A popular diet for many years now, the Atkins diet consists of using already-stored fat deposits in the body as energy to create a fat burning machine out of your own metabolism. It does this by removing carbohydrates from your diet so that you don’t use them as an energy source – once they have been removed, you body can use fat instead to burn off calories and help you to lose weight. Initially, those following this diet remove all carbs from their food intake and survive of protein instead, then gradually re-introduce carbohydrates back into the diet after some time has passed.
The process of shifting your metabolism from using glucose as energy to using fat is known as ketosis, which means you can eat fat-rich foods and still lose weight. Because the production of glucose in the body is kept to a minimum, and your body doesn’t release insulin, it can even help to prevent diabetes. This form of diet is still extremely popular, and it’s status as an effective diet doesn’t appear to be fading any time soon. What makes it so appealing to people is that they don’t have to cut out the usual sins of a diet, which are high-fat foods. Naturally, given the inclusion of so much fat, it has been under scrutiny by many experts as being bad for your health. This hasn’t stopped millions of people from following its practices and rules though. It remains one of the most popular diets ever to have been devised, despite the risk it poses to people’s health over time.
The Atkins diet is easy to follow an follows a pyramid scheme of foods that you can include – you can have a lot of protein sources, such as meat and eggs, but whole grains are kept to a minimum at the top of the grid. To keep you from getting bored, and to introduce a little variety as you go along, you can begin to include low-carb foods once you’ve been on the programme a while – eventually you can begin to eat a few carbohydrate foods as well. This type of diet that enables flexibility is great for dieters as it stops them from getting bored and giving up – the main cause of so many diet failures. The Atkins diet relies heavily on the body’s natural functions, so it alters the way our bodies work by causing it to metabolise fat and use the very thing we’re trying to lose as energy. This means you’ll see both short-term and long-term effects. In the short-term, your body will lose the weight by burning the fat you already have stored, meaning you’ll see results quickly. In the long-term, your body is being prepared for metabolising differently so that you can include the right amount of carbs without gaining weight again.
There are risks attached, such as potential risks to your heart due to the inclusion of so much fat in your diet that may clog up your arteries or cause blood clots, as well as the risk of developing kidney stones. Because you are cutting out certain food groups, you’re also risking other areas of your health such as your bones. As with any diet shift, you should seek the advice of your GP before drastically changing your diet. There may be pre-diagnosed health risks that may make this unsuitable for you. However, maintaining a healthy weight is important, so if you are obese then you should seek out a way to return to a normal weight to avoid any undesirable health concerns.
