"Clean" eating vs. Moderation- what works for you?
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avvgromano wrote: »que the strawman about eating only twinkies ....that train is never late...
strawman? just some messages above yours someone wrote:
"It's all about calorie deficit. Even if all you eat is cake - Twinkie diet helps nutrition professor lose 27 pounds: edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/ "
This is used as a means to show that weight loss in general has a positive impact on your health if you're overweight and that a calorie deficit is all it takes to achieve that.
No one is suggesting *actually* going on an all-twinkie diet.0 -
avvgromano wrote: »que the strawman about eating only twinkies ....that train is never late...
strawman? just some messages above yours someone wrote:
"It's all about calorie deficit. Even if all you eat is cake - Twinkie diet helps nutrition professor lose 27 pounds: edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/ "
I believe the point was that you COULD do it and lose weight, but no one was actually recommending it...0 -
herrspoons wrote: »avvgromano wrote: »que the strawman about eating only twinkies ....that train is never late...
strawman? just some messages above yours someone wrote:
"It's all about calorie deficit. Even if all you eat is cake - Twinkie diet helps nutrition professor lose 27 pounds: edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/ "
He did it to illustrate a point - that as far as weight loss is concerned, CICO is all that really matters.
No-one, and I mean no-one, is going to be eating an exclusive Twinkie diet as a matter of course.
Why is this so difficult to grasp?
because the clean eating mentality is to always fall back on the strawman that moderation = 100% twinkies all day.0 -
I am still very new here - 35 days I think, and I am eating what I like in moderation and within my calorie allowance. I have lost 6 pounds since joining MFP. I'm not going to try any diets or work-outs that I know I will not keep up with. That's just me - I know it will be sabotage if I do. I like candy, cake, etc - but within reason, and for me to say I am trying to get healthy, therefore I will never eat this again, well, that is a lie! I log every snack, soda, etc just so I can see where I stand throughout the day.
I didn't even know the details of what "eating clean" actually was until reading this thread. I had heard of it, but didn't know the specifics.0 -
They aren't mutually exclusive options. You can eat as clean as you want, using whatever definition of "clean" you want to use.. Unless you do that in moderation and stay in a deficit you're not going to lose any weight.0
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herrspoons wrote: »avvgromano wrote: »que the strawman about eating only twinkies ....that train is never late...
strawman? just some messages above yours someone wrote:
"It's all about calorie deficit. Even if all you eat is cake - Twinkie diet helps nutrition professor lose 27 pounds: edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/ "
He did it to illustrate a point - that as far as weight loss is concerned, CICO is all that really matters.
No-one, and I mean no-one, is going to be eating an exclusive Twinkie diet as a matter of course.
Why is this so difficult to grasp?
because the clean eating mentality is to always fall back on the strawman that moderation = 100% twinkies all day.
Exactly. And none of them reply or acknowledge when informed that their ridiculous idea of our moderation is not the case. They only hear what they want to hear and then go about their merry way, skipping into the sunset and spewing their misinformation all over the place.
It's frustrating.0 -
In the past 5 years or so, I have really noticed what seems to be an enormous shift in what is considered the "ideal" diet. So much emphasis is now placed on eating only whole, unprocessed foods, no added sugar, nothing artificial, ditch "white" carbs, etc. Paleo this, Whole 30 that, don't eat gluten, don't eat bread, etc. I totally get that nutrition and weight loss are two totally different things. What I am curious about is how are "real" people who are currently *successfully* losing weight actually eating? Do you have the occasional bowl of sugar cereal if it fits into your calorie allowance, or are your 1200 calories (or whatever your number is) strictly filled with vegetables, nuts, and organic chicken breasts? I want to know what REALLY works for you, not just what is "ideal".
On the bolded, I personally do not think nutrition and weight are two totally different things. I think one of the best things you can do for your health is maintain a healthy weight. So IMO they are interconnected. IMO, the individual needs to find what is sustainable for them for the long haul. For me it is moderation...0 -
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Just going to sit back and enjoy the dogpile on the "clean eating" camp while ignoring how many times people who mention giving up a single food (not an entire macro) are accused of using woo woo diets instead of it being acknowledged that they are moderating their own food. The defensiveness in the pro-moderation posts is quite entertaining viewing.0
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I don't eat 100% clean, but I do eat in moderation so if I want that candy bar, ice cream, or brownie I just work in my calorie goal.0
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i was doing moderation for a while. i'd have a glass of wine or two most nights, some kind of sweet on a daily basis, not to mention some take out and deli foods. sure i would count it all, but my weight never really dropped. i knew i had to change my diet to really see a drop in weight.
basically, i had to moderate my moderation.
