Remember the last time you had a pastry, gulab jamun or pizza without guilt pangs? Most of us wouldn’t, and if we did, that was probably when we were kids, all excited about birthday parties and cakes. (Did you know, all that anticipation actually makes it easier for the body to digest food?) But as we grow past the teens, we tend to associate food with fear and guilt. We become conscious about our bodies and can go to any extreme—starve ourselves or go on a crash diet—to ‘stay in shape’.
Starving is commonly propagated as ‘detox’ or ‘fasting’ and is used as a rampant weight-loss technique. Of course, fasting is powerful (Anna Hazare just proved that) but as a means of weight loss, it’s disastrous. As a method of shedding pounds, it eats into all-important lean tissue that your body tries to hold on to.
When we starve, our body readjusts its metabolic rate to match the lowered or close-to-zero calorie intake. It does this by reducing BMR or basal metabolic rate, the exact opposite of which one should strive for to lose weight and stay fit. This is the ‘starvation mode’, where the body has already smartened up and reworked its daily calorie expenditure to carry on its basic functions, making you fatter in the bargain. (Muscle is the fuel, not fat).
Ironically, the body does not come out of starvation mode as swiftly as it gets into it. Even after you start eating or consuming calories or break your fast, your body keeps working at a lowered metabolic rate. To make things worse, it also converts more calories to fat stores to prepare for the next fast.
The end result is often a frustrated mind and a body tired of trying to lose weight. The only way out is to eat in moderation and exercise regularly. All shortcuts, including fasting, are simply distractions.
(Nutritionist Rujuta Diwekar’s latest book is called Women and the Weight Loss Tamasha.)
