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.

@Hardbackwriter

I still doubt that slim people who claim that it’s all down to willpower experience the same intensity of cravings that many obese people do because those cravings can become all-consuming and are almost impossible to resist and are made much worse by low fat diets.

I think this is probably the case too, because I've always been naturally slimmish - I naturally settle at a BMI of about 23, I'm a bit above that at the moment but that's because I'm losing pregnancy weight, and it's coming off steadily just as it did for my first - but I put on about a stone on antidepressants, which I only lost after I stopped taking them. I told my doctor and he airily said 'oh, they don't make you gain weight, they just increase your appetite. Just only eat what you did before and you won't gain weight'. That was true, but a massive underestimate of what that felt like and how easily I could not eat more - I was constantly ravenous, to the point that if I didn't eat more I couldn't function at work because my concentration was so ruined by my obsession with food. I don't feel like that when I'm not on antidepressants - I get hungry, of course, and I have cravings, of course, but nothing like that. But I suspect that it may be how some people feel all the time, and it really isn't as easy to ignore as someone who's never felt it would assume.

Sounds very familiar. I had the same with antidepressants. I gained 2 stone and the doctor told me to go on a low fat diet. They gave me cravings like I’d never known before and I’d do stuff like get food out of the bin that I’d thrown away and which most people would find disgusting but I didn’t care because I wanted the food.

A great explanation here regarding CICO

It was me who posted the Zoe Harcombe video you've just recommended to me, and I'm a big fan of Jason Fung, and fasting.

I've never heard either of them say that an adult human can adapt to live on a regular diet of 700kcal per day, though. That doesn't sound right to me. We can adapt to less calories than we're used to, yes, but basic biological functions need more than that to sustain even a life with no activity.

The Twinkie Diet experiment - a US professor lost weight eating Twinkies and Doritos but sticking to calorie limits - is a fun example

I've seen a similar UK one where a woman lost a couple of stone just eating McDonald's every day. Extremely unhealthy obvs, but the weight will come off if all you're eating is 1000 calories a day, whether that's in McDonald's chips or salad.

I've found the same with my diet - presently I eat 200 calories of food a day in addition to meal replacement shakes. It makes no difference, weight wise, if I eat that 200 calories in fish and salad or in chocolate (I've done both!).

@DrSbaitso

I’d recommend r/fatlogic on Reddit to anyone with common sense.

I wouldn't. It's not that it's wrong, but it's egregiously unkind and spiteful.

Some of it’s also wrong and all of it blames and mocks the overweight person. It’s populated by ‘a calorie is a calorie’ people who think you are a moral failure if you eat more than 1200 calories a day.

I am not a fan of HAES either. I’m not deluded and I know that obesity is not healthy. It’s just that I think the ways that we as a society treat it and people who suffer from it is wildly wrong.

@DrSbaitso

I’d recommend r/fatlogic on Reddit to anyone with common sense.

I wouldn't. It's not that it's wrong, but it's egregiously unkind and spiteful.

I thought it has clear rules about personal comments and I find it well moderated. I see more spiteful comments on Mumsnet tbh!

@TheFoundations

It was me who posted the Zoe Harcombe video you've just recommended to me, and I'm a big fan of Jason Fung, and fasting.

I've never heard either of them say that an adult human can adapt to live on a regular diet of 700kcal per day, though. That doesn't sound right to me. We can adapt to less calories than we're used to, yes, but basic biological functions need more than that to sustain even a life with no activity.

I don’t think I said that? Not as a general rule at least but in some cases it does. People who have bariatric surgery usually can’t eat much more than 800 calories a day post-surgery. You’d expect them to keep losing and losing but most of them will never lose all their excess weight, usually only around 75% or so and will settle at a weight that’s significantly lower than pre-surgery but often still in the overweight range. So in their case, their bodies do find ways to function long-term on incredibly low levels of calories. But I didn’t say that this happens to everyone and it’s an odd point to pick out from everything I’ve said because if you posted the ZH video, it sounds like you agree with the core things I’m saying.

I thought it has clear rules about personal comments and I find it well moderated. I see more spiteful comments on Mumsnet tbh!

Oh, they're clear about not insulting each other. They can dish it out (as it were)...

