by Marama Carmichael

Created on: January 10, 2009   Last Updated: January 13, 2009

I've recently come to the conclusion that all diets work. You'll always lose something on a diet - though it may not just be weight. Money, willpower, and sanity often disappear just as fast as the weight. And they often take longer to come back.

Looking for a diet is like a single person looking for their soul mate. It's out there, you know it is. You believe the next one is THE ONE. The diet to end all diets. The only diet you'll ever need. But along comes the diet, and yes at first it's great. The weight drops off, you feel fantastic, and you believe it'll last forever. A diet is not just for Christmas, it's for life. That's it, you've changed. You'll be thin and happy forever. But then something goes wrong, and soon it all ends up pear-shaped. And so do you.

Oh yes, we'll try anything to lose weight. Strange diets with their bizarre food combinations - the cabbage soup diet, the chicken soup diet, the grapefruit diet, the high-fibre low-carb diet, the fruit one day and vegetables the next diet, the broccoli diet. There really is no end to the amount of crazy diets out there. We're desperate. We'll try anything we can to lose weight no matter how odd or disgusting.

The latest craze in Japan is the banana diet. The Japanese have gone so crazy for the banana diet that it's almost impossible to buy bananas in Japan these days. And all because a famous singer lost 15 kilos in six weeks by only eating bananas for breakfast. The average Japanese woman's BMI (Body Mass Index - in case you haven't done quite as many diets as me) is between 16 and 20 (over 20 is healthy, under 20 is underweight), yet the Japanese are besotted with every diet fad, pill, or exercise machine that has ever come out. They simply can't get enough of them. It's a country full of underweight women and anorexics. In a clothes shop in Japan an extra large size is a UK 14, which is a US 12! And even then it will be barely cover a real women's chest or bum, and you can only buy it in special shops. But even so you'll never see people diet like the Japanese. They are completely fastidious about it, and they are so good at it too!

The problem with these crazy diets is that while they always work - they only work to an extent. Eventually, the weight always comes back on. But, like the search for your soul mate, the search for your soul diet will continue until you have success. So why not get out there and try the banana diet, the broccoli diet, or the pea soup diet, because like men, eventually one of them will stick, and then finally you will have found THE ONE.

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