7 Weight Loss Methods that DON'T Work

Have you been trying hard to lose weight but ended up with more pounds than you started with?

Unfortunately, many of us turn to these wrong 'slimming' methods first when decide to lose weight. I wish someone would have told me years ago that these methods actually lead to more weight gain and puts my health at risk. Needless to say, while sticking to any of these methods you are hardly capable of enjoying life. And for some individuals these methods can easily lead to eating disorders which are destructive to health, mind, body and life. So if you spot your friend or your teenage daughter following any of the pseudo-slimming methods, definitely let them read this article!

1. STARVING AND FASTING

This includes:

• fasting
• ignoring hunger and intentionally going the whole day without any food (or maybe having just some very light snacks)
• any severe calorie restriction despite feeling hungry
• not eating after certain hour, e.g. after 5 or 6 pm or even after 1pm despite feeling hungry

If you intentionally ignore a natural signal that your body sends you to say that it is hungry, your body assumes there is a famine and so cleverly adapts to it by slowing down the rate at which calories are burnt to conserve energy. Basically, your body does everything to keep you alive, which is your genetically built-in mechanism.

When you start eating as usual again, the metabolic rate has now changed to a slower rate. Your body holds on to its fat tissue and makes new fat deposits in case you'll starve again. That's how you eventually gain even more weight. The worst thing is when you do crash dieting or fasting repeatedly, as your metabolism eventually becomes resistant to fat burn and your set point becomes higher, which means it will be even harder for you to lose weight in future. As you can see it does totally the opposite of what you desired to achieve!

Needless to say, prolonged hunger is not fun. Plus, if you starve yourself, chances are you'll eventually fall off the diet wagon. If not on a first day, then on some other day. It is just a matter of time, but it will eventually happen as simply you cannot stay forever on a regime that's so far away from being healthy, natural and balanced. And the more and longer you starve yourself, the more likely you'll fall off in an extreme way. It's so easy to skip breakfast in the morning or forget about lunch, but in the evening your body will demand everything you deprived it of during the day. Apart from this higher power of mother nature, psychological factors have a big role to play, such as feeling of deprivation, stress and any emotional discomfort. Most common lapses take form of super-large heavy dinners and generally eating in triple quantities. And if you were sturdy enough to skip your dinner, there's a big chance of going and eating whatever there is in a fridge in the middle of the night! Disrupted sleep caused by waking up 5 times a night from hunger and lethargy the next day are included in the package. And as mentioned above, you'll put on even more weight as your body now converts every single bite you into a fat tissue. It's a vicious circle and a game you can't win.

Remember, that side effects of crash dieting are dangerous: gallstones, heart disease and thrombosis. Some of them can be lethal, so let's not fool around.

For similar reasons, fasting is a no-win game. If it has been prescribed to you by your doctor for medical reasons and your doctor approved that it is appropriate for your health, age and weight, then carefully follow your doctor's instructions. Otherwise, fasting is a much more complex regime than may seem, being appropriate only in rare individual cases and has its own strict rules. After you break the fast, your metabolism works very differently. You are in that 'survival' mode described above, which makes you highly predisposed to getting the lost pounds back and even some more as a 'bonus'.

2. STICKING TO CALORIE COUNTING

In reality, the kind of food matters so much more than its calorific value alone.

Let me show you an example.

OPTION A (left): Raw sugar-free muesli with berries, some nuts and plain low fat yoghurt (380kcal)
and

OPTION B (right): A croissant (288 kcal) and a small skinny latte (109 kcal)

Breakfast options A and B may have the same calories, but due to different metabolic pathways, Option B will trigger fat storing hormones, while Option A will not. Option B is much higher in sugar, saturated fats, contains trans fats and has poor nutritional value and is far less satiating than Option A. It will make you retain metabolic waste, disrupt natural detoxification, adversely affect liver, cardiovascular system, energy level and mood, and in the long run may deprive you of beauty assets like shiny hair and glowing skin.

