Freeman Hunt said:
[I]t ... comes down to math... There is no mystery to getting in shape.
Noumenon said:
I think it's a complete mystery. As some magazine article I read pointed out, it's impossible to do controlled experiments with diet regimens because there's no proven way to lose weight and keep it off to use as a control group. We haven't a clue.
I said:
I agree that it's a mystery, but you can extract one truth: if you're still fat, you need to eat less. It doesn't matter why other people don't get fat when they seem to eat the same thing. Look at your own situation. If you're still fat, cut down. Eat less, and weigh yourself. Do it every day for the rest of your life. There's nothing wrong with you. It's just the natural impulse that allowed your ancestors to survive through famines. You have a healthy urge and a healthy body, but in times of affluence, that will make you fat. You've got to go against your nature and eat less. Until you're not fat any more. Or, as Roseanne Barr once said: "Just be fat and shut up."UPDATE: Some people are getting very upset at that Roseanne Barr quote -- which is from that great concert she did before she had her sitcom. It's almost as if people don't remember that she's a comedian... and that she's fat. Some folks are reading this post as insulting fat people and calling them lazy. Huh? Where is that? And many, many of the comments here and on other blogs are testament to how amazingly strong the mental defenses are. People simply do not want to face the fact that if they are fat they've been eating too much, which is all I said. It is utterly irrelevant to that point that some people can eat a lot more than others without getting fat or that if you'd exercise more you could get away with eating more. If you are fat, you are eating more than you need to fuel your body as you are using it. That doesn't mean it's easy to just eat less, and it doesn't mean that there aren't some ways of eating less that are better than others. But, good lord, it's absurd to keep denying that you're fat because you're eating too much!
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The problem with just "eating less" is that another human survival instinct might kick in: Fear of starvation. If a person eats less thinking that they will lose weight, but also fears that they won't become full or satisfied, and that they will have to go hungry, then they will, at some point, start binge eating. You can't disregard the psychological impact of eating. It's not easy enough just to say "I'm going to eat less", if you also think that eating less means going hungry.
I didn't say it was easy. I just said it was true and that you'd have to go against your nature. Of course, nature is trying to keep you from starving and there's no way to tell "it" the facts, which is that there's plenty of food around here and there always will be.
"...you can extract one truth: if you're still fat, you need to eat less."
But that isn't true. Eat more -- more calories, more nutritious calories, more times per day. Now become more active and use your stored body fat for two purposes: as perfect fuel for your muscles and as weight for resistance exercises. Do your resistance excercises 2 or 3 times per week, get enough sleep, and your muscles will grow. Muscle fibers burn stored body fat even while you sleep. The secret isn't in eating less; it's in moving more.
And for those over 40, remember -- no pain; no pain.
Meade is right. Although some people do need to eat less and most need to eat more healthy, the most important thing is exercise. If you're exercising a lot and get yourself into that kind of mindset, you start to view food as fuel. You pick your meal based on whether it will get you through the next workout.
It's not *just* eat less. It's eat less, move more.
Ugh....
I spent too many years overweight and was surrounded by this advice from articles, friends and DOCTORS.
If you've gained weight suddenly-and you just can't lose it give yourself half a chance and see an endocrinologist.
There are diseases that effect the metabolic rate and they ar becoming more and more common it seems like.
That is the problem with just eating less - your body goes into "starvation" mode. Worse, most people dieting go off their diets after awhile. They may get bored, or may have hit their weight target. The problem is that when your body is trained this way, you will pack it back on in short order, as your body prepares for the next famine.
You need exercise to lose weight, but not just aerobic exercise, but also exercise that builds (preferably) muscle. One of the big problems with putting on weight as we age is that our metabolisms slow down - but they do that primarily because we lose muscle mass - approximately 10% per decade, unless we work hard at maintaining that.
Meade is right that exercise is good for weight control - but as my doctor said last month "We both know you should exercise, but we also know you can't. I don't quite know what to tell you."
Oh, and another qute for you if you are collecting, from Victor Buono: "I am not overweight, I am underheight. My weight is perfect for a man of seven foot ten inches."
Exercise, or at least physical activity, is really the key. It takes care of the starvation response, but I think it also tends to regulate your appetite without you having to think about it.
Once I began working out really regularly (I've always tended towards scrawny-with-an-inner-tube rathter than 'fat') I found that my appetite more or less naturally fluctuated with the amount of activity I was getting. If I went on vacation and didn't work out for several days, I just didn't feel like eating as much, and when I started back at the weight room, I wanted to eat everything in sight.
