Why Crash Diets Are Dangerous

Posted in Healthy Choices, Uncategorized. Written by yelkaim

Crash diets are diets that normally involve extreme behavior and promise rapid weight loss as a result. Extreme behavior, on a diet, involves cutting a massive amount of calories, eating a diet that involves only one food, juice, or tonic, or taking a weight loss pill or supplement that promises fast results. Rapid weight loss can be anything from 5 to 30 pounds in less than a month (very unnatural.)

Not only are these diets ineffectual for the long term, they are dangerous. For one thing, losing a massive amount of weight in such a small amount of time usually translates to a rapid loss of water and electrolytes. This will leave your body dehydrated, and can even make you shaky, weak, or nauseous.

Another problem with a crash diet is the huge deficit in nutrition that crash dieters experience. Electrolytes, like sodium, magnesium, and potassium are just the beginning. The body can lack iron and calcium, B vitamins, and omega 3’s; all of which promote healthy blood and cell growth. When you diet, your goal should always be to get healthier-not just skinnier.

Getting skinny might make you look better,( although if you just lose water weight, you will still be unhappy with your body because you will retain fat, which is less attractive than muscle) but it is not going to make you healthier, necessarily. A skinny person can still develop illness and disease from a toxic diet.

Being at one’s appropriate weight does not necessarily translate to heart-health, either. If the diet is still high in cholesterol, or if you take a “fat burner” that increases your heart rate, you will still be at risk. Crash diets just don’t amount to healthy, permanent results. And they don’t add up to more energy, either.

In fact, you might find that you are more tired, or even feel worse during and after a crash diet, because your body will not be getting all the things it needs to stay active and alert. Dehydration alone can cause poor energy and lack of focus; how much more so when it is combined with poor nutrition?

A crash diet may sound great and promise results, but we recommend a steadier, healthier form of dieting. A diet should be about more than getting skinny, it should be about looking and feeling your very best, and it should be about permanently changing your eating habits towards something healthier, more natural, and more sustainable.

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