stumptuous.com

Most products promoted as weight-loss supplements do not help the body lose fat.

They are often just diuretics, which means they make the body dump water. Or they are laxatives, and we all know what those are. Dieter’s tea, for example, is just a fancy diuretic and laxative (often it contains senna, a powerful herbal laxative), and herein lies the very real danger. Your body needs water to function, and it needs to keep certain minerals (often known as electrolytes), such as potassium and sodium, in balance to perform nearly all metabolic activities. But when you force it to rid itself of the water it needs, or to excrete too quickly, it can upset the delicate balance of your body’s minerals. Several people have died from products like the dieter’s tea because the diuretic and laxative combination threw their electrolyte balance out so badly that the heart wasn’t able to get the signals across its cell membranes, and it didn’t know how or when to beat properly. So it shut down.

Another danger in laxatives is that the natural peristaltic action (rhythmic muscular contractions) of the intestines is disrupted. If laxative use continues for too long, the intestinal muscles atrophy and lose their ability to move the food through, which leads to all kinds of intestinal distress such as constipation and blockages. Very unpleasant! It may seem like weight is lost in the short term with these products, but all that’s being tossed overboard is water and improperly digested food, not fat.

Other diet products work by suppressing appetite. Here’s a bit of trivia: the drug MDMA, better known as ecstasy, was originally developed in Germany in the early 20th century as a diet drug, because of its appetite suppressant effect. It’s not known whether experimental subjects lost weight permanently, but they started wearing funny pants and hugging a lot.

Usually, appetite suppressants have a stimulant effect. Caffeine, for example, often suppresses appetite and perks you up. Same with ephedrine. These two products have been used in conjunction by many dieters, and in general, if used intelligently, the side effects are limited to jitteriness, irritability, sleeplessness, and an elevated heart rate. Kinda the same as having too much coffee. The side effects usually diminish with use. However, there have been deaths linked to ephedrine use, and while it hasn’t been conclusively proven that the ephedrine was to blame, it wouldn’t be surprising if someone thought that if 25 mg of ephedrine and 250 mg of caffeine was the recommended dose, then maybe 250 mg of ephedrine and 2500 mg of caffeine would work 10 times better. I’ve tried ephedrine on and off through the years, always with a half or even a quarter-dose. Even 8 mg of ephedrine would give me a good buzz. But I quit when I noticed a weird squeezy feeling in my chest every time I had some ephedrine. Anyone who has a major predisposition to cardiovascular disease should exercise caution with these. A good life lesson is not to fuck with stimulants, for they will definitely fuck with you.

And finally, other things like meal replacements just “work” because they require you to substitute them for a meal. Well, duh, if a Slim Fast bar is 200 calories, and you have to eat it for breakfast and lunch, then unless you eat 2000 calories for dinner, you’re going to lose weight. If you read the fine print, you’ll find that meal replacement bars tell you to eat a moderate dinner and exercise. Amazing. Hell, you could eat dryer lint and get the same effect. Also, many of those bars and shakes are loaded with sugar and other chemical crud you don’t need.