The first time I saw the tongue patch diet on the evening news I thought it had to be a joke. Surely there would be absolutely no market for something so ridiculous. Sadly, I found out I was wrong.
If you’re willing to fork over $2,000 to a cosmetic surgeon, you can get a piece of surgical mesh designed to repair hernias sewn onto your tongue for a month. The tongue patch makes eating so painful you’re forced to stick to a liquid diet.
In June of 2013, the American Medical Association officially classified obesity as a disease. In the wake of that announcement, there is now an obesity vaccine in the works. It is incredible to me how, over the course of a generation, we have become so confused about food when the answer is right in front of us.
The Tongue Patch is a Torture Devise, Not a Diet
It used to be when someone said they were going on a diet it meant they were going to skip dessert or seconds. Now it means having a torture devise implanted in your face that forces you to starve yourself.
Assuming you’re desperate enough to try it, the tongue patch is sewn onto your tongue in an outpatient procedure and left there for one month. If you try to eat any solid food, the bristly mesh of the patch rubs painfully against the roof of your mouth so you can’t swallow it.
Because of this, you have no choice but to consume a diet of juice, broth, and protein shakes. These types of diets are not meant for people who only have 5-20 pounds to lose as they are highly calorie-restrictive.
With liquid diets, you only consume 400-800 calories per day. Women need approximately 2,000 calories per day and men 2,500 in order to stay fit and healthy. Sudden and extreme calorie restriction sends your metabolism into shock and puts your body into starvation mode.
Having food available 24 hours a day 7 days a week is a fairly new concept in human evolution. Our bodies were designed for periods of famine. During these times, our bodies hung on to fat for dear life. Restrict your calories too much for too long and your metabolism will slow down permanently, making future weight loss attempts that much more difficult.
Dangerous Side Effects of the Tongue Patch Diet
- Drooling
If you’re going to do the tongue patch diet, forget about being seen in public for a while. With the constant pressure on your tongue, your salivary glands will start working overtime and you’ll have trouble controlling your drool.
- Inability Speak Properly
So you’re at work and that hot guy from accounting starts talking to you. You smile and say something really witty but it doesn’t even make sense because you have a patch sewn into your tongue!
- Tongue Swelling
Anytime you have any kind of surgical procedure, your immune system creates inflammation in an attempt to heal the wound. Your tongue is no different. As soon as that sucker gets slapped on there, your tongue is going to get swollen and inflamed. In extreme cases, your tongue could swell so severely it affects your breathing.
- Swallowing the Patch
Another risk of the tongue patch is that it could come loose from your tongue and slip down your throat. Whether down your esophagus or your trachea, this could cause serious internal damage (not to mention suffocation).
- Insomnia
The tongue patch is painful even when you’re not trying to eat solid food. This fact, coupled with tongue swelling, could make it difficult to sleep. Can you imagine going an entire month not eating and not sleeping properly? There’s no need to torture yourself like that.
- Permanent Patch Fusion
One of the biggest risks of the tongue patch is permanent patch fusion. If the patch is not removed within one month’s time, it will fuse to your tongue and be extremely painful if not impossible to remove.
You Don’t Have to Take Drastic Measures to Lose Weight
You don’t have to take these incredibly drastic measures to lose weight. You also don’t have to starve yourself or take pills or anything like that. You just need to get back to basics.
- Learn How to Read Food Labels
When you understand how to read food labels, you’ll never fall for the low-fat diet food scam again. Diet food does not help you lose weight. Just the opposite, in fact. These foods are filled with highly-processed synthetic sugar and trans fats that interfere with your metabolism and hormones. They do not nourish you and leave your body constantly starving for real food.
Here’s the rule I follow: If it contains more than 5 ingredients, it’s not food. I shop around the perimeter of my grocery store and load up on organic produce, nuts, seeds, beans, meat, poultry, fish, and dairy. After that, I hit the health food section and grab a few munchies (I’m into being healthy, but I’m not perfect).
- Go Back to Basics
The difference between food and food-like-products is how close to nature it is. Food-like-products you find in the snack food aisle do not nourish you. The reason you crave them is because they contain addictive chemicals. Real foods like vegetables, fruits, meat, cheese, yogurt, etc. are nourishing. They contain the essential vitamins and minerals your body needs to function at its best.
Try looking at it this way, it’s not how much you eat but what you eat. If you’re feeling hungry, don’t reach for a low-fat snack food cake filled with dozens of preservatives. Eat some fruit, nuts, or cheese instead. Basic foods that don’t come out of a box or carton are your best friend in the battle of the bulge.
- Exercise Regularly
Exercise is a necessary part of any weight loss program. You have to get out and move to rev up your metabolism, build muscle, and lose fat. You can’t get around it and you shouldn’t try. Not only does regular exercise help you stay fit and trim, it also staves off heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune disease, and cancer.
The good news is you don’t have to work out to excess to achieve results. As a matter of fact, working out too much can actually be unhealthy for you.
If you haven’t exercised in a long time, start out slowly. Start walking around the block, hiking in the park or swimming at the YMCA. The more you move, the more you’ll want to move and the easier it will become.
- Drink Plenty of Pure Water
Stop drinking diet soda. It’s not helping you lose weight. Drinking 6-8 ounce of pure, filtered water each day will help detoxify your body, improve your digestion, and help you lose weight that much faster.
The tongue patch diet is among one of the dumbest ways to lose weight on earth. You don’t have to go through torture or starve yourself to be thin. You can get there the healthy, natural way by learning how to enjoy real food again.
**Recommended Research**
One of the most important services we provide here at Health Scams Exposed is to help you identify the “health impostors” on grocery store shelves.
And they’re everywhere…
I’m talking about products promoted as “fat free”… that are full of sugar and artificial ingredients. I’m talking about products that claim to be “natural”… while sporting a list of ingredients that you need a chemistry degree just to pronounce.
Or what about products that put the word “healthy” in the name… as if that alone will make their artificial, Franken-foods magically good for you?
If you want to get back to basics with your meals and learn how to really eat healthy, once and for all, I’d encourage you to check out Kelley Herring’s Your Plate, Your Fate.
Kelley and her husband Jon are great friends of ours and I’d love for you to meet them.
Check out Your Plate, Your Fate here.
Enjoy!
Jessica Coffey
Publisher, Health Scams Exposed
