TV diet shows made us fatter

The theme of the article: This article was a double page spread, with photos, of three women who had very publicly lost weight on TV diet shows and then put it all back on – and more. Nicola Duffett, an Eastenders actress, had been on “Celebrity Fit Club”, where she went from just over 12 stone to 11 stone. At the time of the article she weighed 13 st 7lb! Shelly Stevenson appeared on Channel 4’s “Fit Farm”. She lost 10 lbs, from her starting weight of 12 stone 1lb, but was also 13st 7lb at the time of appearing in the article. Lorna Slater appeared on Gillian McKeith’s “You are what you eat” and lost 21 lbs from her starting weight of 13 st 7lb. She has now returned to her original weight.

What these three guinea pigs have found is that dieting actually makes you fat. There are 3 things that happen directly when you try to lose weight and 3 things that happen indirectly and all of them make your body want more food and need less food. These things combined mean that it is extremely difficult to lose weight by eating less and you are virtually guaranteed to put the weight back on if you do lose any.

When we eat less, our body stores fat, uses up lean muscle and slows our metabolisms. This simultaneously reduces the body’s need for fuel, so that we get to the point where we put on weight consuming the amount of fuel that used to maintain our weight. Another dimension is that our body tries to get us to eat, to reverse the fuel deficit, and we also develop the three medical conditions that cause insatiable food cravings. There are many things acting together to get us to eat more and to slow our metabolisms, so we increase our desire for calories/fuel and reduce our need for calories/fuel. This is why we put weight back on.

My two books, “Why do you overeat? When all you want is to be slim” and “Stop Counting calories & Start Losing Weight” explain exactly what happens when you try to eat less and do more (i.e. follow a traditional diet) and how your body acts in the exact opposite way to how you want it to behave. It increases you DESIRE for food and reduces your NEED for food at the same time – a fatal combination for people trying to lose weight. Read either of these books if you want to see why “Diet shows will make you fatter” and what you must do instead if you want to lose weight and keep it off.


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