The True Definition of Calories i.e. "Why what you believe is extremist BS" page 7

[Roach]

Yay! Another thread originating from a false premise

[YogaBare]

PaeloBird (in her success story) talked at length about how she realised calories count. There was a post a couple of weeks ago where another poster talked about how she realised the same thing. This isn't exactly a new premise on this forum.

Obviously eating more calories than you consume will make you put on weight, but it's also more complex than that. There are different kinds of weight to gain.

The kind of food you eat will effect the kind of weight you put on - whether it's fat, retained water, or muscle. This is a new area, and I don't think much research has been done in it.

I've been doing research on an already-lean Paleo guy who has been tracking his calories / fat intake rigorously, whilst getting his bloods / weight checked on regular basis. After 28 days on a really high fat diet (VLC, lots of meat, eggs, Greek Yogurt, and nuts) he had lost .8Kg but his jeans were hanging off him. They measured his body fat, and realised he had dropped more than 1%, and had gained muscle (they hooked him up to a special machine to measure this). He was doing a total of 7 mins exercise a week.

So basically, of course you'll get fat if you overeat all the time, but if you gorge on high protein, high fat foods, you're more likely to put on muscle (to a certain point).

[otzi]

Like it or not, it does all come down to leptin, insulin, thyroid, and other hormones we may not even know about. Years of eating crap ruin a metabolism. Once you get the diet reined in and start eating good, nutritious food, you have a chance at getting the hormones working again. This entails eating congruent with your activity level, exercising smartly, getting good sleep, and well, what the Primal Blueprint says to do.

In the normal, healthy human, periodic overfeedings are no big deal--the body senses the extra calories and increases metabolic rate during sleep (diet induced thermogenesis). Calories out is autonomic, you don't have to spend an extra hour in the gym when you eat too much. This mechanism is broken in most people eating the SAD.

It is the constant, non-stop feast that gets us in trouble. Insulin resistance, leptin resistance, poor lipid profiles, fatty liver disease, high blood pressure all result from porr dietary choices, for the most part. Eating real food and throwing in the intermittant fast gets these under control pretty fast for most.

[jammies]

Griff left because he felt unwelcome and harassed for not being overly concerned about getting skinny--he'd already achieved his goal of beating type 2 diabetes and being able to walk again, and he felt like he was being attacked for not wanting to force himself to get a lot thinner and asking people to accept that he was pretty happy with where he was.

He also hated exercise (as others have said here) for specific reasons, although people accused him of doing nothing, which was untrue because I know he walks regularly around campus. He's still doing well and has lost more weight, and I am still in touch with him elsewhere and enjoy seeing his ongoing successes both healthwise and in his academic career.

I'm sad he's gone. He was really encouraging to other people who were struggling with major health conditions and large amounts of weight to lose, and I thought it was cool to have someone who was really entirely in this to beat a health condition and not get a six pack.

Oh, and he eats vegetables from what I know of his meals. But I understand why he continues to stay very low carb considering that he is one of those who experienced significant metabolic issues and thus has to deal with things a little differently from those of us who have mainly healthy metabolisms.

Watching Griff get fat-bashed and bullied off this forum was definitely a low point for me here. He was an adamant low carb proponent and it helped save his life. He was extreme in his opinion, but if he had been thin no one would have bothered him about it at all.

It was a shame.

[jammies]

Once again, I'll point out that humans have very little conscious control over their caloric intake in the long term. Caloric restriction in the long term has about a 98% failure rate for weight loss, with a large number of people actually gaining more weight back then they lost.

So suggesting caloric restriction as a method for weight loss is not supported in the real world. People would lose weight if they absorbed less of their food - why not just ask them to do that? It's pretty much the same thing.

Personally, I have found that satiety is the key to controlling caloric intake naturally. I think this idea is becoming more supported by data and will continue to gain support in the coming years.