Everybody has an opinion on diets , exercise etc. - but the interventions to lose weight still don't work when scientifically controlled...
The tough thing is that you can't give-up eating like you can give up smoking or alchol - you have to keep eating, three times a day for the rest of your life, and you have to control it.
That really is tough - dieting is like making an alcoholic take a shot of whisky three times a day, but he has to voluntarily stop drinking after just that one shot - yet you expect him not to lose control, keep drinking and relapse into alcoholism...
I agree with mike that adding moderate exercise to your diet is probably all most people need. One of the reasons Americans are so fat is that we tend to have an incredibly sedentary lifestyle, working behind a desk all day, rarely walking even small distances if driving is an option, increasingly opting for sedentary leisure activities like video games, TV and other media rather than athletics. I don't think there's any reason to attach moral guilt with being fat and/or sedentary, but I also think "its the way I was born and I can't do anything about it" is a cop-out. Be fat if you value the pleasures of food and a sedentary lifestyle over thinness or optimal physical health, but don't pretend you're helpless to do anything about it.
"If you're still fat, cut down. Eat less, and weigh yourself. Do it every day for the rest of your life."
Terrible advice for weight loss!
Weighing yourself every day is the surest way to get discouraged and start a cycle of starving yourself and then bingeing in a moment of weakness. Choosing simply to eat less is the second surest way. Combine those two and yikes!
You aren't asking overweight people to deny their own nature, specifically the part of their nature that made them fat, you're asking them to deny HUMAN nature. You may as well say:
"Run/walk a marathon every day. You'll be sore and tired, but igonre your nature, and you'll lose the weight."
I think weighing yourself everyday is particularly important once you reach your goal weight. Keeps those extra pounds from creeping up on you.
I weigh myself every day at home. I just got back from a six week sojourn and I think I only weighed myself two or three times over that entire period. According to the scale this morning, I didn't gain (or lose) anything.
I know some people who freak out when they weigh themselves, so they limit it to once a week. I know more people like me, who need to be nudged into reality with that daily check.
I've heard anecdotally from many, many people that their metabolisms just slow to a crawl if they restrict calories too much, even if they are getting moderate exercise. My sisters have both experienced having to eat more, and more regularly, to lose weight.
It's complicated, that's for sure.
I feel the need to exercise, but for my health, not my weight. If I got on a regular routine, I wouldn't give a damn if I lost weight, gained weight, or stayed the same. I tried eating less for years, and didn't lose a pound, so to hell with that!
Mike,
Wighing yourself every day is the problem. Once a week or couple weeks i enough. Doing it every day is inaccurate, first of all, but more important it leads to impatience and frustration. On a reasonable diet losing a couple of pounds a week is a lot, and weighing yourself every day makes that seem like a failure.
Plut there are other, healthier ways to measure progress, such as simply seeing if your clothes fit looser, if belts can be notched a bit better. These are actually more accurate, since the goal of most diets is actually to lose fat, as opposed to muscle.
Once you're happy with your weight I think it is good to weigh yourself every day, just as a habit, so that weight gain can't sneak up on you.
Cheers!
The Eskimos......
But, they didn't/don't have the pollution that we have, to deal with.
Pollutants and toxins that are stored in the fat.
If you live in a polluted, toxin-rich environment, it's easier for your body to deal with that if you are thin.
Back in the 1950s etc... it was a cleaner environment, and you could be fat without the side effects, mysterious symptoms cropping up out of nowhere.
Easier to deal with if you're are thin.
Don't the Eskimos live in a pretty clean environment?
Peace, Maxine
Just as a general guideline, most women won't go into starvation mode as long as they're eating at least 1200 calories. For most men it's about 1800.
In any case, eating less isn't always the end of the world. For plenty of people, eating less can mean as little as switching to diet soda and cutting out the daily candybar or potato chips. Having a daily 500 calorie deficit (about the equivalent of a 20 oz. Coke and a Snickers bar) isn't too difficult for someone who is significantly overweight, especially if he starts exercising, and it comes out to about a pound of weightloss each week.
Dannynoonan is right.
I've had diabetes since I was about 11. I had to learn to count carbohydrates very early on (like 16 years ago) to balance my intake of food (fuel) with my intake of insulin (which allows my body to use the fuel). I took nutrition courses in university. I'm also a cyclist. Bottom line is, I'm tuned in to the whole weight management and healthy living thing.
