and so on. A fad diet is basically something that gives a quick result for minimal effort. Well, so it seems.

If you have ever been guilty of yo-yo dieting, then you will know that fad dieting just doesn’t work. You may lose some initial weight, but, because the diet is not sustainable (or even healthy for that matter), you stop the diet, revert back to your old eating habits and gain all the weight back.

By approaching weight loss in this fashion, you are effectively aiming to achieve the end result without learning new lifestyle habits. In most cases, this frankly doesn’t work, because one’s ability to sustain these weight loss results is developed in the “journey” toward weight loss. This journey is where you learn how to establish healthy eating and exercise habits that can be sustained in the long-term.

In essence, fad dieting is the long road to weight loss because the vast majority of people embarking on a fad diet fail. What may initially seem like a quick fix, often turns out to be wasted time, money and effort. Whilst it’s human nature to opt for the quick and easy way out, achieving phenomenal and sustainable results require much more than this.

Ultimately, there is no shortcut. You and only you can put in the work to change your life in the long-term. Put bluntly, the sooner you realise this first-hand, the quicker you will achieve your goals and stop wasting your time with the latest diet craze.

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Why to NOT Lose Weight Quickly

If you’re considering weight loss, chances are that you’re after fast weight loss  and the ability to maintain your new physique in the long-term.  When presented in such a simplified manner, taking an approach to lose weight quickly seems viable.  Yet in practice, fast weight loss more often than not has detrimental long-term effects.

Although we specialise with 12 week transformations, something that I repeat numerous times is that the initial 12 weeks of training is the time in which you develop new long-term habits for sustainable weight loss.  12 weeks is not a period where the typical sedentary person you should go “all-out” and try to lose all excess weight as quickly as possible.

There is an important point to be raised here, which is essential to anyone seeking to transform their physique in the long-term. If you want to achieve long-term success, you need to get away from an “all-or-nothing” mentality. If you approach weight loss with such a mindset, you may obtain GREAT weight loss results initially, but as you (inevitably and understandably) slip up, you will feel that your efforts have been completely compromised.

This discouragement as a consequence of your mistake (as minor as it may be) can be highly detrimental to your progress and result in all that weight piling back on.

In theory, this sounds trivial.  In practice, this mindset can very easily cause you to fall into a psychological pit of guilt that does significantly more harm than good.

This is precisely why people who undertake fad diets gain more weight than they lose.  It’s not because the diet isn’t conductive of weight loss, quite the opposite actually.  The diet is such a contrast to the persons normal (and typically unhealthy) lifestyle habits that they lose weight REALLY quickly.  Cravings kick in and eventually a binge results from self-deprivation of loved foods.  This is not to mention most other food groups that are typically forbidden by fad diets.

Always remember that you are human and you will make mistakes. It is not plausible to expect yourself to adhere to a strict diet, lose weight quickly and then be able to maintain this result.  In fact, once you come off the “diet”, how are you going to maintain that weight?  Are you:

a. Going to stay on the diet indefinitely (Chances are you will be malnourished)

b. Revert back to your old eating habits (You will gain all the weight back)

c. Establish new and healthier lifestyle habits  (Why don’t you skip the diet and just follow this option in the first place?  If your revised lifestyle habits are conductive of maintaining a lighter bodyweight, then they will also result in weight loss at your heavier bodyweight.)

Ultimately, you need to focus on a “balance” mentality. Factor in cheat meals and slip ups. It is my belief that if you eat 80% well, you will lose weight. No, you won’t lose as much weight as eating 100% well in the short term, but you WILL lose more weight than eating 100% well in the long-term. It sounds counter-intuitive, but for the vast majority of people, eating 100% well results in a “falling off the wagon” scenario weeks into their weight loss endeavours. Hence why it is not a viable long-term approach.

This mindset of “lose weight quickly” is very, very common.  For this reason, we have a whole truckload of articles on Amino Z that deal with this very topic.  Here are a few of interest:

How to Lose Weight

Tony Ferguson Weight Loss Program Review…A Fad Diet?

Fad Diet, Fad Result

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Vibration Machine Review

Last week I was inspired to spend a bit of time researching and reviewing this new vibration machines that have hit the consumer market in the past twelve to twenty-four months.  Today I allocated the time (5 hours) to research the topic and write a full-on article (2,213 words!!) discussing these vibration machines and their effectiveness in regards to weight loss.

After sifting through a number of studies, I was actually quite surprised as to how long they have been around.  Did you know that these machines have been around since the 1960′s?!  Okay, they weren’t available for consumer purchase, but they were actually in use for completely different medical applications (as I have explained briefly in the review).

Apart from this, I was also quite intrigued by the potential benefits these machines have in regards to athletic power, various medical applications and rehabilitory purposes.  But upon researching their applications into weight loss, I wasn’t surprised when I found several articles concluding how ineffective this much hyped vibration technology is.

But do have a read of the vibration machine review and I really welcome your feedback.  All of these issues (and more) are discussed in detail.  I really hope that this article can be a real eye-opener for the typical consumer that has considered purchasing one of these vibration machines in the past.

Read our Vibration Machine Review here!

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Vibration Exercise Machine…(Ramble part 2)

Okay I switched the telly back on when I was eating this morning and that vibration ad was on…AGAIN!  This time I watched it in it’s entirety and I tell you what, now I have now been inspired to write a comprehensive article on this product for Amino Z…stay tuned.

But nevertheless, I need to get this off my chest.

For starters, I cannot believe what marketers get away with in Australia.  In the most round-a-bout way possible, they managed to link standing on a vibration machine to weight loss with no effort at all.  Basically the insinuation here is that as you stand on the vibration platform, your legs warm up (as is shown by a “special” thermo-image…wow!)  Now the increased heat loosens tensions of the body tissue which apparently paves the way for fat loss.

