Metabolic Damage?

ryry_

Disclaimer: I don't believe this applies to me whatsoever. I have just seen people throwing it around recently and curious to get peoples takes on it because I'm skeptical if it is actually a thing at all (unless maybe we're talking about a bodybuilder dieted down to contest levels).

So I see a thread that catches my fancy, its got two pages already. Overweight Girl, wants to lose like 90 lbs. Hasn't lost a lot of weight. Started at 1200, then upped to 1600 based on advice, then upped to 2000. She was discouraged that she wasn't losing weight very fast after a few weeks.

The overwhelming recommendation, was that she probably had metabolic damage and maybe she needed to eat more to repair. IDK, that just kind of made me facepalm. Someone is carrying around 90 lbs of excess bodyfat, it seems unlikely their metabolism is damaged.

So my question is, what is your take on the whole concept of it and does it exist, in what circumstances, etc. I was just kind of dumbfounded she was eating 2000 calories a day and people were telling her to up the # after a few weeks.

Chief_Rocka

In response to a caloric deficit, your RMR drops, NEAT drops, and you undergo hormonal changes, all these things work together to steal your caloric deficit. This is why people pleateau, and why you often need to eat even less and/or move even more to reestablish a calorie deficit.

When people eat low calorie amounts like 1200 calories with no diet breaks, no refeeds, they get lost when they hit the inevitable plateau. They don't have enough room to cut enough calories to make a meaningful difference, and they don't have the energy to do more exercise.

The hormonal and metabolic changes can become semi-permanent if you're in a large enough deficit for long enough, and they can be reversed by a prolonged period of raising calories. If someone needs to go through this period of "metabolic repair," I wouldn't expect them to lose weight during this period, I would expect them to gain a few pounds. You shouldn't be trying to "lose weight by eating more," you should be trying to bring your body back to normal, thus raising your maintenance calorie level, giving you the ability to later drop calories and lose weight at a reasonable level.

SideSteel

I would be surprised if there were many examples of obese people with metabolic damage in the context that Layne Norton refers to.


While I like Laynes info for the most part, I think people (on mfp) tend to latch on to "metabolic damage" and apply it to contexts far outside what I believe he's talking about.

The overweight 30 year old who ate 1200 calories for a month does not fit this context. The figure model who did a 40 week diet on 700 calories with 5 days of cardio and weight training, might fit that context.

IronPlayground

Yes, I think it exists. SS and Rock have summed it up nicely as to how it might occur. No, I don't think the person in your scenario would fit the description.

Here is the Layne Norton video SideSteel mentioned in his post. http://youtu.be/QHHzie6XRGk

fluffykitsune

Lets see. Overweight girl, wants to lose 90lb, tries to eat 1200.

I wouldn't say metabolic damage unless she had been eating 1200 for 6+ months. Theres people here on mfp that have been on 1200cal/day for years, thats what I would call metabolic damage, or an eating disorder / mental problems.

In all honesty. I'd chalk it up to her overestimating calories burned, or underestimating what she eats. Maybe she doesn't log things she drinks, or doesnt measure her cereal and is really having 2-3 servings but only logging it as one.

NovemberJune

This topic interests me. I have a friend who regularly eats under 1200 calories and has been trying to lose fat for well over a year and can't. Calculator's would estimate her BMR to be around 1300 and her TDEE around 2000. Most days she eats around 1000 calories, but will go out to eat a couple of days per week, bringing the average intake up. Obviously not the same as the case you are talking about, but definitely something I'm curious about.

misssiri

I know someone that has been dieting for about 28 years, eating around 1300-1400 calories per day and weighs close to 300lb. I'll say that's a down-regulated metabolism. This is your average woman that has been dieting her whole life and at close to 50 years old is trying to eat enough to "reset" her metabolism so that she can actually learn to eat a proper amount of food and no longer be obese. There is no good reason for the average person to under eat ever. (Maybe if you are prepping for a competitive sport of some kind)

So basically what Fire_Rock is talking about. She is trying to go through metabolic repair by eating at or above her TDEE and monitoring her body temperatures, not exercising to reduce stress on her body, and waiting for her weight gain to level out so she can lose with a very small deficit.

