Today, I want to talk about a dieting trend that’s been around for many years. My inspiration for this came from an image posted to Instagram by a so-called influencer earlier in the year. I’ve linked it down below for you to see:
It’s impressive, right? Look at how much weight this person lost in such a short space of time! It’s borderline inspirational; how can you copy them and achieve such incredible goals? Oh, what’s that? The caption says they were on a strict diet of around 1,200 calories a day. If you instinctively think that’s crazy, you’re right, it is. 1200 calories a day is an example of a dangerous crash diet. This is where you restrict yourself far too much, barely eating any food. For context, men will need around 2,500 calories per day just to function correctly, and women need about 2,000. Now, these are average figures, but it shows how ridiculous this diet is.
Crash diets are a terrible trend, and this photo really irked me as you know that lots of people will try to copy it. Don’t be tempted to follow a diet like this; here are three reasons it’s an awful idea:
Not sustainable
Eating 1,200 calories a day just isn’t sustainable. It makes you hate your life, and you feel hungry all the time. After you achieve your weight loss goals, what will happen? You will have a massive increase in calories as you can’t stick to the diet, leading to more weight gain. So, all your work is for nothing in the long term.
Excess skin
The previous photo doesn’t show any excess skin, which leads me to believe they either lied about the diet or had a tummy tuck. You’re probably looking at that term and wondering, what is it? A tummy tuck is a procedure to remove excess skin/fat from your belly. There’s nothing wrong with this, and it can help many people who have lost loads of weight. With a crash diet, you shed so much weight in such a small space of time. Your skin doesn’t have time to adjust, which means you will have saggy and loose skin around your body. This can damage your self-confidence, and it’s avoided by losing weight more gradually over a sustainable period.
Loss of muscle
Crash diets will ensure that you lose fat and other body tissues – this includes muscles. So, while you lose weight, you also lose all of your muscle tone and size. It can make you look far skinnier and unhealthy. Plus, a lack of muscle mass reduces your metabolic rate, making it harder to burn calories in the future. It’s simply not a good or healthy way of losing weight.
Overall, you will see hardly any benefits from a crash diet. Yes, it will let you drop a few dress sizes, but at what cost? You’ll be tired due to a lack of energy, your body is devoid of essential nutrients, and you can’t keep it up forever. It’s much better to follow a balanced diet where you restrict your calories by around 400 per day. In essence, burn 400 calories more than you eat!
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