Why Crash Diets Don't Work - Health - Weight Loss

If you're considering various diets and wondering why the South Beach Diet will yield better results than most other diets, then there are many answers! However, the most accurate answer is that it's because the South Beach Diet is a way to change your eating habits for the rest of your life in a maintainable way. It's not a crash diet, and the truth about crash diets is that, long term, they actually make you more likely to gain and retain extra weight.

Why do people crash diet?People often get into the cycle of crash dieting, which essentially means losing large amounts of weight in short time frames repeatedly, for a number of reasons. The most frequent reason is that they type of diet that causes rapid weight loss isn't one that's a maintainable way of eating. It denies the dieter most types of food, and in some cases even reduces the dieter's daily caloric intake to a level that can't be maintained long term. Once the dieter has been denying him or herself for several weeks, it becomes impossible to keep the severely reduced diet up. However, during those weeks, the dieter lost a significant amount of weight. So after the dieter puts that weight back on, which will almost always happen, he or she resorts to another crash diet to lose it again.

Why do crash diets make you fatter?Crash diets, in fact, when done repeatedly train your body to store fat. When you crash diet, your body recognizes that it's being deprived of nutrients. It starts to slow down its metabolic rate so that it can store those nutrients. It's the body's natural response to wanting to preserve its health, but ultimately a lowered metabolic rate means that you'll burn calories more slowly after your diet and gain even more weight. Additionally, crash diets that deprive your body of food cause food cravings, and those cravings are never for the healthy, diet-friendly foods that you want to be eating! So by crash dieting, you're setting yourself up to crave unhealthy, fattening foods and then metabolize the calories from those foods more slowly. That doesn't sound like a great long term plan of action, does it?

Why is the South Beach Diet different?The South Beach Diet isn't about losing weight quickly, it's about learning to be thin and healthy for a lifetime. You'll go through a type of crash period during the South Beach Diet Phase 1, in which you'll need to eliminate many of the bad fats and bad carbohydrates that you're used to eating from your diet. However, after that, you'll learn to introduce foods into your diet that satisfy your need for carbohydrates and fats in a healthy, maintainable way. Because you're changing your eating habits for the long term, you won't have to deal with rapid shifts in your metabolism or with food cravings (though you will experience cravings in Phase One as your body adjusts).

Don't allow yourself to fall into the habit of crash dieting! It won't ultimately help you lose weight for the long term, and it won't make you healthier. The South Beach Diet, instead, not only trains you to be thin for a lifetime, it also reduces your risk of heart disease and other health conditions. Don't choose crash dieting, choose health!

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