Do you believe in high metabolisms?

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Oishii
Oishii Posts: 2,675 Member
in Motivation and Support
My dad watched a TV program that basically suggested that high and low metabolisms don't exist, as they tracked someone who thought she had a low metabolism and just found she over-reported exercise and under-reported her food intake. Now, for me, one example proves nothing, but my dad just keeps going on about calories in v. calories out, as if everyone who needs more/less food is simply moving more or less, or kidding themselves.

I've read too that a fast metabolism is just when someone is fidgety and burns calories that way. Or is a 'high metabolism' just a sign that someone eats foods that the body requires more energy to process, such as fibre or protein?

So, what do you think? Is there such thing as a high metabolism?
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Replies

  • edorice
    edorice Posts: 4,519 Member
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    Yes, I believe that some people have high and more efficient metabolism. We all process food differently. Some people are more sensitive to processed sugars than others. Some people do very well and a vegetarian diet and others do better on a diet with higher protein. We all come from different regions, backgrounds, and ancestry. It's not all about calories in and calories out. He needs to get out of the dark ages.
  • LilianaGarciia
    LilianaGarciia Posts: 146 Member
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    i always just thought that a high metebolism is when somebody can eat and eat and eat and still look like a twig! <3
  • skinnyhappy
    skinnyhappy Posts: 152 Member
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    My husband is probably 5'8" or 5'9" and he weighs only 130lb (cue me eternally fussing over my weight so I can be smaller than he is). Anyway, he eats WHATEVER HE WANTS ALL OF THE TIME. And nothing happens. Nothing. If he works out at all, he's STARVING and can't seem to get enough to eat. So yeah, I live with a depressingly fast metabolism. I, on the other hand, can eat a piece of cake and notice it the next day. Or that's how it feels, anyway!
  • jenc79
    jenc79 Posts: 16 Member
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    Things like thyroid problems can affect your metabolism, and muscle and fat have different metabolic rates, so yes there will be a variation dependant on things like body fat %

    I agree there's a lot of misreporting though - why being able to write everything down works so well
  • skinnyhappy
    skinnyhappy Posts: 152 Member
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    Yes, I believe that some people have high and more efficient metabolism. We all process food differently. Some people are more sensitive to processed sugars than others. Some people do very well and a vegetarian diet and others do better on a diet with higher protein. We all come from different regions, backgrounds, and ancestry. It's not all about calories in and calories out. He needs to get out of the dark ages.

    This is perfect, I can't eat meat with the exception of fish every now and again. My body reacts well to no meat! My husband, however, HAS to eat meat...no amount of whey protein, beans, even fish will help quell his strong desire for red meat protein.
  • Teeladog
    Teeladog Posts: 157 Member
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    I think so. Or, to rephrase that, I think that all people are different and their bodies process what they put in them differently (withing certain parameters, of course). I am pretty sure that I have a higher than average metabolism, for example. I have a pretty active lifestyle and I try to account for that on my base numbers for MFP. I also add in all my exercise and eat ALL my exercise calories back. And I think in the 50 days I have been on here I have been under my calories maybe one or two days - most of the time I am over by a couple of hundred and sometimes WAAAAAY over that. And, with the exception of my birthday week when I ate way bad, I have lost over a lb. every week (and that week I maintained). I suppose I could be miscalculating my calories burned or my calories eaten but it seems to me that I just burn more calories than the "typical" person on which this site is based.

    Not that I am complaining about it though.
  • baisleac
    baisleac Posts: 2,019 Member
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    Yes! My uncle had a desk job (he's retired now). Eats a big steak & egg breakfast with toast. Has 3 or 4 sandwiches with a full size bag of chips and a full package of oreos (or other premade cookie) for lunch. Snacks all day. Goes home and has a huge meat and potato dinner. Loves his beer. 6' 6" tall never has broken the 180 lb mark but is strong as all get out... and wiry.
  • circusmom
    circusmom Posts: 662 Member
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    I don't know about high vs low, but I do know my metabolism slowed down after I hit 40, damn it!
  • bunchesonothing
    bunchesonothing Posts: 1,015 Member
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    I do believe in a quicker metabolism. I'm not fidgety. I am pretty busy, but so are other people.... and some of them are overweight.

    When I started on here, it put me on a 1200 a day allowance to lose .5 lbs a week. I did my best to eat my exercise calories. At first, I even counted the basic stuff, like housework as exercise. Again, I ate those calories. When I did that, I lost about a lb a week. According to my job, and everyone else on this site, I am sedentary and had it marked as so.

    When I bumped up my activity level 2 notches, and gave myself more calories to eat daily, THEN I finally started losing .5 a week.

    When I was younger I had the hardest time gaining weight...

    EDIT: And when I was in loss mode, I was only 120lbs trying to take it to 110. I'm 5'2", so I'm small.
  • edorice
    edorice Posts: 4,519 Member
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    I don't know about high vs low, but I do know my metabolism slowed down after I hit 40, damn it!

