I have found a four day diet....
the foods within it apparently cancel one another out....
causing you to loose maximum amount of weight possible....
you cant exercise while on the plan....
and you have to follow it word for word....
apparently within these four days you can loose anything....
up to 18lbs....
i am extremely tempted to give it a try....
it is four days after all....
whats the worst that can happen?!....
No foods cancel each other out. That you can't exercise on it, and have to follow it "word for word" raises a huge red flag that it is probably extremely low in calorie.
Worst that can happen - in the short term, you could feel ill and even pass out. Long term - there is a good amount of evidence that crash diets lower your metabolism, perhaps permanently. These effects are likely cumulative, so the more crash diets you attempt, the lower your metabolism can end up, even to the point of insulin resistance. So one crash diet likely is relatively harmless, but like potato chips, who stops at just one?
I have a similiar diet...but mine is lose "18 in 5 days?" Do you eat grapefruit for breakfast and squash/zuchinni every day with a salad? My diet is fairly healthy....but I have yet to actually do all five days consistantly.
I think it's safe to say that kaplods is right. Please follow her advice and don't try the diet. I would be really scared to see something bad happen to you in the long term because of it.
Location: i am neither greek nor athenian, but a citizen of the world.
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Give it a miss. Those 'cancel each other out' things are a big scam. And exercise is good. And it's scientifically impossible to lose that much weight in 4 days. To lose one pound you need to create a 3500 calorie deficit.
Anything under 1200 cals a day is a starvation diet. Will mess with your metabolism and maybe irreversibly. Anything which doesn't contain EVERY foodgroup (cutting out carbs for example or in the 'diet' mentioned above, it looks like zero protein) will also just lead to temporary weight-loss.
It's pretty straightforward really - move about more, and eat clean but on or slightly above your BMR. If the weight's stopped coming off, zig zag your calories a bit, and start weighing your food again for a while to check portions haven;t crept up.
Think EVERY single diet that is about drastic calorie reduction - esp meal replacements or ones that rely on one type of food, or those that compel you to drop or drastically restrict an entire foodgroup like any form of low carbing (even the supposedly more healthy ones) are basically money making scams - they are about handing over your money, and/or about handing over responsibility. Is why people on meal replacement 'diets' regain all the weight and some. Sorry but I been around a long time now, seen it all come and go and get a bit bored with the 'magic bullet' solutions.
Comes down to hard work, day in day out over a long time. Think if you've got to the point you'd try anything to drop X pounds in X days - you really need to chuck the scales, stop number watching as that looks unhealthy if it;s got you that desperate. Forget the numbers and start eating for health. The rest will follow.
As for any regime that states you 'can;t exercise' - blimey didn't that have your alarm bells ringing? Your body even just over 4 days would be consuming its own muscle tissue if you eat just fruit and veg and so far under 1200 cals - you'd probably not be able to exercise, anyway without doing yourself an injury.
It's not about the numbers dropping - it's about being strong and healthy and well, surely?
Last edited by PhatPhoenix; 06-10-2008 at 04:55 AM.
I think that's actually one of the hardest things to do - to look past the desperation and look and work towards health (and let beauty and social acceptability take a back seat). How many of us, at least at some points in our lives wouldn't have been willing to give AWAY years of our lives to be thinner.
And that's why "what's the worst that can happen," becomes insidious, as even when the answer is "death," some of us will still be tempted, because weighing even "death" against a fantasy of being drop-dead (even if it means literally) gorgeous, sometimes we can convince ourselves that the fantasy is worth even the risk of death.
I think that taking the "gorgeous" fantasy out of the equation really signaled a turning point for me. I'm beginning to realize that in the past it was never about heath, it was about a fantasy to become the heart's desire of every man and the envy of every woman (yeah, like that was ever going to happen).
I think you're right. I'm in my 40s now so the vanity thing is no longer an issue - the odler you get, the more it's about health. But if I was younger, yes definitely, health is probably the last motivator. Also a real bottom line thing - when you have kids, you know you can't just not be there for them one day because you liked eating chocolate! That's how I think of it, maybe because two of my kids have an estranged psycho dad and if anything happened to me - he'd go for custody, so it literally is life and death, for me.
For me, I got the added complication of PCOS which makes weight loss three times slower and harder than for a 'normal' woman with a 'normal' body. So yes that too has probably all made it easier for me to be health focussed, cos my physical symptoms of PCOS either disappear or reduce a LOT the second I lose weight.
In my teens and 20s, despite the PCOS, I was a size 6-8 - probably because I was very active, swimming and cycling, and walking everywhere cos I was too broke for a car or even a bus fare. And again, weight for me was not psychologically tied in to my size and attractiveness - purely because at that size, at that time, men didn't look at you if you were skinny. They hated it. My sisters were all size 14-16 and got WAY more male attention than me! I was made to feel a freak and couldn't even find clothes at that size - there are loads now, but weren't then. So for me, being slim - which was my whole adult life til I had kids - was associated with being miserable and ugly!
So I never had to lose that 'gorgeous' fantasy - but I had a very unusual set of circs, probably! Oddly, the older I got, the easier it got to attract men to the point it's never been an issue. But then in my late 30s I was down from my big post baby weight to a 10-14, and had gone blonde and men are a bit thick and superficial, eh? To me, whether I was size 22 or 6, I was the same person and it kind of disillusioned me that men are so stupid and fake - and yet at my bigger sizes, I wouldn't trust a man who was attracted to that as I sense they think you're emotionally more vulnerable, more of a push over - someone who will inevitably (they think) have low self esteem so they can manipulate. Call me a cynic but I seen it with myself and other women I know. One of my favourite exes was someone who was really goodlooking and charismatic when I met him but a year or two before had been nearly 20st apparently - he'd lost it all. And at that time, I'd lost all my extra weight too. He was happy and relaxed and confident with himself and with me, and really supportive. But must admit, even when I felt ugly when I was very thin (or later, very fat), I never had a problem getting men and getting them in numbers - maybe because I'm as uncommitted as most men are. They sense that.
And you're absolutely right, it's only when you take that whole man pleasing/vanity thing out of the equation that you are focused and strong enough to actually get it right!
My PCOS symptoms are a good barometer - if they are diminishing/gone, I know I'm on track. But even at my most vulnerable and desperate to lose some weight, I could always smell a scam (low carbing, meal replacements, etc). All you need is a decent recipe book and a pair of running shoes - which makes no-one rich but maybe Nike! But people crave a quick fix when all that truly matters is the longterm fix.
Sorry...are you trying to lose weight so you can be skinny or healthy? I think you need to think about that. It's statistically proven the faster you lose weight the more likely you are to gain it.
4 day diet
