Do you still think it's all about calories in vs calories out and fat people are not disciplined enough ?

[deebate]

I've been doing a lot of online research over the years around diet/ exercise and what's the answer. How can I keep fit and be healthy.

I've tried various things and I am generally a believer in calories in vs calories out. Which seems to be the favoured method on here.

If anyone complains they're struggling with losing weight, it must be because they're not counting everything etc.

In any case, I've now stumbled across a number of podcasts of different doctors and nutritionists in the field talking about gut microbes and sugar spikes etc and how actually it's really not just about calories at all.

What's the consensus on here about all this ?

In general, people hugely overestimate how many calories exercise burns.

For a 12st person, walking at a moderate pace for 1hr will only burn ~183 calories.

They would need to walk for 19 (nineteen!) hours to burn off just 450g of fat.

So what you get is people changing their diet very slightly at best, maybe walking an extra hour each day - which would feel like loads given the time consumed - and then finding they've lost absolutely no weight.

I'm struggling to believe this!

Exercise is a terrible weight loss tool, it's really all about diet.

I was eating on average 800kcals a day and had a job that involved being on my feet all day.

I did not lose any weight and actually gained.

That is 100% impossible.

Even a completely inactive, 5' 0" tall, 6 stone, 40yo woman burns ~1,200 calories just staying alive.

Saying that you can eat a banana but not if its mashed?
I think there is some sense in this actually and it is because weight loss isn't quite as simple as CICO. Yes, squashed fruit contains the same calories as whole fruit and if you actually did eat the same, the effects would be the same. But that's unlikely.
Take the amount of fruit that typically goes into a smoothie for instance. If you ate that all as whole fruit, it would take ages and you would probably feel full and stop eating. But put the same stuff in a blender, squish it up and you can down it in seconds - you won't feel as full and will probably want to eat again sooner. Likewise if you make an apple into apple sauce - a couple of spoonfuls and it's gone. Eating a whole apple will take longer and there's quite a lot of evidence that chewing and eating more slowly does make you feel full for longer, so you are less likely to overeat. So it does make sense that how a food is prepared makes a difference even if the calorie content id the same.

People definitely underestimate how much they eat.

I am very experienced in calorie counting, and I sometimes get shocked about how many calories some things contain.

If I don't track my food, I can easily eat 500 more a day, little bit here, little bit there etc.

So it is as simple as CICO

Everyone seems to need different amounts to eat (and it is easy to kid yourself, I do it all the time).
I know that if I, personally, eat less food, I will lose weight. But I need to eat a LOT less than those around me. I live with two giant teenagers and a hollow legged husband. I probably eat about the same as DH, and less than the 13/15 yr old boys. But they are all slender and I’m really not.
They all move more than me - the kids are more active and DH walks a lot on his commute, and stands up when teaching all day. And I expect the kids need more as they are growing.
So I can’t do the same calories in as all of them. And even if my DH was sat at home all the time, eating the same as me, he would definitely be much slenderer than I am.

So I can’t compare across people. But I know if I eat less I will lose weight. It makes it hard to eat less when everyone else in the house eats so much!

Do you recall Channel 4 had a show a few years back where people could not understand how they were overweight. The show put Cameras all over the home and hired Private investigators to follow their every move and watch what they ate daily.
Every single one ate more that they admitted or even realised.

They're are alot of complex reasons why people over eat but fat the fact remains fat people over eat.

I say this as someone who is overweight and an emotional eater.

Secret Eaters!

That is quite depressing when you consider that a 12 stone person will burn off around 100 calories sitting on their arse watching the telly for an hour.

I think its calories in vs out. But the way a persons body burns calories is different for each person and there is a maintain/lose/gain value for each of them. One of the issues i think is everyone thinks the 2000-odd average calories a day is for them, for some its less, for some its more.

Additionally there is a balance between food groups needed for optimal metabolic efficiency

this is anecdotal but (I think) relevant. I had two dogs, litter brothers, so same mum and Dad and more or less the same size. Same healthy weight too and fed the same diet.....oh and same quatity and quality of poo! One took after dad, lean and rangy chap, the other more like mum, much more of a square build, shorter legs, thicker bones. Lean and rangy's favourite activity was sleeping. One good walk a day and he spent the rest of it snoring. Chunky boy was forever on the go, running around the garden, wanting to play, physically active for most of the day. I had to feed lean and rangy about a third more food than chunky boy to keep the meat on his bones. Surely this wouldn't be possible if it was as simple as CICO?

