Feeding On Dreams: why America's diet industry doesn't work and what will work for you

The Story

Feeding on Dreams exposes the deception and manipulation that pervade America's diet industry - an industry that preys on the pain and insecurities of its customers, risks their health, sells them short, and then blames them for its own failures. Drawing on interviews with staff and clients of the major diet centers, Feeding on Dreams measures the promises made to lure potential customers against the actual experiences of program participants. Citing programs by name, it reveals the methods used to get dieters to spend hundreds of dollars...and to return again and again, each time heavier than the last. In spite of a growing body of medical evidence that low-calorie diets are ineffectual and ultimately counterproductive, the business of selling potentially harmful diet schemes goes on as usual - unregulated and unlikely to change. As the authors show in this book, the astounding $33 billion a year Americans spend on diet food, diet pills, and commercial diet programs is largely a waste of money. But Feeding On Dreams doesn't stop with an indictment of commercial diet centers. In the second part of the book, Diane Epstein and Kathleen Thompson offer a realistic, workable alternative. With compassion, humor, and a bull's-eye understanding of the dieter's experience and mindset, Epstein and Thompson tell readers how to design their own personal program based on what they enjoy eating. Their approach takes control away from the diet centers and puts it back where it belongs - in the hands of the dieter. And, unlike most commercial diet programs, it takes into account the underlying psychology of body image and the relationship between food and feelings. At once responsible, entertaining, and genuinely helpful, Feeding on Dreams enables dieters to eat healthfully, feel better about themselves, and enjoy food again.