Maple Syrup Diet - Sweet As It Sounds?

The maple syrup diet has a great name, but unfortunately that's pretty much the only good thing about it!

Originally written as a detoxification process, the user takes a mixture of lemon juice water, mixed with cayenne pepper and maple syrup, but not the sort you put on pancakes unfortunately!

The weight loss that results was initially noted as a side effect to the detoxing - but it's hardly surprising since the maple syrup diet only gives you around 500 calories a day.

You could eat *anything* and lose weight if you only ate 500 calories!

It's just not sensible clearly.
It isn't sustainable as the plan itself says, recommending no more than 10 days.

The biggest celebrity user, Beyonce, says she wouldn't recommend it and only did it as an extreme for professional purposes.

There are no long term benefits from this, because as soon as you stop, the weight loss, which would have been largely water, just goes back on.

This puts you back at square 1, unless you stay on the plan, which is obviously not possible!

That just makes it a pointless exercise in my view, so the next time you think of maple syrupm consider it a *very* occasional treat, and nothing to do with weight loss or dieting!

Don't Get Hoodwinked By Hoodia!

Hoodia sounds great - a natural substance that blocks your appetite.
Sounds great, quick, go out and buy lots, right?

Er, no.

It's claimed that the plant Hoodia is eaten by African tribesmen to suppress their appetite if they're going for a long hunting trip.

Actually though, there is no scientific study that backs this claim up.
There are plenty of scientists who say that even if it does work, the only way to get enough into your system to have any effect is to eat the raw plant, so the dried powders and patches are, well, useless!

Anyway, let's be sensible about this, the healthy way to lose weight is not to take something that stops your appetite so that you just don't eat!
This is ludicrous thinking, never mind the dangers of having your thirst quashed too!

The dangers of dehydration should never be underestimated.

What happened to good old eating less calories and exercising more?
Why can't people just spend the money they'd waste on hoodia, and buy fruit instead, so that when they are hungry, they can just eat the fruit!

No need to put any 'apple patches' to your arm, or pop any pills, just go to the store and buy an apple.

Just make sure you don't get hoodwinked by hoodia!

Health & happiness,
Gordon
http://www.gordonbryan.com/dietinfo
http://www.gordonbryan.com
http://www.transformyourlifenow.com

The Least Popular Diet?

It makes me smile when I see all the diet books with their hypey claims on the cover.
Of course it also makes the authors and publishers smile, because they know these books will fly off the shelves.

One diet never seems to shout these sales messages, and it's almost the runt of the litterm abdn it goes like this -

- Eat less calories, sticking to a correct level for your age , height and sex.
- Eat more fruit and fibre, and less saturated fat and sugar.
- Burn more calories by exercising more.

Now *that* does nor make for popular diet - but it *does* make for one that works.
It's a simple choice - follow the crowd, or follow the facts.

Health & happiness,
Gordon
http://www.gordonbryan.com/
http://www.gordonbryan.com/dietinfo
http://www.transformyourlifenow.com/

The Lemonade Diet - Sucks!

This is a diet that is surprisingly popular - surprising because it's shockingly bad!

Written in the 1970s as a detox plan, the lemonade diet tag only took hold when people discovered the amount of weight they lost.

It's hardly difficult to lose weight with this one, because you basically starve yourself!
You live for around 10 days on water, with lemon, cayenne pepper and maple syrup.

That's it!

Er, doesn't that mean you don't get enough calories or nutrients to survive?
Yes, that's exactly what it means, which is why you lose weight!

It's also the reason why it's totally unsustainable and totally unhealthy.

To sum up, steer clear of the lemonade diet, you know what it involves now, and it sucks!

Never Buy Another Diet

The diet industry is huge, a massive money making machine, and the reason for this can be summed up in one word - laziness...

Most people are overweight because they don't do enough exercise if any at all, the laziness has taken over.
Add that to a bad food balance and you have weight gain.

Of course people like this would rather not have to put in actual effort to lose weight, so when a new book with great marketing promises them 'miracle' weight loss, the wallet opens and the purchase is made.

Of course these diets won't work by just buying the book, so when the weight loss doesn't happen in a 'miracle' the idea is forgotten.

Only forgotten long enough though for the *next* diet book to cross their path...

The cycle starts again and another book is bought.
The result will be the same and the coffers of the diet industtry get fuller.

Of course the lazy people know deep down that they don't need any more diet books - a simple reduction of calories and/or better food choices plus some light exercise will get that weight off.

South Beach Diet - Rubbish

The South Beach Diet claims to be not just another fad diet, and not just another low carb diet.

All well and good, but then it goes on to show that it is exactly another fad, low carb diet.

The 1st phase is based on cutting out almost all carbs.
There is no huge increase in saturated fat, which is a huge drawback from the Atkins, but nevertheless, your weight loss in this first phase comes from not much more than low calorie intake.

That initial loss will just go back on, because it isn't a plan that is sustainable.

Also, there are some glaring contradictions in the book, not ideal if you are trying to stick rigidly to it!
In the first phase it's recommended not to eat bananas and yet one of the deserts is banana dipped in chocolate sauce.

The book says that whole foods are better, and then says that mashe potoato is better than a whole potato baked.

Here's something you might want to see in a diet - don't worry about portion sizes.
Great news, except the South Beach then goes on to suggest you do worry about portion size.

I'm not impressed.
The plan claims to have been scientifically tested, but doesn't reference any test for you to go and check.

You'll lose weight at first on this one, and it isn't as out and out dangerous as some others, but it won't teach you anything you don't already know, and is never as good as a plan which gives you a permanent food choice change.

Do Crash Diets Work?

Do crash diets work?

It's a question often asked by people thinking about dieting, and there's a short and a long answer...

The short answer is 'yes'.

The long answer is 'yes, but you need to know why!'

The name gives it away - the crash diet.

The crash diet principle works on the basis that you basically starve yourself.
The programmes last for maybe 7-10 days, and promise big weight loss.

You will indeed lose a lot of weight, but it's the reason for this which is the concern.

Whereas most crash diets say they work due to some food mixing or increased calorie burning nonsense, the fact is that they work by not giving your body enough daily calories to survive, prompting your body to dig into stored fat reserves.

Combine this with water loss which is always the first to come off, and there's your weight loss.

The trouble is that as soon as you stop the diet, which you'll have to or else you'll end up hospital quickly, the water goes right back on, as does any weight loss you had, because your eating habits haven't changed one bit.

Even worsem you have now trained your body to think another famine may be in the way, so it will actually store *more* fat than it did before!

So, yes, crash diets work, but you only go on one if you're too stupid to know any better!

Steer clear.