Many people swear by low carbohydrate weight loss. But how does it actually work? This is a very interesting topic and more research needs to be done in order to affirm whether a low carbohydrate plan is healthy for the body and worth considering as a weight loss plan.
Carbohydrates act as a fuel source for your body. In fact, they are the preferred fuel source over protein and fats and will be used first, and immediately for activity that involves muscle contraction. It is important to realize that all carbohydrates are broken down in the body into sugar/glucose.
This glucose is needed for the smallest of activities such as blinking to the largest activity such as brain activity and needs to be sufficient in the blood and in storage so that it can sustain this ongoing movement.
As soon as we decide to decrease our carb supply as a means of weight loss for a certain period of time, we cut off the supply that is needed to be stored and we start using up the stored supply that should be replaced but cannot, due to the lack of carb intake. The only option that your body has now is to break down the fat in the blood and the protein in the muscles in order to function; this can cause symptoms such as dizziness, tunnel vision, abnormal EEG and fatigue and puts the body under major risk.
And, of course it will be easy for you to lose weight at first on a low carb diet as 1g of glycogen attracts 2.4 grams of water. So, if you have less glycogen in the muscle due to a lower intake of carbohydrates, you will hold less water and your weight loss will mostly be water (Low Carb Diets Revisited: The Atkins Controversy by Phil Kaplan).
Gaining clarity on how your body functions will help you direct your weight loss to a more honest, natural and healthy strategy instead of a quick and fast trend that will fool you into actually gaining weight once you have gone off the low carbohydrate diet plus additional fat gained due to the way in which your body has had to cope with the stress.
