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2006-05-08 -Short Attention Span Theater-

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Posted by tipper 2006-05-08 05:51|| || Front Page|| [7 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 This only proves that sustained weight loss is a life style change, not just a diet.

Posted by Captain America 2006-05-08 08:19|| 2006-05-08 08:19|| Front Page Top

#2 Gosh, what an inspiring article. Guess I'll have another six-pack and bag of pork rinds.

Posted by bigjim-ky 2006-05-08 09:19|| 2006-05-08 09:19|| Front Page Top

#3 Not necessarily. Many people have a genetic heritage that is so acclimated to starvation that their livers become hyper-efficient when their food is decreased. Their margin between starvation and weight gain is ridiculously small.

I've seen an extreme example of this in the Pima Indian tribe of Arizona. They can survive on about 900 calories of crude carbohydrate a day, compared to a bare minimum of 1600 to 2800 of much more nutritional food for someone of European descent.

However, if Pimas eat food with any more calories or nutritional value than bare minimum, they become terribly obese and suffer from diabetes--an endemic problem to their tribe.

For an awful lot of people, the eat less and exercise more concept just doesn't work. Their own body can counter it so effectively that the net result is negligible, other than hunger and sore muscles.

Doctors often see people who are both starved and have excessive fat at the same time. Their bodies sacrifice muscle first, so that it can save their fat.

Posted by Anonymoose 2006-05-08 09:27|| 2006-05-08 09:27|| Front Page Top

#4 As a kid growing up in AZ we knew some Pimas. Dietetic Researchers love them for studies because of their unusual inherited genes.

I know heavy people that eat 1/4 of what I eat and still can't lose weight.

Posted by RD 2006-05-08 10:28|| 2006-05-08 10:28|| Front Page Top

#5 *Diabetic*

Posted by RD 2006-05-08 10:28|| 2006-05-08 10:28|| Front Page Top

#6 The folks you know who only eat 1/4 of what you eat and don't lose weight will stay that way. The body needs food. Their metabolism is so slow that whatever they eat goes directly to storage. Balanced diet, high fiber, high protein, and EEK! EXERCISE. Boring, but true.

Posted by mcsegeek1 2006-05-08 10:52|| 2006-05-08 10:52|| Front Page Top

#7 RD: I know heavy people that eat 1/4 of what I eat and still can't lose weight.

In my experience, they snack a lot and eat tons of food when they head home - at night. That's part of the problem - they really ought to be eating big lunches and easing up at night.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2006-05-08 11:04|| http://timurileng.blogspot.com]">[http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2006-05-08 11:04|| Front Page Top

#8 Common among the Irish as well - famine survival in the 1800's did a wonderful job of selecting survivors with this trait (survive on low carbs, get fat off any more than that, diabetes soon follows).

Posted by OldSpook 2006-05-08 11:55|| 2006-05-08 11:55|| Front Page Top

#9 Sounds like

Take Sibutramine for Six Months whilst exercising.
Then Get Liposuction.

Posted by Bright Pebbles 2006-05-08 12:53|| 2006-05-08 12:53|| Front Page Top

#10 Old Spook,
You are on to something. My family is right out of that niche and tend to be thin and muscular in their 20's and go downhill from there on out. Primarily due to a decrease in physical toil and not an increase in food intake. Believe me, I eat less than I did in my 20's and put on weight at the drop of a sandwich. Genetics are going to rear their ugly head and come to be known as the true culprit in the obesity plague. Who would choose to be overweight if if were in their ability to control their weight and still live a somewhat normal life?

Posted by Bigjim-ky 2006-05-08 15:05|| 2006-05-08 15:05|| Front Page Top

#11 Interesting article in the Economist about how Americans are sicker (by a large margin) than Brits. Suggests long term obesity is the cause.

Posted by phil_b">phil_b 2006-05-08 17:21|| http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]">[http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/] 2006-05-08 17:21|| Front Page Top

#12 While not disagreeing with 'it's what you eat and how much you exercise', I'll note that I am thinish and my weight has varied very little through my life. I can eat whatever I want including things most people find horribly fattening, e.g. I eat a large breakfast of eggs/bacon/sausage every day. For some reason I have an strong aversion to sugar in my food. As a result I eat almost no prepared foods because they all contain added sugar.

Just suggesting the sugar in everything diet screws up our metabolism and causes the fat accumulation. And for the record my blood pressure and cholesterol are great.