Chunky boy was a secret eater clearly...

hahaha nope

I have friends who I don't think eat much less than I do and who are significantly slimmer than I am.

They do eat less though, if we go out for lunch they'll just have something small for tea after, or have skipped breakfast, or not had the toast I had for supper.

They also move more, they are generally up and down more, if I say I've done some work in the garden at the weekend, I've also done a lot of sitting in the garden looking at the work I'm going to do. They won't have sat down.

We kid ourselves.

I don’t understand it either.

People have always said that stress makes you gain/maintain your weight but I assumed that’s because you tend to overeat when you’re stressed/tired but I strictly calorie counted and ending tried SW.

As soon as I reduced my stress levels, my weight just started dropping off even though I went to a sit down job and started eating more calories (mainly due to treats at my new job and drinking alcohol again).

Some people say it’s because your body goes into starvation mode but others say that’s not a real thing.

I agree. I eat whatever I want whenever I want it, in whatever quantity. It doesn’t even cross my mind. I believe gut microbes and sugar spikes and also the order in which you eat your food has a great effect. Ie. Many cultures eat pre meal salads with vinegars or kimchi which I believe line the gut and have been shown to reduce the spike of a blood sugar or reduce micro abrasions which reduce inflammation etc.

I also don’t believe in this brown unrefined grain myth. For me it’s white or don’t bother. The more carbs I eat the slimmer I am. It might be a paradox and people don’t believe me but I am blessed with high amylase and for me it is true. I can eat a rich tea biscuit and by the end it tastes of blackcurrant.

But equally I don’t eat breakfast or lunch the majority of the time. And to counter that again. Occasionally on threads like this I do count a calorie meal of the night before when I get the mandatory poster telling me I must be anorexic or something and it’s always over the daily 2000 calories. Often 2500+

There are a lot of people who just eat far too much. I don’t think this would happen as much if everyone ate full fat everything. No wonder everyone is starving if they are training their bodies to eat low fat versions.

Theres also a lot of people who eat far too little. No wonder they can’t lose weight their bodies must be in crisis mode.

And there’s also a hell of a lot of people (I’m going with the majority here), who spend far too much time sitting, have bad posture and who’s corset muscles are non existent and all their internal organs are hanging about like in a shopping bag. No matter how much weight these people lose they will always have a pot belly and bad digestion without sorting it out. So no wonder they give up and go back, then yo yo continuously.

If anyone has ever seen Honey Boo Boo a trashy American TV show.

They are a family of obese mother and daughters, apart from one who is slim.

They all ate the same food and exercised roughly the same amount, yet the slim one was able to stay slim whilst the others were dangerously overweight.

My family were similar.
My brother and sister were slim (possibly underweight) and I was until about 8/9 and then became overweight/obese in a short space of time, even though we were all on a ver similar diet.
My brother and sister can lose weight very fast and have never struggled with being overweight, whereas I put on weight easily and don’t lose it quickly.

Apparently the latest thinking is there’s particular gut bacteria that helps control the urge to eat. It was found in identical twins where one was overweight the other normal/underweight that the overweight twin was often deficient in this particular bacteria type. I think there’ll be more revelations, understanding of this as more research is done.

My takeaway from this is getting the right kind of food that encourages good bacteria (gut) is as important if not more so than simple calories.

I see this with my friend and I. I naturally assume the most relaxed position I can. Waiting for the bus, I'm sat on the bench, in a bar I want a seat, watching TV I'm reclining, whereas she will pace, stand or sit up, fidget (and leg jiggle!)
I can spend hours reading and barely changing position. She's up and down like a yo yo. I sleep 9 hours a night, she sleeps 6 at most and is up in the night ironing. I vacuum at the pace of a sloth, pushing the thing round in the most lack lustre manner. She attacks it with gusto in half the time. It all adds up.

In my case there’s a definite correlation between my weight, food intake, and exercise levels. That’s not to say it’s true for everyone, but I’m tubby because I eat too much cake (fed up) and don’t gym enough (cba and tired).

How exactly do you count calories though? I’ve tried it and found it quite complex to see the amount of calories that is in a meal that I’ve cooked!

Weigh stuff and look it up on google/myfitnesspal/macrofactor

I used my fitness pal. Weigh things, look them up on there. It gets quicker and easier with time (especially if you often eat the same thing, it’s easy to input again). If you have anything packaged with a bar code you can scan it and often it comes up, and you can say “one slide of this” or “1/3 of this quiche” or whatever.