We live in a world where the “ideal image” of a person often clashes with reality. In reality, a lot of teenagers do not need to diet or lose weight. However, our culture emphasizes this “thinspiration” idea through television, glossy magazines and popular role models. This idea hits teenagers especially hard and pushes them to find different ways to alter their body image. Disastrous problems arise when teens try to diet and drop unwanted weight, which may lead to severe diet disorders.

“Most people think they can usually lose weight by dieting alone,” San Francisco General Hospital’s nutritionist Cam-Tu Tran said. The base amount of calories needed to healthily sustain a person’s body activity is approximately 2000 calories per day. A common dieting misconception is that by decreasing the daily calorie intake, the body will burn up fat reserves to compensate for the decreased caloric intake. According to Tran, the amount of fat burned due to lack of caloric intake alone is minimal. Instead, not eating enough food makes a person feel weak throughout the day because the body responds to the decreasing calorie intake by withholding the release of ketones, a chemical agent used to burn stored fat. As a result, the body sustains its bodily functions by burning muscle tissues instead of stored fat, which is extremely dangerous and may be fatal in some cases. Also, when a person takes in less than the base amount of daily energy needed, the body is tricked into thinking that food and energy is hard to come by. Therefore, the next time that person eats, the body picks up even more calories in an attempt to restore its normal balance, conserve energy, slow down the weight loss process and begin storing fat.

Because the idea that “thin is beautiful” is so ubiquitous in our modern society, fad dieting is another growing problem. Fad diets, such as the South Beach or Atkins diet, among others, usually involve the use of “special” shakes, dieting pills and/or strict regulation on what kinds of food to eat. Fad diets are so appealing because they easily provide desired results. However, these effects do not last because fad diets are not typically diets that can be sustained for long periods of time and do not help a person change the bad habits that caused the overweight condition to begin with. The fad dieters often begin a vicious cycle of “weight cycling,” a cycle of weight loss during fad dieting and rapid weight gain after the diet. After the fad dieting failure, people usually suffer from low self-esteem, depression and other psychological effects.

The common consensus among doctors is to eat enough food to acquire the necessary amount of calories while exercising on a regular basis so that the stored fat—the source of weight a person would want to lose—­is burned.

According to Tran, being aware of what one drinks is also crucial to any diet plan because most drinks are packed with extra calories and sugars. She also advises that teenagers should develop a healthy eating pattern, which includes eating lots of fruits and vegetables daily, eating less food more often and stopping eating when one feels full. Many doctors also advise teenagers to stay away from “prepackaged” diets, such as many fad diets, as they may become very addictive and will most likely cause more damages than benefits in the long run.