Anecdotal I realize but very interesting nonetheless.

SideSteel

I know someone that has been dieting for about 28 years, eating around 1300-1400 calories per day and weighs close to 300lb. I'll say that's a down-regulated metabolism. This is your average woman that has been dieting her whole life and at close to 50 years old is trying to eat enough to "reset" her metabolism so that she can actually learn to eat a proper amount of food and no longer be obese. There is no good reason for the average person to under eat ever. (Maybe if you are prepping for a competitive sport of some kind)

So basically what Fire_Rock is talking about. She is trying to go through metabolic repair by eating at or above her TDEE and monitoring her body temperatures, not exercising to reduce stress on her body, and waiting for her weight gain to level out so she can lose with a very small deficit.

Anecdotal I realize but very interesting nonetheless.

Also anecdotal but I'd be surprised if the under eating caused the damage unless she used to be 600 lbs and also dropped a bunch of weight to get to 300 lbs. Far more likely that she either has separate metabolic issues going on or poor tracking.


Typing from my phone so this is short. In any case I wish your friend the best.

misssiri

I know someone that has been dieting for about 28 years, eating around 1300-1400 calories per day and weighs close to 300lb. I'll say that's a down-regulated metabolism. This is your average woman that has been dieting her whole life and at close to 50 years old is trying to eat enough to "reset" her metabolism so that she can actually learn to eat a proper amount of food and no longer be obese. There is no good reason for the average person to under eat ever. (Maybe if you are prepping for a competitive sport of some kind)

So basically what Fire_Rock is talking about. She is trying to go through metabolic repair by eating at or above her TDEE and monitoring her body temperatures, not exercising to reduce stress on her body, and waiting for her weight gain to level out so she can lose with a very small deficit.

Anecdotal I realize but very interesting nonetheless.

Also anecdotal but I'd be surprised if the under eating caused the damage unless she used to be 600 lbs and also dropped a bunch of weight to get to 300 lbs. Far more likely that she either has separate metabolic issues going on or poor tracking.


Typing from my phone so this is short. In any case I wish your friend the best.

Yeah, it's difficult to know the entire picture. Obviously I'm not a professional either. I do find all of it to be fascinating though.

SideSteel

I know someone that has been dieting for about 28 years, eating around 1300-1400 calories per day and weighs close to 300lb. I'll say that's a down-regulated metabolism. This is your average woman that has been dieting her whole life and at close to 50 years old is trying to eat enough to "reset" her metabolism so that she can actually learn to eat a proper amount of food and no longer be obese. There is no good reason for the average person to under eat ever. (Maybe if you are prepping for a competitive sport of some kind)

So basically what Fire_Rock is talking about. She is trying to go through metabolic repair by eating at or above her TDEE and monitoring her body temperatures, not exercising to reduce stress on her body, and waiting for her weight gain to level out so she can lose with a very small deficit.

Anecdotal I realize but very interesting nonetheless.

Also anecdotal but I'd be surprised if the under eating caused the damage unless she used to be 600 lbs and also dropped a bunch of weight to get to 300 lbs. Far more likely that she either has separate metabolic issues going on or poor tracking.


Typing from my phone so this is short. In any case I wish your friend the best.

Yeah, it's difficult to know the entire picture. Obviously I'm not a professional either. I do find all of it to be fascinating though.

Hopefully she figures it out. My only point was that I again think this is a context that isn't really applicable but I'm speculating.

I would expect that a 300 lb person eating a very low calorie diet for long enough to supposedly cause damage, would no longer be 300 lbs.

That's sort of why I don't think this is applicable to obese people in the same manner that it "may" be applicable to lean athletes on prolonged unintelligent diets with high amounts of activity.

I do think AT happens, just not to some massive extent that heavy people can no longer create sustainable deficits. In small lean women (lower initial BMR) I can see it being a valid concern.

