Crash dieting is a tricky business. Usually, with a crash diet, you drop weight in a way that may not be considered ideal or healthy, only to put the weight back on once you stop the diet. While diet and exercise is firmly the best way to lose weight, if you absolutely must crash diet to drop a few pounds for an event, there is a right way to do it. Make sure that you still get adequate nutrition and never starve yourself to drop weight.
Step 1
Try a salad diet, remembering that salad doesn't only mean greens. You can eat a low-calorie diet for a few days by incorporating some kind of salad for every meal. Kara Gallagher, assistant professor of Exercise Physiology at the University of Louisville, recommends starting the day off with a variety of fruits, and then having a salad for lunch and dinner. Remember to go easy on the salad dressings. Some thick and creamy dresses pack on an extra 100 calories per serving. Stick with oil and vinegar-based dressings.
Step 2
Eat more meals that are smaller but closer together. Forgoing your usual three per day meal plan for lighter fare six times per day can help rev up your metabolism so that you're burning more calories, and therefore losing more weight. Keep your six meals closer to the size of snacks, and make sure that they are nutrient dense, like apples and peanut butter or a cheese stick and fat free milk, along with your salads.
Step 3
Refrain from trying to starve yourself in order to lose weight. Starving yourself causes your metabolism to slow as it goes into starvation mode and begins to store all of the calories that you consume. This could not only cause you to gain weight, but make it harder for you to lose weight in the future.
Step 4
Stop your crash diet after a few days. Crash dieting is not recommended at all, and if you are insistent upon a crash diet, it should never go on longer than a week. Crash dieting, forcing yourself to eat only one kind of food, liquid or partaking in a super low calorie diet could cause you to become mineral and vitamin deficient and effect your physical performance, says diet website 3FatChicks.com
Step 5
Understand that crash diets are not a viable means for weight loss. Once you stop the crash diet behavior, it is likely that you'll gain the weight back. Remember that you can always cut back calories while still eating fruits, vegetables, lean proteins and carbohydrates while exercising for a more healthy lifestyle and weight without resorting to crash diets.
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