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Is a low calorie diet the best for weight loss?

slowriot

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you basically need to eat foods that take longer for your system to consume. Fats like omega 3 and 6 are needed in your diet. The human brain lives on glucose and sugar in general, so you need to cut down your low string carbs, like sugar, white bread, pasta, potatoes and so on and bring in more long string carbs, like full grained bread, sourdough bread, beans etc. Long string carbs, natural fats and protein takes longer for you to digest which means you need less to eat to feel full because the chemical reactions in your brain will be different, you'll gain a more steady flow of glucose to your brain and to your cells on that kind of diet.

Im trying to lose weight aswell and Im reading a book on how the brain works and all the scientific results which suggests the best diet for your brain. You need to look at how your brain reacts to your intake of food and how it regulates your body rather than go on a low calorie diet that you and your brain will eventually start hating because its too one dimensional. I didnt understand how when I was eating pasta on its own I could eat and eat and eat it. But now I know why, its the reward system in my brain that plays me a trick, once my tongue reacts to the pasta and the saliva's meeting with eachother (there is an enzyme in humans saliva called amylase that makes starch to sugar) it tells my brain theres sugar on the way and my brain reacts like an addict "more, more, more!!!!". You have to control the reward system and balance your bodys intake of energy. There is more ofcourse. I cant help you with the book unless you can read danish or swedish since its two swedish doctors that made the book concentrating on the scientific research done on this subject. The authors names are Martin Ingvar and Gunilla Eldh. Im pretty sure theres an english book out there based on the same principles.
 

Thalassa

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Some of the healthy food tastes good. It just doesn't seem to taste as good in comparison to the food labeled unhealthy. I like both carrots and cake for example, but I'll almost always rate the piece of cake as tastier.

Foods that are high in both fat and sugar are the worst culprits. If these foods are so bad for our bodies, why do so many people crave these things? Back in the days of the hunter/gatherer society or when there were food shortages, high energy foods were hard to come by. You eat the high energy foods when you can to store enough fat in your body to survive the times when food is scarce. In modern society in developed countries, that's not needed anymore but evolution has not caught up with the current reality. Back then, eating high fat foods wasn't so unhealthy, you didn't do it excessively like we do today.

So that explains why we crave food that's not good for us. But it doesn't explain why so many of us dislike healthy stuff. Why are there people who hate fruits and vegetables and prefer white bread to whole grain? Shouldn't our bodies naturally want to crave things that provide some health benefit?

You do start to crave healthy foods when you start eating them. I get sick of simple sugars pretty quickly after a day or two, and I prefer wheat or sourdough bread. I feel kind of sick if I eat excessive amounts of cake or ice cream.

It's a good idea to experiment with healthy foods in combinations that are more tasty and exciting, like mixing berries and bananas with some low-fat or fat-free milk, maybe eating them with oatmeal or something if you actually want a whole meal.


Potatoes are actually a good carb, if you cut out white bread and pasta, and don't eat them in excess. Like potatoes, bananas, beans, whole grains...there's a list somewhere, it's actually in TG's diet thread from a couple of months ago.
 
O

Oberon

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You know what I've been craving since I cut down on carbs?

Pita and hummus. Forget the cake... I've never been much of a cake eater. No donuts or cupcakes either. But offer me pita and hummus, or chips and salsa for that matter, and I get a case of the sweats. :D
 

Beargryllz

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If athletes are so healthy, why do they die so young? The average age Dutch athetes died on between 2001 and 2010 was 72. The average life expectancy of Dutch people is 79. Oops...

Let us replace the word "athletes" with "individuals who regularly engage in physical exercise, as advocated by health professionals"
 

Thalassa

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Let us replace the word "athletes" with "individuals who regularly engage in physical exercise, as advocated by health professionals"

Yeah, those are two different things. Athletes are in a different category than people who simply regularly engage in physical exercise, as advocated by health professionals.

Also, to Queen Kat, the difference between 72-79 is just seven years, and I would say it occurs because of steroid abuse, and things like salt/water imbalance in the body due to lack of proper salt intake during marathons and things, and stupid shit like football players drinking four energy drinks before practice on a hot playing field...there's also the danger element, of dying through injuries in constant competition.
 

Beargryllz

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Yeah, those are two different things. Athletes are in a different category than people who simply regularly engage in physical exercise, as advocated by health professionals.

This is why the statement is reworded, because the previous statement was inconsistent with reality.
 

Such Irony

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You do start to crave healthy foods when you start eating them. I get sick of simple sugars pretty quickly after a day or two, and I prefer wheat or sourdough bread. I feel kind of sick if I eat excessive amounts of cake or ice cream.

Theres something about ice cream that my stomach doesn't handle well. I'm that way with deep fried foods too. I still crave them every now and then though.

Potatoes are actually a good carb, if you cut out white bread and pasta, and don't eat them in excess. Like potatoes, bananas, beans, whole grains...there's a list somewhere, it's actually in TG's diet thread from a couple of months ago.

Potatoes seem to get a bad rap even though they are chock full of nutrients. I guess because people do things to potatoes that aren't so healthy like try them and put a bunch of high fat toppings on them.
 

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potato peels have more potassium than a banana:D
 

GZA

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Healthy food can be fantastic! It's just a matter of learning about ingredients and how they go well together, and learning how to cook them. It's really, really delicious once you learn how! Processed food starts to taste like crap, too, as your body is weaned off of it.

