Will Eating Fiber Help You Lose Weight

What is fiber?

Fiber is found in most plant foods. You will find fiber in fruit, vegetables, grains and beans. There are two types of fiber; they are soluble and insoluble. Soluble fiber is digested in your intestinal tract, helps you to feel full and allows for good digestion. Insoluble fiber is not digested by the body, but instead softens stools and speeds waste elimination.

Will fiber help you lose weight?

The bulkiness of fiber can help to make you feel full longer. Because fiber can make you feel full longer, it may help you lose weight.

Should I take a fiber supplement?

Before starting a habit of taking fiber supplements, people should first try changing their diets and begin eating fiber rich foods. More specifically, they should eat more fruits vegetables and whole grains. Some of the foods you should add to your diet are dark colored whole grain breads and ban cereals, apples, oranges, bananas, berries, prunes, pears, green peas, all types of beans, artichoke, almonds and more. This may mean you have to change a few habits, but your body will thank you, and you will end up replacing over processed foods with these good carbs. This replacement of low nutrient, high calorie food with high fiber, low calorie foods is what will cause you to lose weight.

But I don't like high fiber foods?

High fiber foods can be a little hard on the palette at first, but over time, you can come to actually like them more than processed foods. The key is to change the way you prepare the foods.

For example, my favorite food has always been spaghetti. I could eat a box of it by myself every day. I can blame most of my weight gain in my 20's to my diet of spaghetti and not much else. After I started eating high fiber foods, I switched to whole grain spaghetti. I hated it. I switched back and forth for a while. Then I tried a different cooking method. Previously, I had always cooked my pasta separate of my sauce and poor it on top. Now I take my half-cooked spaghetti and finish cooking it in my sauce. It absorbs the flavor of the sauce, and tastes delicious. In addition, no matter how hard I try, I cannot seem to eat a full box of whole grain pasta. It just fills me up too fast.

Similarly, I also altered my pancake recipe when I switched from regular pancake mix. Now I add chopped fruit and nuts to my pancake mix, and my children eat them up when they used to complain and walk away from the table.


By A. Hermitt