Roll_Tide_Meg

I hope it isn't true because a few years ago I ate at 1200 calories and worked out like a mad woman and lost 25lbs in like 3 months but continued to eat 1200 calories for about 6 months....I quit because I plateaued and couldn't get it to move again. Ate what I wanted to for a couple of years and now I'm back so hopefully if it was damaged it is back to normal now. Now I eat about 1750 calories although I am unsure about me netting low some days.

Sarauk2sf

Just to add to what has been mentioned by the OP, SideSteel and Rock

The term metabolic damage is being thrown around all over the place, especially recently with Layne Norton's videos, and 99% of the time is has been completely taken out of context. What people seem to gloss over is the fact that he is talking about people in contest prep, i.e. very lean people trying to get even leaner.

Everyone has a slow down of their metabolism when dieting. It is normal and temporary. It is our bodies way of adapting to and trying to maintain homeostasis. However, the degree to which this happens is dependent on a number of factors, including how much body fat someone is carrying. There is a range at which our bodies are 'comfortable' at. Very lean or obese are not in that range.

What can happen on very low calories is down regulation of energy expenditure - you get slower and make less involuntary movements., however, this is not enough to cause no weight loss in obese or overweight people on very low calories.

The most likely thing that happens is basic tracking inaccuracies, unless there is some other non-dieting related metabolic issue going on. We all get dieters fatigue if dieting for a long time, and just need to acknowledge it.

In the case of the person on very low calories for 28 years, I highly doubt they have been weighing and logging their food that whole time.

It actually drives me nut when someone posts that they are at a plateau and without even asking how long they have been dieting for, how much they have lost, asking to see their diary, asking whether they log their cheat meals, making sure they actually log consistently, or asking whether they are weighing their food the stock answer is...eat more. No...much of the time that is not the right answer. Nine times out of ten, the right answer is 'log your damn food and log it accurately'.

Now, the leaner you get, then hormones start playing a greater and greater role and on low calories that, say 10%, adaptation makes a big difference (I made that number up btw), which is why we have advised some people to walk their calories up to have something to cut from - but these are lean people who have stalled, or people who are losing too quickly.

mustgetmuscles1

All great info above.

I do think metabolic slow down/ adaptation is real but agree it can be blamed for people just not being as consistent.

I think it can really show up in crash/yo-yo dieters and cardio junkies. The more severe the deficit the faster the body tries to adapt to it. Then any time there is a slip up or increase in calories the weight regain can be fast without reversing the metabolic slowdown. This leads to the person reverting to the old large cal deficit diet which only compounds the problem.

This is what Layne talks about in his videos and I think it does apply to a large number of people even outside physique/body builders.



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grim_traveller

If an overweight or obese person is claiming metabolic damage, I would bet my house that it was poor tracking, or outright lying.

I have weighed every bite of food for ten months, and tracked as accurately as possible. I've used a fitbit to track NEAT, to make sure I have kept activity up. I have kept a spreadsheet for all of my macros and caloric intake, along with the guesstimated calorie burn in that time, and compared it to actual weight loss, and it is amazingly consistent. I have figures for daily, weekly, and monthly averages. The most my metabolism might have decreased is about 18 percent, but it is far more likely that the calories burned were overestimated by that much instead. But even an 18 percent decrease in metabolic rate would have been a fair trade for someone in as bad a shape as I was. I was, literally, dying. My high weight 5 years ago was 475, today it's 194 with a 24 BMI at 6'3".

I'd rather not say what my daily calories were for over eight months, as I would be bombarded with crap. But I have been increasing very gradually, eating about 600 calories a day more now than I did for over eight months, and still losing a little each week. The math is spot on, and, because I had so much excess fat, my metabolism is not ruined. I would bet that it is a little lower, which is why I am increasing so slowly, but far from wrecked. The research I have read indicates that it likely takes about as long to increase your metabolism as you spent eating at huge deficits.

As Lyle McDonald said, you are not different. If the math isn't working out, it's because you are counting wrong.

If Sara or SS are interested in my spreadsheet, I'd be happy to send it to them.