 
But here's a BIG disclaimer - I am not advocating to stop controlling portion sizes and start overeating. My point is that the mathematics of calorie counting is quite blinkered and absolutely with no regrets can be left in the past. (Yay!)

3. MONODIETS

When you eat only few 'allowed' products the whole day (for example, only cucumbers or apples or low-fat yoghurt), you severely deprive your body of all other necessary macronutrients, minerals and vitamins. You may eat a lot of 'allowed foods' ignoring the real needs of your body, but you will merely feel stuffed and still hungry. Or in other words - overfed and undernourished. The truth is your body is very smart and it knows what it needs at a particular time. Trying to deceive your body by giving it an apple when it needs quality protein never works. It adds additional stress and puts you into a 'famine' mode (surprise, surprise!) as there is a shortage of required nutrients. All of that releases fat-storing hormones into your bloodstream, which help you survive but also help you gain more pounds when you revert to your usual eating habits. (see 1. Starving and Fasting above)

Many monodiets, short-term diets  as well as fasting or any severe calorie restrictions may offer quick weight loss, but the loss that you'll see mostly be just water. Plus, you're likely to lack energy for simple everyday things, feel dizzy and not able to exercise. Any monodiet is not balanced nor safe or sensible instrument for a long-term weight loss or weight control. And yes, be prepared for super cravings once you come off the monodiet! A take-home message: stay away from any bizzare eating habits.

4. GOING ON A FAD DIET

Many people jump from one popular diet to another, but by now you can see why some diets disrupt metabolic and fat burning processes. The worst offenders are short-term diets or miracle '5-day / 7-day' diets turning your life into a torment. These short-term diets are far from being suitable for everyone as your age, weight, health condition and even ethnic background play a massive role. Secondly, it is a big illusion that after following a 5-day diet a person can lose all unwanted weight and keep it off forever after going back to your old eating habits. If you think "hey, but I can simply do this 5-day diet several times a year whenever I need it", I can assure you this is a direct way to eventually gaining even more weight in the end of that experimental year and getting stretchmarks all over your body.

Then there are these meal replacement diets based on specially manufactured low-calorie shakes,  soups, bars and supplements, which is no more than processed dead chemical food with artificial flavours. This is a very expensive way to lose some weight in the beginning (again, mostly water) caused by severe calorie restriction and is particularly ineffective. As these plans do not teach you how to eat sensibly in the long run, most people regain all lost weight and even more once they revert to normal human food. Severe calorie restriction have been shown to cause mineral deficiencies and in some cases can sadly result in sudden death. None of the meal replacement programmes are supervised by medically qualified staff and if your consult your GP, I really doubt that you'd get an approval to follow such a programme. Meal replacement plans are just a cash-making driven business. You are a human and you are designed to eat real food and you can absolutely be slim and healthy on it. 

"Miracle", short-term or meal replacement diets are not suitable for long-term weight control. You should seek a practical solution, adopt a new lifestyle plan and make a long-term commitment.  

A healthy, well-balanced diet based on whole real foods is your ticket to a permanently slim body and great health. I'm talking both physical and mental health as healthy balanced regime won't turn your days into hell. Sane mind is happy mind, right?

5. DETOX

Some detox plans may help cleanse your liver thus making fat burn more efficient.  A special emphasis on a word "some" here, because a random juice cleanse / juice fast or taking special pills or substances are out of this category. The juice fast is equivalent to monodieting because you only load yourself with carbs and your body thinks a famine time has come (see 1. Starving and Fasting and 3. Monodiets above). If you go on such juice fast detox, be prepared to feel dizzy and lose your muscle mass (vs. fat) due to lack of protein. In addition, such detox diets are far from being appropriate for everyone. They can aggravate or raise a risk of diabetes, heart and kidney problems, gout, anemia and many more. If you suffer from any illnesses, radical detox or juice fast may make things worse as it is extremely stressful for your organism. If you had any vitamin, mineral or nutrient deficiencies, they will become even worse. As for taking detox pills, this is no more than just a support of a multi-billion industry. The right detox plan that indeed helps cleanse the liver or enhance liver function should be based on certain foods, for example, those that contain sulfur. You can buy these products at your groceries store and incorporate them into your daily meals. There's no need to splash your cash on detox pills, powders or supplements and there's no need to fast. 

