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If a calorie is a calorie, why do we see this?
Replies
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magnusthenerd wrote: »(snip for reply length)
This does remind me though that this morning I saw Menno showing a study that showed on long term predictions of weight maintenance seems to do with variability in weight.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31949298
Menno felt with his clients the less variability in weight, the more the life style they're doing is a maintainable one instead of reactionary.
Reading only the abstract (since the article appears to be behind a paywall): Maintainability, perhaps (which I assume is equivalent to sustainability, in this context?); or perhaps just extent of personal commitment to change at that point. I support the idea of research to substantiate common sense, and this seems like it might be that sort of thing. To put it in MFP-common lingo I don't really believe in, are we saying that people who fall off the wagon more often along the way are less successful in the long run?
This is not a diss of anyone for "lack of commitment", BTW: I've tried to change many times, in many ways. When I decide to change, I change, as long as the relevant factors are under my control. I've often mused about what it is that makes that switch flip: If I could consciously control it completely in all cases, that would be useful. People say all kinds of things about discipline and determination and motivation, but those are somewhat-circular abstractions, IMO, so not very satisfying as explanations.
I'm thinking the fluxation is more a symptom of many possible things than a cause.
Leaving it at falling off the wagon still feels proximal; it feels like it leaves it at willpower. I think the hypothesis Menno would push is the fall offs represents not a lack of will, but setting up changes that use up too much willpower to sustain. Or maybe I'm putting words in Menno's mouth unfairly. I'd say that is how I would hypothesize the study.1 -
Amber_Dawnn wrote: »I was always told to eat more food early in the day and less at dinner so you're not overlapping sleep with digestion.
Unless it causes an individual an actual problem with sleeping, there's no reason to worry about eating a larger meal closer to bedtime. In fact, since full digestion takes about two to five days, most people would be hard pressed to combine adequate nutrition and adequate sleep under this rule.9 -
magnusthenerd wrote: »SnifterPug wrote: »
Why We Eat (Too Much) by Dr Andrew Jenkinson
As for Jekinson, I'm not sure what his book says, but isn't bariatric surgery predicated on the idea that the amount of food matters to weight? Most weight loss surgery causes an inability to take in large amounts of high fiber foods, the ones usually agreed upon as "healthy", good for you, and "necessary" for weight loss by people claiming clean eating is needed, not counting calories.
Jenkinson's book was inspired by the stories of his patients and is not about bariatric surgery (though it touches on the fact that the more modern methods such as the bypass and sleeve) are much more effective long term because they either trigger early release of satiety hormones or remove the cells that secrete ghrelin and thus reduce appetite).
He was struck by how many people tell exactly the same story - namely that they have tried CICO and yoyo dieted for years, and now feel they are useless, have no willpower, and that surgery is the only course left open to them. So he wondered if there is a genetic aspect to obesity (apparently there is) but his main theory is that the body has what he calls a weight set point in terms of how much fat it wants to carry. If you give it the necessary signals then you can affect that set point up or down. The body will ultimately force you to get to its own set point by altering your appetite and metabolism, much as it regulates your water levels by altering thirst and urine production to maintain homeostasis. In the case of a crash dieter the body reckons you are in a famine and if you force your body below its fat storage set point it will learn from that and prepare you better to survive a future famine (by means of laying down even more reserves of fat the minute it has a chance).
There's loads of really interesting stuff in there, including how the food industry has much to answer for, given that the obesity crisis only really kicked off in the 80s after we all started getting told to eat low fat.
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SnifterPug wrote: »[There's loads of really interesting stuff in there, including how the food industry has much to answer for, given that the obesity crisis only really kicked off in the 80s after we all started getting told to eat low fat.
This claim gets repeated a lot, but the problem is that we never really did eat low fat.
What seems to be the case is that whatever the trend is re healthy eating/dieting, the food industry will respond, and people who are deluding themselves with the idea that "low fat" or "low carb" or "no added sugar" or whatever will buy products with labels signaling virtue even where they aren't actually lower cal or particularly nutritious.
I mean, I remember when Snackwells were at their heyday, and I never thought they were anything but junk food or that low fat meant one could eat unlimited amounts without gaining, as some now claim (that was a joke back then as much as now). Nor do I think anyone genuinely thought foods like that (if consumed in large amounts) would make up a filling, nutrient dense diet.
