Biochemistry of the Human Metabolism

The human body is well adapt to survival in environments where food is scarce (such as the conditions of the past in which humans evolved from). If an individual starts a cold turkey “no more eating” or “low caloric” diet, the body will go into shock and perceive this action as starvation and slow down the dieter’s metabolism and basal metabolic rate! As a result the dieter will lose a couple pounds (a majority of which is liquid) in the first two days of this diet, but will soon reach a plateau where the dieter’s body weight will remain constant (plateau) (refer to fig. 1). This occurs because the body’s biochemistry (as a natural defense mechanism against starving to death) has slowed down the body’s metabolism to conserve energy and prevent further weight loss.

Now in most cases, individuals who have tried any low caloric diet will give up when they stop seeing results and binge on an enormous feast because hunger has taken over them. However note that the body’s metabolism is still low and your enormous feast contains more energy than your body is ready to process, so it causes the dieter to gain more weight than when they started the diet! Note that even if the dieter gave up the diet and returned to their normal diet, they would still gain weight because of the lower than regular metabolism (refer to fig. 2). Dieters who have already tried losing weight will notice that it is the last couple of pounds that are impossible to trim off.

So how the hell do we lose weight with just dieting alone, if our body’s damn natural self-defense mechanism prevents us from losing weight in the first place!?!

We trick it.

We eat a diet that is exactly suited for your Basal Metabolic Rate so your body will not go into shock. However every variable day (every 2^nd or 3^rd day) we eat a reduced caloric (but not nutritionally deficient) diet. By varying the day in which we eat a reduced caloric diet for only one day, the body does not have enough time to adapt and perceive starvation (refer to fig. 3). This allows dieters to eat fewer calories over time and metabolism to remain normal, thus allowing individuals with this variable dieting pattern to lose weight over time.However realistically one will be supplementing their dieting regime with exercise to improve and accelerate results!