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Crash Dieting Techniques

Crash diets are typically not recommended by doctors, nutritionists or fitness experts. These individuals instead tend to promote slow and steady weight loss. However, crash diets still prevail as the most popular methods for losing weight quickly. Crash diets always involve some method of total or partial elimination of certain or all food groups. If you are attempting a crash diet, there a few techniques that you can employ to make it through whatever diet method you choose.

  1. Elimination of Certain Food Groups

    • One of the less extreme methods of crash dieting involves the temporary elimination of certain food groups. In an article on That's Fit titled "The Crash Diets That Doctors Do," assistant professor of Exercise Physiology at the University of Louisville, Kara Gallagher, Ph.D,. reveals that in a pinch, in order to lose weight quickly she relies on salads, lean proteins, and fruits and vegetables. She cuts out all desserts and starches and snacks on fruits to relieve cravings. If you are looking to lose weight through a crash diet but don't want to go to an extreme level, this technique may be your best option. Temporarily cutting certain foods from your diet will cut calories and lead to quick weight loss.

    Liquid Fasts and Cleanses

    • Far more extreme versions of crash diets are those that involve the temporary elimination of all solid foods in order to lose weight quickly. These diets usually take the form of a liquid cleanse, such as those consisting of a concoction of lemon juice, cayenne pepper, water, sea salt and maple syrup. In Olivia Gordon's Times article, "Can crash diets be good for you?", professor of psychiatry and nutrition at Tufts, Susan Roberts, reveals that crash diets that involve the temporary elimination of food groups may be helpful for those who are easily tempted by food. She states that not having the option to eat the food during a crash diet such as a cleanse may work better than having to learn how to eat the food in moderation during the diet. If you are easily tempted by foods that sabotage your weight loss efforts, a cleanse type diet may be the only crash diet you can adhere to. However, these types of diets are not intended as a long-term weight loss solution.

    Concentration on One Food Group

    • Crash diets that focus on one main food group are popular and trendy, and have been around for years. These diets are not as extreme as cleanses, since they allow you to eat something, yet they still are extreme. One popular crash diet involves eating a special diet cookie in place of one to two meals per day, in order, according to Karen Ravn's LA Times article, "The Cookie Diet" to lose as many as 15 pounds per month. In Ravn's article, Dr. Sanford Siegal, creator of the first cookie diet in 1975, reveals that the cookie diet, and those like it that focus on one particular food group, are effective because they allow people to eat. He states that all diets work, but when hunger is a constant factor, the dieter has far less of a chance of succeeding. If you know that you will be hungry on a crash diet that calls for you to eliminate food groups, a crash diet that involves concentration on one main food group may be preferable.

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