The Attempt:
Much like a seasoned cafe hopper, 28-year-old *Norah is more than familiar with health fads too. She's jumped from one to another all her life. She points to Tumblr, YouTube and online forums as her main source of information.
"I'd get on whatever that's trending, basically."
She goes on to tell me all about the
Baby Food Diet and
Apple Diet—both of which she had tried on separate occasions. "Being my lazy self, I bought pre-made baby food; ones in jars from the supermarket and had them for meals. Oh my god, they tasted so bad."
I'm not surprised. Replacing breakfast and lunch with jars of pureed ham and strained peas? That doesn't sound appetising at all.
It took diligence on her part to ensure that things were going to plan. As much as possible, she'd avoid dining out. Otherwise, she'd strategically schedule social activities before or after meals. Like Fion, this was driven by her obsession of attaining "good looks" defined by society.
"Thinness was a trend. For whatever reason, so many people wanted to get rid of a thigh gap. I did too." These attempts were rarely about health, which she now realises at an older age.
"I've learned that there's a limit to how much you can sleep hunger away. The more you can't have something, the more your body naturally craves it."
Before anything even worked though, she was on to the next thing.
As her myopia began to deteriorate, she began consuming more carrots. She'd even volunteer to have friends' leftovers whenever carrots were the ones left uneaten. Her vision continues to worsen at -600 today, so all that conscious consumption proved futile.
The Apple Diet? It required her to eat at least three a day—one enough to keep the doctor away, three to cause alarm.
The Professional Take:
"These kinds of health fads—the Baby Food and Apples Diet—contain misinformation which can be very dangerous," Pooja laments, stressing that they can cause "extreme nutritional deficiencies."
According to her, weight management is more about the quality of food. It's bad practice to simply count calories. She recommends looking at macronutrients and the glycemic load (how quickly food affects your blood sugar) instead.
It's not that clear cut. "There's also other factors—the consideration of hormones, for instance, and how that can impact someone's weight and metabolism."
*Norah isn't entirely wrong about carrots though. Pooja chimes in: "Orange foods like carrots, mangos and apricots are high in beta-carotene, which is a form of Vitamin A. It's what you'll need for good eyesight. Still, she stresses the dangers. Say, if someone has high blood sugar or insulin resistance, it might not be good to have them all the time.
"Again, this loops back to bio-individuality."
Just because it works for one person, doesn't mean it's a one-size-fits-all.
