Diet plan should not be compromised

The core answer is never to implement a templated solution without compromise, but to match your actual individual needs without compromise.

I don’t say this in vain. When I helped my distant aunt treat gout two years ago, I best understood the necessity of “strict implementation”: the low-purine diet plan prescribed by the doctor clearly stated that she should abstain from thick broth, seafood, and alcohol. At first, she secretly drank half a cup of home-cooked pork rib soup. That night, her toes were so swollen that she couldn’t even put on slippers. The uric acid level in the follow-up test was 40 μmol/L higher than before. This kind of clinical nutrition intervention for diseases is itself accurately calculated, and it may affect the treatment effect even if it is even small, and cannot be discounted even half a cent. This is also the core basis of the "diet must be strictly implemented" faction, and there is indeed nothing wrong with it.

But if you neither need clinical disease control nor are you an athlete preparing for competitions, and you hold a food scale and count to one decimal place every day, you are simply looking for trouble for yourself. Last year, I met a little girl who had just applied for a fitness card. She followed a fat-reduction blogger with millions of followers on the Internet and ate a template meal, which included 120g of chicken breasts, 80g of brown rice, and 150g of boiled vegetables every day. Later I found out that the blogger's plan was for a 180-pound male, and the iron intake could not meet the needs of her weight. She only focused on "100% execution" and did not consider that the plan was not designed for people like her who are of a small base and are somewhat iron deficient.

Now the nutrition circle actually has no unified view on this matter: the clinical nutrition faction must give priority to compliance. After all, it involves treatment, and the room for error is extremely low.； The public nutrition faction is much more relaxed. If you go to the Chinese Diet Pagoda, all intakes are within the given range. Cereals and potatoes are 250-400g per day. If you eat one more bite of rice and one bite less sweet potato today, it will not affect your overall health at all. ； There is also the recently popular precision nutrition faction, which simply tests your genes and intestinal flora first. The plan itself is tailor-made, including your lactose intolerance and whether drinking coffee will affect your sleep. There is no need to copy other people's templates.

When I was trying to adjust my insulin resistance two years ago, I also went through a period of "strict implementation". The 16+8 light fast was so stuck that I didn't dare to eat after 6 o'clock in the evening even if I was so hungry that I panicked. As a result, I suffered from insomnia for a week, and my hands shook when I typed code at work during the day. Later, I simply relaxed the rules. I only need to fast for 12 hours a day. If I work overtime late, I will nibble on a small apple or drink half a cup of warm milk. Instead, I sleep soundly. After three months, I checked again and found that the insulin resistance index dropped faster than the doctor expected. Last month, a friend had a hot pot date, and I specially chose the tomato hot pot, with only lean beef and green leafy vegetables. When I went back and tested my blood sugar, my blood sugar didn't fluctuate at all. It was not like I thought before, "I'll lose all my efforts after just one bite of eating out."

There is a lot of quarrel on the Internet now. Some people say that "dietary plans that are not strictly implemented are useless", while others say that "it is better to eat casually if you are so strict." In fact, both sides are correct, but they are suitable for different people. If you are preparing for the Olympiad, your body fat must be reduced to single digits. Even an extra spoonful of peanut butter may affect your performance on stage. You must be accurate to the gram. ； If you are an ordinary office worker and want to maintain a healthy weight, you don’t have to weigh every meal. As long as you eat more whole grains, more vegetables, enough protein, drink milk tea twice a week and have a barbecue, there will be no problem at all.

To put it bluntly, the original intention of our diet plan is to make you eat comfortably and healthily, not to put you in a shackles. What you should pay attention to without discounting is never the cold numbers written on the paper, but the feelings of your own body: Will eating this food cause acid reflux and bloating? Are you energetic enough at work recently? Is aunt accurate? These are a hundred times more important than strictly enforcing the template. After all, it is a really good plan if you can stick to your eating habits for a lifetime.