天博体育

Talk about a big wedding.

In addition to the 1,900 guests in Westminster Abbey (assorted royals, governors-general, church leaders, and celebrities like Mr. and Mrs. David Beckham, Sir Elton John, and Guy Ritchie without his ex, Madonna), an estimated 2.5 billion people will be watching Friday morning when Prince William of Wales and 鈥渃ommoner鈥� Catherine Middleton exchange vows.

One topic of royal wedding conversation has been Middleton鈥檚 weight and whether she has gotten too thin (too rich is an altogether different matter). According to one report in the British press that I read recently, she weighs 8 stone 8, or 120 pounds (a stone is 14 pounds). Many sources put her height at 5 feet 10 inches. If that weight and height are accurate (granted, a sizable if), then her (BMI) is 17.2, which would put the 29-year-old princess-to-be in the underweight category. British newspapers have reported that Middleton has dropped two dress sizes since the engagement was announced in November.

There seem to be three prevailing theories about Middleton鈥檚 presumptive weight loss鈥攁nd two may pertain to many brides (and perhaps a few grooms, too): stress, 鈥渂rideorexia,鈥� and a new diet.

1) Could it be stress?

The notion that stress could be causing Middleton to lose weight is plausible, though a great deal of research suggests that stress tends to move weight in the opposite direction.

One part of stress is the 鈥渇ight or flight鈥� response. It includes a surge in adrenaline-like hormones that suppress appetite. Fight-or-flight physiology may also discourage eating because it shunts blood away from the digestive system.

While acute stress may reduce food intake, chronic stress appears to increase it. Studies have shown a correlation between increased stress and excess weight. Stress increases the level of cortisol, a hormone secreted by the adrenal glands. A high level of cortisol has been associated with obesity. And there are some pretty convincing lines of evidence that suggest that high cortisol levels from stress increase the appetites for foods that are fatty and sweet.

Of course, we鈥檙e all different. Some people may respond to stress mainly with an appetite-suppressing fight-or-flight response, while others may have a cortisol-driven desire to calm down and eat.

2) Does she have 鈥渂rideorexia鈥�?

Another theory is that Middleton is trying (perhaps too hard) to lose weight for her wedding.

Who doesn鈥檛 want to look good for their wedding, royal or common鈥攁nd these days, looking good almost always means looking thinner. It鈥檚 been noted that in many couples鈥� lives, no event is as photographed as their wedding. (This may be true for Will and Kate, although unlike the rest of us, they鈥檝e a coronation to look forward to.)

I don鈥檛 know about the UK, but on this side of the pond people started turning the desire of brides to look good and lose weight into businesses several years ago. Now there are bridal boot camps, bridal workouts, bridal diet plans, and reality shows based on brides-to-be slimming down to get ready for the big day. The term 鈥渂rideorexia鈥� was coined to denote the most extreme (and frequently unhealthy) of these wedding-related weight-loss efforts.

Several years ago, a pair of Cornell University researchers in the journal Appetite. I spoke to one of them, Jeffrey Sobal, last week.

Their sample consisted of 272 bridal show registrants who filled out questionnaires about six months, on average, before their wedding day. In many ways, the results were just what you鈥檇 expect鈥攁nd not all that alarming.

Most (70%) of the women wanted to lose a lot of weight (23 pounds, on average) and had lost only a fraction of that amount (8 pounds). But their goals were in a healthy range and their methods for reaching them were pretty reasonable: drinking lots of water, aerobic exercise, eating less food, and eating foods with fewer calories.

鈥淚 think brideorexia is hyperbole,鈥� Sobal told me. 鈥淲e didn鈥檛 really see it.鈥�

Still, about a quarter of the women in the study who wanted to lose weight did resort to at least one of what Sobal and his colleague, Lori A. Neighbors, termed 鈥渆xtreme behaviors,鈥� such as smoking, taking diet pills, and skipping meals (skipping meals may not be wise but it hardly seems extreme). And 14% took the risky step of buying a wedding dress that was smaller than their current body size.

3) Does the Dukan Diet deserve the credit?

Rumors that Kate Middleton lost weight using a popular diet devised by Pierre Dukan, a French physician, aren鈥檛 true, says royal watcher Ingrid Seward. But talk about the Dukan Diet was enough to pique my curiosity, partly because low-carb, high-protein diets have actually fared pretty well in head-to-head studies of weight-loss diets.

I dipped into the English translation of the Dukan Diet that became available in American bookstores just last week.

Dr. Pierre Dukan uses a soup莽on of science along with many of the tried-and-true techniques of diet books:

• a strict first phase that promises quick results (my yellowing copy of the Scarsdale diet promises that you鈥檒l lose a pound a day during the first two-week phase)
• subsequent phases that are more liberal but are supposed to keep the weight off
• a聽mix of flexibility (don鈥檛 worry about calories) and rules (no bananas,grapes, or cherries during the consolidation phase)

Dukan recommends consuming 3 tablespoons of oat bran daily and eating only protein one day each week (he suggests Thursdays) for the rest of your life. There are also some charming French touches, such as steak tartare is okay during the initial, all-protein phase, but only if it is prepared without oil.

There is a significant difference between the Dukan, Atkins, and South Beach聽diets when it comes to fat. Dukan casts dietary fat as the 鈥渁bsolute enemy of anyone trying to be slim,鈥� whereas the other two are more accepting of it.

But overall, you might say about the Dukan Diet聽plus 莽a change, plus c鈥檈st la m锚me chose (the more things change, the more they stay the same).