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The Diet Fix

sciencebasedmedicine.org

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Re: The Diet Fix

#21

Post by _zen »

Dieting does not fail, but dieting does not work how the author thinks.

For most, dieting is to maintain the status quo. Overweight or obese people drink and eat diet beverages/foods, or conform to some self-imposed diet, to maintain their current health. They know they can't give 100% into their desires, or they could have dire consequences (hospitalization, death), but they are not determined enough to take the actual steps to losing weight (significant diet change, routine exercise).

I see this everywhere. Family, friends, etc. They all say they're dieting, but year after year they are as out of shape as always. They are happy and content with themselves, because dieting to them does not mean "get fit like those gym guys on T.V."

Re: The Diet Fix

#22

Post by elijahtaylor »

cab_codespring wrote: post #7
antidaily wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno. I know people who've lost 100lbs and kept it off doing keto.

I bet if you counted the calories in/calories out it would show the calorie deficit accounting for it. The thing with low carb, in my experience, is that it does make it easier to eat less if you have the right attitude about it. I do it AND count calories. Also, just the fact that it cuts out most of the foods in the universe helps to make it an easy decision whether or not to eat something, whereas with just calori…

> I bet if you counted the calories in/calories out it would show the calorie deficit accounting for it

By definition it would have to be true that you consumed fewer calories than expended. Calories in/calories out is not wrong, it's just not useful (or at least it's not a nearly complete picture).

Calories in/out are not independent variables. The type of calories you consume dictate at least: 1) how your body processes the calories you consume, 2) the energy you will have to expend, and 3) the hunger you will feel.

Re: The Diet Fix

#23

Post by Quaro »

jonheller wrote: post #14
antidaily wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno. I know people who've lost 100lbs and kept it off doing keto.

I lost 50 pounds eating ~500 calories more on keto than I did before. Unfortunately I wasn't completely comfortable with the types of meals I ate with that lifestyle. But it did make me feel as though the whole calories in - calories out was nonsense. Especially after trying (and failing) diets based around that (weight watchers) multiple times.

>I lost 50 pounds eating ~500 calories more on keto than I did before

>But it did make me feel as though the whole calories in - calories out was nonsense.

As a diet methodology, calories in vs calories out is not very effective for the general public. I too have lost more weight via keto.

But when I really tracked what I was eating I found keto simply kept my appetite under control better. This is extremely valuable but ultimately it was still down to calories.

(You also tend to drop a ton of water weight when you first start keto which makes it seem super effective at first)

Re: The Diet Fix

#24

Post by raverbashing »

"Freedhoff opens the book describing “Dieting’s Seven Deadly Sins”, which are commonly held, but dangerous, beliefs about dieting. Hunger is the first myth to go. Freedhoff argues that any diet plan that leaves you hungry won’t be sustainable. Sacrifice is next—perpetual sacrifice of anything you enjoy will make any diet fail. Willpower is important, but permanent resistance is almost certainly futile. Blind food restrictions are the next to go, and Freedhoff is adamant we need to manage, but not banish, certain food groups. Sweating is the next myth, with The Biggest Loser epitomizing the belief that exercise can contribute to significant weight loss. You can’t outrun your fork—not in the long run. Anticipating perfection is also a myth, so real diets must be flexible enough to accommodate setbacks. Denial is the last myth. “The diet was great—I just couldn’t stick with it” is a common refrain. As weight loss progresses, any suffering gets harder to sustain, and harder to deny."

Looks like a great beginning to a book.

One could write a great informational material only basing themselves on these myths.

Re: The Diet Fix

#25

Post by mahyarm »

jonheller wrote: post #14
antidaily wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno. I know people who've lost 100lbs and kept it off doing keto.

I lost 50 pounds eating ~500 calories more on keto than I did before. Unfortunately I wasn't completely comfortable with the types of meals I ate with that lifestyle. But it did make me feel as though the whole calories in - calories out was nonsense. Especially after trying (and failing) diets based around that (weight watchers) multiple times.

Comparing how I felt doing keto with the keto flu vs. just plain calorie counting, I think the unique metabolism of ketosis makes your body not use everything you eat during keto. It's very hard to keep under 20g of carbs and not eat too much protein also. Much easier to just go to chipolte/subway and calorie count. If your lifestyle makes you make all 3 meals already, then keto is great. If you don't, then it's a lot of work.

