Happy International No Diet Day!

Doesn’t it seem counterintuitive to celebrate not dieting when our culture so enthusiastically rewards weight loss? Well, today’s the day to hide your scale, forget about calorie counting and love your body just the way it is. A British woman named Mary Evans Young, the founder of an anti-dieting campaign called DietBreakers, started International No Diet Day (INDD) in the 1990s. Today, educators, health-care workers and anti-diet advocates mark the day by challenging ideas about weight and food. According to Canada’s National Eating Disorder Information Centre, some of the the goals of the day are:

‘ Declare a moratorium on diet/weight obsession.
‘ Increase public awareness of the dangers and futility of dieting.
‘ Celebrate the beauty and diversity or our natural sizes and shapes.
‘ Educate the public with the facts about weight-loss dieting, health and body-size.

While some may see INDD as an excuse to gorge on three junk-food meals, that’s not really the point of the day. The message is that ‘going on t a diet’ for the short term is not the healthiest way to maintain your weight. Personally, I think every day should be No Diet Day. What do you think?

Related:
‘ 5 reasons most diets fail
‘ How cheating on your diet can help you lose weight
‘ How diets make you fat