From conventional calorie counting diets to ultra low-fat or ultra low-carb approaches, dieters can choose from a veritable smorgasbord of at home weight loss plans. For legal reasons, dieters are warned to speak with their physicians before trying a new diet. Most assume this is a mere formality and ignore the warning. But doing so can be a grave mistake – far graver than many realize.
A Hormonal or Metabolic Problem May Be to Blame for Weight Gain
The body maintains its fat tissue deposits vis-à-vis a complicated and only rudimentarily understood system of homeostatic balance. Hormones, enzymes, genetics, and other factors all can regulate (or dysregulate) the fat tissue. Rapid or unexplained weight gain can be a telltale symptom of a disease or a metabolic problem like hypothyroidism. Certain medications can also cause metabolic syndrome – a cluster of health problems that includes obesity, diabetes and insulin resistance. Normal physical changes in the body (such as menarche or menopause) as well as exposure to pollutants or other toxins can cause changes to hormone levels and thus lead to weight gain (or loss).
Individuals engaging in at home weight loss – without consulting their doctors – may miss the signs of these hormonal/metabolic problems. Consequences can be dire.
Changes in Diet Can Precipitate a Cascade of Changes to the Body
When someone cuts calories, fat, carbohydrates or other elements from the diet, metabolism will change in innumerable ways. Running an at home weight loss plan is a lot like running an uncontrolled experiment. A given diet may work (or appear to work) for a period of time. But initial successes can mask longer term failures. And just because someone loses “weight” doesn’t mean that the person is losing “fat.” People on very low calorie starvation diets can break down their muscle and even organ tissue for fuel in the absence of calories from food. If some metabolic or hormonal factor (such as excessive insulin secretion) prevents the body from accessing stored calories in the fat tissue for fuel, dieting can be dangerous.
Even Successful Weight Loss Plans Can Have Jarring Side Effects at First
The Atkins Nutritional Approach, historically one of the most successful weight loss plans, requires that most dieters enter a phase called "induction," during which carbohydrate intake is limited to just 20 grams per day. Compare this with the typical USDA recommended intake of 300 grams of carbs per day. Drastically reducing carbohydrates without proper medical supervision can be dangerous for some people, particularly the elderly and very sick. Just as doctors don’t advise heroin addicts to go cold turkey, so too might physicians warn against sudden and severe carbohydrate restriction for serious sugar addicts.
A Physician Can Provide Essential Support
Many at home weight loss endeavors fail because dieters operate in a vacuum. A competent, experienced, and credentialed physician (and preferably an endocrinologist) can answer a dieter's questions and guide them through stalls.
Listening to a Qualified Physician
Weight loss can yield awesome benefits, including reduced risk for diseases and an improved sense of well-being and self esteem. However, dieters who jump into at home weight loss plans without adequate physician supervision run risks:
- misdiagnosing the fundamental cause of weight gain
- ignoring underlying hormonal problems
- traumatizing their bodies by making too-rapid diet and exercise changes
- dieting without adequate support and guidance
Sources:
MayoClinic.com. *"Belly fat in women: How to keep it off" (accessed March 23, 2010).
WebMD.com. *"Weight Gain Shockers Slideshow: Surprising Reasons You're Gaining Weight" (accessed March 23, 2010).
Adam Kosloff - Adam Kosloff is a Yale University educated writer who is fascinated by counterintuitive theories about nature, life and the universe that ...
Join the Conversation