Carb Diets Essay

There is a huge difference between no carb diets and low carb diets. The no carb diet is where there is total elimination of all carbohydrates in everyday meals. This means that the person has to rely on fats from animal source foods as the main source of energy. This diet is particularly well suited for people who need to go on ketogenic diets, particularly a small number of epileptic children with difficult-to-cure conditions. People often mistake this kind of diet with the low carb diets. It should be noted here that the unsupervised or uncontrolled use of the no carb diet can lead to a lot of unfavorable and permanent medical conditions.

On the other hand, the Atkins diet is one of the more popular examples of low carb diets. The Atkins diet, in particular, also advocates the substitution of fats and proteins to supplement the loss from carbohydrates in the diet. Some of the basic principles of low carb diets include limiting most processed grain-based and starchy products like breads, breakfast cereals (specifically the sugar frosted ones,) pasta, potatoes and heavy rice meals. Most meat and diary products are allowable in limited portions. But the key to achieving the so-called balance in this kind of diet is to eat more foods like green leafy vegetables and raw fruits because these are high in nutrition but low in carbohydrates.
For one thing, most people who undergo such diets usually experience constipation due to the lack of fiber inherent in most carbohydrate based products like corn bran, wheat and whole wheat. Some people would need either need to eat more fiber rich foods that are not carbohydrate based like celery, green beans and prunes. In most cases though, there is already a need to add fiber supplements and laxatives to the diet in order to solve the constipation