    It's like running up an escalator that is going downward.
  • Chemmy
    Chemmy Posts: 23
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    I watched a BBC program on YouTube called "How to be slim" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSm1dWjMGeM&amp;

    There were two women within the program, one who could eat anything and stay thin, the other was overweight. The thinner person thought she had a faster metabolism but it turned out the larger woman had the faster metabolism. The reason is explained in the program along with a lot of interesting facts.

    It's an interesting program if you have a spare hour to watch all the parts.

    And circusmom I know what you are talking about :sad:
  • taso42_DELETED
    taso42_DELETED Posts: 3,394 Member
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    I once read that the difference between a "high" and "low" metabolism is very small, like 50-100 calories/day.
  • Oishii
    Oishii Posts: 2,675 Member
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    I think my dad and I both have pretty high metabolisms. I'm 5"4', about 120 lbs, and my maintenance calories are about 2200-2300, I think. I keep thinking that would be impossible to maintain in the 'wild', surely, so maybe I'm 'designed' to be far skinnier than I've ever chosen to be.

    I think that by clinging to the calories in v. calories out, my dad gets to feel superior, as if he must be trying hard to stay in shape if he is in shape. On the other hand, when a friend hit a plateau and I suggested more fibre, she came off that plateau... I dunno!
  • Pangui
    Pangui Posts: 373 Member
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    From my experience over the past 8 weeks, I believe that not all calories are the same. I joined MFP and I set the program to lose a pound a week, slow and steady. After a few weeks of losing at that rate, I changed over to a whole foods plant-based diet. It was a LOT more food, but the SAME amount of calories. I immediately noticed that when I avoided fat and focused on high-nutrient dense foods, my metabolism kicked into a higher gear. I am now consuming the same amount of calories per day, about 1700, yet I am losing 2+ pounds per week. The best part is that I feel fantastic and enjoy my food more than ever.
  • zeeeb
    zeeeb Posts: 805 Member
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    I totally agree that some people don't put on weight as easily as others. but it's many things that contribute to that (food intake, body type, height).

    For me, i can work my butt off at the gym, but won't see significant changes unless i drastically change my diet, where as some people seem to be able to eat pretty much what they like if they exercise a few times a week.

    i know i have a healthy appetite, but i feel that i work really physically alot harder at the gym than many people who seem to be flouncing about doing not too much, while i'm cranking it up to number 14 on the cross trainer, they are prissing about at level 2....
  • UpToAnyCool
    UpToAnyCool Posts: 1,673
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    I don't know about high vs low, but I do know my metabolism slowed down after I hit 40, damn it!

    It's like running up an escalator that is going downward.

    ^ BUT EXACTLY!!! :laugh: :explode: My goal is to increase lean muscle mass to increase metabolism...
  • Oishii
    Oishii Posts: 2,675 Member
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    I watched a BBC program on YouTube called "How to be slim" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSm1dWjMGeM&amp;

    There were two women within the program, one who could eat anything and stay thin, the other was overweight. The thinner person thought she had a faster metabolism but it turned out the larger woman had the faster metabolism. The reason is explained in the program along with a lot of interesting facts.

    It's an interesting program if you have a spare hour to watch all the parts.

    And circusmom I know what you are talking about :sad:

    Maybe this is what my dad watched! I'll have to watch it now!
  • fromaquasar
    fromaquasar Posts: 811 Member
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    There are medical measures of a metabolism..... That rank it as higher or lower. My boyfriend studies science and medicine and they have just finished doing a whole series of labs on it. In this test they basically consume a track-able substance and then see how long it takes the body to move it through to useage or waste and then there is an alogrithm that takes into account various factors to produce a metabolic rate ranking.

    So yes - you definitely can have a high metabolism or a low one.

    My boyfriend has an extremely high metabolism. He eats like a horse and struggles to weigh 65 kilos. In the test he ranks several points above average so it is safe to say that on both anecdotal evidence ("I eat lots and weigh little") and medical proof he has a high metabolism. This isn't him kidding himself it is a fact.

    I think the issue is when people self diagnose. Like people who say they are celiac because they get bloated after eating bread but have never actually been tested by a doctor. So people make assumptions or infer things when really it is because of other reasons. It means that the validity of anyone talking about metabolic rate is decreased.
  • DeeDeeLHF
    DeeDeeLHF Posts: 2,301 Member
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    Loved watching this! Very engaging!!

    D
  • Oishii
    Oishii Posts: 2,675 Member
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    Just watched the film. I'm pretty sure it is what my dad watched. It made it hard for him to believe me when I said how much I was eating, although he's mainly supportive of my using mfp. He just thinks I must be eating less than I think:grumble:

    Great film, in general, but what about those people who really do eat a lot? I didn't think I ate that much until I started mfp, but I really do. The mystery to me is how I ever became overweight...

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