The South Beach Diet was created by cardiologist Dr. Arthur Agatston based in a hospital in South Florida. While his diet was originally meant to help overweight heart patients, the success in weight loss popularized the diet among other individuals wanting to lose some pounds. This diet is sometimes known as the "healthy" Atkins diet and consists of foods such as whole grains, healthy fats, fish, chicken, fruits and vegetables.
The South Beach Diet is divided into three stages to guarantee weight loss:
The first stage is called "Phase 1: Eliminate Cravings and Kickstart Weight Loss". During this short, two week phase, dieters work on getting rid of their cravings for sugar and refined starches. The purpose of this, according to the official site, is to "stabilize blood sugar (which minimizes cravings), making it ideal for people who are pre-diabetic or diabetic, as well as for those who need to lose a lot of weight."
In "Phase 2: Lose Steadily" , the dieter goes on a long-term weight-loss period. This stage is also ideal for people who only want to lose a smaller number of weight, such as 10 lbs, or for those that don’t have problems with cravings or who just want to improve their health.
The final stage is called "Maintain For Life" and is meant to help you make smart food choices throughout your daily life. This stage begins once you have reached your healthy weight. During this phase, you continue to follow the food rules you learned in phase one and two, and apply them over your lifetime. In the diet, this is the key to maintaining a healthy weight for life.
For more information on the stages of the South Beach Diet, visit their Official Website!
It is important to remember that while the South Beach Diet looks a lot like the Atkins diet, they are in fact quite different. The main difference between the two is in how they determine the carbohydrates that are ok to eat. In the Atkins diet, all that matters is the amount of grams of carbs per serving. In the South Beach Diet, the Glycemic Index of the foods is used to determine whether or not it is good to eat.
Recently, the South Beach Diet had been reformulated and "super charged". While this diet is mostly the same as before; with three phases and all, Dr. Agatston decided to include some more foods in his allowable diet and has included a new 20 minute interval training workout that he claims helps to speed up the metabolism.
According to Every Diet, the South Beach Diet is actually good for dieters with busy lifestyles that don't have much time for exercise and dieters will also benefit from the detailed meal plans with recipes. With the exception of the first phase, the diet also does a good job including a balance of all the food groups. However, on the down side, the diet does require complete abstinence from certain food groups (fruits) for a two week period, its diet is very restrictive, many of the South Beach food products contain artificial sweeteners (no good!), and there has been no evidence to show that the diet produces long term weight loss effects.
If you are interested in learning more about The South Beach Diet, here are a few sites I recommend visiting:
Exercise: For you non-sick folk out there, today is a yoga day. Enjoy taking an hour out of your day to center yourself as you work on balance, strength, and flexibility.
Eat: The last ten days have been all about how to shop healthy and affordable. For the next eight days, I'm going to give tips on how to eat healthy, according to Cooking Light. These tips are meant as some beginning guidelines to help you get into a healthy eating habit. Today's tip is "Variety is the Spice of Life". Research continues to point to eating a variety of foods in order to have a healthy diet and stay at optimal health. Make sure you are eating a daily variety of fruits and vegetables in many colors; and stay to whole grains, beans, legumes, and a wide range of lean protein.
Relax: Since I didn't go into work today and basically slept all day either on my bed or on the couch, I got to catch my favorite "trash TV" show today live (usually I just DVR everything I want to watch): The Bachelor. Today was the women's reunion and it was catty! Even though the "Women Tell All" reunions are never my favorite episode, I still enjoyed watching it with my family.
No comments:
Post a Comment