[Paleobird]

Griff left because he felt unwelcome and harassed for not being overly concerned about getting skinny--he'd already achieved his goal of beating type 2 diabetes and being able to walk again, and he felt like he was being attacked for not wanting to force himself to get a lot thinner and asking people to accept that he was pretty happy with where he was.

He also hated exercise (as others have said here) for specific reasons, although people accused him of doing nothing, which was untrue because I know he walks regularly around campus. He's still doing well and has lost more weight, and I am still in touch with him elsewhere and enjoy seeing his ongoing successes both healthwise and in his academic career.

I'm sad he's gone. He was really encouraging to other people who were struggling with major health conditions and large amounts of weight to lose, and I thought it was cool to have someone who was really entirely in this to beat a health condition and not get a six pack.

Oh, and he eats vegetables from what I know of his meals. But I understand why he continues to stay very low carb considering that he is one of those who experienced significant metabolic issues and thus has to deal with things a little differently from those of us who have mainly healthy metabolisms.

It's good to know that he is doing well. The next time you contact him, Owly, please tell him that there are a lot of people here who valued his insights greatly. The way he was treated was shameful and this board is a lesser place without him.

[breadsauce]

It's good to know that he is doing well. The next time you contact him, Owly, please tell him that there are a lot of people here who valued his insights greatly. The way he was treated was shameful and this board is a lesser place without him.

Add me to these sentiments, please!

[SLB0404]

I've found this thread really insightful thanks!

There are 3 points I'm taking away from this:
1. Calories DO matter
2. It's so incredibly hard to determine exactly where the maintenance and deficit zones are (it's not as simple as using an internet formula and even through keeping calories constant for a month and weighing yourself every day you probably won't get an accurate result due to the fact that the scale should not be the only measurement used!)
3. Yes, you need to create a calorie deficit to lose weight but it's important that you do this while still consuming real, whole foods.

All other points (role of exercise, validity of measurements etc) I think fall under point 2... is there anything I'm forgetting?

[magnolia1973]

it basically says people who are overweight are lazy and gluttonous. Yea, it's not nice, but sugar-coating isn't approved on The Primal Blueprint, so deal with it

I think the people who take the most offense are women who have dieted for YEARS and actually can't lose weight with fairly rigorous calorie restriction and exercise. I think there is a lot of common sense, but when you need to eat in the 1200-1400 calorie range to lose, it's really fucking hard and 99% of advice is completely irrelevant. It's like telling someone that makes $800 a month to "skip starbucks" and "bring a sack lunch". Or perhaps "Oh, well just spend $1200 a month, but don't use credit".

I *get* that calories matter. I *get* that I need to eat healthy foods and a diet of butter and bacon is not gonna provide me the nutrition I need at such a low calorie count. I just wish there was more advice and acknowledgment (and ideas beyond very low carb) for people like me. The low carbers try and tell me I can eat whatever as long as its fat and protein (not true for me) and the "calorie people" (myself included) assume I just eat more than I know.

I think years of caloric restriction does a number on the bodies of women that maybe is not well understood. I'm pretty sure I spent the last 10 years malnourished, I don't expect primal to fix that quickly.... but I see a lot of (mainly women) in the same boat and CICO and low carb really does nothing to help us.

[emmie]

Magnolia-

If you think 1200 cal is 'hard,' try doing 900 cal to lose. Age and medical issues required that from me, and guess what I discovered? If I'm eating at my body's requirements (rather than what I'd like to be its requirements), I can be satisfied.

Was I ever hungry? Yes. But what I discovered is that true, physical hunger is not very uncomfortable. What's difficult are the 'cravings' that we create ourselves in our minds. Once I realized that and learned to control them, eating at a level that allowed me to lose weight was possible.

These days I can only eat about 1,100 cal to maintain (my doctor agrees), but, again, my body is totally satisfied with this caloric level. I'm never truly hungry. It's my 'mind' that wants to eat more.