While people go on and on about the evils of assuming low fat would protect you, we now have all sorts of foods like low carb (or, on the other end, vegan) ice cream, Atkins snacks, gluten free desserts, etc. While the vegan and gluten free products are wonderful for those who are ethically vegan or celiac, many likely delude themselves into thinking those are somehow not going to make them fat or are "better" for weight purposes than other such foods even when they are as many cals or more.
Thus, I actually think it's much more not understanding calories than something specific about low fat vs. other ways of eating.
Worth noting that the traditional Japanese diet is quite low fat and did not lead to obesity, for all those claiming that advice to go low fat -- that was not even followed -- is what caused the obesity epidemic.
Not to mention that people were also told, and consistently have been told, to eat more fruits and veg and swap whole grains for refined, and neither of those has happened either.8 -
@lemurcat2 - quite so. And a big nail you have hit the head of, so far as the Jenkins book is concerned, is the word "products". He has a big downer on processed foods (which also mushroomed in the 80s along with all the possibly spurious government health advice).2
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If I remember correctly, "lowfat" was also about Baby Boomers getting into their forties and starting to worry about heart disease. Fat was bad for that. That huge demographic included people who were hitting the natural middle-aged "spread." We were working indoors at desks and driving everywhere and using TV as the leisure activity. Heck, there were even remote controls! What scorcery is this!?
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SnifterPug wrote: »@lemurcat2 - quite so. And a big nail you have hit the head of, so far as the Jenkins book is concerned, is the word "products". He has a big downer on processed foods (which also mushroomed in the 80s along with all the possibly spurious government health advice).
Let me be more pointed, as someone who was alive, adult, and paying attention in the 1980s: It wasn't about processed food per se, or about government advice, in the 80s, it was about behavior.
The 1980s also saw the rise of the internet, increased workplace and home automation, increased ubiquity of prepared convenience food available 24/7 with negligible effort, a boom in screen-based entertainment options' popularity (gaming, burgeoning cable TV choices, computer), increased portion sizes, changes in social behavior regarding things like carrying an XL sugared drink around to sip steadily, and much more.
On average, it takes something like 200 calories per person per day above maintenance to explain the obesity crisis, and that can be a combination of reduced activity and increased eating.
There was processed food before 1980. That got rolling in the 1940s-50s, and kept growing. The inflection point in the population bodyweight curve in the 1980s is all about eating more (of anything and everything) and moving less.
It's facile to blame the government or food companies, but we demonstrably ignore the government advice, and the food companies only give us what we vote with our dollars to tell them we want. If single-serve, organic, calorie-appropriate ecologically-packaged roasted Brussels sprouts were what we voted for, they'd be available in every drive-through and convenience store everywhere, and food companies would be falling all over themselves to make their brand the most cost-effective and the top of consumer taste tests. We prefer soda, cookies, burgers, fries, coffee-spiked hot milkshakes and candy.
Walt Kelly's Pogo said it best (though in a different context): "We have met the enemy, and he is us."15 -
There's a misnomer I don't like there. A lot of people tend to use CICO and calorie counting interchangeably, which makes understanding where they are wrong is at. CICO is how all weight loss happens - arguably not in the case of water or limbs lost, but if someone wants to raise that kind of pedantry, I'll double down on the pedantry with those things do contain calories too. So people that literally argue against CICO think perpetual motion machines are real and the human body is one.SnifterPug wrote: »magnusthenerd wrote: »SnifterPug wrote: »
Why We Eat (Too Much) by Dr Andrew Jenkinson
As for Jekinson, I'm not sure what his book says, but isn't bariatric surgery predicated on the idea that the amount of food matters to weight? Most weight loss surgery causes an inability to take in large amounts of high fiber foods, the ones usually agreed upon as "healthy", good for you, and "necessary" for weight loss by people claiming clean eating is needed, not counting calories.
Jenkinson's book was inspired by the stories of his patients and is not about bariatric surgery (though it touches on the fact that the more modern methods such as the bypass and sleeve) are much more effective long term because they either trigger early release of satiety hormones or remove the cells that secrete ghrelin and thus reduce appetite).
