There are tons of different types of diets that can help improve your health and if Weight Watchers works for you should go for it. I have nothing against people who are able to do keto and stick to it long-term but personally I am very anti-diet because most programs you can only realistically do for a few months and set you up for failure. Everyone has a specific diet that they like to follow and some people may choose to go vegetarian while others could never give up meat but there is no type of diet that will work for everyone because we all have different goals. I eat healthy because it’s important that you have a well-balanced diet but I have never joined any kind of diet program when I need to lose weight because I can’t stick to thing that give me a laundry list of things that I can’t have because it’s considered “bad.” In this post, I am going to talk about why I personally have never joined any kind of diet program.
Many programs are too restrictive- Nutrition looks different for me as a disabled person because every food choice I make matters and can have a massive effect on my bowel health if I don’t eat enough of the right kinds of food. The thing that I don’t like about most diet programs is that it encourages you to cut your carbs which might be fine for some people but when you have bowel issues reducing your carbs super low can be very bad. There are days that I will eat less carbs because that is what my body is feeling that day but there will be other days when I eat slightly more carbs than I did the previous and that is okay. Everyone needs carbohydrates because that is your body’s preferred energy source but when you live with bowel issues it’s even more important that you have a well-balanced diet because it can affect your ability to have a bowel movement and anyone who has had that experience knows it’s awful to not be able to go to the bathroom. Diets that tell me I can only eat ten carbs a day will never work for me because carbs is what help me go to the bathroom and if I don’t eat enough or too much of them it can be a serious issue. I eat better when I am not told what foods I can and cannot have because when I feel restricted I often make worse choices and want to eat more of the things that are off limits.
Weight loss plans don’t support my goals- Every diet program out there is geared towards weight loss which is fine for people that want to shed a few pounds but for me personally it’s something that sometimes happens but not a goal I make. I wish that all programs out there didn’t gear everything toward weight loss because although some people have that as a goal everyone not everyone needs to lose weight. I aim to build muscle and it can be so hard to find a program that supports strength because almost of them are telling your not good enough and to lose weight. Weight loss programs don’t typically support my goals because they all tell you cut calories which is good for someone who needs that but not so great for someone who is trying to build muscle and need to eat more rather than cutting calories.
Calorie counting is triggering- Many weight loss programs encourage to log all your food and keep track of how many calories you are consuming which is fine for a vast majority of people but it can be triggering for some people. In high school, I had a very poor relationship with food and struggled with disordered eating that made me obsessed with eating healthy and very stressed to eat carbs. I still don’t have the best relationship with food but I have been able to somewhat heal my relationship with food by learning more about nutrition from credible sources and not keeping a food journal that tracks all the calories I have eaten that day. I support healthy eating and know that if you eat five giant scoops of peanut butter daily that it’s not good for your waistline but I couldn’t tell you exactly how many calories I ate for lunch is because counting calories makes me obsessed with numbers and causes me to severely under-eat. A big part of my healing journey has been to be aware of what is healthy and what isn’t but the thing that has helped me the most is walking away from dieting that tell me I am only allowed to have a certain amount of calories. Diets that require you to count all your calories don’t work for me because once I know how many carbs I am eating I get stressed and don’t want it anymore.
It’s not healthy to fast and not eat carbs– I practice Intermittent fasting because it helps me feel better and not have constant gut issues and I have no intentions of stopping it any time soon. If you fast for short periods of time it can be beneficial for your health but I wouldn’t fast and severely cut your carbs because you are already eating less and it wouldn’t be healthy. If I was going to consider dropping my carbs significantly I would stop fasting because not eating combined with not eating carbs is even worse for you.
It’s not sustainable– I am a strong believer that most diet programs set you up to fail and do not work for a vast majority of people. If you can’t stick to a certain way of eating for more than five years it’s not sustainable and you will be in a constant diet cycle if you are always choosing things that only work temporarily.. . Personally I only do things that I can sustain long term because what is even the point of starting a diet that you will end up quitting? Diet changes tend to affect my gut health in a negative way which is fine if I was going to stick to it for a while because eventually your body does get used to it but I wouldn’t put myself through horrible diet changes if I wasn’t planning on keeping with it. As a disabled person for me it’s always better to find a diet that I can maintain and don’t constantly have to change because all that does is cause my stoma to go crazy.
There are a lot of diets out there that can improve your health but I personally never do any of them because most programs want you to cut your calories severely which is not healthy for anyone but as a disabled person it can be worse for you. Every food choice I make supports my bowel health in some way because there is nothing worse than being to go to the bathroom and that is bound happen when you restrict yourself too much. I think for some people diet works but not for me and when you give me a laundry list of things I can’t have it makes me binge and want them more. I am anti-diet but I am not anti-health and I am only against dieting because for a vast majority of people they work long-term.. This is my opinion with dieting and I am not trying to tell you to never diet because for some people it works and hold you accountable. Make your own decisions because even though twelve-hundred calorie diets work for some people that doesn’t mean everyone who tries it will experience positive results. What are your opinions on dieting?
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