Brace Yourself: It's Diet Season

Here we are, 8 days into the new year and it has been diet season for all 8 of them (if not more; sometimes diet season starts the day after Christmas). My social media feeds, despite my best efforts at blocking or hiding them, are replete with ads for meal planning kits, diet kits, keto starter kits, and every other manner of “proper” way to eat that one can imagine.

So, here is your semi-regular reminder:

DIETS DON’T WORK

It is, in fact, the opening statement in this article from two researchers who study why diets fail. The whole article is worth a read, but there are two points in particular that I want to pull out:

Diets cause neurological changes (“Nicky” is the fictional Naturally Thin Nicky that Mann and Tomiyama use as a stand in for other thin people)

Source: https://theconversation.com/what-thin-people-dont-understand-about-dieting-86604

Diets disrupt cognition and executive function

When I say that diets don’t work, what I’m talking about is how restricting caloric intake, whether by eliminating certain kinds of foods or eating a lower number of total calories, is not sustainable. There was a study done in 1950 called The Minnesota Starvation Experiment (MSE), which I knew nothing about until my friend Kathleen posted about it a couple of times. She linked to both this post from counseling student and activist Shira Culter and a longer post from activist Ragen Chastain (which also has a link to Culter’s summary).

Here are the things that stuck out to me: The subjects in the MSE were the 36 physically and psychologically healthiest cis men out of the pool of volunteers. Their calorie restriction of 1,570 calories a day is higher than the current maximum daily intake of calories recommended by commercially available weight loss programs. The subjects experienced severe physical, cognitive, social, and psychological changes during their period of starvation. Even the period of re-feeding (returning to their previous caloric intake of 3,200 calories per day or more) that the subjects had post starvation did not fully reverse the psychological effects of the study. The images below are from Cutler’s post.

2020-01-08 13_46_19-Shira Cutler on Instagram_ “All I want to do in 2020 is talk incessantly about t.png

2020-01-08 13_46_36-Shira Cutler on Instagram_ “All I want to do in 2020 is talk incessantly about t.png

If modern diets are asking us to restrict our eating to 1,000 calories per day or less, then they are asking us to harm ourselves in the name of being thin. Not in the name of being healthy… only being thin. The point in Cutler’s first bullet is worth repeating: Prolonged food intake restriction physically and psychologically injures the mind and body. It is a form of trauma—both physical and emotional.

Remember that when you see that NutriSystem ad for what feels like the millionth time this season.