Re: The Diet Fix

#26

Post by grecy »

fatman wrote: post #2

Sounds promising. Calories in, calories out - the rest is just noise.

That times a thousand.

I've posted here about my experiences with weight loss before (tldr; I got involved with weight watchers, have personally been involved with hundreds of people losing hundreds of pounds each over ~10 years).

There is no person on this earth that can eat less calories than they use and not lose weight. It's not possible. So there are two very easy ways to lose weight.

1. Eat less calories (than you use).

or

2. Burn more calories (than you eat).

(or a combination of the two - as a lifelong program like Weight Watchers promotes.)

Obviously it can be hard for some people to eat less calories.

I'm not saying it's easy, I'm saying it's simple.

Re: The Diet Fix

#27

Post by smacktoward »

cab_codespring wrote: post #13
jp555 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exercise can stimulate profoundly positive physiological changes, and that alone is a good enough reason to do it. But people forget that they burn more calories during a single night of sleep than they do doing 3 hours of cardio a week. Balance is important, but shedding nutrition & health mythology is even more so.

The Gluten Free nonsense drives me the most crazy. Of course they don't have Celiac disease, but they are "Sensitive" to it, which there is no way to refute. There is so much pseudoscience crap floating around I'm glad there's one book out there refuting it, I just wish he was a nutrition researcher doctor or something instead of a pharmacist, which doesn't sound very impressive for a diet book.

There is one benefit from it, though: a much larger market of gluten-free products than would exist if the only people buying them were people who legitimately suffer from celiac. In that respect it's a net positive: stupid people are out some money, but it's hard to get too worked up about that since (being stupid) they would have probably found some other pointless thing to waste it on anyway, and at least this way their waste makes it possible for celiac sufferers to have a better quality of life.

The only hitch is that fads are by their nature transitory, so at some point the stupid people will flit away from gluten-free to some other fad, and the market of gluten-free products will collapse. Which will kind of suck for those who actually need them.

Re: The Diet Fix

#28

Post by npsimons »

Quaro wrote: post #20
TrainedMonkey wrote: post #6

There is claim that exercise contributing to significant weight loss is a myth. I beg to disagree, while exercise itself might not be significant contributor to weight loss, no exercise means lower metabolism and overall health. As always there is no silver bullet, you need to have a balanced lifestyle to be healthy.

>no exercise means lower metabolism and overall health For those who have a controlled weight already, is a higher metabolism actually something to aim for? People who practice calorie restriction for life extension do seem to exercise but not to raise the metabolism, they view that as a tradeoff.

For those who have a controlled weight already, is a higher metabolism actually something to aim for?

Perhaps not; as I get closer and closer to my ideal weight, I wonder if I should taper off my exercise routine. The problem is that exercise has more benefits than just higher metabolism. There are hormones that get released by exercising, not to mention that functional fitness is necessary if you are trying to reach a goal.

I'm not an expert, nor have I seen any research along these lines, but I've heard arguments made that since exercise speeds up metabolism and gets the blood flowing, it should clean out things like histamine (reducing allergic reactions) and disease faster. There's all sorts of reasons to not take my experience as scientific, but I certainly seem to have less allergies, heal faster and get sick less often the more regularly I exercise. I also tend to be more relaxed, have higher clarity and am on more of an even keel emotionally after I workout (and it tends to last most of the day, so I prefer to workout first thing in the morning).

Re: The Diet Fix

#29

Post by TrainedMonkey »

chrisgd wrote: post #15
TrainedMonkey wrote: post #6

There is claim that exercise contributing to significant weight loss is a myth. I beg to disagree, while exercise itself might not be significant contributor to weight loss, no exercise means lower metabolism and overall health. As always there is no silver bullet, you need to have a balanced lifestyle to be healthy.

The first line sort of agrees with what you are saying, but the second line paints a more clear picture: >Sweating is the next myth, with The Biggest Loser epitomizing the belief that exercise can contribute to significant weight loss. You can’t outrun your fork- not in the long run.

Good point. If you eat shitty food, no amount of exercise or vitamins can help you. However, first sentence mentions that exercise contribution to weight loss is a myth. I disagree with that notion, in hindsight I should had been more more careful with my choice of words.

Edited my original comment to reflect this.

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