Have you been downing lemon juice and honey for months now but your weight has not gone down? Obviously, because there is no scientific basis to this. You are, like many other dieters, trapped in just one of the many old wives tales regarding weight loss. And if you continue to believe them, rather than losing you may as well be adding on the kilos. Rid your mind of some of the common weight reducing myths.

1. Lemon juice helps in reducing weight.
   This is a total no-no as far as losing weight is concerned. The fact is that lemon juice is a rich source of Vitamin C, which helps in repairing the worn out tissues in the body and cannot burn out excess fat. In fact, lemon juice has no action on fat.
2. Drinking a glass of warm water in the morning
   How can a glass of hot water break up fats or shrink the stomach? Fat is already present as tiny droplets in the body. Breaking them further does not mean taking them out of the body. In fact, water is an important nutrient for your body. Many dieters also assume that drinking cold water makes them fat, forgetting the fact that water is not a food which can help in adding or losing weight. In comparison, aerated drinks are fattening.
3. Honey helps in reducing weight.
   Honey is a concentrated source of carbohydrates and hence a source of energy. It will, in fact, add on to your weight instead of reducing it. So, if you are dropping weight with honey, it is just a psychological effect.
4. Miss a meal and you will reduce
   If you continue skipping meals, you will gain weight. When we eat, the body’ s metabolism increases. Increased metabolism helps to burn excess fat. So, if you don’t eat, the body starts working slowly and hence you tend to put on rather than shed weight.
5. Avoid potatoes to shed fat
   It is a fallacy that potatoes are fattening. Bread, wheat flour, and rice are more fattening compared to the simple potato. It is the way potatoes are cooked which makes them fatty. Instead of deep-frying; boil, bake, steam or roast them and you will add a rich source of carbohydrates to your diet.
6. Juices help in losing weight.
   How many oranges do you need for making a glass of juice? A minimum of three, at least. And how many spoons of sugar will you add to that? Doesn’t that make it rich and sweet in calories, rather than cutting them? And you are losing out on the entire fiber of the fruit. Always prefer whole fruit to juices because they give a bulk of the fiber, which is nutritionally very important.
7. Margarine rather than butter
   The calorie content of both margarine and butter is same. Hence, both are equally fattening.
8. Eating yogurt with every meal doesn’t add to the weight.
   This is true if yogurt is made from low-fat milk but if it is made from full-cream milk or is fruit-based, your calorie content will zoom. So, the weight gain factor depends on the type of milk used.
9. Fruits are not fattening.
   Fruits like banana, chick, grapes and mangoes have high sugar content and hence are more fattening as compared to less sweet ones such as apples, papaya, guavas etc. Most of the fruits have negligible fat content except for avocados, which have a high-fat content.
10. Eating carrot helps to keep you slim.
    Though carrots are a rich source of vitamins, eating them in excess can lead to health-related problems such as amenorrhea (absent or irregular periods), temporary infertility or discolouration of the skin.
11. A calorie is a calorie is a calorie. All calories may be equally fattening, but they are not equally nourishing. For instance, a calorie from milk and a calorie from coke are equally fattening. But while the milk calorie provides other nutrients, the coke calorie is just an empty calorie.
12. Sleeping after lunch makes you fat. If you load your body with rich oily foods or creamy desserts, the blood flow to your digestive system increases and your blood sugar levels rise proportionately higher. In such a case sleeping is but natural. This is not likely to happen when you eat a normal balanced diet. So it is not sleeping or resting after meals that increase your weight but the kind of food you’ve eaten for lunch or dinner.