You can’t log onto your social media accounts’ explore page without being bombarded with social media influencers, fitness bloggers, or Kardashians posing with their coveted Fit Detox Teas.
The captions rant and rave about the ways the Fit Tea helped them lose their bloat or tummy fat, helped them detox after a good “cheat day”, or even to get rock-hard abs. This leads a majority of mostly young women to believe they too can resemble their favourite social media personalities just by hopping on a 28-day tea-fuelled detox.
Many of us look to social media to see what’s hot and what’s not, what’s trending, and what brands and products are being used by the top influencers and celebrities. “Influencer Marketing” has led big brands to dish out their dough to big name celebrities like the Kardashians, or even to influencers with a much smaller follower count, to reach your newsfeeds as many times and in as many ways as possible. Regardless of who you follow, you are bound to stumble into the rabbit hole that is Fit Tea promotion posts.
The true tea about these detox teas is the bodies they promise cannot be accredited to the detox at all, yet the massive marketing campaigns led by these companies continues to snake its way onto our newsfeeds in ways that are inescapable. The dangerous element of these teas is that the main ingredient in a large majority is a herbal laxative.
The reason that you may see a temporary reduction in bloating is because the main ingredient in these teas, Senna, is a herbal leaf traditionally used to treat constipation. It works by irritating the lining of the bowels and forcing a bowel movement, emptying out the contents of your stomach and helping in the loss of water weight. This throws your bodies natural functioning out of whack and can contribute to a number of related health problems affecting your intestines.
Prolonged use of these teas may cause your intestines to depend on the herb for regular bowel movements, and may cause electrolyte imbalance, muscle weakness or liver damage. These teas have not been proven to show any weight loss or fat loss, and only contribute to dehydration, and a convoluted understanding of achieving physical fitness. The only reason you’re losing that stubborn bloat is because your bowels are forced to empty, stressing out your body and actually impeding proper weight loss.
The nature of our society, especially surrounding social media has lead to a dependence on instant gratification, instant feedback, and instant results, and the Fit Teas promise of a quick fix is alluring to most. The promise of a dream body achievable through such easy means, gives us a way to increase our follow count and the number of likes on our latest selfie.
One of the other dangers is that many fitness Instagram accounts pose alongside these teas with sculpted physiques that were attained through a strict diet and training regimen. This adds to the gross misconceptions surrounding weight loss that are cultivated and perpetuated by social media and leading women to damage their insides for a momentarily flat tummy.
A clean diet and exercise aside, bikini and fitness competitors online credit Fit Tea for their muscular bods and “helping them keep the bloat away”. The cinched waistlines of many of the celebs posing with these teas were often not earned through being avid tea drinkers or relentless exercise, and we cannot credit a detox for helping them achieve their curves. Truth be told, throwing out the gym membership for a detox tea will do you more harm than good. Fit Tea companies have succeeded at preying on insecurities of women worldwide and misleading them to believe that their bikini body is only a cup of tea away.
In reality however, SkinnyMeTea was shut down because the Australian Medical Association was concerned about the unrealistic before and after images posted on the account, which led one user to be hospitalized after using the tea.
Every other day a new fit tea company pops up, proving that women around the world are sold on the promise of fitness in a cup, dishing out their dough for that hourglass figure, without any real promise of results. Influencers and Kardashians alike will continue to cash their cheques regardless, so instead of taking their plethora of endorsements at face value, its time for us to dish the tea on Fit Tea.
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