To think that 'eat less move more', everything in moderation and CICO is total bollox?

[Honestopinion23]

CICO stands for calories in vs calories out by the way.
I often read the weight loss section on here. Every day there are people embarking on any number of diets and body overhauls and I reckon about 95% of them are unsuccessful. Calorie counting, shake diets, you name it, people always gain the weight back before long. Even celebrities who seem to have done well with weight loss eventually gain it back, e.g. Pauline Quirke. I am watching that new amazon show with Melissa McCarthy and she is also back to being around the same size she was before starting her weight loss. Lisa Riley is another one who lost a lot of weight and most of it is back now. Clearly it's not working and people are making money out of telling fat people that they can be thin if only they want it bad enough or try hard enough. The scientific research shows that once you are morbidly obese, you have an absolutely miniscule chance of getting to and maintaining a normal BMI without surgery. Yes, there will no doubt be people popping up here saying they did just that but you are the exception.

The idea that if you just eat less than you burn is also flawed when a) your body adapts to lower amounts. For instance, those who have gastric bypass and eat v low calories forever still tend to be overweight/mildly obese because their bodies just can't get to a low BMI and b) you're fighting against intense hunger urges that someone who has always been normal weight just can't imagine dealing with.

If I was morbidly obese, I would ditch all the dieting crap, admit that I couldn't fix it and have surgery. I see so many dieting plans just blame the dieter for 'failure' when they're trying to do something impossible. If I was stage 1 obese or overweight, I'd go low carb no-processed for life because I think that is the only thing that switches off the hunger signals in the brain.

@Gwenhwyfar

"when many people's weight over the course of a day fluctuates by 1-2kg."

You mean 1-2 pounds, yes? Even that is quite a lot I think, but 2kg is 4 pounds.

4 pounds isn't a crazy amount for your 'stable' weight to vary by, depending on how much you weigh in the first place. I weigh myself daily (always same time of day) and yesterday I weighed 12st 3.6 and today 12st 0.9. I can imagine someone weighing 20st would find they vary more, and someone weighing 8st would find they vary less.

@Hardbackwriter

I think this thread is fascinating but it's striking that no one has mentioned the incredibly strong link between obesity and poverty - people rarely do, unless they're going to sneer at the lack of self control in the working class. But this surely shows the huge role of environment - it clearly isn't the case that poor people just have less self control, but nor can it be that they happen coincidentally to be more likely to have a genetic propensity to be overweight.

People have mentioned the UK's obesogenic environment, which is obviously worse in poor areas.

The problem is that as a nations we eat far more than we actually need to live and move far less than people did when the arbitrary 2000 cal a day for women was set! Plus it has to be sustained not just done for a few days then resort to old habits. I’m a stone heavier than I was ten years ago but now where near as active and still eating the same amount! This is my fault - no one else’s- as I make the choice to out food in my mouth. I know I’m eating too much but can’t be bothered to do it properly .

As an still overweight person you can't get fat from thin air.
I'm fat because I ate crap and I ate late at night

There's no point deluding yourself.
Your hormones,your attitude to food and eating too much is the reason why people are overweight.

I'm now diabetic,so low carb.
What works for me won't work for someone else.
I'm cc and I find that works best for me.
Because no food is off limits ( apart from white bread,white pasta,sugar)
Basically anything white🤣.

It holds me accountable and I don't call it a diet.
To me it's just healthy eating in much smaller portions.

All these methods do work if you stick to them. I am a binge eater and was 20 stone at one point, I'm now 11 stone at 5ft 7 and have kept it off. But I have to fight it constantly.

4 pounds isn't a crazy amount for your 'stable' weight to vary by

Definitely not.

I'm currently loosing weight so monitoring closely. My weight often goes up by 5-6lbs during the course of a day which is perfectly normal.

Lisa Riley still looks thin, this was her instagram from 5 days ago?

@TheFoundations - there is a lot of evidence to show that healthy choices lead to a healthy microbiome and less inflammation, which makes it easier to stay at a healthy weight. This is widely accepted.

