This past year, every time some serious new revelation was called “Fake News” by a certain segment of the Twitterati, I would just shake my head. But when it came to the nutrition news being spouted by the media, I was often the one yelling “fake news.” It was almost endless! Nutrition writers for traditional, well respected news media; many nutrition bloggers, sad to say; and most troubling of all, even some professional nutrition researchers have been spewing questionable nutrition news because it makes money! Every baseless nutrition story sends thousands of consumers to dietary supplement stores, book stores (for the latest diet book), and purveyors of unproven health care practices.
Let’s be clear: I’m not disputing traditional nutrition, which recommends adequate nutrient intake to prevent deficiency diseases we hardly hear about anymore—vitamin C for scurvy and vitamin B3 (thiamin) for beri beri, just to name a couple. Every single nutrient is so critically important in your diet, that deficiencies in any one of them lead to relatively rapid serious problems (for a nice short review on vitamins, click here). So where’s the problem?
It’s when we start blaming too much or too little of certain nutrients for long-term health issues like high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, arthritis, obesity, diabetes, kidney disease, osteoporosis, and cancer that we start to get into trouble, evidence-wise. And so do you, if you latch onto one or another claim about superfoods or “toxic” foods or any nutrient that some media voice has invoked as preventing or causing any of the diseases that take years, not weeks, to develop.
But let’s face it: It’s January 1st! And even more than getting or staying healthy, you want to lose weight, right? So what is the perfect weight loss diet? The one that lets you lose pounds and keep them off, without breaking a sweat or having to give up ice cream?
THE PERFECT WEIGHT LOSS DIET DOESN’T EXIST! Here, in a (large) nutshell, is why, and why the only diet that works is the one that works…FOR YOU!
Low carbohydrate diets have been touted since at least the early 1960s (think Stillman, Atkins…). Their appeal lies in the apparently limitless amounts of bacon, eggs, cheese, butter, meat, and fish you may consume while still seeing the pounds melt off. Think about it: how many people are going to stick with a hamburger patty and a slice of cheese and nothing else, when we’re deluged day after day after day with appealing ads showing a cheeseburger on a toasted bun with a side of fries and lots of catsup?? In short, it’s easy to see how and why people on a low carb diet lose weight, at least at first, but can’t stick with it. Further contributing to the initial weight loss is that carbs like bread tend to cause us to retain water weight, which we lose as soon as we eliminate carbs from our plates. But few people can stay on such a limited diet, and health-wise, that’s a good thing. Humans were not meant to consume diets devoid of plant foods (i.e., fruits and vegetables). Plant foods are the major sources of many vitamins and minerals and the sole sources of fiber in our diets: Our important gut bacteria (not to mention our livers, kidneys, and hearts) cringe at a constant onslaught of animal fat and protein. But the low carb diet does teach us something. It’s doubtful any of us stays overweight because we eat too much broccoli, not to mention lentils, spinach, Brussels sprouts, or kale (complex, or unprocessed, carbs)! Yet for those of us who habitually consume limitless amounts of foods like bread, pasta, rice, cake, cookies, ice cream, and candy, the key to weight control is finding a way to limit those “refined” carbs, not throwing the baby out with the bathwater by eliminating the complex carbs: fruits, vegetables, beans, and whole grains.
Low carb/high fat diets have gained new, yet still unfounded, respectability in recent years, thanks to reporters and even some supposed scientists who’ve realized they can make tons of money selling diet books that blame carbs for most chronic illnesses. We’ve been told by the media that in the 1960s, sugar manufacturers paid highly respected nutrition researchers to falsify their research findings and exaggerate the dangers of dietary fat. Regardless of the evidence for this conspiracy theory, these same science writers would like us to believe that a diet of unlimited high fat animal products is a recipe for a long, thin life, as long as we don’t consume them with a side of potatoes or on a bun…That, in fact, is the big fat lie, as syndicated physiologist and syndicated health reporter, James Fell wrote last month.
Adding to the popularity of low carb diets is recent interest in something called a ketogenic diet. This diet, consisting almost entirely of fat (as in eating whole sticks of butter) and only enough protein to support growth, was found in the 1920s to help children with seizures that could not be controlled medically. Our bodies, especially our brains, require glucose for fuel; this diet forces the body to burn fat for fuel (resulting in a metabolic state of keto[acid]osis). Starving the brain of needed glucose may have a plausibly beneficial effect on abnormal brain activity. A small amount of evidence also suggests that starving fat and liver cells of glucose may help control refractory diabetes, but neither of these observations justifies the fervent belief of some that this extreme diet is beneficial or even healthy for the average person, those trying to shed weight, and especially competitive athletes. However, without a medical imperative, almost no one can stick to this diet anyway (how much do you relish drinking cooking oil?). If avoiding carbs (at least refined carbs like bread and pasta) one or two days a week seems to help you lose or control weight, it’s probably not lethal. Just don’t look for this diet to help your performance.
Low fat diets must be the answer, then, right? Again, it depends! Cutting saturated fat (fat from meat and dairy products) reduces levels of fat in the blood that have been linked with higher risks for heart disease, diabetes, and some types of cancer. Because meat and cheese are calorie rich, folks who switch to a more plant-based diet, that is, one higher in unsaturated fats (think nuts, seeds, avocado, olive oil), to lower their risk factors often find they lose weight…unless they trade those mounds of meat and cheese for massive quantities of peanut butter, nuts,…and carbs!
Focus on the burn? So will throwing yourself into a high-intensity exercise program melt your excess fat? Activity can help a calorie cutting food plan, and exercise—both aerobic and strength training–is vital for keeping weight off and for heart health, but if you’re thinking exercise will let you keep your current eating habits and still lose weight, think again.
Too much! In case you haven’t caught on yet, what keeps us overweight is eating too much—of some foods or all foods. Which is why you could even lose weight on a diet of subs or Twinkies or bacon because it’s not so much what you eat, but how much. Which is probably why not eating at night might help you lose weight…IF you tend to mindlessly polish off bowls of chips or ice cream while watching your favorite shows…Or why limiting yourself to 500 calories a day two days a week might help you lose or maintain weight…IF you don’t make up for it by eating 3000 calories a day the other 5 or 6 days.
What I’m saying is that you will start conquering weight management when you undertake your own research—not on dubious or even evidence-based websites, but by cataloging your own personal eating and activity habits, to figure out where the excess calories are sneaking (or jumping) in and what changes work for you to balance those calories out. You need to keep a journal…period. Of course you can go further and actually count calories, and judging by the numbers of calorie counting apps out there, I’d have to say many of us at least believe they work. Calorie counts (i.e. the amount we take in by eating and the amount we burn through activity) definitely provide useful data for tweaking our calorie balance. But accurately counting calories, even with the best app, is time consuming, and if you’ve read my blogs before, you know how inaccurate calorie counting tends to be, even when done by professionals! If you’re a number cruncher and love the feeling of control that calorie counting provides, by all means try it. But if not, a journal may prove the most useful way to collect useful data and achieve accountability, and you can do it if you take it one step at a time. If you’re saying to yourself, “But how do I keep a journal? Where do I start?” don’t worry: In the coming weeks, I’ll share with you what’s worked for me and offer suggestions to help you. Remember, there are no short cuts, and no magic potions or pills. Just trial and error to see what works!
I wish each and every one of you a very Happy 2018, and look forward to helping you succeed in your nutrition goals as I continue to debunk all the fake nutrition news.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!