I've had some success with very low calorie diets - admittedly 20-30 years ago.
I got all Born Again and Zealoty about them too.
Actually believed that 'anyone can do it' - for a while.
If only I had known...
I think overall I probably lost about 7 or 8 stone across several diets and several years. The lowest calorie intake was several weeks at 330 cals a day. It was a shake that I made up with water. Others were veg only, and I recall one that was mainly cabbage. O joy. Each time I would lose, be overjoyed, and then simply fall off the wagon and face first into every high calorie, high carb food item I could find. Will power was like a candle in a hurricane as my body took over and sent me face first into carb fests of Epic proportions. Ironic really, considering the will power I regularly exert over other parts of my life.
The weight gain after each diet was quite horrifyingly rapid - as though my body was driving me to eat and regain - which of course it was.
Every time I ended up weighing more than I started.
In retrospect, it was perhaps unfair to expect a teenage body with reactive hypoglycaemia, polycystic ovary syndrome and a prolactinoma to react like a 'normal' person. But then I had no idea at the time that my hormones were so severely dysfunctional.
The net result was that I seem to have taught my body to rapidly adjust its metabolic rate to varying food intake.
Bit of a pity, really.
Low cal diets definitely suit some people. Especially if they have 'normal' hormones, and 'normal' appetite controls, and haven't ever dieted before, or had any Yoyo dieting experiences. Horses for courses, eh?
I got all Born Again and Zealoty about them too.
Actually believed that 'anyone can do it' - for a while.
If only I had known...
I think overall I probably lost about 7 or 8 stone across several diets and several years. The lowest calorie intake was several weeks at 330 cals a day. It was a shake that I made up with water. Others were veg only, and I recall one that was mainly cabbage. O joy. Each time I would lose, be overjoyed, and then simply fall off the wagon and face first into every high calorie, high carb food item I could find. Will power was like a candle in a hurricane as my body took over and sent me face first into carb fests of Epic proportions. Ironic really, considering the will power I regularly exert over other parts of my life.
The weight gain after each diet was quite horrifyingly rapid - as though my body was driving me to eat and regain - which of course it was.
Every time I ended up weighing more than I started.
In retrospect, it was perhaps unfair to expect a teenage body with reactive hypoglycaemia, polycystic ovary syndrome and a prolactinoma to react like a 'normal' person. But then I had no idea at the time that my hormones were so severely dysfunctional.
The net result was that I seem to have taught my body to rapidly adjust its metabolic rate to varying food intake.
Bit of a pity, really.
Low cal diets definitely suit some people. Especially if they have 'normal' hormones, and 'normal' appetite controls, and haven't ever dieted before, or had any Yoyo dieting experiences. Horses for courses, eh?