Hello friends I am here to give you a quick and dirty lesson on all those diet fads/cleanses/juices/wraps/etc and why they work and why they’re equally complete bullshit.

“But how can something work but also be a scam?”

Well here’s an explanation. You may have seen ads like these:

Over priced all natural supplements, teas, and diet based cereals promise you’ll drop a shit load of weight in two weeks-a month. And you will! You absolutely will! It’s called water weight.

Water weight is something of a confusing subject, since it sounds like weight you gain by drinking too much water. In fact, water weight is what gets expelled when you become properly hydrated, reduce your sodium intake, or begin eating a more balanced diet. When you’re dehydrated, your cells hold on to every bit of water they can. This causes bloating and the infamous water weight.

So in two weeks, when you become ultra hydrated on that juice cleanse, or reduce your caloric intake by eating cereal, or take an herbal supplement that includes a diuretic, you will lose weight quickly. The heavier you are, the more pounds you’ll lose.

And then, after a week or two, it’ll stop. Once the water weight is gone, the only weight loss left to go is fat deposits. And you’re not going to healthily lose fat by drinking herbal teas or wrapping your abdomen every day. A healthy range for weight loss on a caloric deficit is 1-2 lbs a week, with the high end being on a very large deficit. Anyone wanting to lose fat should strive for a .5-1 pound of weight loss a week. It’s a slow process, and many drop out because they lose their patience. Especially after that 10 lb drop in the first two weeks sets up lofty expectations.

These things are scams because you do not need to pay a cent to lose water weight. You just need to properly hydrate and watch your sodium intake. If you drink a lot of soda, cut back. That’s it! These companies know what they’re doing, and the multi-level marketing ones are the worst at it. Because they’ll have sales reps who tried it themselves and ‘woah man it actually works!’ Yes! It will work! You will lose 5-10 lbs in two weeks! But you didn’t need to shell out $60 to do so.

Don’t fall for these things. The world is full of enough focus on fat shaming, body negative bullshit scams without a natural process being exploited for mad cash.