Weight Reducing Diets

If you want to lose weight, you will be surrounded by numerous diets that claim to be the best weight reducing diets available. The thought is indeed tempting, but have you ever wondered whether these diets are really good for your body? A close look at all the currently available diets that claim to lose weight will help you make your decision easier.

Liquid diets

What you take in: The diet plans to replace two meals and one snack per day with a milk shake. This shake is made from eight ounces of skimmed milk and a powdered drink mix. The third meal should have a calorie count of 600 calories and it should be a low fat combination of nutrient dense foods. The milk shake has a calorie content of 200 calories; hence the total daily intake amounts to 1200 calories.

Length: Indefinite

Positives: The milk shake is made using a formulated mix and hence it is well balanced. So combining it with a meal, makes your meal well-balanced.

Negatives: The pounds return once you go back on solid foods. You also miss on the important plant substances that protect you from diseases.

The grapefruit diet

What you take in: Breakfast consists of half a grapefruit along with a cup of black coffee. Lunch includes half a grapefruit along with an egg, cucumber, a bread slice and plain tea or coffee, while dinner you can have two eggs, half a head of lettuce, a tomato, grapefruit and tea or coffee. The total calories amount to about 800 per day.

Length: Three weeks

Positives: The nutritive content of grapefruit is responsible for all the positive points. Grapefruit is low in calories and sodium but very high in vitamin C. Being rich in water and fibre, it gives you a feeling of being full.

Negatives: Any diet restricted to one food cannot be healthy. The grapefruit diet will not provide you with calcium, a vital bone mineral, iron and many other vitamins and minerals required for the proper functioning of the body.

Food combining diets (Beverly hill diet)

What you take in: You eat a generous serving of only fruits for the first 10 days. Half a pound of bread, two tablespoons of butter and three ears of corn follow this on the 11th day. This continues till day 19th when a complete protein such as steak or lobster is included.

Length: three weeks

Positives: It provides you with a greater variety of foods in the later days and hence can be followed easily.

Negatives: This diet has been judged as extremely low in vital nutrients and may even cause diarrhoea, which further results in loss of nutrients from the body. This diet promotes muscle breakdown to cope with the protein deficiencies.

Cabbage soup diet

What you take in: Drink cabbage soup to your heart's content along with a specific food in unlimited or fixed amounts as specified. On day 1 you can have any fruit except banana to any amount. Day 2 is the vegetables day, which includes a baked potato. On day 3 you can have fruits and vegetables except potato. Day 4 allows you to have a maximum of eight bananas along with skimmed milk. From day 5 onwards you can have non-vegetarian food. On day 6 you can have six tomatoes along with a maximum of 20 ounces of beef, chicken or fish. This is followed by unlimited beef, chicken or fish on day 6. Day 7 is the cereal day and you can have brown rice, vegetables and unsweetened fruit juice.

Length: One week

Positives: You will lose weight quickly while eating as much as you like.

Negatives: Being too low in complex carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins and minerals, this diet results in weakness and a decreased ability to concentrate.

Sugar busters

What you take in: You eat all food other than those high in refined sugars. These foods include potatoes, corn, white rice, white bread, beets, carrots and sugar in most forms (moderate amounts of fructose and lactose can be taken). The total calorie intake should amount to 1200 calories per day.

Length: indefinite

Positives: You decrease your reliance to refined foods, which is the main aim for overall good health. You take in complex carbohydrates as a result of which the fibre intake increases. Fibre has numerous beneficial effects on the body.

Negatives: There is no scientific evidence of fact that increased sugar intake is associated with increase in weight. So you lose weight because of calorie restriction and not solely due to low refined carbohydrates.

Whatever diet you ultimately choose is a call you have to make. But before taking a decision remember to evaluate the pros and cons carefully.