KISS

[oolala53]

From an email by Brad Pilon (aack! the competition) without his sales pitch.

"
In a study published in the International Journal of Obesity titled
"Dietary adherence and weight loss success among overweight women:
results from the A to Z weight loss study" researchers re-examined
the A to Z weight loss trial (of 300+ women assigned to 4 diets, Atkins to Zone for one year) to see if there was an association
between the level of compliance and the amount of weight that was
lost.

Guess what they found?

Astonishingly only ONE subject in the ENTIRE study followed the
diet as directed for the whole 12 months. This means that every
other subject was not following her assigned diet properly at some
point during the research trial!

The researchers also found that adherence was significantly
correlated with 12-month weight change for all three-diet groups.

So the better a woman was at following her diet, the more weight
she lost.

The fact that adherence was so low is very interesting considering
that these women spent eight class sessions reviewing their
assigned diets with a registered dietitian before they even started
the diet...you can imagine what adherence must be like for someone
who simply bought one of those books, read it cover to cover and
then gave it a try!

The findings from this follow-up analysis also suggest that the
difference in dietary macronutrients had only negligible effects on
the participants weight loss success.

The bottom line is that you can generally figure out how successful
a diet will be by looking at how complicated it is.

More rules = more complicated = low chance of success

Less rules = less complicated = high chance of success

In my opinion weight loss can be incredibly simple if you let it.

Find the easiest, most comfortable way to reduce the total amount
of calories that you eat. The less intrusive a diet is on your
lifestyle the greater chance you have of sticking to it long term.

[SpiritSong]

That's why I'm back. No Rules wasn't working, so I needed Some Rules, but not Too Many Rules.

Thanks, No S!

[MaggieMae]

So true! Sticking to the same diet for a year is incredibly boring, especially if you have to count everything or restrict food groups (I'm looking at you Atkins!). Haha. I love No S not only because of the S days, but because my three meals a day can be regular food. I can eat what I cook for my family, or eat out at restaurants with friends without blowing my diet.

[oolala53]

What's interesting is that Atkins isn't complicated. But I guess what makes it become complicated is how much people have to do to exploit the limited food choices and the mental energy to keep justifying it.

I hope newbies reading this might think, "Oh, I can see why only one person stuck totally to the diet; they're so demanding. Gee, this isn't like that. I can be VERY strict on N days and not even come close to what it would take to be strict on a diet. I guess I'll double up my efforts."