Having a great metabolism is like winning a lottery

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  • kirayng2
    kirayng2 Posts: 36 Member
    edited June 2016
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    3dogsrunning wrote: »
    kirayng2 wrote: »
    There are three different body types: endomorph, mesomorph and ectomorph. Endos lose weight very easily and also have a hard time putting on muscle, mesomorph is the "norm" as in no trouble losing or gaining, ectomorph has trouble losing weight and puts on muscle easily.

    Somatotypes are bunk and have no scientific basis.

    Really? proof? I suppose bodybuilding.com is crap too just out to sell you supplements? I'm really scared of all the misinfo on the net these days. :( They even teach us this in school (I'm majoring in Nutrition) http://www.somatotype.org/Heath-CarterManual.pdf
    It's just a theory in any case. Not proven.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,170 Member
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    delgrand wrote: »
    I don't believe that there is anything called "people with fast metabolism"
    2 friends of mine , all their life claimed that they have "fast metabolism " , and they were asking fat people how can they get some fat on their bodies because they were very slim ! they claimed that each one ate 3000 cal +

    last year they had some exams that they had to sit for 8-10 months to study for. They did not work or do any activity, just sitting in their rooms studying, and eating ! guess what ? both of them gained at least 50 lbs.

    So what happened is that they were over estimating number of calories they were eating. when they sat at home to study for the exam and truly ate like what do fat people eat , they got overweight .

    Mmm, I dunno. I think there must be differences. It turned out that, at least over the course of my weight loss & into maintenance, I seem to have a surprisingly "fast metabolism". I don't know why, and I don't assume it will necessarily last forever. (But I'm not complaining.)

    I'm 60 years old, 120 pounds, truly sedentary other than exercise I explicitly account for and eat back all the calories from, weigh/log my food meticulously, and have been maintaining for 3 months at nearly 50% more net calories than most calculators estimate for my NEAT.

    I have MFP friends I've interacted with a lot, to the point where I feel pretty confident that their logging is accurate, who have similar personal characteristics, but who maintain on the predicted levels of calories (or less!) or lose at a rate consistent with the predicted maintenance-calorie level (or more slowly)

    None of this "invalidates CICO". But while individuals' CO clusters fairly tightly around population averages, it does appear, from my vantage point, that there are individual differences.
  • jenilla1
    jenilla1 Posts: 11,118 Member
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    People's perceptions (of themselves and others) are not as accurate as they think. Watch Secret Eaters on YouTube. It might be quite enlightening for you.
  • tomteboda
    tomteboda Posts: 2,171 Member
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    There's evidence that people within the average population (1 std deviation) have variations of +- 200 calories/day in metabolic expenditure (and they aren't rare butterflies, either). So you could theoretically be on the high end of the standard deviation and your sister on the low end, and wind up with a difference of 400 calories/day needed.

    What's more likely, however, is that your sister doesn't absorb nutrients as well as you do (for a variety of possible reasons).

    At any rate, you're right, in a way its like she "won the lottery" but you know she's actually underweight and likely needs to consume as many calories as possible to maintain her activity and health. Don't discount that struggle! Being underweight comes with its own host of insecurities and cultural biases as well. Focusing on your perceived disadvantage may be preventing you from seeing her life clearly.

    Even if others have "won the lottery", what good does it do to compare ourselves to them? It doesn't change your situation one iota, and only makes you feel miserable in the comparison! Focus on your health and goals, and you'll find the situation much more bearable.
  • Oishii
    Oishii Posts: 2,675 Member
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    Another British TV program (maybe even one from the same series) took a group of 'naturally skinny' people and made them overeat. There were three outcomes:

    1) they over ate, gained weight, but lost it easily afterwards.
    2) they really couldn't force themselves to overeat (tears etc) so didn't gain weight.
    3) one gentleman over ate, as requested and still didn't gain. I think they did tests and found his body really did just burn off any excess foods.

    It's possible, but unlikely, that your sister is in the third group.

    There is also evidence that having been obese and having lost weight makes your metabolism slower (eg recent study on ex Biggest Loser contestants), so it isn't impossible for metabolisms to be different from each other, plus the 400kcal natural range and the possibility you're both outliers, BUT more likely is just that she eats less and moves more than you think.

    Personally, I seem to have an unusually high metabolism that I am quite capable of out-eating.
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,398 Member
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    You know what? When I lost most of the weight I wanted to lose my colleagues asked me how I could have cheese after lunch, eat lots of curries at work, and white rice, and so much other stuff. It was all perception. It was a tiny 25gr piece of quality cheese I took back to my desk, next to a big bowl of snack vegetables. The food from the canteen? It wasn't much! I just mixed it all together and it looked like much more than it was. When someone brought donuts or similar stuff I only took a half or less, yet the colleagues only saw me eating donuts. When I asked for the best burgers in town for a meetup with friends I checked out the calories beforehand and had a small burger without cheese, no fries, sauce on the site. Yet colleagues heard burger and thought: wow, how does she do that?
  • stevencloser
    stevencloser Posts: 8,911 Member
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    https://examine.com/faq/does-metabolism-vary-between-two-people/
  • VitaSh
    VitaSh Posts: 113 Member
    edited June 2016
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    I used to have sh**t metabolism but it took me 3 years to completely reverse it (saw a difference after the first year).. through heavy training and slowly increasing my food. I'm currently eating and maintaining an athletic 146 lb at 2400 calories 5ft 7 in. If someone hasn't already suggested, look up Dr. Layne Norton's videos on youtube about reverse dieting, how you can help increase your metabolism so that you can maintain and diet on higher calories eventually. Takes time but so worth it, changed my life. Metabolism is not static, it can go up and down. Genetically we are predisposed but we can totally change it too. I'm still slowly increasing macros/calories! (slooowly).
  • slava977
    slava977 Posts: 20 Member
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    Thank you everyone for input, very interesting.
  • paperpudding
    paperpudding Posts: 8,995 Member
    edited June 2016
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    And some people ( not saying this is your sister) do eat a lot of high calorie foods and not gain - because they have some absorption issue like Crohn's disease, for example.

