It is obvious that most people do not grasp why diets fail them when you see all of the obesity in todays modern world. The majority of western society now has a terrible obesity problem which is only getting worse and worse every year.
The food industry as a whole have flavor scientists whose sole function is to find ways to make foods more and more palatable. These people work for restaurants, junk food producers, and even grocery stores now. The entire food industry has an emphasis on making foods as tasty as they can, while ignoring how nutritious they are. It is hard enough to lose weight when we are addicted to carbs, but when we are also hooked on great flavors, the job gets even tougher.
Your task should be on educating yourself about nutrition in order to make healthy choices for yourself, and understand that some foods you really need to just give up. If you do not understand this point, you are doomed to fail. It may not happen right away, but you will revert back to obesity over time if you do not heed this warning. You should also know that organizations that charge you a fee to lose weight on their program, and who also allow you to continue eating poor food choices, do not have your best interest in mind. These businesses only care about taking your money which you naively hand over in the hope of losing weight for good. Would it not be reasonable to expect an absolute majority of people paying for commercial weight loss programs should be successful at weight loss and management?
The Reason Diets Fail Us
We become fat not only because we eat too many calories for our needs, but also because simple carbohydrates and sugar make us so.
Protein does not make us fat, and fats are not the evil culprits as some people might want to believe. For instance, how many people have you personally known who went onto a low fat diet, only to fail miserably. The problem with low fat diets is that they are usually relatively high in carbohydrates. The simple truth is, we lose weight and keep it off when we restrict our intake of carbohydrates.
When we get serious about losing weight whether through diet and/or exercise, we almost always make changes to what and how much we eat. Whether you realize it or not, your weight loss comes from a reduction in your carbohydrate intake. simply because they are the easiest to eliminate. We stop drinking beer, and quit eating sweet treats to cut our caloric intake, but these calories are carbohydrates that are exceptionally fattening.
When we stop drinking sugar sweetened drinks and fruit juices, we replace them with other drinks that do not contain sugars. When we do this, we are not only eliminating calories, we are also eliminating fructose which is specifically responsible for making those soft drinks and juices sweet. When we quit eating sweet treats, we might think we are eliminating fats that get a bad rap. However, once again, we are eliminating simple carbohydrates with an emphasis again on fructose. Fructose comprises half of the make up of refined sugar. Diets fail us when we do not cut out sugar and simple carbs.
When we go onto a calorie restricted diet, we are cutting the total number of carbohydrates we are consuming too. That is just simple math. If we cut our calories by half, we also have cut our carbohydrates by about half. Because carbohydrates usually comprise the largest portion of our nutritional habits, that is where we will see the greatest reduction of macro-nutrients. Again, this is simple arithmetic.
When we diet, we are cutting our intake of fattening simple carbohydrates from our diet. This is the reason you lose weight. You have cut your intake of calories and carbs which cause you to lose water weight along with body fat. Every gram of carbohydrate you consume causes you to retain three grams of water, which is the only reason we lose weight so quickly in the first ten days or so.
When you begin eating low fat foods, you are not helping yourself in the least. The reason is, food producers will remove fat in order to remove some of the calories, but then they add sugar into the product in order to make it more palatable. For instance, when fat is removed from yogurt, it is usually replaced with high fructose corn syrup which is only going to sabotage your efforts! You might innocently believe that your low fat treat is a heart healthy snack, but the reality is it is only going to make you fatter because of the added carbohydrates and fructose.
Our diets fail us because they restrict foods that are not the culprits that make us fat. Protein builds muscle and tissue repair and replacement. Fats help our hormonal balance and assist with uptake of vitamins and minerals. Those carbohydrates and sugars that you are still eating are what spikes your blood sugar and insulin. Your diet will only last as long as you can stand being in a state of semi-starvation. And that is not going to be too long when you keep consuming simple carbs and sugar.
Diets fail us when we do not make changes that work towards our goals. When we reduce our consumption of protein and fats, we starve our bodies of energy and protein required to rebuild tissues. The resultant hunger which will always accompany this only brings about a failure to succeed at weight loss and management.