But you're right that there is also the principle of uniqueness; our microbiome also dictates how much weight we lose on a particular diet vs another type. www.healthline.com/nutrition/gut-bacteria-and-weight#TOC_TITLE_HDR_3

@JoborPlay

So how do we do it

I did post this upthread too. Tackles CICO and has a look at the hormones.

If you want to mess about with when you want to eat (ghrelin), you can change it in less than a week; it's a hard few days, but you can reset your 'Ooh, I'm getting hungry' times by changing when you eat each meal, and gritting your teeth for just a few days. Or you can move a meal 15 minutes further each day, which takes longer but is more comfortable.

Leptin makes you feel like you don't want to eat more. It gets surpressed when we eat processed carbs and fat together. Addictive junk food (sweet or savoury) is addictive because it has fat and carbs together. Fat and carbs together is a man made creation. It's only found in nature in breast milk, which is specifically eveloved to be addictive, to stop babies going 'Nah, don't fancy any today, thanks...' and dying of malnutrition. Protein and fat will make you full.

Insulin is the hormone that says 'Oooh! Sugar! Fabulous: easy fuel! STOP BURNING FAT, BODY! WE'VE GOT SUGAR!!' and then when you get a bit lower in sugar a few hours later (we can't store much), it goes 'GIVE ME MORE SUGAR OR I'LL HIT YOU WITH A MALLET' (ie hangry)

If your body is burning fat as fuel on the regular, this won't happen.

Bigger gaps between eating will be both easier if you focus on this stuff, and will perpetuate the continuation of these behaviours. No calorie counting. You can eat until you don't want to eat any more. You can control when you want to eat.

Also sleep is an important factor regarding weight.
I was insomniac for years.
Waking at 2 in the morning,eating toast and tea at that time certainly didn't help with the weight.

@PhillMcCann

4 pounds isn't a crazy amount for your 'stable' weight to vary by

Definitely not.

I'm currently loosing weight so monitoring closely. My weight often goes up by 5-6lbs during the course of a day which is perfectly normal.

Mine too. Its water if I eat salty food, and weight of food in the gut, especially bread and pasta which seems to soak up water like a sponge and add a few pounds on.

@CookPassBabtridge

Lisa Riley still looks thin, this was her instagram from 5 days ago?

And these are some stills of her on screen from this year. I don’t know what filters she chooses to use on Instagram but I don’t think that picture matches reality.

I think this thread is fascinating but it's striking that no one has mentioned the incredibly strong link between obesity and poverty - people rarely do, unless they're going to sneer at the lack of self control in the working class.

This is absolutely true.
The less money have the higher chance you will suffer with malnutrition and become under or over weight.

You mean 1-2 pounds, yes? Even that is quite a lot I think, but 2kg is 4 pounds.

No, I meant 1-2 kg, not not .45-.9 kg, though for some it's likely less and for some it's more - I seem to be one of the latter, though not enough for it to concern the HCP I know. This time, simpler thermodynamics can be useful:

A litre of water is about a kilo, if I drink 500ml upon sitting up in bed, I'm already over the 1 pound mark from when I woke up. Now think about the weight of food and liquids you consume. That weight has to be stored in your body while it's processed, whether you use it or excrete it at the end. The length that takes depends on many factors, but it's part of our weight before that happens - the scale can't distinguish what's in our gut from the rest of our weight.

Now add in things like bloat or other biological factors that affect how much we weigh at any given moment, some of which we don't currently know and that we're taking measurement throughout a 24 hour period. There can be a 2kg difference in weights measured during that time without there being anything wrong or even eating/drinking a ridiculous amount.

@toocold54

I think this thread is fascinating but it's striking that no one has mentioned the incredibly strong link between obesity and poverty - people rarely do, unless they're going to sneer at the lack of self control in the working class.

This is absolutely true.
The less money have the higher chance you will suffer with malnutrition and become under or over weight.

yep, and malnutrition doesn't necessarily mean few calories but a lack of diverse, nutricious food, quality veg and the ability/time/money/equipment to cook or prepare good meals.

[quote TheFoundations]@SionnachRua

eatingdisorders.dukehealth.org/education/resources/starvation-experiment

The Minessota Starvation Experiment.

