Nutrition is such a young field; it seems one year something is good for you, then the next year it’s not. It’s all so confusing and frankly, overwhelming. I choose to keep things simple in my office and that’s exactly how we succeed. We don’t fall for the latest and greatest fad diet trends. Here are just a few examples of diet and nutritional myths to avoid:
- I need to go on a diet to lose weight. Dieting is the best way to gain weight. Psychologically, it’s terrible. We sacrifice, deny, and deprive to get to our goal weight, then we go right back to bad habits because the torture is too much to sustain forever. Plus, we eat with a vengeance and regain every ounce back plus more. This method is absolutely terrible for our body and causes diseases in the long run in addition to weight gain….the very thing we try to resolve.
- Low-fat & fat-free helps lose weight. Low fat and fat-free products only makes us gain weight because it’s loaded with sugar and chemicals which prompts our body to add weight to dilute the toxins so we don’t die. Fat is not the biggest culprit to weight gain. It’s actually sugars and chemicals. Enjoy the real stuff your great grandmother would recognize.
- Skipping meals helps lose weight. So many of us starve to death in order to lose weight. What we don’t realize is that a lack of calories actually tells our body to slow down metabolism and store fat because it’s apparently “famine” season. We train our body to be less efficient at metabolism for survival. Let’s go back to eating real food and enjoying it instead of torturing our body to only TEMPORARILY lose weight. So NOT worth it!!!
- Going carb-free helps lose weight. There’s just no need to take out an entire food group, only to crave it like crazy, and binge on it more often then we’d like to admit. Sound familiar? We have to get the right carbs, not too much, and…we often lose weight going carb-free mainly because it means we aren’t over indulging in donuts, pizza, pastas, sandwiches, and all things overly carb-heavy.
- Alternative sugars helps lose weight. Every year there are ads for a new, healthy sweetener but in the end a sweetener is a sweetener. It’s still refined sugar with not enough fiber to slow down the metabolism. So, no matter how unprocessed and how “healthy,” it’s still a sweetener which turns into fat and our brain craves more and more of it. Studies show we are more addicted to sugars than cocaine. Crazy!!!
Dieting simply does NOT work. Understand the science and psychology behind how you will succeed for life maintaining weight loss and most importantly, loving your body. Get a free health consultation at www.HappyFoodHealth or (619) 876-2655.
~Samantha Hua, Health & Nutrition Coach, San Diego, CA
