Our hunter gatherer ancestry gives a clue that fat free diets aren’t what we’re made for. Prior to agriculture becoming prevalent, the human diet was high in natural fats, and low carb. The opposite to what many people are eating today.
There are several small groups of hunter gatherer even today, still eating what our ancestors ate. It’s interesting that these people tend to be lean, strong and relatively disease free – all despite a high in fat diet.
Have you been swept along with the fat free diet craziness? Here are just a few of the dangers.
1 Malnutrition
When food is made into ‘fat free diet food’ or ‘low fat’, it’s not only the fat that is removed.
Take milk or cheese for example. When the fat is removed, the fat soluble vitamins are removed too. You need to eat fat to get these nutrients. Even if you take supplements, they’re not going to be absorbed well without fat.
Many people who aren’t short on calories, are malnourished because they have a multitude of deficiencies caused by eating low fat.
2 Reduced Metabolism
Certain fats like omega 3, are required for a healthy metabolism. And if you don’t get enough your metabolism slows down, you feel sluggish and at some point move onto number 3 on this list.
3. Obesity
In a lot of people who develop a sluggish metabolism will suffer weight gain as a result.
Who would have thought a fat free diet can eventually lead to weight gain!
The added problem here is that a fat free diet inevitably leads to an increase in carbohydrate consumption. Excess carbs easily turn into body fat, in fact they do this much, much easier than dietary fat.
4. Dry Skin
Without adequate healthy fats in your diet you can’t have healthy, smooth and glowing skin.
Your skin should be naturally moisturised with the oils it produces. It can only do this if it has good quality fat from your diet.
5. Increased Appetite
If your body isn’t given what it needs in terms of healthy fats and vitamins – it’s not going to stop needing them.
Your body knows when it’s short of raw materials, so in an attempt to get them your appetite may increase. Your body ‘hopes’ you’re going to give it what it needs.
Often a craving for fatty food comes from a deficiency in healthy fats.
6. Increased Risk of Diabetes
Low fat and fat free diets end up being high carb and sugar diets, because he fat has to replaced with something.
Human physiology is not equipped to deal with a high carb diet, so disease is often the result of sticking to this long-term, often in the form of diabetes, heart disease and dementia.
Diabetes gets worse and worse if you don’t curb your carb-loaded diet by eating more healthy fats instead.
7. Decreased Brain Size
Over the last 100 years human brain size has actually reduced in Western countries!
This is thought to be the result of lack of healthy fat in the diet. Looking at the dry weight of the brain, 70-80% of it is fat, meaning fat is really important for a healthy brain.
8. Psychological Problems
A knock on effect of not having the proper raw materials to build and maintain a healthy brain is impoverished function.
This shows up as anxiety, depression, and other mental health problems. This is compounded by a deficiency of the fat soluble vitamins, which also results for low fat and fat free diets.
If you’re taking antidepressants and not making progress, perhaps you need to have a look at your diet.
Fat Free Diet
Low fat and fat free diets are just not a normal thing for a human being to eat, which means you can’t be healthy if eat one.
That said, neither is a diet high in unnatural fats healthy, like altered vegetable fats e.g. margarine and deep fried food.
To be healthy you need a regular supply of healthy natural fats like omega 3 (found in oily fish and flax seeds) and saturated fats (found in animal products and coconut oil).
Fat is one of the keys to health and ideal body weight.
I spend an entire session within Uber Slim educating my clients about fat. It’s hard to swallow at first, after years of being scared of it (as a result of diets). But once it’s been fully explained, it begins to make sense to include more and more of it in your diet – this is excellent, because high fat food is great to eat!
Feel free to get in contact with any questions or would like me to expand on any of these areas.
Have a great week.
Dr Julie
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It all boils down to knowing your good fats and eating them, and knowing your bad fats and not eating them! I suppose?
And eating plenty of the good fats is a lot nicer than eating fat free rubbish! Thanks Phil
I have started eating more good fats, more fish and cut out some sugar I have , been eating a low fat diet, weight watchers products, for too many years , over the last two days I have developed a pain below my bra strap in the middle of my chest, which I think is trapped wind which I have experienced before and can be very painful, what can I do to get rid of the pain.
Thank you, regards Jac
Great that you’re eating more good fats and cutting down on the rubbish, especially the over-priced weight watchers products.
Re the pain – hard to comment with limited info, if it’s really bothering you I would go and see your doctor.