I lost as much as 20 pounds last year. I've gained some, but not all, of it back (I wasn't trying to lose weight when I did, so gaining it back has not been a disappointment). I'm not entirely sure why I lost weight; I ate as much food if not more than I had been before. It was when I lived in residence in university. I had weighed 190-200 pounds prior to university, and I weight as little as 173 in march of last year. I'm 6'2. The food at the school cafeteria was actually pretty good, freshly made, mostly raw ingredients and relatively little processed junk. I think I probably ate a greater variety of foods, and probably had the same calorie intake if not slightly greater, and the overall nutrition of the food seems like it would be pretty similar to what I would have ate at home. A mix of healthy food and sweets. I wish I had something helpful to pass along from this... maybe this goals to show that what makes us lose weight is difficult to understand and different for different people.

I definitely do NOT believe that cutting calories is a good way to lose weight; it is clearly an oversimplification of human biology. Obviously calories have something to do with it, but I think the popular concept of weight lose overemphasizes calories way too much. Ultimately, eating healthy, freshly cooked food made with healthy, raw, unprocessed ingredients is the healthiest way to eat and switching from an unhealthy diet to a healthy one alone should result in weight lose.
 

slowriot

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Excerpt from the book Im reading:

The weekly magazines simplistic weightloss advice has lead many on a bothersome stray, where starving periods replace over-eating. Of course the calories intake in the long run needs to go in minus, but its not where the best payout is. To reduce the energy-intake is just a little part of what is needed to reach the goal. If you have to reach it there are a couple of things that is needed: You have to eat correctly and until you are full, you need to exercise more, sleep better and reduce the negative stresslevels. Therefore weightloss diets, that only is about you eating less, are doomed to fail. Fact is that there are 5 times bigger chances that you will stop smoking than you losing weight on those methods........

...Evolution has ensured that the body is etremely good at handling the risk for hunger and malnutririon. Its what you can call hardcore physiology: The brain and the homones ensure in unification to save the calories: They make sugar out of anything they can get their hands on and first of all - ensures that the whole organism is on standby, so no energy is lost. Your brain signals to the cells that there is a crisis and the body goes on standby. "Starvation! Hunger! Bad times! Find food! Get something sweet!" Its not strange, that its hell to lose weight with conventional methods. In addition to that its cruel, since the calories get consumed at a lower rate and storage of fat in the body increases. Its quite smart f its about surviving a period of starvation - but really bad odds for the person that want to lose surplus kilos.

To cut down on calories and fat will in the long run give bad result than strategies that focus on the intake of carbohydrates (Shai et al, 2008). The main reason for this is behind your ears. Your mood deteriorates, when you are forced to live with an insulin-bonus, while you still dont get enough calories. And after some time all you can think of is food and eating. Your brain uses all its energy to find quick energy and sends you on a mission of calorie hunting (Kemmotsu & Murphy, 2006)

Because the body functions like any other machine, some of the energy disappears again in the form of heat. Not only are you hungry and depressed, you are also freezing. It is simply not fun to lose weight in this manner. Regardless, many known diets that focus strictly on how many calories you eat do not spend time on what food is good or useful. The diets are not only inefficient (Hession et al, 2009), the brain and body forces you to mistakes that gives feelings of guilt and failure. The outcome is that many on diets are not honest when asked how the diet is going (Lichtman et al., 1992)
 

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heh, thats extremely similar to what ive been saying (except calorie reduction,lol) I think t he calorie amount should depend entirely on the activity level of the person.
 

slowriot

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yes curator

to further prove the point. We eat about 1,2 mio calories a year. If a person eats 2% more than they burn off that would increase weight by 20kg/45 pounds. And the 2% equals 1 extra mouthful per meal. So going strictly by calories on a diet makes no sense at all, how are you able to control your diet that precisely? Its more what you eat that should be the deciding factor in how much you eat. The human body requires homeostasis to function best, so if your bloodsugar, insulin, hormones and enzymes are not balanced correctly your weightloss proces is not going to reach its goal. Sleep, reducing negative stress and an active life are also keys for balancing the body i.e. the bloodsugar, hormones and so on. All things are controlled by your brain and how your brain reacts to certain stimuli, especially when it comes to food. You might decide to buy salmon and lemon and really healthy foods but come home with pizza and beer. A part of that is how your brain's chemical reactions forces you to want other things because of external/internal stimuli. Reward and punishment in our brain is controlled by the same chemical reactions so no wonder you want icecream when you punish yourself.
 

SpankyMcFly

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(There is also a very unhealthy way of keeping your metabolism high, calory variation. Anorexic people sometimes use this to lose weight. They go from -500 calories one day to 1500+ the next. This is very, very unhealthy.)
Yeah 500 per day is pretty darn drastic and I'd never recommend that to anyone. That said, I've used a similar type of dieting before. It's called Anabolic Burst Cycling Diet Exercise (ABCDE). You basically sync your caloric intake with your exercise regimen in an attempt to maximize lean muscle mass gains. Your metabolism isn't the only thing that is affectied by this type of diet. Your hormone levels (testosterone, growth hormone, IGF-1, insulin) start spiking.

Ironic isn't it? That someone can use the same "system" to either be anorexic or to actually gain a certain type of weight.

http://www.bodybuildingweb.net/blog/anabolic-burst-cycling-of-diet-exercise-abcde/
 
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