now i fill up with fruits and vegetables, and do 90% of my own cooking and snack preparation. yes, i will still have a drink, but it's limited to two days a week, and just to two drinks. i'll still have sweets, but those are very very limited as well, and i'm also more conscious of what kind of sweets i'm having. and i've started weighing and measuring EVERYTHING.
and since doing this i've dropped about six pounds in 2 months.0 -
Just going to sit back and enjoy the dogpile on the "clean eating" camp while ignoring how many times people who mention giving up a single food (not an entire macro) are accused of using woo woo diets instead of it being acknowledged that they are moderating their own food. The defensiveness in the pro-moderation posts is quite entertaining viewing.
almost as amusing as the verbal gymnastics the clean eating folks go through to define what they can and cannot eat....0 -
Capt_Apollo wrote: »i was doing moderation for a while. i'd have a glass of wine or two most nights, some kind of sweet on a daily basis, not to mention some take out and deli foods. sure i would count it all, but my weight never really dropped. i knew i had to change my diet to really see a drop in weight.
basically, i had to moderate my moderation.
now i fill up with fruits and vegetables, and do 90% of my own cooking and snack preparation. yes, i will still have a drink, but it's limited to two days a week, and just to two drinks. i'll still have sweets, but those are very very limited as well, and i'm also more conscious of what kind of sweets i'm having. and i've started weighing and measuring EVERYTHING.
and since doing this i've dropped about six pounds in 2 months.
You can be practicing moderation and still eating too much, which is what it looks like you were doing...0 -
For the past two years my whole family has started "clean" eating. It has taken that long to adjust. What i mean by clean is we've cut out as many processed chemicals that we possibly can. We follow one basic rule dont get anything with more then five ingredients. Nothing with chemicals used in any type of cleaning. (You would be amazed at how many processed foods have these chemicals.) Organic meat as much as possible! We are working on getting our own chickens and we are also buying a cow with another person who can take care of it. This is all so that we dont get the chemicals that are fed/processed in meats. It is a hard lifestyle to have, but i feel good about what i feed my family. Given all that i must also say that every once in a while we do eat a bag of doritos or something along those lines. Of course we also eat in moderation because moderation is important whether you eat clean or not.0
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devoslosingit wrote: »For the past two years my whole family has started "clean" eating. It has taken that long to adjust. What i mean by clean is we've cut out as many processed chemicals that we possibly can. We follow one basic rule dont get anything with more then five ingredients. Nothing with chemicals used in any type of cleaning. (You would be amazed at how many processed foods have these chemicals.) Organic meat as much as possible! We are working on getting our own chickens and we are also buying a cow with another person who can take care of it. This is all so that we dont get the chemicals that are fed/processed in meats. It is a hard lifestyle to have, but i feel good about what i feed my family. Given all that i must also say that every once in a while we do eat a bag of doritos or something along those lines. Of course we also eat in moderation because moderation is important whether you eat clean or not.
My salads have way more than 5 ingredients, and I use vinegar in cleaning all the time.
You never consume vinegar? Or baking soda?0 -
"Clean eaters" who say they get bloated or whatever after they eat "bad" food, I believe it's all in their heads, unless you have a REAL medical issues that have been diagnose by a doctor an not themselves. Cause if really had issues then why would you keep eating it prior to weight loss or getting healthy and now all of sudden you/they have issues now.0
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herrspoons wrote: »avvgromano wrote: »que the strawman about eating only twinkies ....that train is never late...
strawman? just some messages above yours someone wrote:
"It's all about calorie deficit. Even if all you eat is cake - Twinkie diet helps nutrition professor lose 27 pounds: edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/ "
He did it to illustrate a point - that as far as weight loss is concerned, CICO is all that really matters.
No-one, and I mean no-one, is going to be eating an exclusive Twinkie diet as a matter of course.
Why is this so difficult to grasp?
Challenge accepted.
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Eeep. double post... nothing to see here. **slinks away**0
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"Clean eaters" who say they get bloated or whatever after they eat "bad" food, I believe it's all in their heads, unless you have a REAL medical issues that have been diagnose by a doctor an not themselves. Cause if really had issues then why would you keep eating it prior to weight loss or getting healthy and now all of sudden you/they have issues now.
Yep, they read some article about certain foods causing inflammation and BAM, they're bloated after eating said food. And omg they feel soooo much better since cutting it out. Clearly that particular food is the root of all evil.0 -
When someone says, "I eat 80% clean with the occasional cheat", they are practicing moderation...0
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Capt_Apollo wrote: »i was doing moderation for a while. i'd have a glass of wine or two most nights, some kind of sweet on a daily basis, not to mention some take out and deli foods. sure i would count it all, but my weight never really dropped. i knew i had to change my diet to really see a drop in weight.
basically, i had to moderate my moderation.
now i fill up with fruits and vegetables, and do 90% of my own cooking and snack preparation. yes, i will still have a drink, but it's limited to two days a week, and just to two drinks. i'll still have sweets, but those are very very limited as well, and i'm also more conscious of what kind of sweets i'm having. and i've started weighing and measuring EVERYTHING.
and since doing this i've dropped about six pounds in 2 months.
