Crash Diets Often Lead to Dreaded Weight Cycling

Although it is easy to claim that dieting is rarely effective in the long run and may do more harm than good, it is important to understand that this is not due to a lack of willpower but a lack of understanding about metabolic suppression and how the brain manages the body's set point. The more weight that you want to permanently lose, the more lifestyle changes you must be willing to make. Most people's bodies are simply not wired to make weight loss easy, but sustainable weight loss is doable if you're willing to work hard enough. Moreover, despite your best efforts to use self-control and manage your eating habits, it is easy to experience setbacks that can sabotage your weight loss goals.

Whether you have a problem with overeating or cheating between meals, understanding dieting setbacks is essential to managing your weight loss plan, including:

• WEIGHT CYCLING - Research shows that losing weight quickly and gaining it back repeatedly confuses your body and makes it more difficult to lose weight on subsequent attempts. Crash diets can cause muscle loss along with a reduction in stored fat.
• CULTURAL NORMS - Many Americans have abandoned hope that a diet is a temporary change of eating habits that will allow for adjustments to their weight. This has caused a cultural shift in seeing strict dieting or fad dieting as an effective way of achieving permanent weight loss.
• BAD EATING HABITS - It is very easy to develop bad eating habits over time and these can be difficult to break. You get accustomed to starting your morning with a cup of coffee and a cupcake. By the afternoon, you've become sluggish and start to give in causing the guilt about your bad eating habits to take over.
• SLOWER METABOLISM - It is very difficult to lose fat quickly without suffering a loss of metabolically active muscle mass too. Eating from a personalized menu plan can increase instead of reduce your metabolic rate.
• LACKS SUSTAINABILITY - One of the biggest criticisms of fad diets is that they are not sustainable for the long term. However, new research has found that a moderately low-carb diet is more effective than strict calorie counting for controlling blood sugar levels and improving lipid profiles.
• EXAGGERATING THE NEGATIVES - As long as you focus on the negatives or setbacks, you will never feel empowered by the new skills that you've developed. If you make a mistake, correct it and move on. Instead of exaggerating the negatives, review the positive things you did that day.

You may need to give up on the idea of perfect control of your diet to improve your overall self-control by eliminating food-related stress and anxiety. From the first forbidden food in the Garden Eden, food restrictions have led to weight management problems. One of the most useful approaches to permanent weight loss is to review your own success stories. If you've adopted a mindful attitude toward eating, you will constantly be applying knowledge about yourself, such as the best portion sizes to keep the weight off. Your diet should be personalized to meet your body's specific energy needs. Let the pros at Metabolic Research Center show you how to increase your metabolism by eating healing foods.