Gregory Freeman: Its About Time the Government Tested Diets. 6/1/2000

Headline: IT'S ABOUT TIME THE GOVERNMENT TRIED TO TEST VARIETY OF DIETS
Reporter: By Gregory Freeman

Publication: ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Last Printed: Thur., Jun. 1, 2000
Section: METRO, Page: B1, Edition: FIVE STAR LIFT

Battle of the bulge

Finally.
The government has decided to take a look at a couple of the popular diets on the market to see if they work. As one who has tried more diets than Bill Clinton has political lives, I can only say it's about time.

Those who know me know that I'm on a seemingly perpetual diet. I've always been on the heavy side. Some would suggest that I'm "big-boned, " but I don't know that my bones are any bigger than anyone else's. It's what's around those bones that's my trouble.
My dieting goes back to my college days. My first diet -- like some of those around these days -- wasn't terribly healthy, as I recall. I drank lots of Tab -- the bitter cola alternative offered by the Coke people in those days -- and ate broiled fish. That was about it.
I lost lots of weight. But man does not live by Tab and fish alone, and within a year or two, I'd gained it all back.

About 10 years ago, the fad was liquid protein. That's the one that Oprah popularized by bringing a wagon of chicken fat on her program to show how much weight she'd lost by using the liquid protein diet.
    The diet required you to drink several protein shakes a day and eat nothing. More than a diet, it was sort of a fast, with the shakes designed to make sure that you got proteins and vitamins.
   Several of my larger journalistic colleagues went on that diet, with amazing results. Guys who had been quite large became small guys, almost overnight. That, I thought, was the diet for me.
   So I got on the liquid protein diet and lost about 50 pounds within a couple of months.
   Ultimately, though, I couldn't stay on that diet forever. When I'd go out to dinner with friends, they'd order meals, I'd order a glass of water to mix my protein shake. That got old fast. I'd ask my wife for a forkful of what she was having. One forkful led to a nibble, one nibble led to a taste, one taste led to a small plate. . . . Well, you can see where it went from there. I gained those 50 pounds back.

Perhaps the most successful diet that I ever went on wasn't a "diet" at all. Several years back I joined Weight Watchers. That organization tries to get you to change your lifestyle. I would go to meetings once a week, keep track of the calories that I ate each day, and pay close attention to my weight. I lost about 90 pounds with Weight Watchers.
But then, the excuses came. My life somehow got busier. I wasn't able to attend the sessions each week. I ended up eating out more often where I had less control of what I was eating. Then I had surgery. One thing led to another, and I started regaining weight.

I've managed to keep about 60 pounds off, but I'll be the first to say that I'd like to take off much more. It doesn't help me much that I like food, or that my favorites happen to be the foods that I should stay away from -- things like pastries and baked goods, sweets, dairy products and the like. (I'm fascinated that Julia Child has lived to be 87 while cooking with all those creams and sauces over the years. Does she know something that doctors aren't telling the rest of us?)

The feds are going to study low-carbohydrate diets that are high in protein, and another that is ultra-low-fat and virtually vegetarian. I'll be eager to see the results.
I only wish they were also studying the pill that one company is touting these days that you're supposed to take before going to bed and then awaken the next day, miraculously thinner. I have doubts about that one -- or any diet that claims that you can eat whatever you want as long as you take this, drink that or say a magic incantation before going to bed.

There probably is only one real answer to too much weight, however: Eat less and exercise more.
Despite that, many will continue on the search for the ever-elusive "miracle diet, " leading me to believe that P.T. Barnum's remarks about a sucker being born every minute were right on target.

Daniel Schesch - Webweaver

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