Fat Burners & Diet Pills

Twice a week I post on this blog, discussing topics ranging from gym workouts to supplement reviews, but here’s a little secret: The principles surrounding weight loss never change!

The health and fitness market is one that is rapidly growing, yes. But this isn’t because of a magical scientific discovery, it’s due to the fact that our society has a greater awareness of what goes into a healthy lifestyle.

Naturally in a growing market like this one, companies are always looking at ways to exploit this fact and make money. But there are plenty of companies that provide sound products for the health and fitness market and manage to make a decent profit while they are at it.

Weight loss is amazingly simple:

• Calories in > Calories out = WEIGHT GAIN
• Calories out > Calories in = WEIGHT LOSS

That is literally it! But of course the theory is so often far more easy than the practice.

So this is where diet pills come in. If you want to lose weight you have to directly affect at least one of calories in, or calories out. 

Diet pills obviously affect calories in – or do they? The truth is that while the marketing of these companies will try to show them off as some scientific extension working out of a high-facility lab, they are really just appetite suppressants.

The theory being that if you become full quicker, you eat less, therefore taking in less calories. As a concept that can’t be faulted. But say these pills work then? And you get down to the weight you want to be – then what?

Once you stop taking the pills your appetite will shoot straight back up to where it was before. This creates the yo-yo effect that is all too common in regular users of these supplements.

Some do work in slightly different ways. When you consume food an enzyme called lipase helps to break down the fat you eat to make it more easily digested. So some pills inhibit the lipase, meaning less fat is absorbed, instead being removed through bowel movements.

I’m not sure about you, but the removal of fat through bowel movements doesn’t sound exactly like the kind of thing I want to subject my body to.

We know how clever are bodies are, just look at what they can do! So are you going to tell me that the ‘scientists’ working for these companies have created products that can out-smart the human body? I doubt even they would claim that.

So while their understanding of the human body might be limited, their understanding of the mind is in fact far superior.

Again I refer to our constant search for the ‘quick-fix’, and these companies are so aware of it. Plenty of people out there buy in to this idea. Well I’m here telling you not to.

These aren’t the kind of supplement you can just try out to see if they work. But I can’t even see why you would want to!

I go back to my very first point – the principles behind weight loss haven’t changed. If you exercise and eat right you will lose weight – it’s science! Yes, our metabolisms may all be slightly different, but these people who claim they ‘can’t lose weight’ often haven’t followed the right advice.

There’s no diet pill I would want to specifically review in a blog because I know I wouldn’t recommend it. No supplement out there can substitute hard work in the gym and the kitchen, fact.

If it’s your appetite you want to suppress just eat smaller portions of food more frequently (every 3-4 hours). Simple tips like this will help you lose weight, not a quick pill before a meal!

There’s no potion, no spell and no tricks. Just make sure you are doing the important things right, and in the end you’ll get out everything you are willing to put in!