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What are your unpopular opinions about health / fitness?

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Replies

  • Jruzer
    Jruzer Posts: 3,501 Member
    Counting calories each day for a few years is one thing. But for those that do it, do you really envision doing it for 25+ years to come?

    Yes, I do. As far as I'm concerned it's like managing any other chronic condition. I'm more relaxed about it than I used to be, for sure, but I think the framework will hold.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,843 Member
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    fvsp1213 wrote: »
    Lizarking wrote: »
    exercising to lose weight is dumb. Especially spending time on a treadmill to justify a candy bar.

    I'm a very short older woman. If I didn't exercise on my treadmill, I'd have the paltry caloric allowance of 1200 calories to create a 150 calorie deficit since my maintenance for being sedentary is 1,350 calories.

    I don't want to eat like a toddler.

    Can't say enough how awesomely true for me this is.

    My (maybe) unpopular opinion:

    Maybe you can eat crap food (hamburgers, soda, ice cream (weep a little), candy bars, milk shakes) and make it all fit into your calories for the day, but food is fuel for me, and my body doesn't function properly when I feed it garbage. Good for you if you can make it work. But I actually doubt even you (whoever you are) can make that work for a lifetime of health.

    A hamburger is bread, meat, and maybe some toppings. A body can easily use bread and meat as fuel. It's carbohydrates, protein, and fat -- three things I'm eating every day anyway. Also consider the micronutrients it contains like iron, B12, potassium, and B6 and I'm confused as to why anyone would think a hamburger is "garbage."

    I'd call hamburgers from McDonald's "garbage" in that their taste is vastly inferior to the burgers I make myself or get at local, non chain restaurants.

    In the context of that post, it didn't seem to be about taste. The statement was made that the individual's body wouldn't function properly on hamburgers. Given that everybody has different tastes, I think blanket statements about whole types of food being "garbage" don't make much sense. A McDonald's hamburger isn't for me or for you, that's fine. But many people do genuinely enjoy them.

    Interestingly, my OH, who eats fast food all the time, considers burgers as a whole to be junk food while I reserve my disdain for burgers that taste inferior to me.
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    fvsp1213 wrote: »
    Lizarking wrote: »
    exercising to lose weight is dumb. Especially spending time on a treadmill to justify a candy bar.

    I'm a very short older woman. If I didn't exercise on my treadmill, I'd have the paltry caloric allowance of 1200 calories to create a 150 calorie deficit since my maintenance for being sedentary is 1,350 calories.

    I don't want to eat like a toddler.

    Can't say enough how awesomely true for me this is.

    My (maybe) unpopular opinion:

    Maybe you can eat crap food (hamburgers, soda, ice cream (weep a little), candy bars, milk shakes) and make it all fit into your calories for the day, but food is fuel for me, and my body doesn't function properly when I feed it garbage. Good for you if you can make it work. But I actually doubt even you (whoever you are) can make that work for a lifetime of health.

    A hamburger is bread, meat, and maybe some toppings. A body can easily use bread and meat as fuel. It's carbohydrates, protein, and fat -- three things I'm eating every day anyway. Also consider the micronutrients it contains like iron, B12, potassium, and B6 and I'm confused as to why anyone would think a hamburger is "garbage."

    I'd call hamburgers from McDonald's "garbage" in that their taste is vastly inferior to the burgers I make myself or get at local, non chain restaurants.

    In the context of that post, it didn't seem to be about taste. The statement was made that the individual's body wouldn't function properly on hamburgers. Given that everybody has different tastes, I think blanket statements about whole types of food being "garbage" don't make much sense. A McDonald's hamburger isn't for me or for you, that's fine. But many people do genuinely enjoy them.

    Interestingly, my OH, who eats fast food all the time, considers burgers as a whole to be junk food while I reserve my disdain for burgers that taste inferior to me.

    Just goes to show what an interesting term "junk food" is. Two people can use it and mean very different things.
  • Bry_Fitness70
    Bry_Fitness70 Posts: 2,480 Member
    Counting calories each day for a few years is one thing. But for those that do it, do you really envision doing it for 25+ years to come?

    I do. Properly balancing my nutrition will actually become even more critical as I get older and more vulnerable to losing muscle and bone density and facing the medical challenges of the elderly.

    I liken calorie counting to balancing my checkbook (for those of us who were around before internet banking). Even though I gained competence in managing my finances for years, would I really feel confident enough to stop balancing my accounts and just winging it?
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,879 Member
    rdridi12 wrote: »
    cwolfman13 wrote: »
    My unpopular opinion is that calorie counting is a temporary learning tool, not a "lifestyle." It's like training wheels on a bike...they can get you comfortable, but eventually one should just be able to ride.

