What "diet" is the right diet for life?

dcavazos

I don't know about you all but lately I have found myself overwhelmed and confused with all of the information out there. I decided to start my weight loss journey again for the upteenth time. But I thought to myself - there has to be a new approach I need to think long term how should I really be eating for the rest of my life. Sounds easier than it was. Some people are strong proponents of the Keto Diets -- VLCD -- where you are in a constant state of Ketosis. Others say -- this is not natural this is not healthy. Some say, just watch your calories but others say "not so because the TYPE of calories is what is important". Low Carb, High Protein not anymore, they say Low Carb, Medium Protein, High Fat. What will the studies show tomorrow? Doctors are no better. I have had some tell me that staying in a low carb ketosis type diet is dangerous, too much fat etc. Some tell me that fat is ok but its carbs that are evil. My most recent trip to the doctor I was told basically the best diet is Vegan. Oh and then juicing.... don't get me started on that.

I just want to be healthy, but at this point I don't even know what healthy is anymore.

I guess what I want to know is for those of you who have lost weight and maintained do you have any information on what is the right diet for a healthy life? What has worked for you and what if any research have you done on what to eat?

I welcome your discussions and also welcome you to add me as a friend and give me pointers you have learned along the way

Sinistrous

Start with the count your calories diet.

NEVER eat something you don't like, as that will not sustain you.

Learn portion control.

Make sure you do some sort of strength training.

Stay active.

NoelFigart1

Seriously? Get your calories under control first. Then start throwing in fruits and veggies that you like, and try to get enough protein and fats that make you satisfied.

There are people who do better on lots of whole grains and veggies. There are others who need more meat and fats to feel at their optimum.

The problem is that you really shouldn't be taking dieting advice from fitness mags (and to be honest, I think random strangers on the Internet are probably worse... so take what I say with a grain of salt and some professional advice) and that humans can live on ANY diet.

And no diet is going to make you immortal or eternally young. That's just advertising.

dcavazos

@NoelFigart1‌ point taken but it can't hurt to see what those who have found success have done. Although I do agree that all of our body make ups are different and what will work for some may not work for me.

flabassmcgee

Eat at a calorie deficit and you can eat anything you already like. I like the 80-20 approach...80% whole foods, 20% not so whole foods ('junk'). It's great because I never feel deprived. I'm not focusing on macros right now because I'm just losing weight, but when I get closer to goal, I'll ramp up the macro counting.

I've lost nearly 10 pounds so far, so I think it's working.

FatFreeFrolicking

Look into IIFYM (flexible dieting). http://iifym.com

kbmnurse

First delete the word "diet". Think of it as eating healthy for mental, physical and emotional health.

JoseCastaneda

FatFreeFrolicking wrote: »

Look into IIFYM (flexible dieting). http://iifym.com

^^This is what has worked for me. It seems like a lot of math and formulas, but it's not, it's the easiest way to go (at least for me).

Texafornia23

The right diet is the same one you think you'll want to be on in 20 years. If it isn't fun, easy to incorporate, or helthy, then any diet or exercising you're doing isn't sustainable. Find something your comfortable with, keep it simple, and commit to it long term.

Metazoick

There is so much conflicting information because the science behind nutrition isn't exactly decisive, and because people love to focus on the trivial - which is fine for them, but then to justify it some people act like unless you're only eating oranges upside down before 5pm you're going to die at 40. This is not true.

But, to answer your question, it depends on what you mean by healthy. Do you mean not overweight? Just make sure you aren't eating more calories than you're burning off, it might be a bit fiddly to find that number but it's pretty easy to stick to once you have the hang of it. Do you mean not deficient in anything? Simply eat a range of food. Asparagus is good for you, but only eating that would eventually make you sick. Just try and eat some fruit and veg etc to get enough micronutrients to run and you'll be golden. You can go further down the rabbit hole and start looking at GI and macronutrient ratios and the like, but it isnt necessary.

