The term dieting often gets a bad rap which is sometimes obvious in the sneers and giggles you may observe from friends when you inform them that you are on a diet. Some people’s negative reaction to the term dieting is partly because of their misunderstanding of what a diet is and partly because most people are unsuccessful at dieting. Dieting is an adjustment or regulation to a person’s intake of food to achieve a set goal either for medical reasons or cosmetic weight loss. Most people correlate dieting with losing weight but there are many different types of diets for many different aims. For example Olympic swimmers are some of the fittest and slimmest athletes but a male Olympic swimmer’s average daily calorie intake on their training diet is 8,000 to 10,000 calories per day. The average man consumes just north of 2,500 calories per day.  People go on diets for various reasons such as to reduce cholesterol, reduce blood pressure, lose baby fat, build muscle, shape out for their wedding day. However most people go on diets in order to lose weight, look and feel better about themselves. The problem with dieting for weight loss is that most people are unsuccessful in their attempts to shed the pounds for many reasons. The sum of reasons is that they misunderstand the application and aim of a weight loss diets and so remain frustrated in their attempts to lose weight. As a weight loss consultant I find many of clients who come to me have tried several diets and have failed. When I probe further with questions of what exactly they did to lose weight I find many of them making the same mistakes or errors.

Here are some of the common diet myths that are practised today. Some of these practises I am sure many readers will be shocked to know is not true.

1. Myth – Eating late at night causes you to put on weight – this is perhaps the most common dieting myth. The flawed logic is that is if you eat late at night since you are largely inactive in the evening hence you will not burn off what you have eaten and as a result you inevitably put on weight. This is misleading because the truth is in order to lose weight a person must simply burn more calories than he or she consumes in a given period. Hence it doesn’t matter that you consume your calories late in the evening. What really matters is the sum total of how many calories you consume in a 24 hour period. I admit that a lot of slim people follow this rule as a force of habit but the fact is usually people who avoid late meals then to be more disciplined in their food consumption than overweight people but understand correlation is not causation! If your late dinner is a healthy portioned low carb and low fat meal then there is no reason why you would gain weight. If you are still in doubt then google a study at the Dunn Nutrition Centre in Cambridge. Volunteers were placed in a whole body calorimeter, which measures calories burned and stored. They were fed with a large lunch and small evening meal for one test period, then a small lunch and large evening meal during a second test period. The results revealed the large meal eaten late at night did not make the body store more fat.
2. Myth – Eating only fruits for a meal helps to lose weight – This is another ill advised practice that I teach my clients to avoid. The flawed logic is that fruits are generally healthy, light, nutritious etc……..hence it’s better to avoid ‘heavier’ food items in your meals if you are trying to lose weight e.g. carbohydrate, proteins, fats, oils etc. Hence eating fruits allow you lose weight. Unfortunately this is not just flawed but very unhealthy our bodies need to have all major food groups with every meal. We need our carbs, proteins, oils and vegetables to keep our bodies healthy and working at an optional level to burn fat and produce energy. Fruits are healthy but apart from the vitamins and nutrients are essentially fruit sugar (fructose), fibre and water. Eating a meal of just fruits is consuming large amounts of sugar. They have a relatively high glycemic index number i.e. ranking of various carbohydrates on how quickly they release glucose into the blood stream. Our body does not need this excessive readily available sugar (energy) unless it is undertaking a high octane activity. Hence the excess sugar is quickly turned into fat for storage. Our meals should always have a balance diet approach with healthy carbs, fats, proteins and fruits included to ensure we get all the nutrients we need and the energy is released into our blood stream gradually over the day.
3. Myth – Drinking Fruit Juices instead of Soda will help you lose weight.  I see a lot of my clients trying to lose weight proudly tell me that they avoid sodas and drink fruit juices instead. I have bad news but if you are trying to lose weight, drinking fruit juices is almost as bad as drinking sodas. Instead of drinking juice, its far healthier to eat the fruit and drink water instead! When you eat a fruit like an apple, you eat the fruit in its natural form with a lot of fibre which aids digestion through your gut and reduces the rate at which the fructose (fruit sugar) is broken down and absorbed into the blood stream. However when you drink fruit juice most of the fibre has been removed and you are left with mostly fruit sugar and water. Secondly you consume far more calories (or fruit) in liquid form. e.g. you need 3 to 4 oranges or  apples to fill a small glass versus the one or two pieces of fruit you would normally have. So always choose the fruit, it is healthier and with its bulk and fibre, far more filling than fruit juice. And so if you are trying to lose weight, make water your drink of choice.
4. Myth – Dieting means starving – It is true creating a calorie deficit is a must for weight loss. When you start burning more calories than you take in through exercise and proper diet, your body will begin to use its fat stores for energy which will cause weight loss. However taking this idea to an extreme and starving yourself should result in a whole bunch of weight loss, right? Wrong! If you cut your calories too drastically, your body’s metabolism will slow down to conserve energy which will result in a slower than expected weight lose. To lose weight, eat a sensible healthy nutritious meals in healthy portions for your activity level, age, height and sex.