The only thing I would do different, besides getting so huge to begin with, is that I should have started lifting much sooner in my weight loss. I was a bit of a cardio bunny for a long time. Ok, maybe a cardio sasquatch, but you get the point.

Sarauk2sf

All great info above.

I do think metabolic slow down/ adaptation is real but agree it can be blamed for people just not being as consistent.

I think it can really show up in crash/yo-yo dieters and cardio junkies. The more severe the deficit the faster the body tries to adapt to it. Then any time there is a slip up or increase in calories the weight regain can be fast without reversing the metabolic slowdown. This leads to the person reverting to the old large cal deficit diet which only compounds the problem.

This is what Layne talks about in his videos and I think it does apply to a large number of people even outside physique/body builders.



.

His video was only re lean people from what I could tell and from what I have read (and definitely not about morbidly obese people). Also, there are 2 separate issues - the stall and then lack of reversing which exacerbates the issue when trying to lean out again.

The concept is similar in Lyle's RFL - the higher the BF%, the less refeeds and the longer you can go as there are more fat stores.

The main issue with VLCDs for overweight/obese people is adherence and the more likely possibility (for anyone this is, whether obese or not) or falling off the wagon and putting the weight back on due to that.

Sarauk2sf

If an overweight or obese person is claiming metabolic damage, I would bet my house that it was poor tracking, or outright lying.

I have weighed every bite of food for ten months, and tracked as accurately as possible. I've used a fitbit to track NEAT, to make sure I have kept activity up. I have kept a spreadsheet for all of my macros and caloric intake, along with the guesstimated calorie burn in that time, and compared it to actual weight loss, and it is amazingly consistent. I have figures for daily, weekly, and monthly averages. The most my metabolism might have decreased is about 18 percent, but it is far more likely that the calories burned were overestimated by that much instead. But even an 18 percent decrease in metabolic rate would have been a fair trade for someone in as bad a shape as I was. I was, literally, dying. My high weight 5 years ago was 475, today it's 194 with a 24 BMI at 6'3".

I'd rather not say what my daily calories were for over eight months, as I would be bombarded with crap. But I have been increasing very gradually, eating about 600 calories a day more now than I did for over eight months, and still losing a little each week. The math is spot on, and, because I had so much excess fat, my metabolism is not ruined. I would bet that it is a little lower, which is why I am increasing so slowly, but far from wrecked. The research I have read indicates that it likely takes about as long to increase your metabolism as you spent eating at huge deficits.

As Lyle McDonald said, you are not different. If the math isn't working out, it's because you are counting wrong.

If Sara or SS are interested in my spreadsheet, I'd be happy to send it to them.

The only thing I would do different, besides getting so huge to begin with, is that I should have started lifting much sooner in my weight loss. I was a bit of a cardio bunny for a long time. Ok, maybe a cardio sasquatch, but you get the point.

Thank you - and huge congratulations on your weight loss.

I have heard the same thing - that is takes as long to get your metabolism up as you dieted for. However, I think this is only for more sustained dieting, but could be wrong here.

mustgetmuscles1

All great info above.

I do think metabolic slow down/ adaptation is real but agree it can be blamed for people just not being as consistent.

I think it can really show up in crash/yo-yo dieters and cardio junkies. The more severe the deficit the faster the body tries to adapt to it. Then any time there is a slip up or increase in calories the weight regain can be fast without reversing the metabolic slowdown. This leads to the person reverting to the old large cal deficit diet which only compounds the problem.

This is what Layne talks about in his videos and I think it does apply to a large number of people even outside physique/body builders.



.

His video was only re lean people from what I could tell and from what I have read (and definitely not about morbidly obese people). Also, there are 2 separate issues - the stall and then lack of reversing which exacerbates the issue when trying to lean out again.

The concept is similar in Lyle's RFL - the higher the BF%, the less refeeds and the longer you can go as there are more fat stores.

The main issue with VLCDs for overweight/obese people is adherence and the more likely possibility (for anyone this is, whether obese or not) or falling off the wagon and putting the weight back on due to that.