There's nothing here or, as far as I remember, anywhere else, about the subjects gaining excess weight to their start weight after the experiment ended. Just that they were a bit of a mess psychologically.[/quote]
Apologies I'm getting mixed up - they experienced binging up to 8 months later and "constantly struggled to distinguish between appetite and hunger" post the experiment - my point which could have been better made if I'd remembered correctly was that it fucks you up even when you go back to normal eating.

@Confrontayshunme

I think you are right but for different reasons. I started eating whole foods plant based as a friend recommended it. Basically an oil free, unprocessed diet of fruit, veg, starch and whole grain. I eat huge amounts of food (including pasta and potatoes and dark chocolate) and it is really so easy to keep my weight down. I stopped counting calories and eat without feeling hungry. I would guess I eat 1800-2000 and burn around 2000 as I am more muscular and active. So if I lose weight at all, it is slow and manageable. I have lost 4 inches from around my waist and stopped my blood pressure medication which is a blooming miracle. The MacDougall Programme and Forks Over Knives are good information about it.

@Confrontayshunme was that really difficult to switch too? Did you used to eat a lot of meat? Do you still now, at times, or not at all?

It's all very well referencing the Minnesota Starvation Experiment and Herman Pontzer to come to the conclusion that calorie restrictive diets and exercise for weight loss are pointless however painting such a picture is inaccurate as much as it is bleak.

The subjects did lose weight in the Minnesota experiment they just had problems afterwards with eating correct amounts. Pontzer maintains throughout his book that exercise is extremely beneficial to health, cardio vascular system, improving insulin resistance, combatting depression, reducing inflammation are just some of the benefits. The tribe he studies, who got a significant amount of daily exercise, had no significant occurrence of metabolic diseases, were fit, muscular and had low levels of body fat.

So, if you need to lose weight you may have to watch what you eat going forward. No surprise. People don't get overweight by some sort of magic and going back to previous lifestyle choices would create the exact circumstances by which weight gain occurred. Yes, the calories burnt and weight lost may not be entirely linear but exercise benefits the body so much and can be enjoyable so why not give whatever form of exercise you can do a go?

Honestly I've been trying and failing to lose weight for years. It only appears to work if I eat about 1000 or less cals a day. On which I am miserable and angry and tired. I started weight lifting in April and I am still no lighter. Nor have I changed clothes size. I'm stuck haha

Really when you dig down into the science you do find the body is incredibly adaptable: to exercise, to diets people doing strict Keto can find themselves become more insulin resistant / intolerant to sugars. The following video explores this:

My take away is try a diet and exercise programme. Systematically log what you are doing. If you plateau tweak something till you no longer are plateauing until the excess fat is lost. Then put the same effort into maintaining.

@scoopydoopy, have you tried a calorie deficit in conjunction with doing the weights?

"I do think I need to shake up my friends as some of them are not helping my ability to change and have noticed they’re adopting ‘feeder’ personalities trying to get me to eat cake and stuff I don’t want to eat. We hardly ever discuss the friends who consciously or subconsciously try to sabotage us either and it’s extremely common too"

The feeder friends/family are such an issue! One inlaw of mine is very morbidly obese and is the worst for this, particularly when I was a normal weight. Once when my DH was serving up he asked everyone what they wanted and I wanted one pasty and inlaw said "don't be silly you want two", in front of everyone. I had to keep saying that I really only wanted one and she went and told my DH to put two on my plate 🙄 I mean she has wider issues around consent but this is a pattern I've seen across several friends and family. Why do people feel the need to comment on someone else's food One way or another? There's definitely a social component to overeating (along with all the other causes).

Jason Fung explains that even if CICO works biologically (metabolism/hormone havoc means this isn't always the case), humans find it incredibly difficult to maintain a low weight after so many years being bigger. And this problem is so widespread it means CICO just doesn't work for huge numbers of people.

I also think people have unrealistic goal weights
And actually how long it's going to take to get there.
And you will get stuck, unmotivated and you will get days,weeks of not being bothered to do anything.

But those are the days we especially need to keep on track.

@grasstreeleaf

@scoopydoopy, have you tried a calorie deficit in conjunction with doing the weights?

Yep I have been doing it consistently since January and I've lost precisely 7lb in total. I am nowhere near the 'healthy' category in bmi