1. Myth – Dieting means eating food you do not enjoy – To lose weight, you need to avoid food that you love and eat loads of boring and tasteless meals. If this was your previous experience of dieting, I suggest you book a appointment with a dietician who will create a fun eating and healthy regime that you can look forward to. I help my clients discover a world of new foods and new ways of cooking tasty meals. In addition, adding fresh fruits, well seasoned vegetables, nutritious salads will make ensure your diet a delight and help you discover more tasty dishes you can enjoy without ever feeling guilty.
2. Myth – Diets don’t Work – Many people strongly believe dieting simply doesn’t work. They are right and wrong. If you’re looking for a quick fix, dieting probably won’t work for you. The weight will come back if you go back to your old eating vices. Saying that all diets are worthless is wrong. It doesn’t matter how you think of it, cutting calories will eventually lead to weight loss. If thinking about it as a lifestyle change rather than a diet helps you, then do it. Some dieters lose weight faster than others but never despair, keep your eyes on the price and the weight loss will follow. The important thing is never revert to old bad eating habits.

1. Myth – Low-fat foods help you lose weight – ‘Low-fat’ or ‘fat-free’ doesn’t necessarily mean low calorie or calorie-free. Our supermarkets are filled with boldly marketed ‘low fat’ products designed to lure you in. Avoid these marketing gimmicks, when a products says ‘low fat’ it actually might mean low fat but high sugar which is equally bad for your waistline and health. A good tip is to avoid foods with a high portion of the fat content from saturated fat or high proportion of its carbohydrate content as sugars. Foods labelled low-fat should contain no more than 3g fat per 100g. Also just because a products says low fat does not mean we should eat to our hearts content. Always keep your diet limited to a healthy portion to speed up your weight loss.
2. Myth – Only eat when you’re hungry – Similar myth to starving yourself. Researchers at the National Weight Control Registry (NWCR) based in Rhode Island, U.S have reported that spacing food evenly throughout the day is key to weight-loss success. People who eat healthy food at regular intervals, starting with breakfast, are better nourished, sharper and experience fewer mood swings than those who eat erratically. Meal skippers are more prone to weight problems probably because once they do eat, they eat too much of all the wrong stuff. People who successfully maintain a healthy weight eat nutritious foods every four to five hours, regardless of whether it’s a weekday, weekend or holiday.People often think they can save calories by skipping meals, but most people more than make up for those saved calories at other times of the day.

1. Myth – Drinking liquid meal replacements will help shrink your stomach – Dear readers, liquid diets are strictly for babies and invalid hospital patients!  The stomach is a muscular organ which stretches temporarily when you eat, and then return back to its normal size.” There is nothing you can do to shrink your stomach. As you diet, over time you may get used to eating less, but that’s not because your stomach has actually shrunk. So it is best to do some crunches and eat a healthy diet that will help you excess lose fat in not just your tummy but your whole body as well.
2. Myth – Some Foods Burn Fat – There is no food that, just by you eating it, can burn fat and magically melt away flab. So called dieting gurus have praised various items from grapefruit to celery to eggs to cabbage soup as the one thing you need to eat to lose all the weight you want. While many of these foods are packed with essential vitamins and minerals and should have a place in every healthy diet, none of them can speed up your metabolism to the point that you will lose weight.

Top Ten column written by www.tailoreddiets.com