Most of us have tried out a fad diet or we may know someone who has tried one. A fad diet aims to restrict your intake of certain beverages and foods to facilitate weight loss. There are fad diets that reduce caloric intake and some that impede your intake of carbohydrates. A fad diet usually focuses on what you put in your body as opposed to concentrating on what you do with your body. The plan with fad diets is that the individual will achieve weight loss by reducing their food intake or removing something from their eating routine.

A balanced diet is part of a comprehensive and nutritious eating plan aimed at health improvement through improvement of the quality of foods taken. A healthy eating plan is important in informing you on how foods influence your body so you can make educated choices when it comes to your meals.

A balanced diet concentrates on slow but permanent weight loss over a duration of time while a fad diet concentrates on losing the weight quickly but usually the results do not last long, with the weight often returning when the food/drink restriction is no longer in place and the person then blaming the fad diet as not being effective.

A healthy eating program with a balanced diet approaches weight loss holistically meaning you have to enforce a healthy lifestyle change for you to see positive results. Your diet plan can include anything ranging from meditation to exercise aside from a balanced diet. On the other hand, a fad diet focuses on your beverage and food intake alone.

A balanced and nutritious eating program focuses on how you will achieve your target weight and not just the results. This means you have to find out about healthy food choices and implement them into your eating plan. A fad diet usually has a strict regime detailing what you should and should not eat or drink instead of letting you make your own food choices.

Healthy eating programs allow you to include vegetables and fruits in your diet and they applaud a balanced diet. A fad diet is characterised by the emphasis of the intake of a specific kind of food (i.e. the grapefruit diet or cabbage diet) or it removes some foods from your diet completely.

A healthy eating program does not rely on schemes or gimmicks as it recognises the fact that obesity and its related illnesses are not solved by quick fixes. You will need to put in the work long-term to turn your lifestyle around for successful results. Fad diets rely on gimmicks heavily to persuade you that you can lose the weight by following a single rule.

A healthy eating program usually involves the following characteristics making it a healthier option.
– A balanced diet comprising of all the food groups namely healthy dietary fats, low-fat dairy,
lean proteins, vegetables, fruits, and whole grains.
– Regular physical activity or exercise
– Normal portion sizes
– Consistent meals with healthy snacks in between
– A few of your favorite meals
– It is flexible and is suited to your schedule
– Consists of food you can find at social events or restaurants

In short, a fad diet will see quick results, but at the cost of risking your health to achieve them as well as gaining weight again shortly after stopping the diet.
If you prefer long lasting results, go for the balanced diet route!