Tanya Zuckerbrot
Photo: Sylvain Gaboury / Paul Bruinooge / Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
Over the past few weeks, stories have appeared about the alleged dangers of the F-Factor diet, a popular high-fiber diet developed by prominent dietitian Tanya Zuckerbrot. Several articles detailed claims shared by Emily Gellis Lande, a fashion and lifestyle influencer who has spent much of the summer posting hundreds of screenshots on Instagram of the messages she has received from people who sharing dangerous side effects they say they experienced while on the F-Factor. diet. In the messages, which Gellis shares anonymously, people say they are suffering from hips and rashes, migraines, cancer, and severe gastrointestinal distress, including constipation and rectal bleeding.
The scream has raised questions about the safety of the popular diet, which counts among his fans celebrities such as Megyn Kelly and Katie Couric. According to a new report from New York The time, though, the story also has a bizarre twist: Of the hundreds of anonymous requests about the plan, one of the most dramatic – that the F-Factor and its products caused a person to abuse – was a hoax, planted around the other legitimate stories.
So, what is the F-Factor diet, exactly? Is it safe? And who planted the fake message and why?
The F-Factor diet was developed over 20 years ago by New York dietitian Tanya Zuckerbrot. On its website, the F-Factor prides itself on being the “most liberating approach to weight loss and optimal health”, and states that it has four “disruptive principles” – eating carbohydrates; go out to eat; drinking alcohol; work out less – make it “liberating” and “sustainable”.
The focus of the F-Factor diet is glass fiber. In step one, according to Good family, dieters should eat 35 grams of fiber per day, and less than 35 grams of net carbohydrates. In steps two and three, they should still focus on 35 grams of fiber per day, but may increase the number of carbohydrates they eat.
While the F-Factor website states that diets are not required to cut or count calories, it claims that “there is an inherent calorie cap built into the program,” because by eating so much fiber, people are fuller. feel and eat less. To help them reach their daily goals, dieters are encouraged to purchase products from the F-Factor line of glass fiber / protein bars and powders.
According to Dr. Tom Hildebrandt, head of the Center of Excellence in Eating and Weight Disorders at the Icahn School of Medicine on Mount Sinai, health professionals have been concerned about the F-Factor for years. He told the The time that the patients who see his office are “particularly vulnerable to diets with very branded promises” – such as those of F-Factor – and that the messages of the plan apply “if you agree to a diet like this that you require to to eat very little food and to approach food in a very regimental, controlled way. ”
In response to the concern of Drs. Hildebrandt told Zuckerbrot the The time: “Why did he not reach me and say: ‘Tanya, your program is harming people? If he has such altruistic motivations, why has he not reached out to me? “She also pointed out that several doctors have praised her plan on the back of her book.
Gellis, 34 – a fashion and lifestyle influencer with more than 173,000 followers on Instagram – had never done the F-Factor diet, but had heard of it through the grape vine over the years. “It was definitely a very popular diet in NYC,” she told the Cut in an email.
Then, in mid-April, she says she saw an anonymous tip on Instagram that said Zuckerbrot had suggested to a private client of hers that she should stop taking antidepressants if the antidepressants caused weight gain. (Zuckerbrot vehemently denied this allegation in the The time, saying that it was a “lie”, and that “this never happened and it would never happen.”)
After seeing the post, Gellis responded with a video on Instagram in which she prescribed the importance of mental health and anti-depressants by doctor. Shortly thereafter, Gellis began noticing and sharing more posts on her Instagram Stories about people’s experiences with the F-Factor, and more and more people started dating. Some of the allegations – including one from a woman who said the F-Factor products caused her miscarriage – were picked up by retail outlets such as the New York Peal and Refinery29.
“This story started because I just became a means for women to share their stories,” Gellis told de Cut.
While Gellis says her inbox has been flooded with positive messages from people thanking her for sharing her stories, she says she has also been met with “intense cyberbullying”. “This is a common theme in the F-Factor playbook,” she says, and therefore gives anonymity to people who share their stories.
Gellis says the most common complaints she sees are rash on body and armpits, migraines, hives, severe gastrointestinal distress, panic attacks, and heavy metal poisoning. “One girl unfortunately removed part of her colon,” Gellis claims.
Although the vast majority of the stories Gellis shares are anonymous and unverified, the The time spoke to some of the women who shared their experiences and fact-checked their claims. One said she went on a diet when she was 32, and “within a month developed abdominal pain so severe that she went to the doctor and went to the emergency room and underwent two CT scans.” Another said that after eight months of drinking shakes mixed with the F-Factor glass fiber / protein powder, “they developed horrible red spots that needed a biopsy.”
Zuckerbrot maintains that their diet and products are safe. She told the The time that their company has received more than 176,000 purchase orders for its powders and beams since they were introduced two years ago, and that at that time they received only 50 complaints about stomach complaints or rashes.
Gellis, meanwhile, has requested that Zuckerbrot release a certificate of analysis from a third-party lab confirming that the F-Factor products do not contain contaminants such as pesticides or hazardous levels of heavy metals. While Zuckerbrot initially refused to release the document, claiming it contained its own information, she told the The time that she would share it in the coming days, explaining, “Because of all the misinformation and accusations of high levels of lead, our true customers are now worried.”
One of the biggest curveballs in all of this relates to two messages Gellis received from women who said the F-Factor diet and products had caused them. These accusations were cited in multiple news stories, but one of the claims, the The time found, was a hoax.
In an email to Zuckerbrot and Eva Chen, the director of fashion partnerships on Instagram, Alison Brettschneider, 44, a former Instagram influencer, said she made up the miscarriage story and that it’s a FULL OUT LIG. I have never used Tanya’s products before. ”
Brettschneider, who emailed Chen and Zuckerbrot from the account [email protected], told the The time that she was once again the target of criticism on Instagram in the summer of 2018, after academic and activist Rachel Cargle posted about the murder of a young Black woman, Nia Wilson, at a BART station in Oakland, California, writing: “I’m waiting for your fave white feminists to post about #NiaWilson.” While some white feminists responded to Cargle’s call to take action, Brettschneider, who ran the popular Instagram page @ 25Park, became defensive. In posts later shared by Cargle on Instagram, Brettschneider called Cargle “shameful” and a “clown”, accusing her of being a stranger to women. She also threatened the followers of Cargle, and reached out to some of her employers to complain about her. Her Instagram account was subsequently suspended for bullying, and she now follows Instagram.
Brettschneider told the The time that she planted the false miscarriage story because she could not stand silently and watched as Zuckerbrot was “attacked” by people on Instagram. Oh, and Brettschneider’s cousin, Amanda Karp, is F-Factor’s chief dietitian, but I’m sure that’s just a coincidence.