    I agree with this, and our bodies are equipped with ALL the right things to allow us to just ride and feel our hunger. But I think it takes a lot to really be able to listen to your body in that aspect at this point in human life for many different lifestyle reasons, which makes it a little unrealistic for most people now.


    I think awareness and mindfulness of what you're doing is important and calorie counting taught me how to be better with this. I haven't logged anything in over 4 years now, but I'm still mindful of what I'm doing. I also have "rules" that I live by and make exceptions to those rules from time to time, just not most of the time. My diet is also heavily whole foods based and I'm pretty active which makes it somewhat difficult to overeat.

    I know a lot of people say they will track forever, and there are probably a few who will, but I don't think logging into perpetuity is something the vast majority of people can or will do...I certainly couldn't envision spending the next 40-50 years keeping a detailed food diary. A mere 9 months of it made my head a bit squirrely as it was.
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
    Jruzer wrote: »
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    fvsp1213 wrote: »
    Lizarking wrote: »
    exercising to lose weight is dumb. Especially spending time on a treadmill to justify a candy bar.

    I'm a very short older woman. If I didn't exercise on my treadmill, I'd have the paltry caloric allowance of 1200 calories to create a 150 calorie deficit since my maintenance for being sedentary is 1,350 calories.

    I don't want to eat like a toddler.

    Can't say enough how awesomely true for me this is.

    My (maybe) unpopular opinion:

    Maybe you can eat crap food (hamburgers, soda, ice cream (weep a little), candy bars, milk shakes) and make it all fit into your calories for the day, but food is fuel for me, and my body doesn't function properly when I feed it garbage. Good for you if you can make it work. But I actually doubt even you (whoever you are) can make that work for a lifetime of health.

    A hamburger is bread, meat, and maybe some toppings. A body can easily use bread and meat as fuel. It's carbohydrates, protein, and fat -- three things I'm eating every day anyway. Also consider the micronutrients it contains like iron, B12, potassium, and B6 and I'm confused as to why anyone would think a hamburger is "garbage."

    I'd call hamburgers from McDonald's "garbage" in that their taste is vastly inferior to the burgers I make myself or get at local, non chain restaurants.

    In the context of that post, it didn't seem to be about taste. The statement was made that the individual's body wouldn't function properly on hamburgers. Given that everybody has different tastes, I think blanket statements about whole types of food being "garbage" don't make much sense. A McDonald's hamburger isn't for me or for you, that's fine. But many people do genuinely enjoy them.

    Interestingly, my OH, who eats fast food all the time, considers burgers as a whole to be junk food while I reserve my disdain for burgers that taste inferior to me.

    Just goes to show what an interesting term "junk food" is. Two people can use it and mean very different things.

    I would be less kind and replace the word "interesting" with "useless."

    :D
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,843 Member
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    Late to the party but... I will try to hit one that hasn't already been stated I don't think.

    Convenience foods (frozen meals, skillet meals, ready rice, even <gasp> Hamburger Helper) can taste good AND be a part of a healthy, nutritious overall diet?

    Does this mean I eat only convenience foods? Nope.
    Does this mean I can't cook? Nope.
    Do I have a damaged palate? Nope.
    Do I ignore nutrition? Nope.
    Do I think the ingredients are going to have a negative impact on my health in the short or long term? Nope.
    Does it mean that I'm a busy working mom who prefers sometimes to rely on a frozen breakfast bowl (Egg whites, turkey sausage, breakfast potatoes and cheese) microwaved for 3 minutes for 240 cals and 22 g of protein rather than cooking something similar myself (which I could, but would take much longer to prepare)? Yep.

    I've mostly cooked from scratch over the last almost 20 years. I've lately surrendered when it comes to brownies, something my OH likes on hand for a bedtime snack. He was paying $5 for five brownies, which I thought was way too much, so when I moved in I started making brownies. I couldn't get them to come out the way I had in mind for look and texture, and after trying recipes from the JOC, ATC, the Cuisinart food processor cookbook, I finally thought that what I had in mind may have come from a box, and sure enough, it was the Dunkin Hines and/or Betty Crocker mixes. (Ghirardelli mix also failed.)

    For a special occasion like someone's birthday, I would still use the JOC recipe, but oh boy is it a pain - chop the baker's chocolate, heat the chocolate (carefully), cool the chocolate (but not too much), more dishes, more expense.

    With Dunkin Hines it's ready to go in the over by the time the oven comes to temperature. And it's cheaper, with less cleanup. But since it doesn't taste quite right to me, probably due to artificial vanilla, I don't overindulge, which I was doing with the other brownie recipes.

    So now I'm wondering what other convenience food I can add to my repertoire and am reminded that I used to like Zatarain's.
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