Agree. One of the studies he sited was on adaptation to dieting by overweight/obese people and why they regain.

http://ajpregu.physiology.org/content/301/3/R581.full.pdf+html

I wont even pretend like I read the whole thing or understand any of it :happy: I dont know if we can discount some of these adaptations just because the person is overweight/obese. The weight regain spiral might be just as severe while the true plateau might not be.

Sarauk2sf

All great info above.

I do think metabolic slow down/ adaptation is real but agree it can be blamed for people just not being as consistent.

I think it can really show up in crash/yo-yo dieters and cardio junkies. The more severe the deficit the faster the body tries to adapt to it. Then any time there is a slip up or increase in calories the weight regain can be fast without reversing the metabolic slowdown. This leads to the person reverting to the old large cal deficit diet which only compounds the problem.

This is what Layne talks about in his videos and I think it does apply to a large number of people even outside physique/body builders.



.

His video was only re lean people from what I could tell and from what I have read (and definitely not about morbidly obese people). Also, there are 2 separate issues - the stall and then lack of reversing which exacerbates the issue when trying to lean out again.

The concept is similar in Lyle's RFL - the higher the BF%, the less refeeds and the longer you can go as there are more fat stores.

The main issue with VLCDs for overweight/obese people is adherence and the more likely possibility (for anyone this is, whether obese or not) or falling off the wagon and putting the weight back on due to that.

Agree. One of the studies he sited was on adaptation to dieting by overweight/obese people and why they regain.

http://ajpregu.physiology.org/content/301/3/R581.full.pdf+html

I wont even pretend like I read the whole thing or understand any of it :happy: I dont know if we can discount some of these adaptations just because the person is overweight/obese. The weight regain spiral might be just as severe while the true plateau might not be.

On a quick read of this, the review looks to be more about the body's predisposition to return to it's 'set point' as well as the known decrease in BMR that dieting causes, outside the expected amount that comes along with being lighter, rather than any metabolic damage per se.

This may be definitional, but a slightly suppressed metabolism due to dieting =/= metabolic damage.

mustgetmuscles1

Yea the term "damage" is not very accurate and probably means something different between people. What I think it means is where weight gain and/or loss does not seem to line up with calorie intake.

If someone is in an extreme case where they are really eating a low amount and exercising but still seeing zero or less than expected weight loss or eating what should still be a deficit and seeing weight gain it is fairly obvious that something is wrong. Their bodies have become resistant to weight loss and primed for energy storage.

When it is someone who is still over weight but has gone through a few cycles of weight loss, rapid regain and seems to be having trouble losing at what should be a pretty good deficit for them it gets kind of blurry. People are quick to blame consistency or inaccuracy (which is probably the case most of the time) but maybe it is not always the case.

Sarauk2sf

Yea the term "damage" I is not very accurate and probably means something different between people. What I think it means is where weight gain and/or loss does not seem to line up with calorie intake.

If someone is in an extreme case where they are really eating a low amount and exercising but still seeing zero or less than expected weight loss or eating what should still be a deficit and seeing weight gain it is fairly obvious that something is wrong. Their bodies have become resistant to weight loss and primed for energy storage.

When it is someone who is still over weight but has gone through a few cycles of weight loss, rapid regain and seems to be having trouble losing at what should be a pretty good deficit for them it gets kind of blurry. People are quick to blame consistency or inaccuracy (which is probably the case most of the time) but maybe it is not always the case.

It is more likely a non-diet related metabolic issue imo if not logging issues. There is probably adaptive thermogenics going on, don't get me wrong, but not to the degree that someone who is 300lb cannot lose on 1,200 calories. Don't forget, we are talking about situations where you have someone who is morbidly obese apparently not losing on a VLCD.

amonkey794

. You shouldn't be trying to "lose weight by eating more," you should be trying to bring your body back to normal, thus raising your maintenance calorie level, giving you the ability to later drop calories and lose weight at a reasonable level.

I love this. I need to keep this in mind.