Modern Screen (Dec 1931 - Nov 1932 (assorted issues))

(Above) Remember Alice Terry? If ever there was a slim princess star, she was it. But Alice gave up the screen because her constant dieting amounted to drudgery. (Right) Pearl White, too, is much, much heavier than she was in her grand old serial days. irrigations, besides robbing the system of the properties it must have to function normally, impair certain organs and certain organic muscles so that eventually they lose their ability to function properly even after such practises have been discontinued. The capacity of an adult stomach is about three pints. It can and does, however, accommodate itself to the amount of food eaten. Therefore, literally, the more you eat the more you want because once your stomach stretches, it feels empty unless you keep on giving it the excessive amount to which it is accustomed. And all of this excessive food is like so much manna to the fat cells which thrive upon it, demanding more and more. All of which explains why the first week or the first ten days of any diet prove the most trying. People usually have previously eaten a greater amount of food than their diet allows. Therefore, until their stomach shrinks to a size sufficient only to hold the new amount of food it feels empty. MANY of the Hollywod stars go on an exclusive orange juice diet for one or two days before starting on a prescribed diet routine. The purpose of this is to give the system a chance to eliminate all food stored within it. The patient gets a nice fresh start and, besides, there is a definite psychological blessing in this idea: if you make up your mind that all you can have for a day or two is orange juice, it is comparatively easy to exert your will power and stick to orange juice. If, however, you start right in on reduced rations, you are inclined to hedge a bit. "Oh, well," you argue, "I'm really cutting out fattening things. I guess it won't hurt to have another helping of vegetables." And, of course, two helpings of even nonfattening foods have exactly twice as many calories as one helping. Kathryn Crawford, who had gained 60 Nita Naldi, always a voluptuous type, has now definitely given up dieting. These three former actresses decided that the glory wasn't worth being a little hungry. Perhaps some of you agree with them— now. But you probably won't when you finish this article. considerable weight before her return to the screen in "Flying High," went on an exclusive orange juice diet for a week — but she went to a hospital for the purpose and had a trained nurse in attendance the whole time. There is the danger, always, of going on a diet so strenuous that when the doctor whom you finally are obliged to consult insists you eat more than you have been eating you find yourself unable to do so. Your stomach can shrink to a size insufficient even to hold an adequate diet. "All of this talk about counting calories and including in your diet those properties vital to your system is all right," I can hear some of you complain. "But how is it that I gain weight out of all proportion to what I eat? It seems to me I gain if I even look at food! I don't eat nearly as much food or nearly as rich food as my girl friend and yet she remains lovely and slim! Etc., etc." The answer to this is also simple but, unfortunately, at the present time the remedy tor this is available only to those who live in or near a large city. An inclination to put on weight out of all proportion to what you eat has been traced to a subnormal metabolism. An inclination to lose weight out of all proportion to what you eat has been traced to an over-active metabolism. And you may as well familiarize yourself with these terms right now because they're going to become as common as hearts and lungs and brains. LAST month when talking about iodine we learned it J was important to the thyroid gland. Physicians call our thyroid gland the policeman of our system. It is this gland which controls our metabolism. Metabolism is the process whereby we incorporate into our own tissues substances obtained from our food, making these part of our own body and also transforming {Continued on page 90)