He was struck by how many people tell exactly the same story - namely that they have tried CICO and yoyo dieted for years, and now feel they are useless, have no willpower, and that surgery is the only course left open to them. So he wondered if there is a genetic aspect to obesity (apparently there is) but his main theory is that the body has what he calls a weight set point in terms of how much fat it wants to carry. If you give it the necessary signals then you can affect that set point up or down. The body will ultimately force you to get to its own set point by altering your appetite and metabolism, much as it regulates your water levels by altering thirst and urine production to maintain homeostasis. In the case of a crash dieter the body reckons you are in a famine and if you force your body below its fat storage set point it will learn from that and prepare you better to survive a future famine (by means of laying down even more reserves of fat the minute it has a chance).
There's loads of really interesting stuff in there, including how the food industry has much to answer for, given that the obesity crisis only really kicked off in the 80s after we all started getting told to eat low fat.
Calorie counting, done correctly, will become CICO. We humans tend to be poor at the counting when starting, and we never get as good as a metabolic ward or some doubly labeled water.
I think setpoint is a fair enough approximation for what a combination of the hormone systems and environment plus habits do when we look at hunger. It doesn't work when the theory is some vague hand waving that accepts people are generating energy from nowhere, which I think some people need to clarify it is not what they mean. I think people avoid admitting they don't mean that in some cases because they don't want to be forced into admitting the observed failures of "CICO" are really just cases of people failing at calorie counting. I think that comes from the idea that people view failures of calorie counting as some kind of competence or moral failing, which is a bit unfair burden to put on themselves or others. I believe that we'd get a lot further at treating and understanding the obesity crisis if we avoided worrying about blame on a personal level - it ironically pushes people away from understanding the things that will actually let them fix it.13 -
magnusthenerd wrote: »
There's a misnomer I don't like there. A lot of people tend to use CICO and calorie counting interchangeably, which makes understanding where they are wrong is at. CICO is how all weight loss happens - arguably not in the case of water or limbs lost, but if someone wants to raise that kind of pedantry, I'll double down on the pedantry with those things do contain calories too. So people that literally argue against CICO think perpetual motion machines are real and the human body is one.SnifterPug wrote: »magnusthenerd wrote: »SnifterPug wrote: »
Why We Eat (Too Much) by Dr Andrew Jenkinson
As for Jekinson, I'm not sure what his book says, but isn't bariatric surgery predicated on the idea that the amount of food matters to weight? Most weight loss surgery causes an inability to take in large amounts of high fiber foods, the ones usually agreed upon as "healthy", good for you, and "necessary" for weight loss by people claiming clean eating is needed, not counting calories.
Jenkinson's book was inspired by the stories of his patients and is not about bariatric surgery (though it touches on the fact that the more modern methods such as the bypass and sleeve) are much more effective long term because they either trigger early release of satiety hormones or remove the cells that secrete ghrelin and thus reduce appetite).
He was struck by how many people tell exactly the same story - namely that they have tried CICO and yoyo dieted for years, and now feel they are useless, have no willpower, and that surgery is the only course left open to them. So he wondered if there is a genetic aspect to obesity (apparently there is) but his main theory is that the body has what he calls a weight set point in terms of how much fat it wants to carry. If you give it the necessary signals then you can affect that set point up or down. The body will ultimately force you to get to its own set point by altering your appetite and metabolism, much as it regulates your water levels by altering thirst and urine production to maintain homeostasis. In the case of a crash dieter the body reckons you are in a famine and if you force your body below its fat storage set point it will learn from that and prepare you better to survive a future famine (by means of laying down even more reserves of fat the minute it has a chance).
There's loads of really interesting stuff in there, including how the food industry has much to answer for, given that the obesity crisis only really kicked off in the 80s after we all started getting told to eat low fat.
Calorie counting, done correctly, will become CICO. We humans tend to be poor at the counting when starting, and we never get as good as a metabolic ward or some doubly labeled water.
