Posted on 06/17/2021 8:24:09 AM PDT by BenLurkin
Shaw Somers, a consultant surgeon who specialises in weight-loss operations, has been treating people with severe obesity for many years. He says people like Sarah, who have an inherited set of certain genes, are much more likely to develop obesity compared with those who don't.
Historically, he says, people with these genetics would have done well in a famine, but with today's plentiful, high-calorie food they will put on weight "without strong determination and support".
Dr Denise Ratcliffe, a clinical psychologist...says that many of the people she sees, have experienced trauma, abuse or neglect, for example, which leads to a dysfunctional relationship with food.
Both the genetic and psychological components of obesity can be amplified when there is easy access to fatty, sugar-laden foods, which are available cheaply and conveniently.
Dr Abd Tahrani, a senior lecturer in obesity medicine at the University of Birmingham, says there are a lot of people who are "biologically pre-designed to conserve energy", which is stored as fat. He explains that signals from the hypothalamus - the part of the brain that controls appetite - bombard the person with feelings of hunger and a desire to eat, that are almost impossible to fight.
For many scientists and doctors who have developed a deep understanding of obesity, the condition is a complex illness driven by a combination of factors. To blame someone for suffering with that illness flies in the face of the scientific evidence, they say.
"If blame worked," says Dr Abd Tahrani, "we would have a very thin society by now. Everybody who has obesity has been blamed an endless amount of times, either by their doctors, by their neighbours or their family, or wider society. It's not working, please stop it."
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
It isn’t “calories in / Calories out”. LOTS of evidence now. No one familiar with the science would argue it is just calories.
Calories DO play a role. And extremes of calorie cutting WILL result in weight loss. But that is a STUPID way of doing it because there ARE ways a fat person can gradually reset their body.
I’ve done diets for nearly 50 years. What I’ve done the last 3 is working FAR better than any diet I tried before.
A variety of good videos with evidence here:
https://www.youtube.com/user/lowcarbdownunder/videos
Thank you for your thoughtful post, best wishes on reaching your goal.
Maintaining the calorie expenditure of a 18 year old marine recruit isn’t practical for most people, however most people can boost their baseline metabolism and get light exercise which makes a huge difference.
However, ignoring what you eat and only considering how much is doomed to failure.
Pretty much every contestant on “Biggest Loser” gained the weight back because calorie restriction destroyed their base metabolism and they could not maintain the level of exercise required and hold down a job, care for a family, etc.
I lost 40 pounds several years ago and have had no trouble keeping it off. I don’t go hungry and I don’t spend several hours a day exercising. I eat like my parents and grandparents did before the medical community and department of agriculture sabotaged our diet.
Yeah, it is - at least for the vast majority. Unless you've repealed the first law of thermodynamics, if you burn more energy (calories) than you consume, you will lose weight. You can't get something from nothing.
“Pretty much every contestant on “Biggest Loser” gained the weight back because calorie restriction destroyed their base metabolism and they could not maintain the level of exercise required and hold down a job, care for a family, etc.”
They gained it back because they consumed more calories than they expended.
It would be impossible for there to be another cause.
It’s a binary and absolute axiom.
to say otherwise is enablement
The article discusses that the folks are hard wired to store fat only in times of plenty.
During starvation they starve along with everyone else
The article discusses that the folks are hard wired to store fat only in times of plenty.
During starvation they starve along with everyone else
Um, I’m not sure what your point is?
You can’t excise key words out of what I wrote, and then claim something I didn’t say in the first place is “false”. Does this make sense?
Let’s try this again.
“Excess calories are stored in the body as fat.”
I think we can agree on this. If not, we’ll try to clarify things further.
This.
Good for you. Stay with it. Out of curiosity how’d you do this?
And any gender or woke issues.
My recipe (pun intended) started with calorie counting and carb counting (Keto). I used the LoseIt app to determine my daily calorie limit. I purchased a WIFI scale and weighed myself daily. The most important part of that is I gave myself permission to be right where I was and refused to judge myself. Once I did that I allowed the data to be data and let it tell the story of choices I’d made in the preceding days (carb intake especially). I exercised at least 3 times a week by walking 2 miles. It wasn’t about speed... it was about completion and being committed to the full distance. I didn’t lift weights. I tried to do intermittent fasting (IF) in the beginning but gave that up.
Half way to 206 I started IF because my calorie ceiling got too low. For that part of things I went to a 16:8 routine. I ate all of my calories in an 8 hour windows. Usually one small meal at lunch and my bigger meal at supper. I gave up ALL SUGAR. Critical step for me.
After regaining the 35 pounds I tried to follow that routine but found that it wasn’t effective. So I switched to a smaller eating window. By then I’d developed the self discipline to do one meal a day after 5PM and before 9. I drank water/coffee/diet sodas during the day and managed it well. I don’t recommend starting there.
Again, exercise has been key. There are some alcohols that are keto but I find even those slow you down. Best to give up the booze for a season. At least that worked for me.
I’m now working on eating more cleanly. Natural foods rather than processed. Still staying keto but cooking from scratch, fewer processed meats and cheeses, etc.
Eggs are you best friend (if you like them). They are a miracle food in terms of nutrition.
You are correct, of course.
What happens though, is the first 20 or 30 pounds is “easy”, and then after that it gets tougher, the body starts to slow metabolism down, and due to the fact that less calories are necessary to operate at the new weight.
I shed 60 pounds in about 6 to 8 months and found a stubborn few plateau levels along the way. It is kind of bizarre, because by a strict calories in calories out equation, it shouldn’t be possible to hang around at a specific number for days on end. At first my average was about 2 or 2.5 pounds every 10 days, but as time went on the average dropped to about 1.5 to 2 pounds a week or maybe a little less.
