DIET YOURSELF POOR AND STUPID
*NEWS UPDATE… July 25, 2012.
Kirstie Alley is being sued… for allegedly lying how she lost weight.
The 61-year-old actress credits her 45kg weight loss to Organic Liaison, a program she helped to develop (see story below) and which includes organic weight-loss products, natural dietary supplements, and access to online diet and exercise tools.
But Marina Abramyan isn’t buying it and is bringing a class-action suit against Alley, Organic Liaison LLC and Organic Liaison Management, alleging that Alley (pictured left in February this year) did not lose the weight by using Organic Liaison but rather by dancing the weight off during Dancing With The Stars and by following a strict low-calorie diet.
Abramyan tried the weight-loss plan and claims the products “are nothing more than run-of-the-mill fiber and calcium supplements” reports The Huffington Post. Abramyan did not lose any weight while using the products.
“The plaintiff also alleges that Organic Liaison used false advertising, including allegedly deceptive photos of Alley, to promote the weight-loss plan.”
Have you ever bought into a diet that didn’t work? Is it reasonable to sue a weight-loss company?
Wendy Harmer takes a look at Kirstie Alley’s diet plan… and a few of her own…
Like most of us, I was transfixed by the photos of Kirstie Alley on the runway a few days ago.
She says she’s lost 45 kilos – down from a size 14 to a size four. (That’s down from size 18 to 8 in OZ sizing.) Bare arms, a waist, a belt. Triumph! I can never go past a good celebrity weight loss story.
Of course, I had to immediately check out how she did it. I figured if it involved eating nothing but a giant pot of vegetable soup for five days, I could just about manage.
No such luck. Her regimen involved a stint on Dancing With the Stars during which she lost 27 kilos. And then she lost a further 13.5 kilos on some products she’s flogging called “Organic Liaison”.
I’ve been asked to be on DWTS (more than once), but have declined the invitation because, whilst I am an excellent party dancer, I sincerely doubt my ability to put actual dance steps together, in a sequence, in high heels, stone cold sober.
In fact, years ago I was in a comedy stage show with Jane Turner and we took lessons for a two-minute dance sequence. Jane tripped the light fantastic while I’ll never forget the humiliation of having a famous dance instructor reduced to kneeling on the floor in front of me, grabbing one foot in either hand and sobbing “this one’s left”, “this one’s right”. True story. Ask Jane. She’s still laughing.
Besides, using the terror of being on national television to lose weight is not entertaining – for me or anyone else, I’d wager.
As for Kirstie’s new product – the “Organic Liaison premium kit” comes with a one-month supply of Rescue Me, Nightingale, and Release Me, plus a special Organic Liaison glass bottle, elixir pump, and Body Game Manual – $119 monthly.
Is that Ms Alley I hear doing the samba to the sound of ka-ching, ka-ching? (And I don’t even want to know what you’re supposed to do with the pump.)
A quick peruse of my book shelf includes, I’m ashamed to say, more than a dozen diet books. Actually, I should put them in a pile and jump over them for an hour each day if they’re to be of any use.
I recall some years ago, I simultaneously read the Oprah Winfrey, low-fat cook book and the high-fat Atkins plan and walked into a store to buy something for dinner.
I left with a bottle of water.
There’s a new diet plan along every few months with the latest craze being the Dukan diet. This one, designed by French Doctor, Pierre Dukan is made up of four distinct phases - Attack, Cruise, Consolidation and Stabilization.
Hmmm, sort of reminds me of the Israeli Army Diet from the seventies. That one was for eight days where the same food was eaten for two days at a time – apples, cheese, chicken and salad.
I always wondered if anyone came up with a Palestinian refugee diet?
They did in 2001. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency came up with a diet plan for the Palestinian refugee population living in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and Gaza. The idea was to try and raise the dietary intake of those poor souls to 1600 calories a day. They were given sugar, vegetable oil, whole milk powder, pulses and olive oil.
Most of which are on the prohibited food list for diets for we rich, Western fatty boombahs. Makes you think, doesn’t it?
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41 Responses to this article
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shelley September 21, 2011
All these diets, can you imagine the kind of gas that your body would emit? Enough of a reason not to go down that road. I like Kirstie Alley, I think she is funny, but she has some body image issues, does she not? Remember, this woman LOVES burgers, so how long do you give her on the Organic Liaison Kit? I bet $100,000 that within 6 months she has regained a lot of her lost weight. Why so cynical/skeptical? Because she LOVES hamburgers, and no amount of Rescue Me and a body pump will give her that kind of satisfaction. Besides Kirstie has body image issues, it is about her thinking, nothing else. Anyway, in those photos she looks gorgeous, if a little snippy/hungry. I wish her well and I will happily eat my words should I be wrong. I have no diet stories because, having tried the Israeli Army diet back in The Dark Ages and then developing disordered eating I decided to show some self-respect and get healthy.