I'm going to share the secret to maintaining a healthy weight. It's easy, but requires some math.
There are four nutrients: fat (9 calories/gram), protein (4 calories/gram), carbohydrates (4 calories/gram), and alcohol (7 calories/gram). The bottom line is, if you take in more nutrients than you burn, you will store the excess as fat. It's how your body works - and your body actually needs a balance of fats, protein, and carbohydrates to function properly.
Balancing your fuel intake and how much fuel you burn is the only trick to maintaining a healthy weight (which doesn't necessarily mean skinny!). It's not easy in the beginning, but if you incorporate it into your life, you will reap the benefits.
Saying eat less, is easy for people who get to eat as much as they want...just saying "eat less" is not really an answer it's more a copout that lets those who are thin without much effort feel morally superior
There *are* some people who stay skinny with very little effort. But there are a LOT of people who you just *think* come by it easily.
I can't count the number of times fat people say things to me like oh, you can eat that, you don't have to worry about getting fat. Riiiiiight. My weight has nothing to do with the fact that I DON'T and WON'T eat crap. I'm just a ninny who doesn't eat things that I *can* eat.
Noumenon - Freeman Hunt already made this point, but eat less doesn't necessarily mean put less bites in your mouth. It can - and probably usually does - mean eat less calories. Drink water not soda. Eat a carrot not a candy bar. Eat two servings of vegetables and one starch with each meal. Eat more vegetables, less dessert. Etc...
Since I am (too) thin, I'm probably in no position ot answer this, but this being the blogosphere, I will anyways.
I think one important thing is no matter if you eat more or less, to eat consistently. Otherwise the body will just pack on fat to survive what it thinks is unstable food environment.
You don't need to exercise to lose weight - if your body is burning 2000 calories a day, and you eat 1500, you will lose weight. The question is, what kind of weight? If you want to lose fat an retain muscle mass, you need to exercise.
Jeepers Ann, it sounds like you think all overweight people are lazy ane have no self control.
There are medical conditions that can contribute, in fact, some medications make you gain weight regardless of what you do or how you eat.
I am a little insulted, and very disappointed in you.
Yeah, people like to explain weight issues so easily - I think that naturally thin people enjoy giving themselves backhanded compliments for having so much "self-control" or whatever concerning food.
I am "thin" by most people's so-called standards, yet my weight fluctuates constantly - ten pounds up or down, no matter what I eat or how I exercise. This is maddening, because I'd like to make sense of it all, but I cannot seem to correlate it to any food or exercise patterns. It just happens.....
I heard a cool comeback line once about how if someone is fat, they always have the potential to lose weight - but an ugly person has no possibility of reprieve. Poor them.
Beth: It's just not true that I'm saying it's easy. Try to reread what I said without feeling too defensive. I think the whole issue of exercise is bogus. You need to eat less, a lot less, until you lose the weight. And it's not easy. In fact, it's most likely you'll fail. But the fact is, there's a lot of talk, and a lot of defensiveness and detail and emphasis on exercise, but the truth is that it's really about eating less, a lot less, until you lose the weight. I realize it's hard, but that doesn't make it not the truth.
The question is, Ann, why do you care whether anyone else is overweight anyway?
If you don't care, why spend time telling other people how to lose weight (as if they didn't know, anyway)?
Have you considered the sometimes "eat less" doesn't do a thing? You know, some people eat tons of food--fatty junk food, even--and don't gain a pound, even without exercise. It is NOT as simple as you make it out to be.
Weigh yourself every day? I couldn't disagree more. I haven't voluntarily stepped on a scale in at least 20 years, and I weigh 20 pounds less than I did then. I think obsessing about weight is not only counterproductive, it adds unnecessary worry, which is also bad for your health.
And to be perfectly honest, Ann, seeing people write about others being fat and tell them to eat less/quit being lazy/whatever really chaps my ass. You must not see how incredibly arrogant it looks.
Beth (a different Beth from the one above)
PIMF.
"the sometimes "eat less" doesn't do"
s/b
"that sometimes..."
Are you actually promoting starvaion and obsessive weight checking? Because frankly, that's what it looks like. And those are two of the major symptoms of Anorexia Nervosa.
Funny how it's really not that simple.
Oh and BTW, I don't hear the fat people flapping their traps, just you.
Ann I have never heard of you before, but t hat is OK you have never heard of me either.
I just want to tell you how wrong you are giving this kind of advice. Ask any bodybuilder what they eat, how they diet and they will tell you Ann that it is small meals every three to four hours and exercise.