    Needless to say, having something like Crohn's disease is not winning the lottery.
  • RosieRose7673
    RosieRose7673 Posts: 438 Member
    edited June 2016
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    paperpudding wrote: »
    And some people ( not saying this is your sister) do eat a lot of high calorie foods and not gain - because they have some absorption issue like Crohn's disease, for example.

    Needless to say, having something like Crohn's disease is not winning the lottery.

    This is very true. My sister has Crohn's and when it's not well controlled, she loses a TON of weight. People who don't know about the Crohn's compliment her all the time when that happens. The compliments actually really bother her. She actually has an arsenal of clothes ranging from size 0 to size 12 (she bloats like no other when on high doses of steroids).

    Edit: she actually had one idiot who knew about her Crohn's exclaim that she wished she had Crohn's so she could lose weight. :neutral: her Crohn's is very advanced for her age.
  • queenliz99
    queenliz99 Posts: 15,317 Member
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    RosieRose7673 wrote: »
    paperpudding wrote: »
    And some people ( not saying this is your sister) do eat a lot of high calorie foods and not gain - because they have some absorption issue like Crohn's disease, for example.

    Needless to say, having something like Crohn's disease is not winning the lottery.

    This is very true. My sister has Crohn's and when it's not well controlled, she loses a TON of weight. People who don't know about the Crohn's compliment her all the time when that happens. The compliments actually really bother her. She actually has an arsenal of clothes ranging from size 0 to size 12 (she bloats like no other when on high doses of steroids).

    Edit: she actually had one idiot who knew about her Crohn's exclaim that she wished she had Crohn's so she could lose weight. :neutral: her Crohn's is very advanced for her age.

    What d!ck head! People are so stupid sometimes!
  • pearceflint92
    pearceflint92 Posts: 8 Member
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    Tdee doesn't factor in thyroid problems
    Or hormonal issues. My tdee is 3700 but if I eat over 1500 calories I won't lose weight. I'm 6 ft 5 350 pounds
  • KetoneKaren
    KetoneKaren Posts: 6,411 Member
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    I have 4 little dogs. Three of them are skinny and we work to be sure they keep enough weight on. The fourth one, Mabel, who is a full sister of one of the skinny dogs, is not skinny. Because we keep the food up off the floor and control feeding times and amounts, we are able to keep her on a food plan to maintain her at a healthy weight. All of the dogs run around like little maniacs and go for walks, etc. The three skinny dogs are allowed as much food as they want at feeding times but poor Mabel gets her paltry portion and can't have any more. She has been checked for thyroid and other conditions, and she is healthy. Dogs are different, even if they are related.

    I come from a family of normal weight people. I gain weight easily. My sibs have all been overweight for brief periods of time due to medications and other reasons, but they shed the weight quickly later and don't work at keeping it off. In the absence of medications which cause weight gain, they would have to work as hard at staying overweight as I have to work at staying thin.
  • KateTii
    KateTii Posts: 886 Member
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    I often get told (usually when not eating "bad" foods) "Oh but look at you, you can have it! I shouldn't but i'm going to anyway!" I can't help but think, yes I can "afford" it because I don't have it!

    It also work in reverse, yes I ate two large pizzas (they were *kitten* delicious too) and "Wow, I can't believe how you get to eat all that and stay so skinny!". But what they don't see is how I eat when i'm not enjoying delicious, tasty pizza.
  • pearceflint92
    pearceflint92 Posts: 8 Member
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    EvgeniZyntx wrote: »
    pearceflint92 wrote: »
    Tdee doesn't factor in thyroid problems
    Or hormonal issues. My tdee is 3700 but if I eat over 1500 calories I won't lose weight. I'm 6 ft 5 350 pounds

    Then that's not your TDEE (the 3700). What's calculated from a formulas is an estimate. TDEE means total daily energy expenditure - it is individual and changes daily and depends on your activity - both exercise and non-exercise.

    If you are saying that you have a TDEE of 1500 - the point were you doing gain or lose - I'd suggest that one important factor to change that is that you become more active. Convert your everyday lifestyle to one that requires that you move more. Your TDEE will change.

    Which is also probably a big factor in the OPs sister's life - you say she's sedentary but even with a 9-5 desk job - some people never sit still, are always tapping or twitching and moving about.
    EvgeniZyntx wrote: »
    pearceflint92 wrote: »
    Tdee doesn't factor in thyroid problems
    Or hormonal issues. My tdee is 3700 but if I eat over 1500 calories I won't lose weight. I'm 6 ft 5 350 pounds

    Then that's not your TDEE (the 3700). What's calculated from a formulas is an estimate. TDEE means total daily energy expenditure - it is individual and changes daily and depends on your activity - both exercise and non-exercise.

    If you are saying that you have a TDEE of 1500 - the point were you doing gain or lose - I'd suggest that one important factor to change that is that you become more active. Convert your everyday lifestyle to one that requires that you move more. Your TDEE will change.

    Which is also probably a big factor in the OPs sister's life - you say she's sedentary but even with a 9-5 desk job - some people never sit still, are always tapping or twitching and moving about.

    I do cardio twice a day every day of the week and do gym workouts five days a week. Someone my size with normal testosterone and thyroid levels would have a bmr of 2600 easily but mine is much lower

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