The key is persistance, because it is calories that count but it takes some time to get a “good head of steam” built up and start watching the numbers decline on the scale, but I think the advice generally given to people is a bit on the optomistic side. Truly sedentary people need very little food intake, and many foods are packed with calories, carb laden or not.
A tablespoon of peanut butter takes an hour of brisk walking to burn off! Exercise isn’t gonna make a huge difference if someone isn’t paying close attention, and to my way of thinking, as much as I love peanut butter, it ain’t worth an hour of walking just to add another dollop. Once I got a scale and started weighing portions and looking at calorie info on common food ingredients it opened my eyes.
Put another way, I’m not going to overeat and then try to exercise it away. Once in a while, I used to make biscuits and sausage gravy, hash browns, eggs, bacon etc. i added it up, and it could approach 4000 calories.
That’s literally enough to run a marathon, and that wasn’t happenin’. More likely a nice long nap. So the mystery of how I porked out there for a while, I think it’s solved! Reg’ler Sherlock Holmes, I know.
It is most definitely calories in/ calories out. Over meaningful periods of time anyway.
But it damn sure isn’t a linear process. That’s what makes it screwy. The key is to find out what the metabolic rate is, the charts are a little optomistic on that. I think they don’t want to scare people off. My mom was an RN, and I think her ancient Taber’s Cyclopedia says something like “900 to 1100” calories for moderate weight loss and “600 to 800 calories” for more rapid weight loss.
It sort of checks out with fat having (about) 4000 calories per pound. It isn’t going to be a linear decline, but it does burn off if caloric intake is reduced. We can’t live on air, though people have tried. I can see why fasting is popular, I’m never less hungry than when I fast, and a too-big meal invites more of the same by causing more carb cravings.
Excess calories are stored in the body as fat.
I think calories that are not part of an excess might be stored as fat. There are harmful substances that can be stored in fat. Omega 6 fats can be stored in fat. Plastic can be stored in fat. If you have too many toxins in your body, it might be a high priority for you to create fat so you can move toxins from your blood to the fat stores.
Insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. You people pushing calorie restriction diets and exercise have a forty year history of short term success followed by long term failure.
The human body is a dynamic system that changes in response to stimulus. Calorie restriction diets cause our metabolism to slow down, requiring even more calorie restriction and exercise to make up the difference. Eventually you are starving all the time and spending enormous amounts of time exercising — just to maintain.
Eventually people get sick of spending four hours a day in the gym and starving themselves. They stop exercising, start eating more and they are worse off than they were before because they have destroyed their metabolism. Everyone who has ever followed a traditional diet for very long is all too familiar with this pattern.
If you are obsessed with calorie restriction, the only way to do it without sabotaging your metabolism is some form of fasting. And fasting is far easier and more effective than calorie restriction diets anyway. Your body is built to effectively fast, and it actually increases metabolism instead of depressing it.
Insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. You people pushing calorie restriction diets and exercise have a forty year history of short term success followed by long term failure.
Yes, it is hard to read a thread with so many stupid people.
Alcohol is Not Good for anyone trying to lose pounds.
The reason is because, in the same way that the body can not burn any fat unless and until glucose reserves are exhausted, no glucose can be utilized until alcohol has been metabolized. Not only are you not burning any fat, you’re not burning any carbs either! Alcohol is treated as a poison, or at least it burns it off preferential to anything else.
I think “Keto” gets conflated with Intermittent Fasting. I love IF, it works for me. But I’m not giving up carbs. I can and do eat Pizza, mashed potatoes and gravy, sausage gravy, things like that.
The key is calorie reduction. There’s different ways to go about that. I don’t believe we need to feel hungry all the time either. Who wants to do that? So the standard advice often seems to be “Eat 6 small meals a day to keep metabolism up.”
That isn’t going to work for me. Drive me crazy. Worse, it’s usually coupled with diet “plan” stuff like: “Breakfast: 1 Almond, half slice oak sawdust toast, brussel sprout smoothie, water.” The hell with that. Right now my metabolic needs or whatever is around 1400 to 1800 calories. If I eat more than that, I will gain. I could choose to eat a couple large Hershey bars and still maintain my weight, but it would be miserable, because empty carbs cause more cravings .. for more carbs. Mom was right, after all (Moms are always right) “You’ll spoil your dinner”.
“Eventually you are starving all the time and spending enormous amounts of time exercising — just to maintain.”
Ludicrous and fallacious.
Only the people without sufficient will, fail.
I eat between 1800 and 2100 calories of whole foods every day. And I invest about 5 hrs per week in exercise. I eat when I’m hungry, not to assuage some dark demon from childhood or some other specter.
Or because I’m a pussy with low self esteem.
So take your weak-willed nonsense back to the psych office. It doesn’t belong in a health thread.
Intermittent Fasting (aka “time restricted eating”) is the best thing that ever happened to me.
People generally tend to lose the fat, without any changes in what they eat or how much they eat, just by eating one meal a day. I am not immortal though, and I liked to have seen the scale have moved meaningfully down when I get on it. It’s a morale thing.
I have to “restrict calories”, if only compared with what I was eating before, which was “unrestricted” to say the least.
I got fat over time by 1. Eating whatever foods I wanted. 2. Whenever I wanted. 3. In whatever amounts I wanted.
If I can control 2 out of the 3 I got er licked, basically. IF at one meal a day takes care of one, “whenever” and puts the body at a definite advantage apart from simply losing weight. Tonite having Chicken & Rice, with a glass of milk probably tops out at 1300 calories. It tastes fantastic, and is filling.
Coffee and cigarettes for breakfast, as God intended!
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