Main Dangers of an excess of Fat in the Diet

Fats make you fatter Fats, as mentioned before, can very quickly increase your body fat stores. What is of concern here is not so much the aesthetic disadvantages of being fatter (although nobody wants to look obese!) but the secondary problems associated with fatness. If you gain excess body fat, your risk of developing the lifestyle diseases mentioned above increases. Elevated cholesterol levels, high blood pressure, kidney problems, infertility and diabetes can all be caused or exacerbated by a marked increase in body fat.

Fars are ’sticky’ There are many types of fats that can stick to the _artery walls, but the two most damaging ones are LDL (`bad’) cholesterol and triglycerides. Both are churned out by the liver in response to the ingestion of saturated fats or trans-fatty acids. But let’s not worry at this stage about the different types of fats and what they do. The point is this: if you cut out all fats, there will be none to clog up your arteries.

Fats are not water soluble. When they travel through the blood, they tend to stick to those small parts of the artery walls that have been ‘nicked’ or ‘damaged’ by oxidants. After a while, a fatty build-up (plaque) develops, and the actual width of the blood vessel begins to narrow. This is when cholesterol becomes a real problem. If blood cannot carry oxygen and vital nutrients to the various parts of the body that need them, those parts will begin to suffer. And if the blood is forced to squeeze through these narrowed vessels, pressure may build up (like a bottleneck) and the plaque may be dislodged. If this hard blob of fat passes through much smaller blood vessels, such as those found in the brain or the tiny capillaries delivering oxygen to the heart muscles, a blockage will occur, preventing oxygen from reaching these organs. This is when a stroke or a heart attack occurs.

Unfortunately, most people^, are unaware that they have a serious cholesterol problem, as the condition may go unnoticed for years. This is why it is imperative that you have your blood cholesterol levels tested regularly.

Fats can make you constipated Fats slow down gastrointestinal movement, and eating too many can lead to constipation. The idea that fat is some kind of a ‘lubricant’ could not be further from the truth. It is valid to say that a sudden over-consumption of copious amounts of fats (say during a Christmas dinner) will cause your bowels to open, but this is simply your body’s way of saying that you’ve eaten far too much, and that the food must go!

It’s also been shown that diets that are high in fat tend to be lower in fibre content — and a low-fibre diet also contributes to constipation. I’m not talking only about fast foods here. Consider Mum’s cottage pie: it’s very high in fat and it contains no fibre! The dish may certainly include some vegetables, but chances are that these have been so thoroughly cooked that they yield negligible fibre. Follow this meal up with ice cream and chocolate sauce, and you’ve eaten a meal that’s packed with fat, very short on fibre and guaranteed to make you constipated.

Fats can cause adult-onset diabetes How often have you heard people say to their children, ‘Don’t eat so much sugar, you’ll get diabetes!’? This is a common misconception. Adult-onset (Type II) diabetes is not caused by sugar. It is caused mainly by Syndrome X, which makes you more prone to gaining body fat. When your diet contains too many fats, you develop a problem in processing sugar. Lack of sugar control, therefore, is a complication of diabetes, not a cause.

Fats can weaken your immune system It has been shown that the excess consumption of fats can decrease the efficacy of the immune system (the protective army of blood cells that constantly fights to ward off disease). This is common among people who have highly stressful lifestyles, and who regularly consume high-fat, low-nutrition meals. Such a diet can make you more susceptible to upper respiratory tract infections (such as colds, influenza, tonsillitis, pharyngitis and bronchitis) and to vaginal thrush, mouth ulcers, acne and boils.

Fats can worsen gout Fats prevent uric acid from being urinated out of the body in gout sufferers, and so symptoms cannot be held in control.

Fats can worsen liver problems Because they are fairly difficult to process, fats can ‘clog’ up the liver, and thus weaken a liver prone to disease.

Fat makes oestrogen As the fat stores in a woman’s body increase, so does her level of the female hormone oestrogen. This is because oestrogen is produced not only in the ovaries, but also in other fat stores. Too much body fat and oestrogen has been associated with breast cancer, and with other cancers alike.

You can see now why unintentional overeating of fat can cause many problems. Now we must correct the problem by tipping the scales quite aggressively in the other direction. To do this, we must understand that in order to lose fat in the body, we must eliminate all fat from the diet.

Easier said than done.

More than once a day, please

Constipation is our enemy

Constipation is a contributing factor to many disorders, including headaches, lethargy, flatulence, spastic colon and — in the long term — even bowel cancer. When you are constipated, and the ‘goods’ sit in the bowel for a long time, there is an increased risk that the waste products contained in the stool will damage the lining of the bowel.

I tell my clients that a daily bowel movement is not enough. You should aim to move your bowels twice a day, if possible, as this will ensure a disease-free gut and minimise your chances of bowel cancer. This may sound like an impossible task, but I can assure you that if you follow the X Diet to the letter you will have no problems in achieving a bowel movement twice daily!

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