Posted by phil_b">phil_b 2006-05-08 17:37|| http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]">[http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/] 2006-05-08 17:37|| Front Page Top

#13 Just like the 'global warming' crowd chooses to ignore the increase in energy generated by the Sun, the nutritionist ignore evolution and natural selection.

Not only have we only recently beat about 100,000 years plus of cycles of feast and famine with plentiful food year round, but it is easily obtainable [even delivered if you so request]. Add to that, the fact that with modern 20th Century medicine we had far more children survive who would, due to various frailties and diseases, died and would not have added to the population pool along with those various defects or anomalies. A lot of problems arise now because we live long enough to become afflicted with them rather than die off at a much earlier age.

Finally, death is a zero sum game. You die of something. No one seems to die of old age anymore. "He done plum wore out". Every death certificate has some cause. However, being a zero sum game, if you reduce the causal factor in one area, you only shift the underlying pathology to another. Its a great statistical game, very useful when asking for more Government Grants [tm].

Posted by Hupese Omack9226 2006-05-08 17:45|| 2006-05-08 17:45|| Front Page Top

#14 Until 100% of all male deaths are due to prostate disease.

Posted by Emily Litella 2006-05-08 17:50|| 2006-05-08 17:50|| Front Page Top

#15 Phil - nail on the head. My theory is that there is so much sugar and "crap" carbohydrates that it overloads those (genetically?) predisposed to Type II diabetes. The worst is Corn Syrup or Corn Sweetner - that crap is in everything and is absolute poison to anyone with diabetic tendencies. Read the labels!

I can eat bacon and eggs just fine. Steel cut whole oats for oatmeal (McCanns). But give me a serving of polished white rice or mashed potatoes or slices of white bread (or anything with sugarin it) and BANG Im in blood sugar trouble. I think a lot of the stuff being researched abotu Glycemic Index is where the problem will be found for people like me.

I've found that eating like my grandfather (who lived into his 90's) did and working out hard with weights most days, jogging only 2 days a week, that has me healthy with control of my pre-diabetes, and has lowered my cholesterol, and my triglyicerides. And thats eating an average daily set of meals like my grandma used to make - and I lived off of when I was visting them on the farm as a teenager: 2 scrambled eggs, 2 strips bacon (crisp & drained) and a cup of strong black coffee for breakfast, small whole grain roll, with a hunk of cheese and meat for lunch with water to drink, and high protein low carbohydrate dinner like potroast or sausages with green beans or other stuff fromthe garden out back, with ice tea (we're southern) for dinner - and a couple of snacks of beef jerky bookending lunch by a couple of hours on each side. He was a railroad man, so took his lunch in a pail, and had the jerky wrapped in wax paper in his pocket. That was a workday meal schedule. The only day they "ate fancy" was on Sunday (and sometimes Saturday if my cousin or aunt was cooking), with pie made the day before, fancy dinner with fried chicken and mashed potatos, cornbread/biscuits with the breakfast stuff.

Funny how I can have my bacon and eggs fried in a little bit of butter and watch these other poor guys trying to eat Low Fat and nearly Vegetarian that only drives their body further into a fat storage mode.

By the way - check out most Low Fat foods - and compare them to the normal version. You'll see they add more Corn Sweetner or Sugar to make up for the lack of fat. "Low Fat" versions of foods are very bad for you if you are predisposed toward diabetes.

My personal regime:

Exercise intensely with weights 3-4 times a week (Mo-We-Fr or Mo-Tu-Th-Fr), walking or other less-intense "aerobic" exercise 2-3 times a week.

Eat 3 small-to-medium sized meals and 2 high-protien snacks - so that you dont go more than 4 hours without taking something in during the day. Do NOT skip breakfast - and be sure thats a low carb, high protien meal (primes the pump for fat burning instead of fat storage). Dont eat within 3 hours of going to bed, and take a multivitamin.

Read the labels, avoid sugars and corn sweetner, load up on natural protiens and natural fats (butter for instance), avoid that fake stuff like margerine and other trans-fats. If you have to have the sweets, go with sugar free stuff (avoid fat free like the plague that it is). And ignore the food pyramid - its the crap that got us into this mess. Avoid bread, potatos, rice, and any other simple grain products.

All of the above applies to me and my biochemistry ONLY. Yours may differ. I am not a Doctor -- See a doctor you can trust and onw who is open minded as to rejecting a lot of the old garbage nutritional info thats out there.