Best wishes and love… -
Annette Piper September 21, 2011
She looks great but she’s not showing her teeth when she’s smiling… maybe she had her lips sewed shut to stop eating?
I struggle along with everyone else but the worst one was the cabbage soup diet …. counting calories worked the best but it just takes too much discipline and I sure don’t have that at the moment!
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Christina September 21, 2011
Hmm…. She looks amazing in that black dress, so much so that it is hard to tell it is her. But I am not convinced. I hate to be a hater, but I will be keen to see what she looks like in a year’s time, or maybe when her endorsement deal is over. I am not buying it Kirstie, sorry.
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kim at allconsuming September 21, 2011
I always look at Kirsty Alley and Sarah Ferguson with their rollercoaster weight lives and see very unhappy women. I know that is wrong, they are probably very very happy with rich and fulfilling lives – but remember when Kate Winslet was being hounded for her weight and then she lost it to a point of healthy weight range and there she’s been ever since? Curious.
Anyway, when I was at school it was the Scarsdale diet – all carrot sticks, celery sticks, tinned tuna or salmon (back in the day when all the fancy schmancy flavours did not exist and it was all mmmm brine) and wholemeal bread. GOD I was miserable. And starving. Then there was the lunchtime my tinned salmon had leaked all in my school bag and was… warm. GAG. Still, to this day, struggle to swallow any form of tinned fish product. *shudder*
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Caity September 21, 2011
She looks HUNGRY. But rich, very very rich. I just wonder how long til she slips back again – AGAIN – because it’s not so much about what you eat, or how you exercise as what you THINK.
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Bonnie Vaughan September 22, 2011
Love Kirstie Alley and I’m happy to see her looking so great. But I do wish she (or her publicist) would stop saying she’s a size 4. She is, at best, a US size 8. And it matters, because by misrepresenting her size she’s setting yet another impossible standard for women. Don’t we have enough already?
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Sam October 5, 2011
Agreed Bonnie. I am a US size 4 and there is no way we are the same size!
Good on her for doing it, but until she addresses the problems psychologically I think we’ll be seeing her back to her original weight next year.
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Amanda July 25, 2012
Weight loss is hard, I say good on you Kirsty, however you did it! Promoting stupid fad diets though is exploiting your fans.
low carb diets((Dukan, Atkins)are the way to go, especially if you have diabetes in your family, and are intolerant of carbohydrates and sugars. steady weight loss, and most importantly and miraculously, no hunger!
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Van Essa July 25, 2012
I’ve been dieting since I was 16 yrs old and I’m now weeks away from being 50. I’ve been up and down and up and down and now I’m up again. I’ve been on every diet known to the modern world and still…
I really liked the comment from Caity that it’s got nothing to do with eating and exercise but how you think. I find that fascinating.
But Wendy your question was, what is the weirdest diet I have ever been on and my answer would have to be The Cabbage Diet. Only because of the distressing issue of wind that came with it.
As for Ally, she is a yo-yoer like a lot of people and I’m afraid she will put her weight back on due to emotional eating. I wish she hadn’t gone so public about this weight loss. Usually people only do it once ie Oprah and then they learn.
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Lady Jewels Diva July 25, 2012
I heard a couple of years ago that someone was suing Dr Phil because they didn’t lose weight on his diet shakes either.
Guess America is just sue crazy.
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TMT July 25, 2012
For me, who’s weight is a direct result of over-eating, the only way to control your weight without denying yourself food is to exercise in direct measure to how much and what you eat. More energy in =more energy out. I’ll never be called thin but I’m fit, a healthy weight and I eat what I want, when I want.
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TMT July 25, 2012
Don’t judge me
It was meant to be whose, really.
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Allison July 25, 2012
Out of all the crazy diets, I think the Jesus diet is the one that would suit me best! I’ve lost 14 kgs over the past year by eating less (although not giving up my red wine!), and exercising. Find food you love and is good for you, that’s not necessarily mutually exclusive – that way you don’t feel deprived – it worked for me. I feel good and more importantly blood pressure / cholesterol / bone density are all now in the healthy range.
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Simone July 25, 2012
Oh come on! We now know that diets make you fat. If being fat is the thing you’re trying to avoid, just stop obsessing about food altogether, whether it’s healthy food or not. It’s fuel, nutrition, and sometimes a bit of fun. It’s not something to warp into some weird ‘diet’ for the sake of changing your body!
