The True Definition of Calories i.e. "Why what you believe is extremist BS" page 38

[charliemathers]

Yeah, ice cream and candy are optimal nourishment...You don't really believe that do you? Incredibly irresponsible nonsense.

Ice cream is highly nutritious as long as you get some that doesnt have all the yucky fillers they like to use. It has tons of sugar which is good for you and feeds the body the energy is truly needs. It even has natural progesterone in it, calcium, all kinds of goodies. Certain candies are really good for you as long as they use real sugar and not HFCS. Especially if its something like gummy bears that also have gelatin in it.

[Nady]

Ice cream is highly nutritious as long as you get some that doesnt have all the yucky fillers they like to use. It has tons of sugar which is good for you and feeds the body the energy is truly needs. It even has natural progesterone in it, calcium, all kinds of goodies. Certain candies are really good for you as long as they use real sugar and not HFCS. Especially if its something like gummy bears that also have gelatin in it.

And I can justify my vodka too!

[charliemathers]

Well if you figure out how to do that please let me know so I can inform my liver. Thank you.

[Nady]

Well if you figure out how to do that please let me know so I can inform my liver. Thank you.

Why, it relieves stress, of course~ just remember to take your milk thistle

[cori93437]

Why, it relieves stress, of course~ just remember to take your milk thistle

Put it in a mudslide milk shake... all the wonderful properties of that healthful concoction can surely over come an ounce or two of liquor?
Make sure to have some "really good for you" gummy bears on the side though.

[Paleobird]

It has tons of sugar which is good for you and feeds the body the energy is truly needs. Certain candies are really good for you as long as they use real sugar and not HFCS. Especially if its something like gummy bears that also have gelatin in it.

Hoo boy. Looks like someone has been drinking the highly sweetened Peat Cool-Aid.

[StackingPlates]

@Stackingplates' long rant.

Oh goodness, not the Okinawans. Again. OK. One more time just in case Choco hasn't beat this point home often enough. Paleo does not necessarily equal low carb. There is a wide range of healthy carb levels. Based on your activity level, you may very well have been eating too little carbs *for you*. So your workouts were not great and you chucked the whole thing instead of making it work. And you have this weird need to ridicule those of us who do make it work.

About clean eating, you showed the flaw in the study yourself. It was not long term. So, you like your pizza and ice cream. If you are young and super active, it won't hurt you once in a while. Enjoy those treats on a regular basis, not so much. I would like to see how you look at age 45. 'Nuff said.

First off, it wasn't a rant. And, if you subscribe to Sisson's version of Paleo™ then it absolutely does equal low carb, don't fool yourself. Look at my last post and you'll see the graphic taken directly from his recommendations which illustrate this point.

Secondly, tell me once where I ridiculed someone who made Paleo™ work for them and told them to stop eating that way? I just got done talking about how many folks I work with are die hard Paleo™ fanatics and I don't try to convert them or talk them out of it? Why should I if it works for them? The whole "make it work for you" comment was pretty funny to me though...why should I eat six potatoes when oatmeal, bread, and bagels do the trick? Do I really have to love sweet potatoes that much? LOL

The study design was short term however the empirical evidence overwhelms us. If you want to live long and healthy then wouldn't you study the folks who have the longest lifespans with the least incidence of chronic diseases? How about those with low obesity rates? Hint, very few of these societies would eat a diet that is Paleo™ approved.

I'm glad you chimed in though because your post struck me as the prototypical "I found something that works so how dare you criticize it as I've become emotionally vested in it" comment. These are the most fascinating comment types I come across...

Didn't mean to paint you with any brush. I will just concede that you have probably "done your homework" and come to a different conclusion than I.

As to the "superhuman" thing....what I said was that eating paleo actually would NOT make you superhuman. Being healthy to start, you are unlikely to see much change with your lifestyle change to paleo.

I you are healthy you can probably get away with eating "junk" from time to time. I'm not certain that there will be no draw backs health wise from it though....as you seem to be. Even so, I'm not 100% anything and have a significant cheat day at least once a week (not necessarily a planned body hack or anything so eliquent. Just happens).

