A break in the diet will help you lose weight

break in diet

If you have been trying to lose weight for a long time and constantly keep to weight loss diets to achieve this goal, you may need to take a break. Researchers from the University of Tasmania call breaks in the diet the key to losing weight and maintaining the result (we all know that losing weight is not so difficult, and it is much more difficult not to gain them back again).

Of course, this does not mean that diets are completely useless. However, in combination with periods of rest they are much more effective (at least for men).

The study involved two groups of obese men. In both groups, the number of calories in the diet was reduced by a third for 16 weeks, yet

  1. the first group dieted for 16 consecutive weeks;
  2. the second group dieted for 30 weeks, taking 2-week breaks after every 2 weeks of dieting*.

*For two weeks, men from the second group observed the diet. In the following two weeks, they ate in a way to maintain their weight, and not to lose it. Then, they were getting on a diet for the next two weeks again.

As a result, the participants of the second group not only lost more kilograms, but also gained less weight after the end of the trial. After the experiment, which took place six months later, it turned out that people in the second group lost on average 8 kg more than people in the first group did, and maintained this weight.

Specialists explained that diet can stimulate various biological processes in the body, including slowing down the weight loss, and even weight gain. If the number of calories decreases, metabolism may slow down. If you take breaks in the diet, they “send” these biological mechanisms back to the past, when the ancestors of today’s people did not know whether they will be able to eat on a specific day or not. Accordingly, the body does not react to the diet as if to hungry times, when they need to make reserves. It is ready for the fact that it will be fed again soon.