I think setpoint is a fair enough approximation for what a combination of the hormone systems and environment plus habits do when we look at hunger. It doesn't work when the theory is some vague hand waving that accepts people are generating energy from nowhere, which I think some people need to clarify it is not what they mean. I think people avoid admitting they don't mean that in some cases because they don't want to be forced into admitting the observed failures of "CICO" are really just cases of people failing at calorie counting. I think that comes from the idea that people view failures of calorie counting as some kind of competence or moral failing, which is a bit unfair burden to put on themselves or others. I believe that we'd get a lot further at treating and understanding the obesity crisis if we avoided worrying about blame on a personal level - it ironically pushes people away from understanding the things that will actually let them fix it.
Oh, man: That knife-edge between feeling personal blame, and taking personal responsibility!
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Well, this is a preliminary study of 93 females with average BMI ~30. They were split into two groups and tracked for 12 weeks. The "big breakfast" group lost more weight than the "big dinner" group. I note that, due to the difficulties of logging, you can't be sure that the "big breakfast" group didn't just plain eat less overall than the "big dinner" group.
Preliminary studies such as these are very important for scientific progress, but larger
Also, never confuse the mean with the individual: If you don't seem to mind skipping breakfast and it helps you lose weight, you should still do that.3 -
cmriverside wrote: »If I remember correctly, "lowfat" was also about Baby Boomers getting into their forties and starting to worry about heart disease. Fat was bad for that. That huge demographic included people who were hitting the natural middle-aged "spread." We were working indoors at desks and driving everywhere and using TV as the leisure activity. Heck, there were even remote controls! What scorcery is this!?
As I recall, when we got the remote control it was constantly disappearing much like the occasional single sock from the dryer. My dad was constantly convinced someone took or hid it. I consider that some kind of jokster sorcerer, for sure.0 -
What did they do after eating? Resting calorie burn? Too many unaddressed variables to say why and that render the study pretty much useless.1
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SnifterPug wrote: »@lemurcat2 - quite so. And a big nail you have hit the head of, so far as the Jenkins book is concerned, is the word "products". He has a big downer on processed foods (which also mushroomed in the 80s along with all the possibly spurious government health advice).
Let me be more pointed, as someone who was alive, adult, and paying attention in the 1980s: It wasn't about processed food per se, or about government advice, in the 80s, it was about behavior.
The 1980s also saw the rise of the internet, increased workplace and home automation, increased ubiquity of prepared convenience food available 24/7 with negligible effort, a boom in screen-based entertainment options' popularity (gaming, burgeoning cable TV choices, computer), increased portion sizes, changes in social behavior regarding things like carrying an XL sugared drink around to sip steadily, and much more.
On average, it takes something like 200 calories per person per day above maintenance to explain the obesity crisis, and that can be a combination of reduced activity and increased eating.
There was processed food before 1980. That got rolling in the 1940s-50s, and kept growing. The inflection point in the population bodyweight curve in the 1980s is all about eating more (of anything and everything) and moving less.
It's facile to blame the government or food companies, but we demonstrably ignore the government advice, and the food companies only give us what we vote with our dollars to tell them we want. If single-serve, organic, calorie-appropriate ecologically-packaged roasted Brussels sprouts were what we voted for, they'd be available in every drive-through and convenience store everywhere, and food companies would be falling all over themselves to make their brand the most cost-effective and the top of consumer taste tests. We prefer soda, cookies, burgers, fries, coffee-spiked hot milkshakes and candy.
Walt Kelly's Pogo said it best (though in a different context): "We have met the enemy, and he is us."
I can't love this post enough... BRAVO!5 -
SnifterPug wrote: »magnusthenerd wrote: »SnifterPug wrote: »
Why We Eat (Too Much) by Dr Andrew Jenkinson
As for Jekinson, I'm not sure what his book says, but isn't bariatric surgery predicated on the idea that the amount of food matters to weight? Most weight loss surgery causes an inability to take in large amounts of high fiber foods, the ones usually agreed upon as "healthy", good for you, and "necessary" for weight loss by people claiming clean eating is needed, not counting calories.
Jenkinson's book was inspired by the stories of his patients and is not about bariatric surgery (though it touches on the fact that the more modern methods such as the bypass and sleeve) are much more effective long term because they either trigger early release of satiety hormones or remove the cells that secrete ghrelin and thus reduce appetite).