Shaking my head at the ‘what would Jesus eat’ thing. I’m sure Jesus ate whatever he felt like at the time and didn’t give a whole lot of thought to it. -
Shepard July 25, 2012
Dukan is crazy. I don’t understand how anyone can tell people that to become healthy they should stop eating vegetables on certain days. What?
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Reannon July 25, 2012
It’s a bit sad that Kirstie Alley is now more famous for gaining & losing weight than she is for her acting…..
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airdre grant July 25, 2012
yes Wendy, please , please, please go on DWTS. that would encourage me to watch it also
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sally July 25, 2012
If the diet industry was any other industry and offered such appalling odds of success they would be sued for false representation and would be laughed out of business. Why do we continue to give our hard earned money to a programme where 90% of people will fail and put all the weight back on again within 2 years? Imagine if we were given those odds for anything else in life, would laugh in the sales persons face and tell them to get lost, but put the word diet in front of it and we all lose our rational thinking and pay good money for something that will never work. We are the fools in all this. Stop giving money for something that has a 90% fail rate. Think about that…. 90% FAIL RATE, what appalling odds!
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Sandra @The $120 Food Challenge July 25, 2012
You know Wendy if you went on DWTS you’d get at least to the final five. You’d get through as the Funny Older Lady (Think Amanda and Noelene) rather than the dancing easter island statue (think Pauline).
G’warrrrn. You’d be brilliant. And we wouldn’t laugh AT you. Just with you.
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Ladylikestodance July 25, 2012
Best diet is eat less and do more…western portion sizes are too big, re calibrate and rethink just how much food we put away especially in the evenings when we should have our lightest meal. Eat slowly, enjoy every mouthful. Go for quality rather than quantity.
I’ve tried all the diets, most successful with Aktins; substituting meat with seafood. -
Bananarama July 25, 2012
Dr Phil has a shake diet?
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shelley July 25, 2012
That’s if there was a Jesus.
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Matt July 25, 2012
Ya gotta exercise, ya gotta sweat! Kirstie Alley losing 20+ kgs from dancing proves that. Plus in the right environment with the right group exercise is fun. On your own it’s as hard as hell and I don’t recommend it. http://www.bootcamp.com.au is a fun and hard work environment to get your butt into gear. There are others and I promise no one will yell at you.
A diet I think works well (in conjunction with exercise of course) is to simply cut out known sugars. Think of all the things this would exclude whilst still allowing you to eat as much of the good things your body needs.
Bottom line changing your body is hard work. You up for it? -
Susan July 25, 2012
A few months ago a friend was doubting the bulk lot of diet shakes she’d bought. The company website didn’t have nutritional information listed, so I emailed for it. Turns out for all the flavours, the ingredients were around half sugar.
However, I do have another story to share. I feel like an idiot because everyone has heard miracle diet stories, but I want to let people hear.
It isn’t a diet. It doesn’t require buying anything special and has no marketing campaign or paid celeb endorsement. It is simply cutting most sugar (specifically fructose) out of what you eat. ‘Simply’ is a bit, uhm, simple though, since so many processed foods contain it, it has been shown in studies to be addictive, it’s in huge quantities in foods we’re taught are ‘good’, like honey, sweetened yoghurt and fruit juice; and can be tricky to determine on food labelling as sugar types aren’t listed separately.
Fructose is metabolised differently to other sugars and historically has only been eaten in very small amounts. Unlike other sugars, doesn’t trip the same appetite control hormones or cause insulin release. That leads on to a cascade of issues including overeating and craving for food (as opposed to rumbly-stomach hunger). That’s a *very* simplified explaination, there is much information from peer-reviewed sources available online.Once I drastically reduced fructose intake I stopped craving sweet things and snacks. I eat no more fruit than one or two pieces a day and that is sweet enough. I never worry any more about my waistline and future weight.
And being free to eat and cook with things like butter and lard makes food taste so good! And! Exercise isn’t necessary (though it is necessary for good health).There is a hoopla article in the related articles above, Are You Addicted to Sugar? It is simple but a good starting point. The best resource I’ve found is David Gillespie’s book Sweet Poison, I highly, utterly, beseechingly recommend borrowing it from your library or buying.
Sorry about the wall of text!
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Amanda July 25, 2012
Agree Susan, sugar, and carbs ( which break down to sugars ) are the problem. They are non essential foods, we can survive without them. They are also hidden in everything we eat, you have to read food labels really carefully for anything processed, especially low fat foods like yogurt, where sugars are added. They’re the cause of the obesity and diabetes epidemic.
