LighterLife diet: A bride to be dies while on this crazy diet
Bride-to-be died after crash diet for wedding
I just wanted to post this as a warning and a reason why people shouldn't do a diet that is based on 500 calories. Although the coroner couldn't say for sure it was the diet that caused her death, it is still unsafe to do such a diet.
Every dieter wants to lose the weight quick. As far as I am concerned there are no shortcuts that are sustainable. You need to aim for a lifestyle change and not just dieting to lose weight.
I read that earlier this morning, it's horrible. :/
Read the story at
How can anyone and/or organisation suggest 500cals a day is a good way to lose weight? The mind boggles?
It's a pity the coroner couldn't point the finger at the starvation diet as being the likely cause. The spokesperson from LighterLife sounds a little too complacent in the circumstances.
Original Post by gi-jane:
It's a pity the coroner couldn't point the finger at the starvation diet as being the likely cause. The spokesperson from LighterLife sounds a little too complacent in the circumstances.
I agree, I think they were glad the coroners report couldn't point a finger at them.
The coroner said: 'The evidence cannot point one way or the other as to whether her indulging in that diet has in any way caused or contributed to her death,' he added.
LighterLife said: We were very sad to hear the news about Samantha. However, we must emphasise that the coroner has stated the LighterLife Programme could in no way be associated with her death.'
Its interesting how they reword what the coroner said in their statement to make it seem like the coroner dismissed any link between the death and the diet.
Sad.
Even if the coroner had stated there was a link, sadly, I don't think Lighterlife would see a dent in their sales. Like gastric surgery, amphetamines and other risky methods, people hear the words 'guaranteed effortless weight-loss' and sign up anyway. They're not interested in the possible downsides.
Hope the family sue....
It was probably a difficult one for the coroner to make a judgement on.
Reading other LighterLife experiences, seems people heavier and lighter than the woman who passed away were successful in losing weight with no adverse problems.
Apparently the idea of LighterLife
"came from emergency food packs for disaster areas that contained the minimum calories needed to survive."
"We thought we could use that for dieters."
There are so many factors that come into play when the body and mind is in a disaster situation. Using this to create a 'Diet' business sounds wrong!
I used to live in England (moved to US in 2006), but have never heard of Lighterlife diet. What is it? It sounds really unhealthy and a very sad story. The story also stated that this was the second death of a Lighterlife Dieter.
There are lots of similar schemes. It's a very low calorie, meal replacement diet and it's sold by agents that style themselves 'counsellors'. We have one of them in our office building and the Lighterlife magazine is often in reception. In the 'Foundation Programme' (14 weeks for women) people get four foodpacks a day containing an average of 500 cals in total. Not cheap, from what I hear. After that you're encouraged to stay with them to 'gain self-awareness' and maintain your lower weight. I'd suspect that's when it could unravel. After 500 cals a day any reintroduction of just slightly more food is going to make maintaining weight really tough.
I wouldn't do it, I think it is unhealthy and support the ideal that dieting is about learning to eat better for life not just until you get smaller.
But... I do know two people who have used lighter life to successfully lose about 100lbs each. Both had BMIs in the 30s and used it to get back closer to 25 before dieting in a less ridged fashion. Neither had any problems that I know of. Both seem like really intelligent clued up people and it worked for them. Neither have put the weight back on a year and two years later respectively.
I wish that the corner either laid blame on the diet or found another clear cause as this seems to be the worst off both worlds. Even if it gave some indication of what + extreme diet = death. People who are desperate to lose weight will carry on doing this and people will die until the guidelines are clarified.
500 calories a day is horrible. I don't think I could sustain that for even 1 day!
It's roughly the amount that someone can eat post gastric surgery. Usually very low calorie diets are done with the supervision of doctors and are only offered to people in the dangerously obese category... where the risks of malnutrition are offset by the risks of remaining dangerously obese.
Original Post by lsam31:
500 calories a day is horrible. I don't think I could sustain that for even 1 day!