He was struck by how many people tell exactly the same story - namely that they have tried CICO and yoyo dieted for years, and now feel they are useless, have no willpower, and that surgery is the only course left open to them. So he wondered if there is a genetic aspect to obesity (apparently there is) but his main theory is that the body has what he calls a weight set point in terms of how much fat it wants to carry. If you give it the necessary signals then you can affect that set point up or down. The body will ultimately force you to get to its own set point by altering your appetite and metabolism, much as it regulates your water levels by altering thirst and urine production to maintain homeostasis. In the case of a crash dieter the body reckons you are in a famine and if you force your body below its fat storage set point it will learn from that and prepare you better to survive a future famine (by means of laying down even more reserves of fat the minute it has a chance).
There's loads of really interesting stuff in there, including how the food industry has much to answer for, given that the obesity crisis only really kicked off in the 80s after we all started getting told to eat low fat.
I've read Jenkinson's book - I found it quite well-researched and persuasive. I'm using some of the steps it suggests now, like avoiding sugar, considering the glycemic load each time I eat (which is basically ensuring that I never eat carbs on their own but always with some protein of some sort), and getting a handle on the Omega 3/6 ratio in the fats I consume. It seems to be helping, and I have to say avoiding sugar has resulted in a significant improvement in my day to day energy levels. All in all, I would say his book is worth a read.2 -
Amber_Dawnn wrote: »I was always told to eat more food early in the day and less at dinner so you're not overlapping sleep with digestion.
Well it turns out that those who told you so might be *correct*, even if the reason might not be.
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How so?1
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Amber_Dawnn wrote: »I was always told to eat more food early in the day and less at dinner so you're not overlapping sleep with digestion.
Well it turns out that those who told you so might be *correct*, even if the reason might not be.
There's nothing correct about the idea that sleep and digestion shouldn't happen at the same time. In fact, as you're ignoring, it's already been pointed out that this would be pretty much impossible, as digestion takes place over a few days and humans require sleep and food on a schedule that would make separation of the two impossible.9 -
janejellyroll wrote: »Amber_Dawnn wrote: »I was always told to eat more food early in the day and less at dinner so you're not overlapping sleep with digestion.
Well it turns out that those who told you so might be *correct*, even if the reason might not be.
There's nothing correct about the idea that sleep and digestion shouldn't happen at the same time. In fact, as you're ignoring, it's already been pointed out that this would be pretty much impossible, as digestion takes place over a few days and humans require sleep and food on a schedule that would make separation of the two impossible.
well, I wouldn't say impossible but certainly improbable, uncomfortable, and unhealthy. That would be some extreme version of IF, though!2 -
janejellyroll wrote: »Amber_Dawnn wrote: »I was always told to eat more food early in the day and less at dinner so you're not overlapping sleep with digestion.
Well it turns out that those who told you so might be *correct*, even if the reason might not be.
There's nothing correct about the idea that sleep and digestion shouldn't happen at the same time. In fact, as you're ignoring, it's already been pointed out that this would be pretty much impossible, as digestion takes place over a few days and humans require sleep and food on a schedule that would make separation of the two impossible.
What? Clearly all of your body's vital functions stop when you sleep and you are temporarily dead. Next you'll say your heartbeat continues.
Or you'll say off the wall things like the majority of your calories are burned during sleep.
Or that things like lack of stuff to digest actually causes issues with staying asleep for lean people dieting like bodybuilders.
Or something like the kidneys and bladder keep functioning, which obviously no one has proof of because no one ever wakes up feeling like they done any work.
Clearly digestion is just an on/off switch like all lights are, and sleep is the off position.20 -
bmeadows380 wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »Amber_Dawnn wrote: »I was always told to eat more food early in the day and less at dinner so you're not overlapping sleep with digestion.
Well it turns out that those who told you so might be *correct*, even if the reason might not be.
There's nothing correct about the idea that sleep and digestion shouldn't happen at the same time. In fact, as you're ignoring, it's already been pointed out that this would be pretty much impossible, as digestion takes place over a few days and humans require sleep and food on a schedule that would make separation of the two impossible.
well, I wouldn't say impossible but certainly improbable, uncomfortable, and unhealthy. That would be some extreme version of IF and prolonged periods of sleeplessness, though!
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