I do think that as we age we may lose some of this flexibility and lea way. Are you able to take advantage of the lea way when young and not pay for it in the future is my only real question. Most chronic issues do take decades to develop, so I think there are subtle changes that may rear their head in the future if you overindulge....even in my case where it is only once a week.

No harm, no foul - my friend. You have always struck me as one of the most sensible of the "harder core" Paleo™ crowd here. Again, I never recommend "over indulging" and always maintain the stance of maintaining your targets over the long term. Many will find that they have considerable "wiggle room" where they can choose to eat non Primal treats, some even daily. As you said, the only real disconnect between us is that you still seem to be reserving caution that non "primal approved" foods somehow automatically lead to chronic issues. I would challenge you to back that up, or at least think about how there is really no evidence that this is true. Interestingly enough, as you also mention, you have "cheat days" at least once a week. What is a "cheat" though? Does it mean you have a couple pieces of pizza or a bowl of ice cream or a huge bowl of rice?

If so, you basically have kind of summarized my entire point here . Why deprive yourself of a type of food you enjoy if you can do so and still hit all your targets?

[Leida]

Nah, it was traditional Russian candy, filled chocolates, and sweet condensed milk toffee-style stuff, caramels - they still know how to make really yum sweets down there. Stuff here is never tasted as good. Most ice-cream was old style cream and sugar one, I am guessing or hoping. Pasteurized, of course, but our dairy is pretty versatile with may things not available here. Interestingly, after yesterday's episode I am not craving it any more. Watermelon on another hand... and cherries... (sigh). *Administers another lick of coconut butter*.

I had experience with consuming those healthy gummies daily after my preg in the afternoon, cherry twizzers, smal bag from a vending machine, as I recall. Once I dropped this habit, along with the healthy serving of berry field pastry after supper, my pg weight start going down.... that's all it took from 150+ to ~ 138 lbs. Just that daily bag of healthy candy.

[Nady]

Stacking~ I think maybe we're talking about two different things here~ you seem to think most of us deprive ourselves because Mark says so. Actually, most came here just like I did~ because our body had already made it's displeasure known and we were looking for a reason why, and how to turn it around..

Bottom line, the only thing you can control is what you put in your mouth.

[sbhikes]

The idea that cutting and cutting calories damages the metabolism I think comes from people with sugar burning metabolisms. It is incredibly stressful on a sugar burner to go without food (shaky dizzy, lethargy, etc.). People who have transitioned to being what Mark calls a fat burning beast are not damaged by calorie restriction at all. Burning your own body fat gives the metabolism a nice tasty snack to go along with the lower levels of dietary calories, so there is no damage.

Yeah, this is really true.

I went extremely low carb on my vacation during the long pre- and post-drive to and from the active hiking portion of my vacation. I just drove and ate pemmican, lettuce and turkey in minimal amounts. I never really felt hungry.

During the hike I ate moderate carb paleo backpacking food I made myself. (Moderate for backpacking anyway.) We hiked about 12 hours a day at altitude. I know I didn't eat enough while we hiked. I could feel the hunger well up and then a switch went off and I could tell I was consuming my body fat instead.

Being able to do this means you can exercise strenuously on very little food without a loss of strength or energy. This is what I like about being a "fat burning beast." The metabolic flexibility and the lack of shakiness, dizziness or lethargy that I used to know in the past. No need to keep an energy bar in my pocket.

What's not clear is the long-term effects of doing this. Short term, for a week, it may be a decent way to lose weight. I lost 5lbs. I lost a notch on my belt. That is to say, I used being a fat-burning beast plus the CO part of the equation to my advantage.

I have not found being a fat-burning beast plus changing the CI part of the equation to be as effective now that I'm at a reasonable weight.

I would think that if you are stuck at some weight, if there's any way to get out of your normal routine for a while and try to manipulate the CO part of the equation to your advantage, you might have better success at pushing the needle than simply cutting calories more and more and more. At least if you manipulate the CO part you are doing things that rev up your metabolism and your body's production of various hormones. In my case, I have to really push very very hard. An hour's worth of additional exercise is not enough.

What remains to be seen for myself is if the weight stays off or comes right back. I really feel an outsized appetite at the moment. It sure was fun to wear a bikini this weekend and feel good about it, though.