You recommend eating less, a lot less. You are promoting starving and that is never good. If a person were to follow what you said, they would gain every pound back after they lost weight once they went back to any kind of NORMAL eating.
Eating small frequent meals tells your body it is getting fuel and then it lets go of fat much easier and in a healthy way.
And IF a person is able to exercise they SHOULD. Not only to get weight off but for their heart and to be healthy. Our bodies were designed for exercise they were NOT designed to sit around at a keyboard 24/7.
When a person ages the muscles in the legs and the heart are two very important muscle areas. The legs get weaker with age and to exercise keeps them strong. Have you not seen old people shuffle when they walk? Many times it is because they did NOT exercise in life and are paying the price in their old age.
It is NOT eating less at all, it is eating the right foods and yes exercise.
You state this...."but in times of affluence, that will make you fat."......wrong again. There are many more people that are fat that are in the medium tax and lesser tax bracket then the affluent.
Why? Because they are holding down sometimes 2 jobs and do not have time to exercise, and their diet is a high fat diet for energy which keeps them fat.
Then there are people on medication. Medication can really mess with ones body. Pain pills, anti- bionics etc. can mess with metabolism, surgery as well. Surgery is a HUGE thing that mess with ones metabolism for a long time. Read about it!
The only other thing I want to say is that I could care less if a friend is fat, thin or exercises. I care much more what kind of person that they are on the inside. Other then health reasons our society is way too obsessed with appearance and it makes me sick!
Please stop telling people to eat less. I am shocked to read that from anyone that has even a small level of intelligence.
Have you never met a person that eats one meal a day and maybe one snack and is fat? That person's diet is high fat and has nothing to do with the amount of food that individual eats. God help us if that person were to eat even less and then starve to death. Tell them to eat right not less good grief.
Shocked to read that fat people need to eat less?
Jeez, this comment thread is a monument to denial.
Yes, it sure is. And too serious defensiveness.
Look, some of the disconnect here may be due to the fact that it *is* easier to keep yourself from getting fat than it is to get yourself back to skinny. But, wake up! You're delusional if you think that when you're not looking, the skinny people around you are cramming doughnuts in their mouth and spending all their free time planted butt first. They just have magical skinny genes. Whatever.
Yeah. I monument to denial.
I weigh exactly the same as I did in high school and I'm 47. So, does my husband, an active duty Marine.
But we have also watched people in the Marine Corps who PT every single day and can max the PFT and still have problems keeping their body fat under control. Because believe it or not there's this odd little thing called inherited body type and body chemistry and we still don't completely understand it.
And if you stop eating your metabolism just adjusts itself accordingly, so that really doesn't work very well.
It always sounds so easy if you happen to be one of those people who doesn't have one of "those" bodies. And yes, maybe some folks could be doing more.
And maybe some folks could be talking less. It's not that simple. At least, not for everyone.
I agree some people should be talking less! Try not asserting that I've said things I haven't said. Take note of the first thing I said, which is that there is a big complex mystery. I've restated numerous times that people are different, etc. My point, which I stand by, is that whatever your situation is, if you are fat, you need to eat less. You are eating too much. Whether you have a genetic predisposition to fat or a medical condition, if you are fat - unless you accept remaining fat - you've got to eat less. The resistance to this crushingly obvious point is denial. Denying that it's denial doesn't make it not denial! It compounds the denial.
OK, now this is just ridiculous.
You're delusional if you think that when you're not looking, the skinny people around you are cramming doughnuts in their mouth and spending all their free time planted butt first. They just have magical skinny genes. Whatever.
Guess what. I'm 39 years old (well past the age of "slowed metabolism") and weigh between 100-105 pounds. I know this because of doctor appointments, not weighing myself.
I am planted "butt first" in all my free time, right here at the computer. I don't exercise. I hate it.
I also eat whatever I want, whenever I want. Chocolate is a staple of my diet. I do drink Diet Coke, but only because I prefer the taste of it to regular coke.
Tell ME again about "delusional."
There's no "denial" or "defensiveness" on this end, nor is it on any of the others. I find this arrogant holier-than-thou preaching from people who aren't overweight--but whom I could easily call "fat" compared to oh-so-skinny-me-who-knows-all-about weight (lol)--offensive and appalling.
