The Side Effects of a  Low Carb Diet

The ever popular Atkins Diet has continued to wow a lot of dieters, believers or otherwise. Ever since it was first introduced to the mass market in the early 70’s by Dr. Robert Atkins, it has captured the imagination of the dieting generation.

Other types of diets that came before the Atkins Diet mostly believe that one needs to count his or her calorie intake in order to maintain an ideal weight or lose some excess baggage. But not all people can seem to maintain a low calorie diet because of its strictness at maintaining a certain amount of calories to be taken at every meal. And this is to be followed daily. It seems that not all people are meant to follow a low calorie diet regimen.

But then along came the Atkins Diet which went against conventional dieting wisdom at the time it was introduced. Most experts then believe that it is the amount of calories that determine weight gain in humans. The more calories that one takes minus the calories spent on everyday activities, the result more or less would be the weight gained by an individual. Low calorie dieters are urged to count and control their calorie intake in order to lose weight. That means one should control the amount of food that he eats.

Restrictions include the consumption of high calorie foods which, in fact, would include almost all the food groups that people would love to eat. Some people seem to tire of following this regimen because most feel robbed of being able to enjoy the joys of eating. But when the Atkins Diet appeared to the public, it seemed to give a lot of people renewed hope.

What made the Atkins Diet popular with dieters is in the regimen that it follows. The Atkins Diet in a way is more liberal when it comes to food consumption save for one restriction. Primarily, the Atkins Diet is a low carbohydrate, high protein and fat diet. Instead of watching for calorie intake like what low calorie dieters do, the Atkins Diet prefers that its dieters put their carbohydrate intake up to a minimum.

People can eat as much or as frequently as they would like provided that they restrict their food consumption to high protein and high fat meals. When people heard of this new diet, they seem to like the idea that they can eat as much and as often as they can and still lose some weight. And many tried it out on themselves. Surprisingly, the Atkins Diet proved to be successful in helping people keep their weight down. The dieting community then was astonished at how such a diet that encourages people to eat high calorie foods can be so successful. All of a sudden some dieting perspectives changed. Now people are aware that there are other ways to lose weight other than counting calories.

But still a lot of experts say that a low carbohydrate diet like the Atkins Diet may have some side effects that people may not be aware of. Some of the side effects noted in one unpublished study include constipation, headaches, bad breath and hair loss. And because the Atkins Diet encourages the consumption of high fat foods, experts believe that it will increase the risk of heart disease and heart attacks among long term Atkins dieters.

Still a lot of studies are needed to be done in order to fully understand the effects of the Atkins Diet. And in the meantime, to lessen the risks that experts say come with the Atkins Diet, other practitioners have designed a modified diet that has lessened the consumption of fat. But until conclusive evidence is given, people would still prefer following the Atkins Diet to control weight gain.