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Catherine July 25, 2012
And don’t forget as all those helpful diet & exercise people say “you JUST need to eat less & move more”!!!!
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RobynMarie July 25, 2012
In the words of the great Michelle Bridges ‘if losing weight was easy, we’d all be skinny’ As a lifelong dieter I know that it’s true. If only there was a shake/bar/diet whatever…there is not. Face it.
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Samantha July 25, 2012
Kirsty Alley is the ultimate example of why not to do fad diets. She has been on SOOOOO many of them and her weight goes up and down up and down up and down (weight cycling).
Diets don’t work. Full stop. When are we going to get that message through to people?
Check out this website about the impact of weight cycling on your physical and emotional health.
http://win.niddk.nih.gov/publications/cycling.htm -
Amy July 25, 2012
Ha! Half of David Gillespies book is comprised of ‘sugarfree’ recipes, most of which have dextrose as an ingredient. DEXTROSE IS SUGAR! And, it’s the one that does the most damage as its GI is 100. Gillespie sprouts rubbish and calls them facts while warpi what SHOULD be a healthy eating plan. Cut out processeded foods and refined sugar but for gods sake, don’t replace it with dextrose! There is no credible research saying fructose is any worse, the issue is that fructose is consumed more, that is all.
The Hungry for Change DVD threw a great light on it- focus on what you are adding to your diet- cram in healthy, natural foods rather than eliminate ‘bad’ stuff. You will satisfy your nutritional needs and because you aren’t depriving yourself you won’t crave sugar and fat as much. Fix your head- address the emotional issues behind weight. Live well and be well and don’t follow any diet that excludes a whole food group, or makes you eat only red floured food on tuesday while standing on one foot facing north…
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Mandy July 25, 2012
I agree with Susan!! David Gillespie’s book ‘Sweet Poison’ is an excellent compelling work.
I read it last year after I had been reading ‘How The Rich Get Thin.’ And don’t let the title of HTRGT put you off. I found this book in the remainder section of a bookshop last year. It is well written and I found it easy to follow and surprisingly didn’t get hungry! I was AMAZED at the results losing 9 kg in 2 months ie slow but steady. This was the first diet I had ever been on but I needed to shift the baby weight that had been sitting on my hips for ,ahem ,about 14 years..
Both authors (like Dukan as well ) basically emphasize the importance of decreasing ‘sugar” and increasing protein and also calcium
. I also heard David speak on the radio and his comment on shopping around the perimeter of a supermarket is so true!! Pretty much all the healthy stuff is on the outskirts and the aisles are mainly full of processed ,sugary food (plus the odd cleaning product and toiletry…)
Also I have to add I had so much more energy when I cut down on sugar…a totally unexpected but enjoyable side effect.
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anna July 26, 2012
My head is spinning from how many times Kirsty Alley ‘s weight yoyo…Is she really 61 if so …wow..not sure..in my nightie, with a fly and cold sore..need to get better to go on diet!!
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Kel July 27, 2012
It’s pretty simple really. Eat mainly fresh fruits & vegetables with meat or fish. The more unprocessed the better and add to this whole grains, seeds and nuts. Try to steer clear of as many things in tins,containers and jars as they’ll all have added sugar and salt, possibly even artificial colours and flavours and they’ll have next to no nutritional value. Eating a raw foods diet is not always practical (especially in winter) but this is probably the healthiest one. Get a dehydrator so you snack on dried banana chips instead of fried potato crisps and eat things like kale or sweet potato. Stay away from all white carbs & processed sugars. artificial sugars are just as bad as your body gets confused and does not know how to process them. They are effectively toxic. Drink Green tea & get plenty of antioxidants. Exercise always helps.
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Susan July 27, 2012
Amy, did you read the book or look into any peer-reviewed papers, rather than just websites trying to discredit it? Gillespie devotes a huge chunk of the book to discussing all the sugars. It is clearly stated that dextrose is a sugar, and discussed in great detail. The “sugar-free” recipe section is a keep-it-simple approach for marketing, in my opinion it’s unfortunate, but the book makes it abundantly clear that dextrose is a sugar.
Of course, eating dextrose while still eating lots of fructose is not going to help anything. As he makes entirely clear.
“There is no credible research saying fructose is any worse, the issue is that fructose is consumed more, that is all.”
Fructose is metabolised differently. It’s not disputed. It is worse than other sugars. Once fructose intake is greatly reduced, chemical appetite control can happen. “Credible research” on fructose is extremely difficult to conduct with humans, past research projects have been stopped due to health concerns for the subjects.
