A man is holding a feeding tube
There are some diets to avoid due to being outright dangerous.

5 Bizarre Diets to Avoid at All Costs

While many diets are not harmful, they are not all effective or sustainable. Diets generally fall into several categories: there are the low-carbohydrate diets (such as the Atkins diet and Paleo diet), low-fat diets, low-calorie diets (such as the cookie diet and raw food diet) and the balanced diets. The best diets are the balanced diets, designed to help you lose weight and stay healthy whilst providing all the nutrients you need.

While many diets are not ideal or safe long-term, there are some diets that are just outright dangerous. The following ‘diets’ should be avoided at all costs:

1. Cotton Ball Diet

At first, I thought this was a joke, limited to on-screen teen parodies. However, some people have been undertaking this diet for real. It consists of eating cotton balls dipped in juices or smoothies.

The theory is it will make you feel full without gaining weight. Aside from the nutritional deficiency of this diet, the real danger is that cotton balls are not digestible.

They could get stuck in the muscular tube that exits the stomach or in the intestines, which is a medical emergency that requires surgery and could lead to the death of part of the intestines, with serious consequences. Eating cotton balls rather than food could also precipitate a dangerous eating disorder.

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