Eat what you enjoy eating, but don't go overboard in anything. Take all advice with a pinch of salt, a ton of it is 'I heard from a friend who heard from a friend who heard from a guy who sells multivitamins...' style. Don't get too hung up in the little things, it's simpler than it's made out to be. You don't need an official 'only eat x and never y at z numbers' rest of your life plan, just take it day by day and change something if it doesn't work.

As for 'what works for me' style advice, eating 'healthier' did wonders for me as it's so, so much easier to overeat from cake compared to chicken and runnerbeans.

queenliz99

Eat what you like now just less of it. No fad diet needed.

bwogilvie

People can stay healthy on an astounding variety of diets. They can lose weight on them, too, by counting calories. That said, I think Michael Pollan's advice is sound: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." By "food," Pollan means something that your grandmother would recognize as food.

Probably at this point, it's better to say "great-grandmother," unless you're already a grandparent yourself, and to say "anyone's great-grandmother," since my Norwegian grandmother probably would not have recognized a Thai green coconut curry as food.

The point is that highly processed foodstuffs, which are cheap to make on an industrial scale, and shelf-stable to boot, are highly profitable to the food industry, but they aren't necessarily the healthiest. And they can encourage overeating, e.g. by being digested relatively easily or not providing a feeling of satiety.

A simpler way to put this is that most of your food should come from the outside of the supermarket: vegetables, fruit, seafood, poultry, meat, and dairy; relatively little should come from stuff in boxes that has been processed and then (re)enriched with (some of) the very nutrients that were processed out of it.

Now, a lot of MFP forum members will point out that you can lose weight eating processed food and even fast food. I've made that point elsewhere, because if you're overweight to the point where it affects your health or well-being, it's most important to lose weight by starting where you are rather than make huge changes. It's also true that if you lose weight by making changes that you don't plan to sustain for the rest of your life, you're likely to gain it back. But since you asked specifically about diet, I'll stick with this answer.

If you want to read further, I'd suggest Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food, Marion Nestle and Malden Nesheim, Why Calories Count: From Science to Politics, and maybe Mark Bittman, VB6 (his book about a "vegan before 6 pm" diet).

CharlieBeansmomTracey

everyone is different so what works for one will not work for another. tomorrow Im starting the IIFYM thingy.watch your calories and eat how you like as long as it fits into your calorie goal. if you feel crummy including junk food then cut that out for awhile, if you feel more energy doing low/higher carb go for that. just make sure you get a decent ratio of the right foods and nutrients and you should be ok.what ratio for you that is right is up to you and what you feel is right and what makes you feel better inside and out.I change things up after awhile just to see if it will make a difference for me.

GiveMeCoffee

The Keep it Simple Diet:

Find a reasonable calorie deficit
Log food accurately and honestly
Learn moderation, portion control and to have patience
Find an activity you like to do

Mr_Knight

dcavazos wrote: »

I guess what I want to know is for those of you who have lost weight and maintained do you have any information on what is the right diet for a healthy life?

Step 1 - define what "healthy life" means for YOU.

IMO a huge part of people's problems is they want bodies that aren't consistent with their activity level. Someone living the typical bed-to-car-to-chair-to-car-to-bed lifestyle so typical in the US can put on a LOT of weight before their body is incompatible with their lifestyle. So if you are highly sedentary, it's going to be hard to keep the weight off because you are going to be constantly fighting your own body, which frankly speaking, doesn't need to shed the pounds based on the lifestyle.

I think an awful lot of people are going about this completely backwards. Figure out the lifestyle you want first...

dcavazos

@kbmnurse‌ I guess I meant more like diet in the noun sense, like dogs have a diet, cats have a diet, what is the best diet for us? But yes I get what you mean about the word diet and the baggage that comes with it.

