dieter's edema, squishy fat, wooshes and what nots

I am not familiar with this process (mental note to read up on it tonight), but basic physiology tells us that there must be homeostasis between ICF and ECF. Water retention is, in part, regulated by sodium levels. If the lipocytes are storing additional water, would they not require additional sodium, and thus could be combated by a reduced sodium intake, forcing the cells to release extra water?

are we talking about homeostasis and water osmolality? I'd question any text book that couldn't support the science then went off on some tangent.

I am not familiar with this process (mental note to read up on it tonight), but basic physiology tells us that there must be homeostasis between ICF and ECF. Water retention is, in part, regulated by sodium levels. If the lipocytes are storing additional water, would they not require additional sodium, and thus could be combated by a reduced sodium intake, forcing the cells to release extra water?

Correct sir. Two processes if this was the case - since hoeostasis is a a ion concentration process either na/cl/ca driven (and could be driven by reduced salt intake) or increase of water will drive dilution up via ion channel pumps.

Excellent, on the same page then.


In terms of "squishy fat", could that not be caused by fat cells shrinking at different paces?

Can you point me in the direction of Brad Pilon opining on this theory? I've poked around his site with little success.

Thanks!

In: For fat cells being pumped full of water!

Brad: Yes. It gets to a point where it starts to hide weight loss even though the body water isn’t going up, you’re body is getting smaller because your burning fat but you will get to a point where you aren’t losing any more water to go along with your fat loss; so your percentage of total body water might actually go up and it localizes itself where your fat used to be. Not a good thing. It also occurs very gradually.

Vince: Is there a scientific name for this phenomenon?

Brad: It’s known as dieter’s edema, or swelling. Dieter’s edema usually starts after the first month of semi-starvation, (and like I said earlier, any strict weight loss diet is similar to semi starvation). At first the swelling is very transient, it comes in later in the day, and it’s gone by the morning. As semi-starvation continues, this edema becomes more apparent and more massive. So the longer you diet, even when your weight loss starts to plateau, you’re still losing fat, but it’s being hidden by this edema (swelling).

Vince: That’s great that we finally have the answers to why this happens and we know it has nothing to do with some metabolic loss slowdown or malfunctioning enzymes, but it doesn’t change the fact that it happens. If you’re someone who is trying to get a six pack and get really lean, how do you prevent this? What are your options?

Brad: Well, first, as I told you, if you’re going to follow a traditional diet which is the same as clinical semi-starvation to get ultra-lean, it looks like you’re going to have to do periodic periods of re-feeding (eating more). Because there’s not a lot of new research on this we really don’t know how long you have to re-feed for, but it seems like the effect is fairly quick. Once you start eating a larger amount of calories, your edema will quickly go away to the point where it looks like you’re starting to lose weight again.

Vince: And what is the option you suggest in your new book?

Brad: I suggest another option in my book, and this option comes from research published as early as 1890.

The research I dug up showed that a full-day fast did not result in edema. That’s right, while semi-starvation causes dieter’s edema, total starvation or fasting, does not.

So you could use the ESE protocol of flexible intermittent fasting and weight training and you would not get dieter’s edema. What you’re essentially doing here is periods of complete starvation (fasting is a better word), which doesn’t cause dieter’s edema, followed by periods of re-feedings. Even if, for some weird, crazy reason, you did get a little bit of edema, it would go away very quickly with this system.

So ESE solved the dieters edema problem even before I knew the problem existed. The Eat Stop Eat lifestyle is meant to be used as an easy and effective weight loss strategy but it ended up fixing this other major problem with dieting too. I guess I kinda lucked out on that one!