Posted by OldSpook 2006-05-08 19:03|| 2006-05-08 19:03|| Front Page Top

#16 Since I've been at the 'Burg I'm on the Popcorn Diet®. I blame the Jooos.

Posted by Seafarious">Seafarious 2006-05-08 19:14|| 2006-05-08 19:14|| Front Page Top

#17 Damn Sea! You're keeping Ethanol prices up!

Posted by Frank G">Frank G 2006-05-08 19:35|| 2006-05-08 19:35|| Front Page Top

#18 thanks OS, age, metabolism and genes are the main actors along with meds. But we can help ourselves by good diet and exercise.

Don't eat within 3 hours of going to bed

if I remember correctly I may have broken this rule last night, the night before, the night before that......

out now damn fat, be gone with you!! 25 lbs to go and holding. »:-)

Posted by RD 2006-05-08 19:46|| 2006-05-08 19:46|| Front Page Top

#19 One other comment. I eat large amounts of bread, but only what I would call dense breads, primarily real rye bread and middle eastern pita. This is not some dietary fad, its because I like them better.

Otherwise, I was fortunate to never have sweet carbonated drinks as a kid, and never acquired a taste for them as an adult. I drink gallons of tea and more wine than is probably good for me.

Posted by phil_b">phil_b 2006-05-08 20:23|| http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]">[http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/] 2006-05-08 20:23|| Front Page Top

#20 I just go off the USMC height/weight tables and stay under my weight for my height. I figure it's very plausible for me to stay under my max weight established by the Corps (176 lbs.) the rest of my life. So long as I stay under that I might look puffy but I'll never look or more importantly feel horrible.

In my current regimen I run 3-4 times a week, hit the weights about 4 times a week and do pushups/chins/& crunches almost every day. For me it comes down to total calorie in-take vice going low carb or low fat. Unlike most folks I do better on less chow - 1,500 calories is actually a lot for me. (but that's just my body - I eat what I need vice what I want) Basically I figure if the average American ate a balanced diet, took in high protein, drank plenty of h2o, does high fiber, & stays away from junk foods w/high sugar or fried fast food garbage they'd be okay. However, like I said, most fatties I see eat what they want vice what they really need.

BTW - I reserve Saturday's for eating anything I want along w/drinking some Pabsts (a man's gotta live a little). Unfortunately for me, the rest of the week I have to watch everything as it's too easy for me to pack on weight - curse of the irish & all.

One thing I tell people is to take off the weight slow, if you're currently 220 and really should be about 190 I say just work on losing the first 5-7 lbs the first month. Then spend the next month staying under 215 or whatever while gradually increasing your exercise and slowly cutting out the garbage in your diet. You'd be surprised how much additional excess you lose just by cleaning up your eating habits. Do this again the next month an so on until you hit your target weight. It might take 6 months but by this method you're not starving your body and the body is not going into a survival mode thus cutting off your fat burning ability. You slowly re-train your body to feel full on less and it gets used to weighing less. Then after you've hit your target/healthy weight make sure you keep a ceiling weight you always stay under; if 190 was your target then say 197 is your ceiling weight where you have to kick yourself in the ass not to go over. I wouldn't even necessarily call it dieting but lifestyle. Again, this works for me & has worked for folks I know. If you have a system that works for you then that's cool, everybody's wired different.

Posted by Broadhead6 2006-05-08 20:55|| 2006-05-08 20:55|| Front Page Top

#21 interesting commets. Thanks old spook and others.

Off the diabetes discussion ...if "dieting" is as worthless as this author claims, shouldn't the opposite be true as well? But it's not. If I were to scarf down nachos, ice cream and donuts all day for a week I'd start piling on the pounds pretty quick. If I didn't stop, the pounds would continue to climb up and up. Yet if I stopped eating the excess then the weight would come off - albeit much slower than it came on.

So, even though I found the accompaning comments to this discussion interesting, it's false to imply thatyou can't lose any weight by dieting. Agree that the best way to lose it is to cut out the refined carbs and eat regular meals otherwise. I'm convinced it is the refined carbs plus fat that is causing the problem in America with obesity and heart diesease. I've often wondered that if other countries like France where they could eat both was because they somehow milled their flour differently than we do.

Never the less, one thing that holds true is that if you remove the refined carbs out of the equation, you can eat to statisfaction and watch the weight come off. Of course, it's not that easy to stay away from all those yummy refined carbs. Thanks for the tips!

Posted by 2b 2006-05-08 22:32|| 2006-05-08 22:32|| Front Page Top

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