@bwogilvie‌ that makes sense and thanks for the books advice, I'll add them to my reading list. I just finished watching Hungry for Change on Netflix which is a message similar to what you are talking about and a message that makes sense.

eatsyork

Nutrition isn't well understood. We are very complex organisms. One day saturated fat is the devil and the next day we should all start eating butter again. There's no real definitive answer as to what is the optimal human diet with the current state of scientific knowledge. Find something that works for you and go with it. For me that means eating more saturated fat, less omega six fatty acids, and minimal carbs. I did ok when I ate raw vegan, too. People will thrive on all kinds of diets in the short term, it's the long term sustainability for you that makes the real difference. I'm pretty nerdy about nutrition. I read a ton of books. Studied nutrition in college. I've dabbled in everything from raw vegan to LCHF paleo. The information out there would make your head spin. I know what works for me and the current science I personally believe, but I have no delusion that it's the only way way to be healthy for everyone so I don't push my beliefs on anyone else.

bwogilvie

eatsyork wrote: »

Nutrition isn't well understood. We are very complex organisms. One day saturated fat is the devil and the next day we should all start eating butter again. There's no real definitive answer as to what is the optimal human diet with the current state of scientific knowledge.

This is all true. There probably is no optimum human diet; we're omnivores with an enormous range of habitats.

It does seem a lot easier to identify suboptimum diets, at least for creatures who evolved when food was relatively scarce, and then try to avoid them!

lemurcat12

What I did was look at how I'd been eating and figure out what changes I could make within the ways that I liked to eat that would allow me to make my diet healthier, lower calorie, and even more enjoyable (so that it would be sustainable). (I also got active, and for me I simply tend to eat better when I'm active; they aren't unrelated.)

I did like not ever having to think about how many calories were in anything, and feeling free to eat according to whim in any quantities, but I also didn't eat so terribly (or giant amounts or anything). I just ate kind of stupidly in a variety of ways, which was pretty easy to figure out when I thought about it. And a lot of the stupid stuff (like a bagel for breakfast, which is stupid for me, not necessarily others, or eating any "special treat" that showed up at work) wasn't based on my love for that particular way of eating, but a lack of organization. Others (like getting Indian takeout whenever I was stressed at work and hadn't bought stuff to cook) were simply overly self-indulgent.

So based on that analysis, I decided that the diet that would work best for me would involve various principles such as: (1) try to cook most meals at home (including breakfast), and bring lunch when possible, (2) eat protein and vegetables at all meals when at all possible (again, including breakfast), (3) don't eat outside of mealtime (mealtime could include a scheduled snack if I decide to plan one) unless there's a really good reason for a rare indulgence of this time and NEVER eat to deal with emotional upset/stress, (4) keep going out to dinner regularly (1-2 times/week) but don't pretend like it's a special occasion that allows for major indulgence if you do it that often and watch portion size and order sensibly, and (5) don't waste calories on foods you don't care about. I'm sure I could come up with others if I thought about it. The main point, however, is that these are rules that make sense for me, based on my preferences and lifestyle, and the food I cook is both healthy and--just as important--every bit as delicious and appealing to my taste as the foods I was eating before.

rybo

Eat real food. Plants, animals, seeds & nuts.
Avoid processed junk that's calorie dense and nutritionally low. If you want to have a "treat" of that sort, by all means do so, but don't overindulge. Avoid foods that cause you problems. Be they allergies or intestinal. If you don't have any issue you don't need to avoid them.

lemurcat12

Putting this in another post, since it's a slightly separate point and the whole thing was too long because I'm a windbag:

As for the nutrition stuff, the basics that everyone agrees on, and that aren't largely personal preference (or some guru vs. another guru on questionable evidence), really aren't complicated and I think people tend to overcomplicate them for whatever reason--perhaps thinking there's some key that will make weight loss easier. I'd say, think about what you learned of as a healthy meal as a kid--some protein, veggies, and then fill out the meal with some fruit or dairy or starch/grains as desired. Once you start logging and experimenting with this you'll easily figure out the combinations that work best for you. Beyond that, low carb or high, low fat or not, it really doesn't matter; it depends on the person and the lifestyle and how you feel. (Well, I suspect that more people are less hungry with moderate to somewhat low carbs and not low fat, but people really do vary and what else you eat will make a difference for you too.)