Crash dieting can be dangerous, and the fact of it has been proven time and again by doctors and in practicality by quite a few number of fashion and couture who under sheer peer pressure and to live up to the dress sizes have dramatically dropped their food intake resulting in tragic consequences.

This time around the victim of crash dieting was a British bride-to-be, Samantha Clowe. Samantha was not exactly your magazine cover bride and had her extra pounds which she decided to drop in a bid to lose weight before her wedding..

She and her fiancé Andrew Smith lived in Leeds, that is until she decided to go on the reputed, ‘LighterLife’ - 500 calories-a-day diet plan. Samantha was ‘fit and well’ when she started out on the diet but 11 weeks later, Andrew found her collapsed at their resident, after which she was declared dead.

Initially at 17st and 61lb.; Samantha had lost 3st after embarking of this ill fated journey which in her mother’s words was to gain– ‘respect at work’ as she ‘didn’t want to be a fat bride’.

What could be more tragic than this? A young woman who started out to be perfect for her wedding with dreams which will now be buried with her…

The coroner who attended to her suspects the cause of death to be from cardiac arrhythmia, when the heart suddenly stops; though the post mortem had not revealed any clues about her diet being the cause of her demise.

Even though ‘LighterLife’ claims that Samantha died when she was still clinically obese, it does not change the fact that she died after losing a significant amount of weight (one sixth) in a short time by living on specially formulated soups, bars and shakes.

In a previous blog of mine - Dangers of going overboard with diet and weight loss; I had listed some of the obvious and some not so obvious dangers of crash dieting and intensive weight loss programmes.

These dangers are not just word of mouth advice but stuff that is clinically proven and advised against by professional dieticians and doctors. So please, spread the word around.

Always, always consult a doctor before going on any sort of diet, especially if you are obese or have some hormonal problems, like diabetes or thyroid imbalance or if you are taking regular and prescribed medications.

Stay healthy and stay safe. People who love us, do so regardless of how you look and how much we weigh, so don't weigh love and happiness on your weight scales! You'll just end up getting hurt and may be irrevocably so...