No magic slimming bullet

Now I wouldn’t claim to be the sveltest person in the world, or to eat a particularly healthy diet. But I know very well that the only way to lose weight is to take in fewer calories than you burn up. So you either have to eat less or become more active, or a combination of the two.

Yet working in an office containing a number of women, who seem to be constantly on some form of diet, I am constantly assailed by the hopeful assertions that:

(a) there is some kind of diet that allows you to eat as much as you like of certain foods so long as you cut out others, and

(b) eating supposedly “healthy” food, such as wholemeal rather than white bread, will help with weight loss

Both of which are essentially myths.

It must make for a very miserable life to be constantly repressing your urges to eat appetising, tasty food and yet then never manage to lose any meaningful amount of weight.