As for MN being worse, well, it's not Shit Olympics, but MN doesn't exist for the sole purpose of relieving one's inflated ego and misplaced sense of superiority at the expense of the overweight.

@Honestopinion23

So you changed the way you eat, lost weight and got healthier?

Yes….? The key being i changed the way I ate. Everything in moderation was terrible advice for me. So was the ‘a calorie is a calorie’ advice. The only thing that worked was drastically changing how I ate, going against mainstream advice and directly targeting my hunger. I’ve not really said anything different on this thread other than that for those who get up to a very high BMI (my highest was 32 which is only mild obesity), they may not be able to do it naturally.

Have you counted your current calorie consumption?

Also, ZH mentions in the video that in the Minnesota Starvation Experiment, according to the CICO calculation, the participants should have lost far far more weight than they did. Andrew Jenkinson mentions in his first chapter that if CICO was correct, most overweight people would weigh over 300 pounds but they don’t. The point they’re both making and which I was trying to make was that the body does adapt and diets, although they look like they would produce weight loss on paper, stop doing so after a time. For some, it gets to quite extreme levels. The response from the CICO lot is ‘you’re actually eating way more than you think’, even if the person is weighing and logging everything.

@TheFoundations
In think I posted a slightly different video but yes it was Zoe Harcombe

Fung is regarded as a quack to be honest.

As are the keto brigade.

Just had this article come up in my recommendations:

news.sky.com/story/overeating-not-the-primary-cause-of-obesity-claim-scientists-12406990?utm_source=pocket-newtab-global-en-GB

References a study whose lead author is an endocrinologist at Harvard/Boston Childrens Hospital. I haven't tracked down the paper but the article says

"A new paper explaining the causes has been published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, claiming there are fundamental flaws in the energy balance model, and tying obesity to the consumption of low-quality food and processed carbohydrates.

The authors argue that an alternate model, the carbohydrate-insulin model, better explains obesity and points the way to more effective and long-lasting weight management strategies."

In my experience slim people eat fuck all and their disordered eating is normalised. I've not known anyone below "overweight" on the BMI chart who doesn't fast, massively undereat or yo-yo diet. Which is fine but don't pretend to obese people that your figure is attainable through normal levels of discipline.

Your comment is ridiculous. I exercise a lot as do some of my friends. We eat well and are a healthy BMI. I also co sume a lot of complex carbs which is a big no for many on MN.

Yes, it's because it's the one point for which I've seen no evidence at all. I don't actually agree with your thread title because I don't think any of it is bollocks; I think all the different viewpoints, which all can be scientifically proven, need to come together and make a whole. They are jigsaw pieces, rather than arguments which disprove each other.

Many people will think that one form of dieting works for them, say, low carb, but they might not realise that by going low carb, they started to eat less calories. So they think low carb wors, but what they actually did was more CICO. Or conversly, I'm sure that many people have tried to lower their calories, and done it via giving up bread and potatoes and chocolate, so they think CICO works, but what their body has responded to is the drop in carbs.

There's a lot of 'you are wrong and I am right', and there's a lot of 'it worked for me, so it works'. Different things will work in different measure for different people. Weight loss hormones are a s different from one person to another as height or size of nose; we are not all the same, by far. And yet we are given one set of rules, and it doesn't work for so many of us, because we rely on that set of rules as the full story, and if it doesn't work for us, we self criticise.

It's a bigger picture, there are more options, and sometimes it's necessary to experiment before you find a way that works for you, your body, your lifestyle, your personality.

It's not 'I'm right and you're wrong', as your thread title seems to suggest. Cutting calories and being more active works for many people, even if there's a high failure rate. It might not be working for the reasons people think it's working, but, for those who have success, who cares?

Have you counted your current calorie consumption?

On occasion. It’s probably around 1800 or so. But if I ate the NHS/SW/WW guidance of plenty of carbs, the odd biscuit and slice of cake, I would be permanently hungry and I wouldn’t last very long on it.

I’m not denying that excess of the wrong food causes weight gain, I’m just saying that when your body is trying it’s damndest to make you fat again, advice like eat less move more is as helpful as a chocolate fireguard. When I eat carbs, my body tries to make me fat by trying to get me to eat more and more.

@Honestopinion23

So you changed the way you eat, lost weight and got healthier?

