Why Extreme Diets Don’t Work

By Siobhan O'Sullivan, SOS Fitness

It’s after Christmas, it’s been a miserable January and you might be carrying a few extra pounds after the festivities!

I know how tempting it can be to try out the next crash diet –trust me I have been there – but I strongly encourage you not to. Here’s why.

An extreme diet is undertaking a way of eating that restricts you in some way. It might be swapping food for shakes; it could be only eating certain foods or it may be as extreme as eating aloe vera to lose weight.

These work in the short term. 100% you will lose weight if you strictly follow one of these diets. But think about what has happened every time you have tried one of these diets before?

My guess is you followed the diet, lost weight, finished the diet, went back to normal eating and put back on the weight and then some?

The reason they don’t work long term isn’t down to you. It’s because they don’t work on changing your mindset towards food and exercise. In order to live a healthy lifestyle long term, you have to do the work on changing your attitude towards food. This means asking yourself why you may be over eating at certain times of the day. It means being mindful of what you are eating and asking yourself if you really want it.

This is something I work on with a lot of clients. If you can change your mindset towards food and exercise to be more positive, you will unlock a new way of living that leaves the extreme dieting world behind. For more information on nutrition coaching, check out my website https://sosfitness.ie/ nutrition/