When Not To Listen To Beyonce
I’m not sure why celebrities are more gullible than normal people, but they seem to be; especially where their health is concerned. It seems that something like, I don’t know, eating less, just doesn’t cut it. Ask them to steam their vagina or tell them to drink their own urine, however, and they’ll be straight on Instagram extolling the many benefits of their new fad. Beyonce is no different, and her diet recently caught my eye.
Now don’t get me wrong, I couldn’t care less how she chooses to lose weight, she could swallow a tapeworm and I wouldn’t give a monkeys, and for that reason, I don’t tend to write too much about this stuff. But curiosity got the better of me and I had a little dig into some of the facts about her diet, including a look at the website of the nutritionist who came up with the plan. That’s where I found this:
It’s very simple. Every time you eat, you’re either fuelling disease or feeding health. Let’s feed our health.
I’m not interested in the next celebrity diet, but I am interested in lies packaged as truth to sell a product. There is much more to your health than diet alone, and enjoying the odd hob-nob here and there isn’t hurtling you towards being sick. Diet is only one part of the picture, and your health can be improved dramatically while eating even the worst junk food. Here’s why you can boost your health and lose weight while still indulging now and then.
If you’ve been reading my stuff for any amount of time, you’ll know that it isn’t the type of foods you eat that determine if you lose or gain weight, it’s the number of calories you consume. With that in mind, it should be obvious that you can lose weight on even the crappiest of diets, like this guy who lost 56 pounds eating nothing but McDonald’s. What is less obvious is that you can improve your health by eating junk too.
- In 2010, a nutrition professor from Kansas State University ate Twinkies every three hours instead of meals, to the tune of 1,800 calories a day. In 10 weeks, on what he termed his “convenience store diet”, he lost 27 pounds.
- In 2017, a man in Colorado ate 2,500 calories of ice-cream with some protein shakes and a smattering of alcohol for 100 days. He lost 32 pounds.
While this might not seem like a big deal, the improvements in health markers from both of these men were. They each dramatically reduced the level of triglycerides in their blood and saw a reduction in “bad” LDL cholesterol and an increase in “good” HDL cholesterol. Rather than “fuelling disease”, they became measurably healthier.
This isn’t an excuse to eat a junk only diet from now on. We still need protein, fibre, vitamins and minerals, and a crap diet doesn’t deliver on that in the long run; but it’s clear that what you eat isn’t the be-all and end-all. In fact, it’s only a small part of a bigger picture.
Try to think of the most healthy diet you can; whatever that means to you. Something that ticks all the boxes of lean proteins, whole grains, veggies, and fruit. If that diet leads to you being overweight, is it still a good diet? The answer is no.
We know that staying lean increases your lifespan. Being overweight increases your risk of heart disease, diabetes, dyslipidemia, sleep apnea, hypertension, osteoarthritis, stroke, liver disease, and cancer. While it might be hard to get fat on chicken and broccoli, the risk of these health problems is exactly the same if you become overweight eating foods that “feed health” than if you get fat on food that apparently “fuel disease”.
Blaming certain foods for your health problems is putting the horse before the cart. Your diet should help you get and stay lean as priority number one. If you can do that while eating a bit of junk here and there and drinking a bit of booze then great.
The message that when you eat you are either fuelling disease or feeding health is not only erroneous; it’s arrogant, judgemental, and harmful. Celebrities fall for this kind of shit because they’re idiots, but you’re not. Junk food is totally acceptable as part of an overall healthy lifestyle.
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