One of the most popular diets for weight loss is a Low Carb. That is, a diet that restricts the carbohydrates from sugar, bread, grains, and pasta. The Low Carb Diet plan focuses on low carb foods like lean meats, fruits, and vegetables. By cutting the carbohydrates from a majority of their meals, many people have reported to have experienced dramatic weight loss when compared to people who cut fats or simply count their caloric intake.
The problem is that carbohydrates are the good stuff: cookies, fries, bread, candy, you name it. If it tastes good, odds are that food is packed with carbs. The diet industry will tell you that there are delicious ways to do a low carb diet and feel satisfied, but we’re going to be real with you: low carb is challenging.
On top of feeling deprived, you may experience the side effects of low carb diet.
Most discussed risks of low card diet include flu like symptoms that hit in the first few days and while they are perfectly normal and safe, they can be very annoying side effects to deal with.
Low Carb diets pay off but they require a lot of will power to prevent ‘cheating’ or quitting the diet altogether. Luckily we are here to help.
If you are on a low carb diet plan and find your willpower slipping, here are three awesome reasons (other than weight loss!) to keep at it:
- Lowers risk of heart disease
Skipping the bread basket is not only going to help keep your waistline trim, it can also lower your risk of heart disease! Eliminating elevated blood sugar levels can work miracles on your blood composition. Low carb diets are linked with increased levels of high density lipoproteins (or HDL, the ‘good cholesterol’). Triglycerides, or fat molecules in the blood, are directly linked to the consumption of fructose (a common carbohydrate found in processed foods).
When a low carb diet plan is adopted, the triglyceride levels drop, which takes pressure off of the cardiovascular system. Finally, low carb diets are also linked to significant reductions in blood pressure. All of these things add up to a much lower risk of developing heart disease, including heart attacks.
- Increased Resistance to Insulin
Insulin is one of the most useful hormones in the human body. It takes the sugar from the food you eat and binds with it, which allows your cells to take in the sugar as energy . Your body produces insulin as you eat to fully digest your food. The more carbs you eat, the more sugar enters your blood and the more insulin is produced to move it to the cells. The problem with the Standard American Diet is that we eat far too many carbs and sugars. This constant high blood sugar leads to an overproduction of insulin and over time the body gets used to the elevated levels. This is how type II diabetes happens. The good news is that adopting a low carb diet will not only cause your body to produce less insulin, but will increase your body’s resistance to it. This means your risk of developing diabetes drops dramatically!
- Cures Epilepsy
The benefits of a low carb diet have been known by the medical community for over a hundred years. It has been used to treat devastating brain disorders, even some cases cancers. The cells in the body and brain primarily rely on carbohydrates for energy, but in their absence (like when on a low carb diet) a healthy cell can utilize fats for their energy needs. Injured or diseased cells cannot switch from sugars to fats and so they diminish in number with a low carb diet. This diet is so successful in children with Epilepsy that nearly 16% of children on a low carb diet become completely seizure-free. There have also been some promising results in studies that use low carb diets to treat Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.
If you are on your low carb diet plan and the cookies, cake, fried foods, and breads are starting to look far too good to pass up, just think of the fantastically awesome benefits of your low carb diet that you will be missing out on if you indulge. Your waist line, heart, organs, and brain will all thank you for it!