Dr. Arnold's Diet Revolution

Yeah, yeah, I know I'm harping a bit on this, but my brain is pretty much fried after a day of editing documents that are completely uneditable. Seriously. It was like reading templates written by Falkner but without any literary merit (translation: they had no concept of spelling, grammar, or punctuation). Now I have nothing against Bill F.; I quite enjoy his works. But his style, my bloggies, was not meant for mass reproduction and easy understanding. Hence my 8-hour long quandary.

That's besides the point. The point is this. My friend from high school, T, once told me that a diet is something one has rather than something that one does. What she was getting at was that a "diet" refers to one's typical food intake. Diet-ing is an action, that of deliberately restricting one's food intake in order to lose weight or affect one's body shape.

I learned, in my readings, that the word diet comes from the Greek word diaita, which means "a way of life." It's all about how you approach food, baby. Friend? Enemy? Energy? Comfort?

The diet that I'm aspiring to is one of using food as nourishment, as fuel. And doing a little enjoying along the way.

There was a study that recently emerged from UCLA which proposed that dieting may not only be absolutely useless, it might also endanger your health. Researchers found that yo-yo dieting caused people to gain back more weight than they lost. Those pounds never left- they just went on vacation and came back with a few of their friends. Who bring back their friends and on and on. It's like a frat party that gets out of control.

They also mentioned (gotta love the Brits) that dieting can lead to anorexia and bulimia. Score one. And the amount of money wasted on diet foods and diet books. Score two and three.

However, this article was not without it's little cliches. "Should you diet?" asks a subheading. "Not unless you have serious amounts of willpower," answers the article. Gee...willpower...where have I heard that before? It's not about willpower you boneheads!! You can't will yourself taller. Short people are so weak. And lazy. That's why they're short. Maybe I'll skip school next year and write "Dr. Arnold's Height Revolution." Screw the fact that I don't have an MD or PhD. You can buy those suckers online for a couple of hundred bucks. Seriously. I did a background check on a lady who had a PhD that she purchased. Needless to say, she didn't get the job.

Lastly, the article seemingly reversed its position and said that dieting "could be healthy." That regular consumption of fruits and vegetables are helpful in fighting disease. While how helpful has yet to be officially determined, it's a safe bet that a healthy diet does include fruits and vegetables. But that's not dieting. That's changing your diet. Big difference.

I have a second part to this rant, but I shall save that for tomorrow. Coherent blogging requires at least a minimal amount of sleep.

posted under dieting |