Millions of people want to lose weight, and everyone wants to find the easiest, fastest way to do so with the least amount of work. The latest scheme for this is known as 'body cleansing', or a 'cleansing diet'. They pull you in with seductive claims of how being fat is not your fault, and if you just take a few little pills you'll be completely fixed and never have to worry about being fat again.
by JohannaWilliams
Millions of people want to lose weight, and everyone wants to find the easiest, fastest way to do so with the least amount of work. The latest scheme for this is known as 'body cleansing', or a 'cleansing diet'. They pull you in with seductive claims of how being fat is not your fault, and if you just take a few little pills you'll be completely fixed and never have to worry about being fat again.
This simply isn't true. Despite the claims of the advertisers, these detoxification schemes never actually work. For example, I recently saw a product advertised that claims to get rid of the "dangerous worm" Paragonimus Westermani, which supposedly lives in everyone and causes health problems and obesity. Only problem with that is, Paragonimus Westermani comes from eating freshwater crabs. Live. When did you last eat a live crab? I seriously doubt it's as common as the advertisers seem to think.
Unfortunately for the people who are convinced by their claims, the weight loss programs they suggest usually do more harm then good. If you follow their instructions and get rid of all the bacteria in your gut, your body becomes extremely susceptible to damage, disease, even to death, as it is no longer protected by its natural defenses.
Imagine your body is a castle, and the good bacteria are an army put in place to keep you safe from the bad bacteria outside of you. In return for using a small amount of the food you eat, they guard you from hundreds and thousands of deadly enemies that you can't even see.
In fact, one of the 'cleansing' program sites showed me a horrible picture of the deadly plaque spots they say could form on your colon. I tell you, it looked really bad, and I was half convinced by them... until I noticed the little tag someone had forgotten to remove in the corner of the picture, which marked it as an image of candidiasis, not plaque. Someone really needed to do their homework better there, because candidiasis is caused by a lack of bacteria!
That doesn't seem very clever. I'd think that someone who claimed to be a doctor would know enough not to make a mistake like that, but I guess they're not as smart as they think they are. Personally I would not want to take the chance of trusting myself to the hands of someone who can't even tell one disease from another.
In the end, of course, it's up to you to decide what you want to do, and who you want to trust. However, I'm sure you can see the sense in not taking any chances. As a matter of fact, I'd rather keep on being fat and unhealthy, then try to fix myself with a hoax diet scheme that's about as likely to help me as it is to kill me.
So all these 'instant fat' and 'cleansing' programs make big promises, but have no idea what their talking about. For real diet advice, talk to your doctor or dietician, and throw these wacky new treatments in the trash where they belong.
About the Author:
Author Johanna Williams is a respected expert in the fields of dieting and nutrition. After hearing about a popular but mistaken weight loss tehnique, she decided to put together a site to tell people which fat loss products really work.
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