Yes….? The key being i changed the way I ate. Everything in moderation was terrible advice for me. So was the ‘a calorie is a calorie’ advice. The only thing that worked was drastically changing how I ate, going against mainstream advice and directly targeting my hunger. I’ve not really said anything different on this thread other than that for those who get up to a very high BMI (my highest was 32 which is only mild obesity), they may not be able to do it naturally.

Yes, you found the way that worked for you for reducing your calorie and fat intake. You may have found there were some foods you just couldn't go near without losing control; that's not at all uncommon.

@Againstmachine

Fung is regarded as a quack to be honest.

As are the keto brigade.

Would that be by the mainstream medical profession who have overseen a huge explosion of obesity over the past 6 decades? The ones who tell diabetics to eat low fat high carb? Ah, yes, I’m sure they don’t like him. The fact that he is able to get patients off insulin is irrelevant i guess.

Yes, you found the way that worked for you for reducing your calorie and fat intake. You may have found there were some foods you just couldn't go near without losing control; that's not at all uncommon.

I increased my fat intake quite a bit actually. Not sure I hugely reduced calories either but I don’t binge anymore so that’s got to make a difference. The point is that if a ‘normal’ diet makes me binge, then I need another way.

When I eat carbs, my body tries to make me fat by trying to get me to eat more and more.

Agree with this. The last few days I've eaten junk, chips, crisps, mcdonalds, and I am absolutely starving. I have chicken and veg for dinner tonight and my brain keeps saying 'get a takeaway'...

I think the food pyramide is misleading.
it should show the recommendation of the different foodstuffs by volume and not calories.
it would look very different

@TheFoundations

Yes, it's because it's the one point for which I've seen no evidence at all. I don't actually agree with your thread title because I don't think any of it is bollocks; I think all the different viewpoints, which all can be scientifically proven, need to come together and make a whole. They are jigsaw pieces, rather than arguments which disprove each other.

Many people will think that one form of dieting works for them, say, low carb, but they might not realise that by going low carb, they started to eat less calories. So they think low carb wors, but what they actually did was more CICO. Or conversly, I'm sure that many people have tried to lower their calories, and done it via giving up bread and potatoes and chocolate, so they think CICO works, but what their body has responded to is the drop in carbs.

There's a lot of 'you are wrong and I am right', and there's a lot of 'it worked for me, so it works'. Different things will work in different measure for different people. Weight loss hormones are a s different from one person to another as height or size of nose; we are not all the same, by far. And yet we are given one set of rules, and it doesn't work for so many of us, because we rely on that set of rules as the full story, and if it doesn't work for us, we self criticise.

It's a bigger picture, there are more options, and sometimes it's necessary to experiment before you find a way that works for you, your body, your lifestyle, your personality.

It's not 'I'm right and you're wrong', as your thread title seems to suggest. Cutting calories and being more active works for many people, even if there's a high failure rate. It might not be working for the reasons people think it's working, but, for those who have success, who cares?

Okay, I should have said ‘for many people’. For some they will do fine eating high carb and a bit of what they fancy but I know how soul destroying it is to try so hard to do something and get told you’re just not disciplined enough so when I learned that for most overweight people, it’s nigh on impossible, this led to a huge shift in my thinking.

Would that be by the mainstream medical profession who have overseen a huge explosion of obesity over the past 6 decades?

Eh we have been discrediting people the mainstream didn't agree with for past year.

The obesity over past 6 decades is due sedentary lifestyles rise of cars and eating more or or more calorie filled foods.

@Iwonder08 my DDad is very similar to your Mum.
He tells me he is eating heathily "to keep slim" but in reality he is obese and eats far too much. His perception of how much he eats is really skewed.
He was pre-diabetic at a recent health check and that was a little wake up call for a few months, but his food quantity has now gone back to normal.
He really doesn't want me move more, or eat less, so I feel obesity and probably diabetes are inevitable.

Not sure I hugely reduced calories either but I don’t binge anymore so that’s got to make a difference.

Yes, not binging will reduce your calories.

You're eating less. When they say "eat less", they don't necessarily mean smaller quantities in general. It depends on the food. But you have reduced your intake, ergo, you've lost weight.

Your way wouldn't work for me as I'm veggie.