Health Case

A healthy diet is the most important aspects to maintain good weight. Healthy weight reduces our risk of heart diseases, high blood pressure, arthritis etc, Body mass index (BMI ) indicates whether one's weight is appropriate or over weight which is at a greater risk for other diseases . With a little planning a perfect diet that blends with one 's life style can be practiced in order to maintain a good health .Three important things about nutrition are fruits and vegetables, regular exercise, and positive mental attitude . However, given our busy lives it is really hard to practice these three important aspects of maintaining healthy weight. For example, nobody wants to buy a $10.00 salad when they can buy a $6.50 meal of their choice at any fast food place. And when we come home we are too tired to hit the gym. When we practice this routine we gain weight over time and before we know it we are in obese body weight category. According to vanderbuilt.edu, today more than 50% of U.S. adults are classified as being overweight. Interestingly, as the number of overweight individuals increase, so too does the number of various diets that are available to Americans who are willing to try them in their search for the thin standard that our culture idolizes. We all want to be healthy and live a healthy life style so out of desperation we start looking for diet plans and is what Jenny Craig got to offer to us. I also looked at many diet plans and found two, Atkins and Cheater's diet, that I really believe can help us.

I have well research and found that Atkins weight lose diet has been popular for many years. This diet got its name from its founder Robert C. Atkins, M.D. I choose this diet because it promises that not only will people lose weight and not feel hungry with this low-carbohydrate diet plan, but they will also be on the road to better heart health and memory function, along with other benefits. According to WebMD, the theory of this diet is based on that overweight people eat too many carbohydrates. Our bodies burn both fat and carbohydrates for energy, as learned in chapter 3 as well, but carbohydrates are used first. So by drastically reducing carbs and eating more protein and fat, our bodies naturally lose weight. Since, according to WebMD by reducing carbohydrates in our daily food intake dramatically which is a significant part of our American diet, our body goes into a state of ketosis which means that it burns its own fat for fuel more efficiently.

According to righthealth.com the second diet I chose is created by Paul Rivas, MD who is an internist and weight-loss specialist, is known as the Cheater's Diet. This diet works on the premises that other diets often fail because people get bored and cannot follow what may be excessive restrictions. The Cheater's Diet makes "sinful" high-calorie, high-fat foods a part of the meal plan to eliminate deprivation compare to any other diet. Doing so, according to the Cheater's Diet, will make it easier for people to stay on the diet and lose weight. The Cheater's Diet weekly meal plan includes three small meals and two snacks in a day that is mostly composed of organic food products but during weekends, the Cheater's diet recommends to its dieters to increase their calorie intake. According to Rivas, doing so will help boost their (Cheaters Diet) metabolic rate without having to endure the starvation mode. This is the Cheater's Diet secret which can help you finish the entire program. The way this diet works is that dieters stick to a strict diet and exercise during Monday through Friday and over the weekend they are allowed to cheat or in other words allowed to eat anything they desire without worrying about their calorie content.

I found both of these diet plans much better than the others I looked at. However, even these two great diet plans differ in great detail from each other. According to Kirby, Atkins diet focuses on low carbohydrate diet to deplete all the extra stores of glycogen from our system; on the other hand according to Dr. Lee, Cheaters diet is based on eating healthy meals and snacks. According to the article, Study: Atkins diet good for cholesterol, in USAtoday.com, many researchers have put the Atkins diet to test and found that it really works; compare to cheaters diet which is most criticized by many since it lacks research and the research and studies dr. Rivas mentioned in his book but failed to site, "No references are listed to back Dr. Rivas' theory that cheating on the weekend boosts the metabolic rate, improving weight loss. Neither Dr. Rivas nor others have carried out controlled studies to test his weight loss plan." (Sass) One thing that I found common in both diet plans is that both diet plans restrict the use of regular sugar and cheaters diet goes even one step further in recommending the use of artificial sugars such as splenda, which we all know is harmful