The History of Fad Diets and Losing Weight Fast

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The History of Fad Diets and Losing Weight Fast

The concept of losing weight fast has been around for a long time and so have its consequences. The notion of a fad means short term; it comes and goes with popularity. Food faddism is synonymous with fad diet and refers to a peculiar eating pattern. History reveals strange eating patterns from centuries ago, when the Romans would stuff themselves and purge. Fasting has also been around a very long time. People would and still do fast for religious or political reasons.

The notion of a fad came about in the mid 1800s when vegetarianism became popular. It is no longer a fad but it was then. Now this is just another dietary choice, which can be healthy. The word diet used to just mean whatever you ate until the early 19th century. There are different accounts of the very first fad diet. In 1820, the vinegar and water diet came around. This diet swept Europe in the early 1800s. Around that time, men used to weigh themselves on public scales. It was some kind of status symbol as to your will or power.

The inventor of the graham cracker instituted a bland diet in the 1830s. A bland diet of course meant nothing spicy or rich. It sounds like eating spicy foods back then was kind of risque. Both of these diets left people weak and listless.

In 1912, an art importer wrote a book about the weight loss method of chewing your food 35 times. Burning calories while you chew? Next, the grapefruit diet came along in the 1920s and hints of it still linger today. This was an 800 calorie diet which included loads of grapefruit and all the coffee you could drink. With this low amount of calories, losing weight fast was easy and dangerous.

The first national weight loss program came to be in 1948. This was called Take off Pounds Sensibly diet.
The risks of fad dieting were well known by then. In the 1970s, there was a diet called the Last Chance
Diet. It consisted of fasting and a liquid protein drink. Apparently, 58 deaths were linked to this diet or diet or one of its copycats.

The Atkins diet of the 1970s was a spin off form of a diet from a book in the mid 1800s. The book called Letter on Corpulence was written by a British mortician named William Banting. His book endorsed a high protein, low carbohydrate diet. The Atkins Diet is probably the most popular fad diet ever. People liked the notion of consuming as much protein as they wanted. Doctors and Dietitians warned against this approach. It is still around today but its popularity has gone, after the safety and quality of the diet was defeated with medical proof.

Fad diets are often composed of restricting one food for another. Fad diets do not work because we crave variety and carbohydrates. Studies have shown that most people who go on low carbohydrate diets do not stay on them. We have one hundred and fifty years of crazy diets. Fad diets why are they bad is because they do not work and they are very unhealthy. When will we get a clue? People have died from being on a fad diet and losing weight to fast. There is no quick way to lose weight. The real way to lose weight is to eat less and exercise more. Losing weight gradually on a well balanced diet including exercise is the healthy and safe way.