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In the 1980’s the Grapefruit diet became a huge craze to help people “lose weight in a hurry”.
The Grapefruit diet plan involved reducing caloric intake to a minimal 800 calories a day, less than half of the daily recommendation for most individuals.
The diet was considered a fad and a dangerous one at that, with such a reduction in food.
It was believed that the diet only triggered weight loss by flushing the system of excess fluid and reducing calories to the point of starvation if continued for a great deal of time. |
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The Sour Face of the Grapefruit Diet and How It’s Changed
If you are going to consider this particular diet, here is the exact regime that is followed: breakfast is (not surprisingly) grapefruit, which is supposed to kick-start the metabolism and burn fat throughout the day. Throughout the day, you can eat more grapefruit and drink as much coffee as you like, supplementing your diet with protein, primarily consisting of boiled eggs. You can also eat a couple of pieces of dry toast during the day, but really nothing else.
Although this does not seem like a logical weight loss program, in recent years, however, some studies have shown that grapefruit does have properties that aid in weight loss. In a clinical trial of 100 obese people, diets remained unchanged, with the exception of 1/3 of the group eating half a grapefruit before each meal three times a day, another 1/3 drinking grapefruit juice before each meal, and the final 1/3 receiving no grapefruit supplementation.
At the end of a twelve-week period, those patients who ate grapefruit showed an average loss of 3.6 pounds. Patients drinking grapefruit juice saw an average loss of 3.3 pounds. The third group who added no grapefruit to their diet but increased exercise slightly, showed an average loss of only .5 pounds.
With this in mind, it seems that perhaps the original Grapefruit diet wasn’t just a fad. Other benefits have been found in eating grapefruit as well, which may lead to the popularity of a new kind of Grapefruit diet plan. Those who consume grapefruit or grapefruit products have lower levels of insulin, which may assist in reducing risks of acquiring diabetes or having a stroke.
While the results of the study of a new Grapefruit diet seem promising thus far, care should be taken in overconfidence that this is the wave of the future. It was the first study of its kind to be conducted, and a much larger study is scheduled to confirm the results seen so far.
While a Grapefruit diet plan that doesn’t reduce caloric intake so drastically may be of benefit in several ways, it is by no means a cure for diabetes and heart disease. Speak with your doctor about supplementing your current treatments for weight loss or diabetes with an increased consumption of grapefruit and grapefruit products. Perhaps this may be beneficial to you, and at least it won’t be harmful as the research continues to build on the value of a Grapefruit diet.
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