by Kimberly Dawn Wells

Created on: August 01, 2007

Unlike other popular diets, The South Beach Diet doesn't have a single magic formula for making it work. As a result, the benefits of the diet are largely misunderstood. Here you will find a list of the pros and cons of the South Beach Diet as each relates to your physiology and long-term health goals.

THE PROS
Upon first glance, the South Beach Diet appears to be one of the most well-rounded pop-diets out there. The diet is based on a plan that includes little counting of calories or portion sizes. This alone can make a big difference to people as focusing too much on a diet can lead to cheating and failure. Dieters are encouraged to eat often, to eliminate cravings and the feeling of hunger. This too is a recommended and accepted eating strategy for a balanced nutrition plan.

The Diet encourages eating complex carbohydrates over simple sugars, which helps you maintain a stable blood sugar and avoid feeling hungry within minutes of eating. Removing refined sugar from the diet also reduces cravings. When you eat sugar, you crave more sugar. When you stop eating it, you stop craving it. The plan is low in saturated fats and recommends replacing sweets with healthy fat foods. This helps raise your HDL cholesterol, the good stuff that scrubs your arteries clean, and lower your LDL cholesterol, the bad stuff that clogs them back up.

Since the Diet allows you to eat from all the food groups, you're less like to get bored quickly and crave those one or two things you are definitely not supposed to have, such as carbs in the Atkins diet. This also helps you eat a variety of nutrients and create a well-rounded meal plan.

THE CONS
While the South Beach Diet sounds ultra successful, there are some definite down sides to the written plan. The first phase starts out with a restrictive diet that can cause you to lose weight faster than what is recommended at healthy levels. The quick weight loss certainly does make you feel good about your rapidly changing body, but the weight you lose will most likely be water weight, or even muscle mass, which is counterproductive to your long-term weight loss goals. The restrictive diet can also lead to health complications from nutritional deficiencies.

The meal plan is not as shiny as it first sounds. Many people may find the financial commitment of the program extreme during the first phase, as protein costs more than your average every day carb. Some of the recipes contain exotic foods, complex recipes, and long preparation times, which

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