Whilst they may claim that “the proof is in the heat”…it’s this type of crap that really makes my blood boil (okay not litterally…but using this line of thinking, if my blood really was boiling, then I’d probably be burning HEAPS of fat! )  With this same simplistic rationale, why not just step foot in a sauna for 10 minutes a day?

Now what really got to me was that probably 90% of this advertisement implied that no exercise was required for muscle tone, fat loss, flexibility and improved circulation.  In fact, they had 2 models standing on the machine and suggested that you only need to stand on this machine for so many minutes a day (I believe it was 10, but will have to double check).  It was only a little bit at the end of the ad that they actually showed a quick snippet of someone doing lunges and a straight armed plank on the machine.

Being the subjective ad that it was, there was absolutely no reference to objective research on this “breakthrough technology” in regards to fat loss.  There were just a bunch of before and after photo’s of people who “apparently” stood on the machine for a few minutes a day with no other change to their lifestyle.

Common sense will tell you not to buy this type of marketing crap.  The same can be said about all the latest diet and exercise gimmicks that have been released (and then quickly dissapear) over the past forty years.  But it’s naturally instinctual of human beings to find the quickest and easiest way to achieve a certain desire.  So I really think that, so long as advertising like this continues to be permitted, we will see many more generations of these machines with outragous promises, yet which deliver very little.

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“As Seen On TV” & Exercise Machines

I sat down to eat something and flicked on the television this morning.  Believe it or not, two of those ads advertising the latest exercise machines were on – one was on a vibration machine and another was on a sled based resistance machine.  I’m actually surprised the Ab King Pro wasn’t being sold

I’ve written extensively on these machines on Amino Z and why I believe that the vast majority of them are garbage.  One article in particular is How To Get Healthy Without Raising A Sweat  However watching the two ads today, as painful as it was, was a profound reminder of the marketing propoganda that floats around the health and fitness industry.

Whilst these machines may have the potential to be effective if they are used correctly, by the appropriate person, for the appropriate goals and under the correct supervision, none of this was pointed out.  But rather these machines were purported as the latest and greatest weight loss phenomenon to hit Australia.  I was almost convinced myself to phone up and buy 2!  (Okay, not quite.)

I laughed at the vibration machine ad where it had a female just standing on the machine, implying that it was the latest weight loss tool.  I mean, come on guys!  Yes there has been some research on this technology (admittedly mainly for rehabilitory purposes)…but standing on a vibration machine…oh my…

Which reminds me…I really must write an article on this vibration technology for weight loss.

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Australian Biggest Loser

I’ve posted several articles up on Amino Z in regards to The Biggest Loser Australia.  Basically, I feel that it’s great to raise awareness for health, fitness & nutrition…but there are many (many) downfalls as to the training methods employed which could be quite dangerous.

You know what, I was reading a Network Blog (a fitness industry forum full of health and fitness professionals), where they were discussing exactly the same thing – the safety and effectiveness of this method of training.

There were 60 posts from professionals around the country, with all very similar opinions – it’s not safe, it’s not a good long-term solution and it’s geared toward entertainment, not the health and wellbeing of contestants.  Many people felt that the way in which the contestants were treated was unacceptable also.

Here are some exerpts from what some industry professionals wrote:

“I feel that the trainers are unrealistically training the contestants.
If I was training morbidly obese individuals, I would not start with high intensity workouts – what trainer in their right mind would?!?!!? “

“It’s just not safe. Is that not one of our biggest concerns in the fitness industry?”

“Belittling people on television and encouraging backstabbing is not my idea of entertainment. Someone will die using the unsafe methods employed by these trainers. The show is complete bull and that is why I have only watched it twice and that was last week!

Never again.”

“Although it is great to see obese people exercising at an intense rate and losing weight, the show is too focused on WEIGHT ie kg lost. It would be much better and more educational for the general public to see body fat % decreasing rather than kg- any one can lose ‘weight’ just by cutting off an arm, or perhaps not drinking anything for 24 hrs. This focus also discourages muscle gain, as muscle weighs more than fat, but is more desirable since it is metabolically active.”

“The biggest loser has been both the best thing for the fitness industry and the worst, the best because it gets people thinking about the results they could get with a personal trainer and the worst because it depicts personal trainers in the worst possible way and the general public see us all that way.”

“What has always troubled me about the series is that it completely contrary to everything I was ever taught about weight loss ( slow weight loss is best) and training very overweight clients ( start slow etc) – I would never have asked an unfit 150kg client to jog!”

Catherine Chapman posted this excellent post:

“Whilst I am a regular viewer of the show I have to agree with many of the comments posted that yes, the training appears to be way too intense for participants of their size and fitness level. I also agree that there is not much thought given at all to technique. One particular episode really got to me – where 2 of the female contestants had to experience “Pain” and one was in a caged area “boxing” with a trainer whilst the other one was moving exremely heavy items on the outside of the caged area.

Having qualified with PunchFit in their punch pad course, kick pad course and personal trainer course, I was astounded to say the least to see how the “trainer” was using the focus pads to hit down on the punching mitts worn by the contestant who was boxing – also without any guidance as to how to “throw a punch”.

Its also interesting to note the number of past contestants who are now in advertisements for weight loss companies which provide meal substitute shakes, bars etc. Isn’t the whole idea of the show to teach them HOW to shop for, prepare and eat normal meals? Having said all of the above, I do feel it can be encouraging to others to lose weight and it is certainly amazing to see all the contestants when they reappear for the final show.”

Interested to hear your comments on the show!

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