The great diet rip off

Thank you to Daily Mail food journalist Joanna Blythman for a brilliant and insightful article today highlighting the do’s and don’ts of healthy eating.

This great piece exposes some of the myths the diet industry relentlessly pushes to hook people at their most vulnerable.

I speak from vast experience. 

As a child I was pleasantly and cheerfully rotund. Endowed with puppy fat, I would convince myself as I was relentlessly teased in the playground by other children.

OK, I lie. I was fat and deeply unhappy, mainly because of the feeling of failure and the constant game of  avoiding swimming, gym, rugby, to avoid the paralysing fear of getting undressed in front of the others knowing they were poised and waiting with venom-tipped tongues ready to start spitting their insults.

I wore my adipose mantle of  excess like a big flashing beacon over my head that screamed “failure”, “out of control”, “greedy”, and “can’t say no”.

Of course, I now know there were other factors at play. I believe being overweight is never really about food.

But this is the state of vulnerability people find themselves in when they become prey to the only thing that promises to restore their dignity and self respect - the diet industry.

And for every tortured, overweight sole, there is an army of slimming pushers just waiting to relieve them of their cash.

I lost weight at 16, and, fingers crossed, have never waddled down the fat path since.

But a permanent scar was left on my psyche, it shadows me constantly in the form of a crippling terror of putting on weight.

The mere hint that I “look healthier around the face” can send me into a panic.

I have done every diet known to man, Every Single One.

Atkins, Slimming World, Weight Watchers, South Beach, low-carb, high-carb, Low-fat, Gillian McKeith, Rosemary Conley, GI, Diet Doctor, cabbage soup, Slim Fast... I could go on and I could identify each one purely on its rules, do’s, don’t,points and coloured brochures.

They were all fantastic in achieving one common result. I became more paranoid around food, and ended up putting on weight.

Joanna’s article points towards a glaring truth  - if we would stop being drawn in by the diet industry’s poisonous lies, we would probably lose weight and be infinitely happier.

They propogate the myth that shunning perfectly normal food and filling up on fat-reduced, point-counted cardboard alternatives is the only way to lose weight.

They will even deliver it to your door, cooked, served and packaged to save you the misery of having to prepare your own food.

I have come to accept a great fact  – none of this is true, none of it, they are lying to you, and they have good reason to, they are making money out of you.

Of course they are going to say butter makes you fat, clogs your arteries, and makes you a wicked person if they are trying to sell you margarine.

Of course they are going to paint floaty angels and stick-thin models on cartons of fat-free yoghurt when they want you to believe even looking at the full-fat version will add three inches to your hips.

None of it is true true – I know from years of experience.

There is only diet-pushing voice worth listening to, and this one really does have your best interests at heart – your own body.

I believe the only way to be healthy with food, both mentally and physically, is to trust your own instinct, and exercise just a little bit of restraint.

Eat when your hungry, don’t eat when your not and ignore, with all your might, anything that promises – “just 300 calories”, “fat-reduced”, “no added sugar” or “guilt-free”.

If you gorge on 10 chocolate bars this has nothing to do with you being hungry, there is an emotional reason driving this. And if you put on weight, this has nothing to do with the fact they weren’t made of low-fat chocolate.

Joanna has 20 years experience as a food journalist so I am more inclined to believe her than the so-called diet expert eager to relieve me of my hard-earned cash.

She says: “I’ve learned that if you choose locally farmed, mainly unprocessed or only minimally processed food, and regularly eat a variety of foods from all the major food groups, you don’t need to worry too much about making the healthiest choice - it will be done for you. 

“Going organic is preferable, too. But there are still certain things you need to understand about everyday foodstuffs (including the processed stuff) to ensure you eat as healthily as possible.”

She lists some of the myths dieters cling to in the hope of shedding unwanted inches, I have added my own take on her findings:

Butter makes you fat – it doesn’t, that is a lie generated by the margarine industry. They want you to think butter will make you fat, it won’t eating twice as much margarine to compensate will.

Wholemeal bread is as bad as white – it is, and it irritates the gut.

Soya is good for you – Soya is the big stick vegans will use to beat their meat-eating inferiors with.

But it is devastating to the environment swallowing up forest for farming, with little yield, and needing to be transported thousands of miles for sale. And is not good for your health, it is highly processed, and high in toxins.

My opinion, ethically-farmed chicken is a much better alternative.

Eggs are good for you – they are. But what about, shock horror, the cholesterol-laden yolks?? Rubbish, evidence points to this not leading to clogged arteries and heart attacks.

There are some more, have a look at Joanna’s article, and if you want to take some of my 20-plus years of weight-watching experience on board, ditch the diet, and listen to your own common sense.