TRY to imagine the following scenario:
SuzyQ, age 23:
"Those people" who are showing signs of age (wrinkles, whatever) really ought to get with the program, fix their awful wrinkles and gray hair. Those lazy 30- and 40-somethings! And GAWD, those even older ones! And when they don't fix their ugly aging, it's just laziness. ANYONE can stop that from happening! I know because I've known "old" people who did it!
Oh, but you say, it's genetics.
Exactly. Think about it.
Or what about rich people who blather on about how poor people just need to do this-or-that, and their financial troubles will be gone? It might be true in SOME cases, but definitely, absolutely not all.
Get down off your high horses, ladies. You may fancy yourselves as shining examples of feminine beauty and wisdom, but you really just look arrogant and clueless. It's definitely not "pretty."
(the other Beth)
Jumping on...
1) As a size 14 person, I'm tired of having size 6 people talk about fat.
2) If another size 6 woman asks me if something makes her look fat it p*sses me off. Why? Because they aren't asking their size 14 friend if they look fat because they are worried about their own health. It's very freudian. Size 6 women who ask their friends if something makes them look fat or talks about other people's fatness do so because they have their own self esteem issues that they relate to or associate with their own looks and they need re-assurance. Apparently their careers, family, education and sparkling personality is not enough.
I mean, think about it. How jacked up is it that a bunch of skinny people are making pronouncements and giving "advice" on weight loss to "fat people".
3) Are you really worried about the health of America and the rising healthcare costs from "obesity"? We are talking about a nation where the average life span of this generation and the next is more than a decade longer than people from the early 20th century.
Obesity is just the current reason du jour. If we jumped in the way back time machine, maybe some of these folks would like to explain to their pioneer ancestress that pushing a plow all day, stooping to milk the cows, washing clothes over a tub all day and then using the lye soap to scrub your body with along with eight or more child birts was going to lead them to a calcium deficiency, crippling osteoarthritis and death looking like a dried up old hag by the time they were 54 (but, hey, they ate natural foods and got lots of exercise keeping them nice and skinny).
The point is, "fatness" is in the eye of the beholder. It's also a sign of affluency. I wonder if anyone here is an art major and knows why Greek and Roman women statues didn't have boyish hips, ribs sticking out and AAA boobs? Why did the renassaince painter Ruben spawn a word describing the figure of a woman (rubenesque)?
Because as nations grow wealthier, the people grow rounder and our ancestors actually thought that was good. They would have themselves painted with round rosy cheeks, double chins and a little girth for the sole purpose of showing how "affluent" they were. This current phase of ultra healthiness and being "skinny" is just that, a phase, no matter how much psycho-babble and psuedo concern for the "health of the nation" or "fat people" most of you folks spew.
4) If anyone wants to lose weight, don't listen to any moron writing on here. Go see your doctor get advice and recommendations from him or her. They can even recommend physicians or dietitians that specialize and can assist you based on your medical needs, health issues and weight. There are far too many health issues that can be effecting your weight from diseases to maintenance medicines to even depression. None of which you want to jack with trying to meet the standards of the bozos on this blog.
Well, John and Kat, you could just start chain-smoking. That might help. ;-)
/running away
Other Beth, I clearly said above that there *are* some people who are skinny through no effort. Do you honestly believe that is the norm? If not, what's your point?
What is it that I could say that would make you people happy? All fat people are fat due to tragic circumstances far beyond their control. Does that work for you? Because, apparently, eat less, move more is not only shocking, its offensive and couldn't possibly work.
Not only a monument to denial, defensiveness could be thrown in there too.
No one is telling anyone to lose weight if he doesn't want to. Information is for those who want to lose weight.
Acting like losing weight is impossible rather than difficult for a person without a special medical condition is silly. Go to John Stone Fitness and hit the message board. There are many many people there who have lost large amounts of weight (some upwards of 100 lbs.) and kept it off.
If you think that a person has to starve to lose weight, then you don't know enough about food. Read about high and low GI carbs, higher protein intake, higher fiber intake, higher water intake, etc.
A family member of mine is in the middle of losing over 100 lbs. About forty pounds in, he runs a caloric deficit of 2500 calories per day, is never hungry, and hasn't lost any lean body mass (yet). He can do this because he's done his homework.
If losing weight is something one wants to do and is willing to take the time to learn about, it is not at all out of reach. Why someone would believe that message to be negative, I have no idea.
One note: I am not at all advocating that most people should use a 2500 calorie per day deficit for weightloss. The family member described is a large man with a large frame and a great deal of muscle mass who burns about 5200 calories daily. A 500 calorie deficit per day is a more reasonable starting point for most people.
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