It's Not Failure; It's Feedback
Dieters' self-image suffers as a result of dieting--at least according to this study.
"It has been well documented that dieting virtually always fails long-term -- about 90 to 95% of the time -- and that dieting drop-out rates are high. But this study also poignantly illustrated that...in the end dieting actually worsens women's health and quality of life...there was nearly 200% more bulimia and eating disorders among the dieters compared to the nondieters. The dieters' self esteem and depression had also significantly worsened, which isn't surprising given most dieters are left with an overwhelming sense of failure. And the psychological and physiological effects, as well as eating problems, resulting from calorie restriction itself have been clinically documented."
These statements seem a little suspect to me. First, I don't think it's true that diets have a 90-95% failure rate, unless you are very strict about defining "failure" as any weight gain whatsoever. Secondly, if you lose weight slowly and healthfully (i.e., don't starve yourself) you avoid a lot of the problem involved with calorie restriction, and reap all the benefits. And finally, at lest personally, I had physical and psychological problems before I ever started dieting, which is how I became overweight in the first place!
"It has been well documented that dieting virtually always fails long-term -- about 90 to 95% of the time -- and that dieting drop-out rates are high. But this study also poignantly illustrated that...in the end dieting actually worsens women's health and quality of life...there was nearly 200% more bulimia and eating disorders among the dieters compared to the nondieters. The dieters' self esteem and depression had also significantly worsened, which isn't surprising given most dieters are left with an overwhelming sense of failure. And the psychological and physiological effects, as well as eating problems, resulting from calorie restriction itself have been clinically documented."
These statements seem a little suspect to me. First, I don't think it's true that diets have a 90-95% failure rate, unless you are very strict about defining "failure" as any weight gain whatsoever. Secondly, if you lose weight slowly and healthfully (i.e., don't starve yourself) you avoid a lot of the problem involved with calorie restriction, and reap all the benefits. And finally, at lest personally, I had physical and psychological problems before I ever started dieting, which is how I became overweight in the first place!
posted by mo pie at 1:37 PM
8 Comments:
"And finally, at least personally, I had physical and psychological problems before I ever started dieting, which is how I became overweight in the first place!"
Amen to that. I think I had to work through mine before I could get started.
(Although - can I say this? - I think if I'm feeling too positive about my body, I lack motivation to be healthy. It's hot here now and the sight of my thighs in shorts, in the mirror as I run on the treadmill, is not a pretty sight but is definitely motivating me. I don't hate my body or myself, but I need to remember why I'm doing this, and it is partly about ditching the cellulite. Which I won't remember if I never look at it.)
There was something wrong with the punctuation of that sentence starting "It's hot..." Oh well, you can see what I meant.
First, I don't think it's true that diets have a 90-95% failure rate, unless you are very strict about defining "failure" as any weight gain whatsoever
The thing is that in order to get a number like 90-95%, you have to have some kind of way of measuring success or failure objectively, and as far as diets go, success or failure isn't so easy to define, nor do all medical studies define it in the same way.
From my reading of several research papers, it seems to be that the usual way that they mean "diets are reported to fail 90-95% of the time, long-term", is this: when people go on a diet, then get followed up some years later (e.g. 5 years later) to see whether they've kept off the weight lost, the proportion of people who have not kept off the weight is 90%-95%.
This seems a reasonable way to measure it, after all, what's the point of going on a short-term diet for a few months if you're only going to regain the weight back? A lot of wasted effort...
In a nutshell, I see that the data about diets says
a) diets do work in the short-term, if you define "work" as achieving some significant weight loss
b) diets don't work in the long-term, if you define "work" as keeping off the weight loss achieved by a diet
c) a substantial proportion of people gain back at least as much weight as they lost in their diet (about a third)
I haven't seen much data about the "lifestyle change always dieting" approach that I think you're talking about (if I read you correctly) so I don't know what sort of percentages of weight loss achievement occur from that group.
This article left a bad taste in my mouth. The information hidden in there is that the "non-dieting" group of women did actually change/improve their eating habits, and become more active, but they did not do it as part of "being on a diet". Also, they recieved counselling specifically geared to make them accepting of and happy with their own bodies, the "dieters" recieved support, but I can only assume that support focused mainly on the diet part, and not on supporting THEM and making them feel good about themselves.
So really I think it comes down to terminology. Arguing about terminology is, ultimately, not particularly useful to making us feel good about ourselves. We already know that thinking of it as "I'm on a diet" leads to also being "off" your diet, "breaking" your diet, and "failing" at your diet. In fact, I'm currently struggling with this very issue: trying not to beat myself up for not being on plan, while simultaneously working towards actually being on plan. All week.
I think that it's true that women who think of themselves as on a diet, or dieting, may tend towards the self-punishing techniques of trying to make themselves adhere to that diet. It's so easy to focus on the self denial and restraint part, because a lot of that is involved in changing your habits.
Healthy positive lifestyle changes and active choices are just much more FUN to do than self denial.
For example: eating a banana and a low fat yogurt because it makes your body feel good and energised instead of the short lived sugar rush of a banana split sundae...that's a positive being-nice-to-your-self behaviour.
Eating a banana and a low fat yogurt as a poor substitute for the banana split that you crave, because you're not allowed the sundae on your diet, and it would be bad for you and you'd feel like a big fat greedy cow for eating what you're not supposed to have...that's self punishing unhappy behaviour.
I think the word diet is a good one, but mostly in the context of phrases like "vegetarian diet", "organic diet", "balanced diet" or "my diet seems to contain an inordinate amount of liquorice and turmeric". We can make it a cage if we like, and lock ourselves inside it and be miserable, or we can think of it as merely a word that describes the combination of foodstuffs we use to fuel our day.
I've certainly found that starting to actively work on loosing weight and getting fitter has made me more self concious and critical about my appearance and fitness capabilities, because I'm paying attention now. It's hard to change your habits without becoming more self aware. It's hard to be self-aware without discovering a few things you're not very happy with, and wishing them gone, or different, or FIRMER.
Oh, and I also think claiming numbers as definitive as 90-95% is an immediate red flag, I want to know their margin of error on that number, not to mention how they define "success" and "failure". As S said, if you define failure as gaining back ANY weight whatsoever ever again...the only way to succeed is to go on the chainsaw diet and chop off you head, because you certainly won't gain back any of that pesky weight if you're dead!
Rosemary, I really enjoyed your comment. Amen to all of it, sister! Also, the chainsaw diet! Hee.
"my diet seems to contain an inordinate amount of liquorice and turmeric".
RG, are you SURE we're not clones? Because that made me laugh partly because the way it's phrased is just as I'd have put it.
Also because it's funny, of course.
I used to loath the word diet. I only just recently came to terms with it, and that's only becasue I realized that it has come to mean something that is often looked on in a negative light (the idea of only "fat" people needing to be on diets). I now think of it as an eating regime. Diet, as in starving yourself, will have a 90-95% failure rate. Diet, as in adopting better eating habits and not eating a banana split everyday, will have a very high success rate.
That's because "dieting" doesn't work and the only way to change that is to really make the comittment in the long haul to change your lifestyle around including your "diet". Counting calories and watching the scale can get obsessive, but making the choice to eat more fruits and vegetables, less junk food, and less emotional eating would be more successful, IMO. Like Annee said, sticking to a regime..
Also, I somewhat agree with the article because dieting and exercise forces you to be more aware of your body which could result in negative cycles if you focus too much on external goals, external feedback or worse, comparing yourself externally to others.
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