The Saint Rose Chronicle

Issue date: 2/13/08 Section: Entertainment

It's midway through February and, according to some statistics and research, more than 90 percent of New Year's resolutions have already been broken. Another stat is that 54 percent of all resolutions involve losing weight or eating healthier. The likelihood that those promises you made are slowly being shelved next to the Oreos is high.

Stopping that line of thinking and getting back on track is not easy, but could be worth it in order to live a longer, healthier life. But instead of eating only grapefruits or cutting out all breads and pastas, there are some lifestyles changes you can adopt that may be more beneficial. Below are three different types of diets that have endured the test of time and helped thousands lose weight and keep it off.

They won't work for everyone, but these examples can at least start you on a search for something that will suit your individual needs better than a large orange fruit can. One last note, some of these diets are almost impossible to follow on dining hall food alone.


Vegetarianism:

Vegetarianism is the dietary practice excluding all animal flesh, including poultry, game, fish, shellfish or crustacea, and slaughter by-products. There are many reasons for choosing such a lifestyle, including morality, religion, ethics, and health.

There are many variants of the diet, some of which exclude eggs and/or some products produced from animal labor such as dairy products and honey. Veganism, for example, excludes all animal products from diet. Studies have shown vegetarian diets to satisfy the nutritional needs for all stages of life, and large-scale studies have shown vegetarianism to increase longevity, improve health, and significantly lower risks of cancer and other diseases.

Most vegetarians also are aware of avoiding products that may use animal ingredients not included in their labels or which use animal products in their manufacturing, for example cheeses that use animal rennet, gelatin, and some sugars whitened with bone char.

For those reluctant to the whole way, semi-vegetarian diets are easier for some. They primarily consist of vegetarian foods, but have exceptions. These include: semi-vegetarianism, in which seafood and/or poultry can be consumed in limited amounts; pescetarianism, which only allows fish or other seafood to be eaten; pollotarianism, where only fowl and poultry can be included in the diet; and flexitarianism, which consists primarily of vegetarian food, but allows for occasional exceptions.



The Mediterranean Diet:

The Mediterranean diet is a modern take on the traditional dietary patterns of some of the countries of the Mediterranean Basin, particularly Greece and Southern Italy. Common to the traditional diets of these regions, people consume a diet primarily of fruit and vegetables, bread, wheat and other cereals, olive oil, olive leaf, fish, and red wine. The diet is often cited as beneficial for being low in saturated fat and high in monounsaturated fat and dietary fiber. Although it was first publicized in 1945 by doctor Ancel Keys, the diet failed to gain widespread recognition until the 1990s.

One of the main explanations is thought to be the large amount of olive oil used in the Mediterranean diet. Unlike the high amount of animal fats typical to the American diet, olive oil lowers cholesterol levels in the blood. It is also known to lower blood sugar levels and blood pressure. Some concerns remain whether the diet provides adequate amounts of all nutrients, particularly calcium and iron. Yet green vegetables, a good source of calcium and iron, are used in the Mediterranean diet as well as goat cheese, a good source of calcium.



The Paleolithic Diet:

A Paleolithic-style diet, popularly known as the caveman diet, is a regime consisting of commonly available foods that emulates the diet of wild plants and animals that humans and their close relatives habitually consumed during the PaleolithicAge. This two million year time period ended about 10,000 years ago, when Homo sapiens invented agriculture. This concept is based on the premise that modern humans are genetically adapted to the diet of their Paleolithic ancestors and that human genetics have scarcely changed since the dawn of agriculture, and therefore an ideal diet is one that resembles this ancestral diet.

Proponents of this nutritional approach differ in their dietary prescriptions, but all agree that people today should eat mainly meat, fish, vegetables, fruit, roots and nuts, and avoid grains, legumes, dairy products, salt, and processed fat and sugar. They argue that modern human populations subsisting on traditional diets similar to this seem to be largely free of 'diseases of affluence,' and that such diets produce beneficial health outcomes in controlled medical studies. Critics have taken issue with its underlying evolutionary logic, and have disputed certain dietary prescriptions on the grounds that they pose health risks and may not reflect real Paleolithic diets. They also argue that such diets are not a realistic alternative for everyone, and that meat-based diets are not environmentally sustainable.

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