The views on detox are very controversial, but if we are speaking of detox as a weight loss tool, then I will have to disappoint you. Detox, as its name suggests, is a plan helping your body get rid of toxins, waste material and retained fluids. But detox does not flush out or dissolve fat deposits from your body.  Detox is auxiliary measure only. Going on a detox for several days and then returning to your old eating habits is unreasonable and does absolutely nothing towards reducing fat deposits in the long run. Nor it is necessary for optimal health.

Only a balanced healthy eating plan and adequate exercise are proven ways to burn off fat. Yes, weight loss won't happen overnight, you'll have to stick to it for much more than just 3 or 5 days, but weight loss will be permanent and agony-free which are huge advantages. Secondly, a healthy diet based on plenty of clean water, whole fresh veg and fruit, wholegrains instead of refined grains, sugars, processed junk, sweets, colas and other commercial drinks as well as giving up smoking and cutting back on salt, alcohol and caffeine is enough to help your body keep eliminating toxins and waste. This kills two birds with one stone. And I'll repeat - no need to fast and no need to buy detox supplements.

6. BELIEVING EVERYTHING YOU READ ON THE INTERNET

Be very careful with any non-pro information you read or hear and think twice before deciding to trust! There are so many people who write and advise on weight loss based on how they succeeded (or not), but many of them have no academic background in nutrition or medicine, there are no scientific references to what they say and they are not weight loss or health experts. Listening to their advices can easily lead to is serious harm to your health. The same applies to the abundant web articles freely available online. Some of them talk absolute non-sense!

Plus, there are some trends being born in the internet society from time to time having absolutely no scientific basis to say the least. One of a very popular myths out there is a statement that lemons / grapefruits / vinegar/ iced water / help burn fat. Ok, this is high time we got over this fable that is so last century. There is no scientific evidence that these foods actually burn or dissolve fat. Fat burn is much more complex than that and occurs under certain circumstances when fat-burning hormones are released and no fat-storing hormones are present at the same time. If you drink lemon water after waking up and then eat refined grains or load up on sugar or fat during the day, don't expect any shift in your weight.

Final note about free info you read on the web - what might sound healthy and harmless may not be suitable for your organism. Even if you consider yourself 100% healthy a particular eating plan can develop unpleasant symptoms or diseases. I got myself a gastritis this way, I've been there!

Bottom line - be wise and triple check. 

7. SLIMMING PILLS OR TEAS

Don’t even try pills (or powders, drinks, teas or any other substance) that claim to burn fat.
Full stop.

The side effects can leave irreversible damage on your health. Even an innocent herbal supplement can lead to severe hormonal chaos which will be very hard to restore later (if at all possible!).

I personally believe that manufacturers of those pills or teas don’t want you to lose weight! They want you to keep buying their products forever. Because if you do lose weight, you won't need their product, they will lose clients and consequently won’t make any money so their business will die. Simple!

As for appetite suppressants – these can never be a long-term solution. Yes, an appetite suppressant mutes down hunger signals that your body send you. However, it is actually important to learn to listen to those signals. The truth is there is no need to starve to be thin and healthy!

You need to become friends with your body – feed it when it is hungry and stop once your physical hunger (vs emotional hunger) is satisfied.

You will face this challenge anyway once you come off the appetite suppressant pill. So why not skip financial expenditure and start practicing intuitive eating right now? Direct your attention to planning on how to avoid overeating and emotional eating. Yes, it is work, but a very well paid one!

And again, the range of side effects is so broad, that taking appetite suppressant pill all your life is extremely unsafe and unreasonable. Some doctors do prescribe it to obese patients for a short term to kick start their weight loss. But because the effect of appetite suppressant pill wears off over time, you WILL need to work out a long-term solution and learn intuitive eating anyway.