AIBU to doubt only 4 per cent of adults get enough fibre?

[Anonnewbie]

To think that the recommended 30g of fibre per day isn't that hard to achieve for most people and be confused by the stats I keep seeing recently that 96% of UK adults get less than this?

Is it 96% don't meet it EVERY day, because that seems reasonable. Or don't average over 30g, which I think is pretty bad. But I'm realising as I type I should Google that question

My real question is how much fibre did you eat today? I just put it into chat gpt by typing out my food for today and despite being horrified by today's diet (1 piece of fruit, a few veg, way too much pastry and cheese, and quite a lot of Easter egg...saved by half a tin of beans), it estimated 37g. I asked it for a breakdown of that and the calculations seemed correct within reason as I'm not going to start weighing etc.

I would have guessed I was above average due to eating plenty of veg and home cooked meals, but cant believe I would be in the top 4% of fibre eaters in the country.... What do you think?

Quoting the digital ignorance (that you yourself acknowledge) and reams of words generated by ChatGPT on MN also leads to grindingly long, tedious posts (‘walls of text’) on a site that’s supposed to be for chatting with and talking to other human beings in real time.

See, e.g. your own post of 07.43. Perilously close to being the epitome of TL;DR.

@NoctuaAthene exactly

have you been spying on me 👀

I don't think I realised until this thread and similar ones that people did dislike pulses so much. For people I know and see regularly they feature quite heavily

I eat them pretty much every day and don't find it repetitive at all. I don't think about it, it just happens

Yesterday I made a batch of hummus and had some of it with my lunch

Today I made a chickpea and carrot salad

Tomorrow I will have kidney beans in a curry

The next day maybe pasta e fagioli

Some days I might have more than one portion TBH - e.g. I might have a bit of left over chickpea salad with lunch and then curry for dinner

I am one of the people who now has minimal fibre due to having an ileostomy. I was diagnosed with bowel cancer last june, and ended up needing emergency surgery in July, which resulted in the ileostomy. I now can't digest in the same way, and have to be careful what I eat: one slice of apple cake landed me in A&E with an extremely painful blockage! Too much fibre can be bad for us Ostomates. There are about 15 million of us worldwide, so this figure fits into the stats...

Everyone is different. As long as YOU feel ok, don't worry about the rest of us. We're doing the best we can.

And: this month is Bowel Cancer Awareness month. I appear to be "on trend" currently, not that I want to be. I had my final session of chemo yesterday, and have had the all clear, so one of the fortunate ones. My only odd symptom was anaemia, everything else I put down to hormones. So: IF SOMETHING DOESN'T FEEL RIGHT, GO TO THE DOCTOR. ADVOCATE FOR YOURSELF (or bring support.) And remember - Jess' rule is in place: 3 strikes and a second opinion.

Congratulations on your all clear 🎉

Re All Bran and Flakes, I buy a 1kg pack of plain old wheat bran (like a flour packet) for a couple of quid, and add a tablespoon to milled chia and flax for topping my weetabix. All Bran is primarily made from wheat bran, and is processed.

Hi Next door neighbour! My secret is out!

🤣🤣🤣🤣

All bran is no more processed than weetabix?

I'm trying to lose weight and actually getting in enough fibre is really tough - even if eating well. Eating low calorie means trying to eat more protein and often means sacrificing foods low in fibre. I've started drinking a psyllium husk and having chia seeds to keep me regular....!

Logged in MFP, I had what I class as a healthy day yesterday:

High protein (120g)
Low carb (60g)
5 x fruit & veg

But only 4g of fibre if MFP is to be believed?

Surely it depends on how much of everything you eat though?? As in, the proportion of things you eat. I don't actually eat much, and before you say anything, no I am not very light, I am just slightly overweight. My bowels are great (thanks), but I love all things white, white pasta, and a french baguette cannot be underesteemed. Brown pasta is revolting. I will countenance brown seedy bread for my breakfast toast.

Do I eat enough fruit, no, I don't like it, too sweet. Do I eat pulses, no, they disagree with me. Do I eat enough salad and veg, yes, I love mixed leaf salads, and a variety of veg.

