When I talk about professional diet plans I am generally talking about diets like Atkins’, the cabbage soup diet, the drop a jean size diet program, weight watchers, slim fast, slimming world, low carbohydrate diet programs and low fat diet plans, and many more. But what do all these diet plans have in common?

Most professional diet programs try to offer people a simple to follow method for restricting calorific intake, therefore resulting in weight-loss. This is sometimes dressed up as something more than just calorie restriction, but the outcome is generally the same. This is sometimes done by limiting or removing several of the macronutrients (carbs, proteins or fats) from many or all meals throughout the day. Thus how does this effect on from dietary requirements of the body?

One example is the Atkins diet program, that aims to alter the way the body makes its energy by virtually removing carbohydrates from each meal. In Dr Atkins’ book he refer to a state known as Ketosis, where fats are converted straight to energy when carbohydrates aren’t present. This diet program has been seen to be very successful at achieving weight-loss in many research, but how can a diet be good for you if it alters your body’s natural energy production systems? Ketosis just happens when the body is starved of carbohydrates, but the central nervous system depends entirely on carbs for energy. How can this promote good health?

Another example of these types of diet plans is low fat diet programs. Low fat diets acknowledge that fat is liable for a greater number of calories per gram than protein or carbohydrates and hence, aim to reduce fat consumption to decrease calorie intake. Although saturated fats could be dangerous to the human body in large quantities, essential fatty acids play many vital roles such as temps regulation, hormone synthesis and most significantly, the absorption of a lot of vitamins and anti-oxidants. Restricting fat in your diet plan may thus lead to vitamin deficiencies, which may have a dramatic effect on a person’s overall health.

I am sure by now you’re feeling confused about what diet plan you need to follow in order to manage your weight and to maintain your overall health. My advice would be to try to follow a normal healthy diet plan, whilst trying to evaluate and estimate your calorie intake. For many of you this won’t be information that you haven’t heard before, but you may have found it hard to develop a healthy eating plan for yourself. Low GI (Glycemic Index) diet programs encourage you to eat foods from each of the macronutrient groups, whilst ensuring that the food you eat releases energy gradually for sustained energy. This includes the principles of healthy eating.

So what are the drawbacks of following a healthy low GI plan? The only thing that can be construed as a drawback (and wrongly so!) is that you will not see the miracle weight reduction you see when you start an expert diet. To address this point, (and to promote healthy eating) generally the vast amount of weight reduction in the first week of an expert diet is due to water losses. When you hear of people losing 3 or 4 kilos in one week of dieting you may be astonished, but let me try to evaluate this for you. To lose 1 kg of fat you must burn 7000 calories more than you consume and to lose 4 kilograms of fat would need a calorie shortage of 28,000 calories, but normally most people’s bodies burn around 2500 calories per day (17,500 per week). So essentially it is almost physically impossible to reduce 4kg of fat in 1 week. If you follow a healthy eating plan, taking in 500 to 1000 calories less than you burn every day, you will lose 0.5 - 1 kg each week, each and every week and your body will still receive the nutrients it needs to maintain a good level of health. You will also be developing an understanding of healthy eating, that you can use for the rest of your somewhat longer life!!!

Low GI meal replacements and healthy snacking options are a perfect technique to follow a healthy eating plan even if you’ve a busy life-style. Usana manufacture world-leading food supplements, therefore to read a thorough Usana products review check out http://www.mlmsummittraining.com/index.php/mlms-team/usana-products/