4 Types of Diets to Avoid if Long-Term Weight Loss Is Your Goal
- Dietitian.Lauren Hmede
- Oct 16, 2019
- 2 min read
Introduction:
Healthy weight loss has been linked to many health benefits including lower level of LDL, high HDL and improved cardiovascular health.
Weight maintenance can be even harder than weight loss and re-gaining weight could result in several consequences.
So when you think about weight loss, you need to think about long term maintenance and in this case some diet should be avoided as they result in weight re-gain.
Unhealthy Diets to Avoid:
1. Crash Diets for Quick Weight Loss
Crash diets lead to weight loss on short term so this can make you happy, unfortunately this is unhealthy and unsustainable.
They usually promise a fast weight loss of 1-2 pounds per week and a low calories intake below 1200 calories.
Most of crash diets involve low calories intake per day which lead to weight loss however this will put your body on starvation mode and the result will be a slow metabolism.
Moreover, your body makes more cortisol which is a stress hormone that induce inflammation making future weight-loss attempts even more difficult.
Finally, crash diets result in muscle mass loss and nutritional deficiencies.
2. Diets That Eliminate Entire Food Groups
Diets that eliminate certain food group like fat or carbs they result in a fast weight loss over short term and cause so many consequences on the long term.
For example excluding carbs from the diet result in low vitamins, nutrients, fiber, and phytonutrients intake. Moreover, a high fat diet or keto diet result in poor GI health an cardiovascular problem.
While eliminating fat could result in essential fatty acid deficiency.
It is important for not excluding any food group unless you have a food allergy, intolerance or health condition like celiac disease that requires specific dietary restrictions.
3. Meal-Replacement Diets
Meal replacement like protein shake or bars could result in short term weight loss, but it is not sustainable.
Over time, you're bound to get bored of consuming the same stuff for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and you're likely to revert to your unhealthy eating habits. That's because when you follow a diet that eschews whole foods in favor of pre-packaged, pre-portioned products, you never learn how to prepare healthy meals on your own.
Moreover, meal replacement are not whole food so they are a poor source of vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients and antioxidants.
4. Weight-Loss Plans That Don't Encourage Exercise
Weight loss diet that avoid exercise are not sustainable.
With time, your metabolism will slow down and surely you need muscle-strengthening exercise in order to boost your metabolism.
You need to incorporate both exercise and diet.
What Diets Work for Long-Term Weight Loss?
The best diet that work for long term is a healthy-well-balanced diet that require some changes to your lifestyle while enjoying your food.
This diet is based on a regular exercise, avoidance of processed food and added sugar and choosing whole grains, fruits and vegetables.
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