I totally agree! I'm supposed to be sticking to 1600 calories a day, and at times I find that hard.. just because I do love food and I do find eating a satisfying feeling ugh I know one thing I could never starve myself NEVER.
So it's expensive to starve yourself these days? Huh. I never realised you had to pay to be denied food - bizarre what people can market as a business! I wish companies like LighterLife that give the impression that there is anything ok with a 500 cal a day diet could be closed down.
I believe the WHO say 950 calories or under is starvation, and that is referring to people in famine crises who cannot afford to eat; not those who are paying to starve when food is abundant!
The Cambridge Diet operated on similar lines and there are other schemes that will happily sell you diet products and meal replacements. I'm sure that it's been checked out by various authorities for any inherent dangers and, since most of their clients are still alive, so far so good. All of that doesn't necessarily make it a good scheme.... just meeting the perennial demand for rapid weight-loss. If people are happy to pay good money to eat starvation ration 'foodpacks'.... more fool them.
I think I will just stick with my chicken breast, whole wheat couscous, steamed broccoli and olive oil concoction that I made for lunch. Been there, done that!; no more of those type of diets again! I learned my lesson with the Metabolic Research Center!
"And National Obesity Forum chief Dr David Haslam warned: 'Samantha's death tragically shows the real dangers of being obese.'"
Yes, because it was clearly the obesity that did her in. Agh.
Original Post by _qwerty_:
"And National Obesity Forum chief Dr David Haslam warned: 'Samantha's death tragically shows the real dangers of being obese.'"
Yes, because it was clearly the obesity that did her in. Agh.
Maybe the dangers of being obese (in this case) was going on a fad diet to loose weight too quickly.
A very sad state of affairs!
And to make it worse you get tales of apparent success like the lady near the bottom of the following link:
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/woman/he alth/2629939/Would-you-do-a-diet-devised-by-t his-obese-woman.html
Just to give a different perspective from one thats tried it.....
I did Lighter Life for 6 months several years ago and went from 16 stone to 9.5 stone. I never felt healthier or happier! Maintaining the loss was very tough but I reckon the health risk from being so obese massively outweighs any risk of the diet itself for me. 500 cals per day seems very little until you consider the millions of calories of bodyfat I had to fuel me.
I have no doubt that slower, balanced, calorie controlled diets are healther and give a much easier weight loss to maintain but I had battled with weight issues for years and never succeeded in losing more than 2 stone using conventional diets. This type of diet reduced my hunger and took food completely out of the equation temporarily while I all my shed weight very rapidly. This kept me motivated, excited and, most importantly, able to stick to it.
Having done the diet I suspect that either her obesity was the cause or maybe she didn't follow the diet correctly e.g. not drinking enough water or not enough meal packs.
Original Post by kermana:
Just to give a different perspective from one thats tried it.....
I did Lighter Life for 6 months several years ago and went from 16 stone to 9.5 stone. I never felt healthier or happier! Maintaining the loss was very tough but I reckon the health risk from being so obese massively outweighs any risk of the diet itself for me. 500 cals per day seems very little until you consider the millions of calories of bodyfat I had to fuel me.
I have no doubt that slower, balanced, calorie controlled diets are healther and give a much easier weight loss to maintain but I had battled with weight issues for years and never succeeded in losing more than 2 stone using conventional diets. This type of diet reduced my hunger and took food completely out of the equation temporarily while I all my shed weight very rapidly. This kept me motivated, excited and, most importantly, able to stick to it.
Having done the diet I suspect that either her obesity was the cause or maybe she didn't follow the diet correctly e.g. not drinking enough water or not enough meal packs.
This is the difficult thing with these fad diets, they work at dropping a lot of weight, all be it not very healthily.
But what you need to do is ask yourself: What did you learn about proper nutrition and healthy eating?
I'm not having a go at you, but society is obsessed with losing the weight quickly at the expense of health. Losing weight in a healthly way is hard work and it takes time. That's what makes it so rewarding when people reach their goals, because they've had bust a gut to get there.
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