So how do you beat a bad diet? Is it really as simple as just “cutting out sugar”? Can you actually just start your diet “tomorrow” or “next week”? And is it even possible to suddenly stop years of poor eating habits cold turkey and switch to a clean and healthy diet?
Sure it is! But in all of my years of experience working in the health and fitness industry, there is only a very small percentage of the population that can actually accomplish all of these things. The majority of people can’t even last a few days never mind a few months without “cheating” on their diets or falling back into old eating habits.
Dieting is a vicious abusive cycle that constantly repeats itself as most diets tend to lead to a restrictive lifestyle full of unpleasant feelings and fluctuating emotions. All of which eventually lead the Dieter to become frustrated with themselves and give up on their quest to become physically fit and healthy.
Do You Understand Your Body?
Your body is not a machine. As much as we like to think of ourselves as indestructible, the reality is that we are human beings. And human beings have thoughts, opinions, emotions and feelings. Human beings also require food and water to function properly. Without either we would eventually die. But our bodies do not require processed sugar to survive. Our bodies do not need trans fats to live. And despite what IIFYM Dieters will tell you, Our bodies do not have to have a fixed amount of macronutrients in our diets to perform at optimal levels
Fad Diets ALWAYS Will Lead to Failure
Intermittent Fasting, South Beach, Atkins, IIFYM, the list goes on. You’ve probably heard about them all. And I’ve studied and researched them all. And my general consensus on all of them is this……….THEY SUCK!!!!!
As I’ve always said, if the diet you’re on, is not sustainable for life, then it will not work. If you are depriving your body of essential nutrients or even non essential nutrients that you just crave from time to time, your diet will eventually fail you. To set yourself up to succeed you need to first be able to identify your weaknesses. Do you prefer sweet or savory foods? Are you a carbaholic or a keto queen? Does your body perform better on more fats or more carbs? And what about protein? Don’t your muscles need LOTS of protein to grow?
Ugh…. My head is starting to hurt again.
Bro Science Making A Comeback
So Intermittent Fasting is suppose to give us more energy. Atkins makes losing weight easy. And IIFYM Dieting allows you to eat pop tarts and pizza on a regular basis while maintaining a six pack year round.
Okay fine. Great. However these self proclaimed nutritional gurus want to sell you on their generic diet/dribble plans doesn’t matter to me. In fact I don’t even care if their “claims” are backed by science and research. All I want to know is if they’re sustainable. Can you go the rest of your life fasting for 12-18 hours each day, everyday? Can you really go the rest of your life without consuming a carbohydrate? And finally, do you really think your heart, arteries and colon will be in good shape if you eat shit food day in and day out, for years on end, because “it fits your macros”?
Factoring in the Factors
So how can we eliminate processed sugar from our diets? How can we decrease simple carbohydrates while increasing our complex carbohydrates that we consume? And do we really need to go low fat to lose fat?
No. No. And No.
Whenever I create a customized nutritional plan for a client there are numerous factors that I take into consideration. Factors such as age, gender and weight are obvious ones. However these are also usually the only factors that fad diets take into consideration and the main factors that some fitness “experts” focus on when designing a diet plan for their client.
But what about lifestyle? How about family history? Does the client have any underlying health issues or physical limitations? These are all things that I need to know when designing an effective and efficient nutritional plan.
Now obviously I cannot explain the entire process that I use when creating a customized plan for a client in a few short blogs, this would be incredibly generic of me. However I can provide you with a few tips that I give to clients to help them transition to their new lifestyle more smoothly and without having to deal with constant relapses of binge eating and poor food choices.
But to do this, you’ll have to check out Part 3 of my 3-part blog next week – “The Life and Times of a Junk Food Junkie……Part 3″;^)
Yours in Good Health,
Nick Cosgrove
Forever Fit Performance