Diet gun

If a weight loss diet is necessary for health reasons or for greater well-being and beauty with the aim of reducing excess body weight and restoring it to its ideal levels, in addition to the benefits it provides to health, it also helps psychology by increasing self-confidence that comes from discipline in the nutritional program but also from the improved image of the person.

However, it is a fact that strict and long-term nutritional programs have been associated with negative effects on the psychology of the person who implements them.

Some negative effects are the following:

Social isolation

The limited and specific variety of foods can lead to social isolation. Avoiding going to a restaurant to eat with friends, partners or colleagues may be related to this.

If we discuss it with our friends or with those we will go out to eat, we will find the solution, going somewhere that will also have what we need to eat.

Alternative solutions to nutrition in these cases should be discussed with the dietitian who has created the nutritional program and foods that will certainly help will be found.

Internal conflicts

Internal conflicts with ourselves are the result of resistance to the specific consumption of food and to the specific, possibly, smaller quantity of food than we were used to.

Hypocaloric weight loss diets are true to be….deprivation.

Deprivation of food quantity and emotional deprivation from what the foods that are now less frequently included in the diet offered us.

Strict restriction can lead to episodes of overeating after we stop the diet.

The solution is to follow a diet that is not so restrictive, a diet that is not so low in calories so that we have the choice of more food and foods that when we ate them before the diet caused us pleasure (mainly more fatty foods, more complex foods).

Anxiety and tendencies for depressive episodes

Anxiety during the diet comes from the sudden change in eating habits and activates mechanisms in the body that often increase cortisol (stress hormone) and reduce serotonin (happiness hormone).

Depression is related to the way we restrict our food and to the possible long-term diet plan that we will follow. In weight loss diets that last a short period of time, there are no depressive episodes.

The realistic goals we will set, short-term and long-term, will help us limit stress and possible depressive episodes.

The dietitian who created the diet can make modifications that will help us in all cases. He knows how to do it and will do it. If he does not do it on his own, we can ask for it.

The dietitian KNOWS how to help, he MUST help.

We choose dietitians who really want to help us and not dietitians who give the same diets to everyone and are happy when their bank account fills up quickly.

Discernment is a great virtue, which helps us choose at each moment what will bring the best possible result for us and for the people around me.

Search and with discernment find the dietitian who really cares about people, who really cares about helping, definitely you will find him.

Sources and articles that may help:
Nutritional psychiatry: Your brain on food
The link between food and mental health
Psychology of food
Understanding Diet Psychology — What Influences Our Eating?
The Importance of Understanding Your Eating Habits

The Psychology Of Dieting
The Psychology of Food Intake and Portion Control