You can be practicing moderation and still eating too much, which is what it looks like you were doing...
most likely. also, i was guesstimating the take-out that i was buying, so i'm sure i was not eating at the deficit that i thought i was.0 -
tedboosalis7 wrote: »tedboosalis7 wrote: »DebHutton55 wrote: »tedboosalis7 wrote: »DebHutton55 wrote: »Eat the right carbs, proteins and fats. Watch the quantity. Move! There's the key to healthy living and an outcome in your later years that has you with your memory and the ability to move around with ease. If you are just eating for your weight, wise up. It's taken me most of my life to figure that out.
Someone said, sugar is nothing unless you have a medical condition. So wrong! Read, read, read. What all this stuff is doing to your brain, is more important than what it is doing to your butt.
Of course, eat an occasional bad but if you start eating correctly, you don't have that desire anymore.
This is awesome. I love this statement: "What all this stuff is doing to your brain, is more important than what it is doing to your butt." Very well put. ♥
Some people tolerate a high carb diet better than others, certainly I am not in the lot of that kind of tolerance. I was borderline Type II and have an auto-immune disorder and had to change my diet completely - I lost the weight, gained muscle and strength, lost many of the symptoms of the auto-immune disorder (not all), and now awaiting my physical this week to check my blood work one year after I made this change.
I can say I have cheated maybe 5 times in one year - and during that time, it was morsels - I still eat chocolate but it has to be pure dark chocolate. I know what is good because I was a chocolatier at one time - successfully owned a business and sold it 5 years ago. I know what goes into confections and there's no way I would eat any of them now unless its pure dark chocolate. Chocolate has fiber - that makes it palatable to eat.
There's a real difference calorie for calorie between different foods - meat <> broccoli, for example. Both provide specific nutrients (or densities of nutrients) the other doesn't have. Further, to achieve the caloric equivalent of meat, it takes a hellalot of broccoli. Say an 8oz hamburger or salmon or tenderloin - take those three calorically and you would need to eat ALOT of broccoli - in fact, all three meats contain differences in nutrition unto themselves.
I do believe CICO matters but it matters within the context of your macros. For instance, not all fiber is digestible (insoluble v. soluble). Not all soluble fiber is digestible - those calories can essentially be thrown out - fiber is used by the body in a much different way than the "net" carb of that food. You can't store fiber (or most of it) because it's not made to be stored. It's made to be moved through the body and aids in the elimination process.
Protein requires protein calories to process it - then some protein is used for muscle synthesis and hypertrophy:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11255140
"Resistance exercise improves muscle protein balance, but, in the absence of food intake, the balance remains negative (i.e., catabolic)."
So one can "move around" but if one doesn't eat the required macro, one creates a catabolic state that in essence wipes out the whole concept of "moving around"!
The remaining protein is then "storable." So figure 33% of your protein calories are convertible to fat.
I don't think there's a magic number when it comes to weight loss - for instance, many purport that eating 1500 calories would garner weight loss - but 1500 calories of what - does that figure exercise into it, and is that enough to sustain muscles over the long-term? Does that raise the metabolic set point to where you need to eat even less once your metabolism slows to 1500?
That's the problem with looking at things from just the CICO perspective. I do agree (and often get mislabeled on here) that CICO matters, but it matters within the perspective of your macros, the kinds of foods you are eating, the processing (or lack thereof) of that food, and your body's metabolic resistance (or lack thereof) to certain macros and foods.
Thanks Ted! So many haters when it comes to "food talk". I stay informed and read everything I can. Looks like you do, also. Stress is another factor and I think I will walk away from this forum and instead, walk in the beautiful sunshiny eighteen below morning.
♥ Yeah I hear ya. Hormones - awesome suggestion.
Another is what you just described - it's much harder to lose fat during the winter months because the body is preserving as much fat as possible to stay warm. I find it very easy to lose fat during the summer.
LOL OK ...
so if I eat in a deficit during winter, I won't lose as much fat...??
http://www.burnthefat.com/cold_weather_fat_loss.html
I never said that was meant for all but some people do have issues losing fat in the winter versus the summer. Some of that can be attributed to activity as well - summer is a very active time - I don't find myself at home at all really during the summer - so moving around helps achieve a greater use of calories than in the winter.
You are right, some do. I'm one of those. I have made it a habit to maintain during winter months and lose during spring/summer. Reason? I want to sit in my warm cocoon and even getting up to drink water is a chore (brrrrrrr). Even when I don't intentionally move less, I have noticed my average non-exercise steps in the winter are around 2500 compared to around 6000 in the summer. Plus, for some reason I feel even colder than normal on days I exercise. I'm not sure why.
