If you categorize foods as “good” and “bad” you’ve fallen prey to the diet industry’s misinformation program, and have started to ignore your body’s internal cues.  Ignoring your internal signals is far worse than eating one of the foods that you may have put on your “S-list.”

Now the diet industry hasn’t been alone in convincing people to stop trusting their instincts and internal cues; diet “experts” and too many personal trainers have helped.  The result is that a huge segment of the population has been turned into chronic dieters, and this kind of dieting has led to a whole host of eating disorders.

The worst eating disorder is chronic dieting.  I’ll repeat for clarity; chronic dieting is an eating disorder.  People who always are on a diet and are members of the “Diet de Jour Club” aren’t able to make their own, healthy choices with regard to what and how they eat. 

There are a whole host of problems that result from chronic dieting, not the least of which is setting people up for failure.  The dirty, big secret about the diet industry is that there are no diets that truly work.  None.  Not one commercially available diet can provide reliable statistics with regard to the guidelines set up by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). 

Not one diet can provide valid stats that reveal:

1)      The percentage of all participants who complete it

2)      The percentage of participants completing the program who achieve various degrees of weight loss

3)      The proportion of that weight loss that is maintained at 1, 3, and 5 years after weight loss has occurred

4)      The type and severity of negative medical effects of dieting, and the number of participants who experienced them

Think about it.  All of those diet books that have been churned out by the likes of Jillian Michaels, Bob Greene, and Dr. Phil and the rest of the so-called “experts” in the field don’t provide this kind of info for consumers.  The programs designed and marketed by personalities are anecdote-based programs and have no basis in sound nutritional philosophy.  In one of her books, Jillian Michaels says that there is no such thing as will power, she tells her clients to throw away all “bad” foods like cookies, tells them to not watch commercials that might set off a craving for a “bad” food and to not taking routes on which fast food restaurants are passed so as to not give in to a craving.  And this is just one recent example of how a “guru” strips people of their natural ability to control their appetites.

The problem is that the more diets people try to follow, the more failure that they’ll experience and this continued failure will continue to break down the individual, both emotionally and physically.  How else can you explain the countless people who say, “Just tell me what to eat.”

This is a complex problem that cannot be easily solved or addressed, and I certainly can’t fix anything in 600 words.  To get countless millions of people to stop relying on diets based on meaningless, disconnected external factors and guidelines is a monumental task.  The first step in this journey is to recognize that our culture of dieting has royally screwed things up. 

If you’re a chronic dieter, take this step now.  Turn off the experts, tune out the gurus and tune back into yourself.

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written by Tracey, August 25, 2007

Thanks for this article! Maintainece is so much harder then losing! It's easy when your in weight loss 'mode'. What I mean is that before I lost the weight,I read so many books on the subject. Most have the same thing in common..good foods and bad foods. Very few allow all things in moderation. That's what I have struggled to learn throughout my weight loss journey..there are no bad foods,only bad diets. It's easy to stay in donuts are bad,one must never eat them..or no ice cream..that's not a diet food..etc.
So much info in the weight loss,nutrition world is blk and white. I wish more books were written on how to maintain a weight loss,or how to eat for life. I think that kind of info would be so much more useful! Lol..like why the French don't get fat..lol
Jeez,I really should write a book. I mean,there is so many levels you go through as you lose weight and learn to maintain. If you can think of any books that I'm speaking of,I'd love to know about them. One of my favorites right now is the Portion Teller Diet. She speaks of all things in moderation. If you have a pancake breakfast,just make sure to keep your carb intake the rest of the day a bit lighter. Maybe a grilled veggie salad for lunch,and for dinner a piece of fish.
Well,sorry for rambling on. I just wanted to explain a bit where I'm coming from with my questions.
Thanks so much for all your good advice and sound nutritional info...I REALLY appreciate it.

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written by Jill, August 22, 2007

I'm so glad you wrote this. Dealing with my own severe eating disorder, being constantly surrounded by a community of chronic dieters does not help to take the focus off of food and weight. People do not realize the extent to which America and many other societies deal with disordered eating now.