Are You Trying to Restrict Your Diet? Here’s How You Can Navigate Through It Successfully.

Are you allergic to gluten or any other food item? Are you dealing with lactose intolerance? Are you trying to lose weight? Are you gripped by a medical condition? If you answered YES to any of the questions above, you most likely eat a RESTRICTIVE DIET.

The main objectives that I am going to cover in this blog are:

• How and why restrictive diets can lead to significant nutrient gaps and reduce compliance
• What is Food Phobia and how it relates to restrictive diets
• How various milk sensitivities differ from each other and what dietary recommendations can be followed
• How consumers can reduce their fear and incorporate a more diverse meal plan to tackle their food sensitivities

While restrictive diets are necessary in certain conditions such as in food allergies, lactose intolerance, weight loss plans and some medical conditions like diabetes and kidney disease, they do not come without their own health risks.

Restrictive diets can cause nutritional imbalance and deficiencies, especially in those who are not closely monitoring their eating patterns with a health care professional or a nutritionist. Secondly, eating a restricted diet over long term generates fear, or is called ‘FOOD PHOBIA’, where a consumer is cautious and very fearful of eating something they have eliminated from their diet with the assumption that it will affect their health negatively. Food phobias very often lead to disordered eating pattern where a consumer will binge eat all the foods they ignored, followed by a strong guilt and reintroduction of the old restrictive diet. The more restricted a diet is the lesser the chances are of sticking with it. Consumers can become very resentful of eating, in general, which leads to poor health outcomes.

Children are at the greatest risk of developing nutritional deficiencies due to restrictive diets because they tend to have more allergies and food sensitivities. For example, if a child is experiencing abdominal discomfort, reflux or eczema, parents begin self-treatment at home by eliminating cow’s milk entirely from the diet. Another common example is the weight loss diets that restrict calorie intake along with which many nutrients are excluded as well.

In a study that looked at various restrictive diets, like DASH diet and weight loss diets, where participants followed a 1500-2000 calorie diet, it was concluded that they were falling short on 15+ micronutrients like Vitamin E, Vitamin D, Iodine, Chromium etc.

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