Sigh.

I was on Facebook not too long ago and came across someone saying this. Multiple times. And I began to get increasingly frustrated with its context.

In this age of crash dieting, juice diets and fitness fads, there’s a slight issue which continues to crop up on my social media accounts and hits a nerve. Recently, I was told about a new “way to lose weight.” I’m not going to name the company but their suggested method of losing weight is to take their “capsules” which supposedly contain “30 kinds of fruits, berries and vegetables” that you take daily. Instead of eating food during the day, they advise you to drink their milkshakes which are also “plant based and a healthy alternative to food.”

In other words, you pop two pills and drink milkshakes all day so the weight will drop.

I have never tried diet pills and I most certainly don’t intend to, so I cannot personally admit or deny their effectiveness. However, I have read reports by scientists, health experts and a personal trainer who have all agreed that this system does NOT work. You are essentially starving your body of necessary food groups such as fat and carbohydrates in order to shed a couple of pounds. The worse aspect; the pounds aren’t actually shed at all, but put back on once you eat normally.

In 2014 I developed an eating disorder. I stopped eating completely, lost so much weight that the doctors became concerned and recommended a complete lifestyle change.I also required therapy to work through and come to terms with what I was suffering with – I’ve underlined the word because going through something as damaging as an eating disorder never really leaves you. It remains in the back of your mind as a constant reminder of what once was: in some ways, it still haunts me. When I look at pictures of myself on holiday, I grimace at the bones sticking out. It’s one of the worst things anyone can go through.

That is why I’m so against diet pills and more specifically, the idea of someone starving themselves to lose weight. Furthermore, over the last year or so, I’ve managed to turn my life around despite all the health conditions I’ve run into along the way. Like most people, I work my absolute hardest to be a healthy weight and a healthy person in general. They do say that if you’re not soaked in sweat, you’re not doing it right! There’s simply no easy way to lose weight.

The company I referred to above work as promoters for their products; their employees talk about the benefits of their products and how becoming a part of their team is the best thing you can do. Ultimately, they’re working from home (ideal, right?) by selling products to desperate women predominantly. They also get paid a HELL of a lot for conning customers. This is where I saw the titled remark of working smarter rather than harder, and thus is the point of my article.

Duping customers is not in my nature and certainly won’t open as many doors as my current job has. Starving my body will not make me as healthy as doing exercise and eating healthy will.

A x