So I have a kind of balanced diet, but not a fibre (or anything else tbf) heavy diet. I eat a lot of fish/meat plus veg or salad type dinners.

I do get over 30g most days. But yes it is hard and you have to be intentional.

No one else in my family chooses to eat like me and my parents find my diet not to their taste either.

I have prolapse so am pretty keen on making my life as easy as possible and I'm for a good easy 3 or 4 on the Bristol stool chart.

I also do enjoy oats, hemp, chia, rhubarb, orange, kiwi, banana, dark 90% chocolate, plum, berries, greens and avocado - all of which are high in fibre and all of which I've eaten today.

My M&S easter egg which was 85% had 15g of fibre per 100g. 90% chocolate from Waitrose has 1.2g fibre per square. So there are enjoyable ways to get it!

Avocado is packed with fibre. I bet you didn't do too badly actually.

I think it might be a bit of nonsense but you never know, fibre/roughage isn't just in cereals nuts etc, it can also be found in some fruit and veg, baked beans, popcorn etc so even if you don't have a particularly healthy diet if you have beans on toast or jacket with skin on with beans will contain a source of fibre, veg stirfry with brown rice is a lot of roughage, porridge is cheap, skin on apples.

I eat what I consider to be a healthy diet, but struggle to hit 30g fibre targets!
As PP mentioned, it is very tricky when also trying to balance a calorie deficit and high protein.

Nutracheck tells me I have 25g of fibre today, which is higher than usual. Today is:
breakfast - Greek yoghurt with blueberries and strawberries. 10g of flax seed and 10g of mixed seeds.

lunch - Greek salad (tomato, cucumber, feta, black olives) with half a tin of chickpeas

dinner - will be quesadillas (I have 1 tortilla) my portion of the filling will have 1/4 tin of black beans and 1/4 tin of sweetcorn, chicken thighs, grated cheese
Plus onion/tomato salad

Brown pasta doesn't taste any different to white pasta

Such weird initial replies op. The whole of this site could be dismissed on the grounds of 'i couldn't care less'.
The lack of fibre in our diets should be of massive concern to all of us as digestive related cancers are so prevalent.
I find ot hard to imagine only 6% of the population are getting 30g based on my diet and people i know but I guess there are plenty of people who eat like pp has said with a reliance on refined carbs and convenience foods.
The answer to everything seems to be 'eat more beans!'

If anyone wants a lovely bean salad recipe, I made this yesterday. It was seriously tasty.

https://plantbaes.com/kale-white-bean-salad-erewhon-copycat/?fbclid=IwY2xjawRBcOtleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZA80MDk5NjI2MjMwODU2MDkAAR4eUN_GTQRWBJewDaHOEBYuvyZA04J1sByBVtPqkgOvpzR-OmFP5eofzAQPLQ_aem_JO3BwW9gM9quschPK7t3bQ

It really does!

I like wholegrains in general but a big fat no to brown pasta or rice.

I remember someone who proclaimed they had no time to soak chickpea😂 Like as if one has to sit there and watch it or something.
Very underrated stuff.

I think the negative virw is because ebery time someone asks for budget, lentils get million mentions. People just have them mentally tied to poverty here, if that makes sense?

I think this is the point though- fibre can be found at good levels in processed / convenience foods.

It’s very much lacking in the keto/ low carb/ meat and veg high protein diets. But you can get plenty from cereal, beans on frozen jacket potatoes, even McDonald’s. I’m not saying these are good things to eat, but it’s why the fibre message gets missed a lot. And 96% of people don’t get enough.

People who eat Greek yogurt and berries assume they’re getting loads of fibre because they’re healthy but they’re not.

Per 100g of flesh its about 3.5g to 7g, thats a wide variance.

i dont know if different species have different amounts perhaps

Thats a shame, Im making up some dhal today.

MFP can't always be trusted on fibre, as the people entering the foods don't always care about fibre and might just enter the calories and protein and leave the fibre blank. If you want to track fibre you need to check that each item you log has it filled, and find an alternative listing if not. Which is a pain.