For years, I was caught in the endless loop of diet culture. I tried every fad diet imaginable, from juice cleanses to cutting out carbs, desperate to achieve the happiness I thought would come with a smaller number on the scale. But no matter how much weight I lost, I never found what I was looking for. Instead, I found myself frustrated, exhausted and stuck in a cycle of restriction and guilt.
As we enter a new year, the pressure to shrink, sculpt and transform our bodies ramps up. In a recent Kic study we found that 4 in 5 of us have made resolutions to lose weight or change our bodies. Social media feeds are flooded with “new year, new you” messaging, and we’re bombarded with the idea that setting resolutions to lose weight or transform our appearance is the ultimate way to “start fresh.”
It’s exhausting, and it reinforces the harmful notion that our worth is tied to how we look or how much we weigh, which is NOT the case. For many, this pressure leads us straight into the arms of yet another fad diet—one that promises quick fixes but rarely delivers sustainable results.
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What Happens To Your Body When You Diet?
Kic’s dietitian, Liv Morrison describes a fad diet as an eating plan that promotes results or fast weight loss without scientific evidence to support those claims. Now, research shows that these diets do not work long-term; the majority of people who lose weight will regain it within a year. After you “complete” a fad diet, you’ll typically regain any weight loss—and sometimes even more. So, you’re falling into a negative cycle of diet, loss and then weight gain (hence the term, yo-yo diet).
The technical term for this is metabolic adaptation, meaning the more times you lose and regain weight, the poorer your body composition will get (lower muscle mass vs. fat mass). This body composition change impacts how much energy your body burns at rest. It’s why the next time you try to lose weight, you have to create a more drastic energy deficit by either eating even less calories or ramping up your exercise to lose the same amount of weight. It’s such a vicious cycle to embark on.
Diet Culture Red Flags & How To Spot Them
Social media is a breeding ground for fad diets, and they’re becoming harder to spot. Diet culture is savvy, so if you’ve fallen victim to it, you’re not alone. It scares the crap out of me when I think about the impressionable young minds who are falling for these fads.
So, if you’re thinking “diet starts in Jan,” I beg you to watch out for these red flags:
- Is the person promoting it a qualified health professional?
- Are there any red flags around ‘challenges’ and the words they are using?
- Is there a start and stop time?
- Are you cutting out multiple food groups?
- Are you actually enjoying what you’re consuming?
- Can you see yourself implementing this long-term?
- And most importantly…. Is it impacting your relationship with yourself or your food?
"the key is to focus on building habits that make you feel good, not ones that punish you"
But Improving My Diet Is Healthy... Right?
I’m all for embracing a balanced, healthy diet—but there’s a huge difference between fad diets and learning to nourish your body with wholesome foods.
The key is to focus on building habits that make you feel good, not ones that punish you. Rather than cutting things out, start by adding nutrient-dense foods to your meals, like veggies, whole grains, and proteins. Tune into how certain foods make your body feel and aim to strike a balance between nutrition and enjoyment. Small, consistent changes—like drinking more water, incorporating movement you love, and eating mindfully—will always be more sustainable than restrictive diets.
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You may have heard about intuitive eating. It’s essentially a non-diet approach to eating, which has been a core belief of ours at Kic since day dot. It involves connecting with your body cues, respecting hunger, responding to fullness and getting back in touch with what you actually feel like eating. Intuitive eating is not restrictive, there’s no calorie counting or meal plans to follow, it doesn’t look at food as good or bad, you simply eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re full.
Remember, food is fuel, not the enemy, and the goal is to nourish your body and mind for the long haul. Be kind to yourself and stay mindful when you’re scrolling this summer.