Yeah I know, excuses excuses, but it works for me so why not? I get to practice maintenance afterall, so it isn't all to waste.0 -
Why are we rehashing this again, seriously people stop, just stop. No one is going to change thier opinion about this on an internet forum.0
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Capt_Apollo wrote: »Capt_Apollo wrote: »i was doing moderation for a while. i'd have a glass of wine or two most nights, some kind of sweet on a daily basis, not to mention some take out and deli foods. sure i would count it all, but my weight never really dropped. i knew i had to change my diet to really see a drop in weight.
basically, i had to moderate my moderation.
now i fill up with fruits and vegetables, and do 90% of my own cooking and snack preparation. yes, i will still have a drink, but it's limited to two days a week, and just to two drinks. i'll still have sweets, but those are very very limited as well, and i'm also more conscious of what kind of sweets i'm having. and i've started weighing and measuring EVERYTHING.
and since doing this i've dropped about six pounds in 2 months.
You can be practicing moderation and still eating too much, which is what it looks like you were doing...
most likely. also, i was guesstimating the take-out that i was buying, so i'm sure i was not eating at the deficit that i thought i was.
Yeah it can be tricky. Even figuring out what your caloric intake should be is a guess at best...
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"Clean eaters" who say they get bloated or whatever after they eat "bad" food, I believe it's all in their heads, unless you have a REAL medical issues that have been diagnose by a doctor an not themselves. Cause if really had issues then why would you keep eating it prior to weight loss or getting healthy and now all of sudden you/they have issues now.
Where I live, doctors don't diagnose medical issues unless you tell them about them first. Apparently you have more psychic powers than they do, since you can declare it's all in someone's head, yet anyone who has been diagnosed with the multiple possible reasons someone has digestive issues can tell you, you know about them long before a doctor has anything to say about it.
As for why did they keep eating it prior to weight loss, that's how an elimination diet works. You stop eating something, and if your problem keeps happening, that wasn't the cause. If it stops happening, that probably was the cause. You eat it again, the symptoms come back, more evidence it was the cause. Until you do that, you don't know what's causing it, unless, of course, you're psychic.0 -
KombuchaCat wrote: »Why are we rehashing this again, seriously people stop, just stop. No one is going to change thier opinion about this on an internet forum.
yet here you are...0 -
KombuchaCat wrote: »Why are we rehashing this again, seriously people stop, just stop. No one is going to change thier opinion about this on an internet forum.
If someone is dead set on labeling the way they eat as "clean," then more power to them.
The point of these types of discussions is to let people, such as OP, who are on the fence about something and are miserable while trying to eat "clean," know that eating clean is not the only way to be healthy and lose weight.
People who are just starting may think that eating "clean" is the be all end all to health and weight loss, try to eat clean, realize that deprivation sucks, and give up altogether because they failed. When in reality they didn't fail.
People can eat what they like and be healthy. You don't have to limit your diet to chicken, broccoli, and quinoa to be healthy. You can eat chicken, broccoli, quinoa, AND cake and be healthy, both mentally and physically. We are trying to get people to understand that.
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Alyssa_Is_LosingIt wrote: »The point of these types of discussions is to let people, such as OP, who are on the fence about something and are miserable while trying to eat "clean," know that eating clean is not the only way to be healthy and lose weight.
Yep...
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Alyssa_Is_LosingIt wrote: »Yep, they read some article about certain foods causing inflammation and BAM, they're bloated after eating said food. And omg they feel soooo much better since cutting it out. Clearly that particular food is the root of all evil.
I also have to wonder about the magical food that doesn't bother them when it's organic, even though the store-bought, commercial version will "tear up" their insides. Come on, people. It's an egg or an apple or a cut of beef. A "yard egg" (as we call them around here) will taste and digest the same way as an egg from the grocery store or from Walmart. I've had both on my counter and in my food at the same time and cannot tell the difference except for color and firmness of the white as it comes out of the shell.
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LoupGarouTFTs wrote: »Alyssa_Is_LosingIt wrote: »Yep, they read some article about certain foods causing inflammation and BAM, they're bloated after eating said food. And omg they feel soooo much better since cutting it out. Clearly that particular food is the root of all evil.
I also have to wonder about the magical food that doesn't bother them when it's organic, even though the store-bought, commercial version will "tear up" their insides. Come on, people. It's an egg or an apple or a cut of beef. A "yard egg" (as we call them around here) will taste and digest the same way as an egg from the grocery store or from Walmart. I've had both on my counter and in my food at the same time and cannot tell the difference except for color and firmness of the white as it comes out of the shell.
It's self validation for some people, and I suppose it can be comforting to the uninformed.0
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