I very rarely say "I'm on a diet," because people have weird connotations with the term "diet." But to me, being on a diet is tending to eat low-fat, lower calorie foods, portion controlling to a reasonable degree, and cutting out junky sodium or sugary or fatty food. It's just... watching what I'm eating.
But even here on the forums I see people talking about how they "don't diet." I'm always curious... What does diet mean to you?
I tend to think of 'being in a deficit' rather than a diet. I'm eating foods that I'll continue to eat in the future. I don't buy anything specifically 'to diet'. I've chosen a way of eating that I enjoy, filled with foods I like, so it's about finding a better way to live. To me 'diet' is usually used when people are eating a lot of things they don't like in order to lose weight and go back to the food they don't like. And to me, that's a big problem.
I would prefer to use the word diet to just mean what I eat. In the past, the word did not have weight loss connotations. We use WOE now to get around that. I wish diet hadn't changed meanings.
If I go with the modern usage of diet, to me it means I'm changing what I eat in some way *in order to lose weight.* As opposed to trying to eat healthily (in terms of what food and how much and my mental/emotional relationship to food), whatever weight that lands me at. Nice and vague, no? Works for me. I do think there is a certain amount of portion retraining some of us need that's about a healthy food life rather than weight loss.
I feel like I've been "on a diet" since I was 8 years old. I consider "on a diet" as trying to lose weight through food/exercise/craziness/etc, but lately I've started to NOT say I'm on a diet, because I don't want to be on this course for my whole life. I realize that I will probably have to watch what I eat for the rest of my life, but I'd like to eventually shift my mindset to "maintaining a healthy lifestyle" not "I'm on a diet."
If anyone outside this website asked if i dieted, i would say no. Being on a diet shows that im unhappy with my body and weight and people knowing that would make me feel very vulnerable and uncomfortable. But, i am on a diet
To me a diet is a consious adjustment to your eating habits with the intention of changing your body/appearance, usually to lose weight but i would use the term if i was trying to gain also.
i say "i'm trying to eat better". it's my way to avoid my sometimes obsessive tendencies, and make it more of a casual thing...this works for me (most of the time), as long as i'm also working out, but probably wouldn't work for others...i look at it as an overall healthy weigh of eating average, with a few blips here and there...
i'd say i'm counting calories, or watching what i eat. not on a diet. a diet means a plan someone sold you - atkins, cabbage soup, whatever.
i'm eating the same things i was eating before, just with portion control and more of the healthier stuff (more protein, more veggies, more fiber, less candy). this change is permanent - once i am happy with my weight, i will eat a bit more and exercise a bit less, but i'll still be counting calories. so it's not a diet, since diets tend to be temporary "quick fixes" (or at least that's how we seem to treat them).
but it's all semantics, really. whatever makes YOU comfortable, y'know?
To me, a diet is your own pattern of foods you eat each day. I think of it first as simply 'what you eat day to day-all the time type of thing', becuase I think that's it's real deffinition; and second I think of it as 'I'm going on a diet' type of deffinition.
Like an example, "The bluejay's food diet is made up of: fruit, nutes, instects...blah, blah."
Like Aurora is saying, "diets" are not good for you in the long run. You can do a much better job changing your body on your own, and for free.
My definition is much like SnowWolf's. I do sometimes use diet as a verb, but much more often use it as a noun.
I think "on a diet," implies that one day I will go off of it. "Dieting," I feel a little more comfortable as a shorthand for "paying attention to my diet," which I intend to do for the rest of my life.
There are many reasons a person has to monitor and control their diet. Even when weight isn't an issue, people with diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, allergies, celiac disease, kidney issues, heart problems, and people taking some medications have to monitor their diet, and even occasionally follow a specific diet.
Generally we don't talk about dieting except in regard to weight loss. We may ask people if they are following a specific diet, but we generally don't ask them if they are dieting unless we mean for weight loss, even though "I'm watching what I eat," can equally apply to someone underweight as overweight, and may be for a specific health or moral issue or for more generically for better health.
I don't have a problem with the word "dieting," but I do have a problem with the concept of dieting temporarily. I don't think that kind of dieting works very often.
I generally equate the word "Diet" with "weight loss". I think that's the mainstream opinion too. I don't diet, but I do maintain a healthy lifestyle. People think eating clean is a diet, when really it's an anti diet, but try to explain that to a bunch of co workers who are trying to convince you to order out pizza with them.
When I was about 10 I remember my aunt talking about loosing weight and saying " yeah I am going on a Die with a T" that has sort of stuck with me. I myseld believe I have undergone a healthy lifestyle change as I have been watching what I eat, exercising and making healthier options for me and my family. I just wish there was a better word to describe it...
I don't use the word diet because to me is has the connotation of
Diet = short term weight loss (ie. when you gained 5 lbs and jeans are too tight)
This is definitely not short term. Although, technically, it IS a diet. I just don't like saying that. Instead I say I'm counting calories and eating healthier.
Your "Diet" is just your way of eating...so you could definitely have a very unhealthy diet which most of us have had in the past and are now choosing to eat a healthier "diet" of foods. or the EXACT definition is:1 a: food and drink regularly provided or consumed b: habitual nourishment c: the kind and amount of food prescribed for a person or animal for a special reason d: a regimen of eating and drinking sparingly so as to reduce one's weight <going on a diet>
I like to think it is just an eating lifestyle and I never say that I am ON A DIET EVER!!
"Diet" Defined
