Little known fatloss news & my monthly fatloss progress report....

Today's Post: Monday, 3-21-2011

Since last month, I learned three key things that can do a lot to help fat loss. They are little known. But they can generate a lot of leverage in your favor.

So far, as you’ll see, I’ve not known them long enough or worked out how to use them well enough to test them in myself. But, they can speed up fat loss from the start if they are put into use right away. And, they can restart stalled progress or help you lose the last few pounds of fat.

1. Fructose in whole fruit and in real fruit juice tends to fatten you. That was very important news for me since I’ve done many things right but not removed the fat from my tummy despite that.

I was getting 3 servings a day of fruit until I learned this: One serving of a whole fruit each day rotating between kinds. One 8 ounce serving of fruit juice. And, one serving of applesauce with no sugar.

Note that for many people, particularly people younger than me, or who have less sedentary jobs, or who exercise three times as much each week as I do, this may be less of a problem.

It also has had health benefits. The fiber, potassium, vitamin C, and phyto-nutrients in each of these is valuable. And, the soluble fiber in the applesauce which also has quercetin helps keep LDL cholesterol down to desirable levels.

What I’ve done is to cut back in a way that will lose as few of these health benefits as possible.

a) I was alternating between grape juice and 100% pure cranberry juice already. (People who drink a glass of either fruit or vegetable juice each day are less likely to get Alzheimer’s disease, for example.) So, now I alternate between low sodium, “spicy hot” V8 and 100% pure cranberry juice Monday through Friday, drink one grape juice on Saturday, and no juice on Sunday. This cuts my intake of fructose and total sugar from fruit juice but doesn’t stop the practice that tends to protect me from mental decline. It also cuts calories a good bit – enough to lose a couple of pounds from that alone.

I tried switching from applesauce to chopped spinach and stopped immediately. The stuff tasted horrible ( & I can eat raw broccoli florets with no problems); it had a surprisingly small amount of fiber; and it gunked up my teeth. That was NOT as working strategy for me at all! But then I hit on substituting unsweetened pumpkin puree. I miss the sweetness of the apple sauce to be sure. But the pumpkin has more fiber, is palatable, and has carotenes the applesauce did not. It also has a bit less calories besides having less fructose.

It’s early; but so far this is working!

Between the parts, I still get the three servings a day but have essentially switched out half of the fruit and fruit juice for vegetables. And, I’ve kept the most important fruit, three servings of organic wild blueberries a week at 100 % of what I have been eating.

2. Milk tends to spike insulin despite having a low glycemic index. Oops! That means that it tends to cause your body to have slightly too much insulin, so it tends to put any extra calories at all straight into your fat deposits – more so than a lower and more normal insulin level will do.

THAT makes a BIG difference to me as I’ve been using nonfat and 1% lowfat milk as a staple food for years and years. Healthwise, that’s actually not bad. I’ve gotten a food source of calcium, abundant vitamin B2, some B12 and the animal form of vitamin A, some potassium, & not that much fat with either saturated fat or omega 6 oils. And, I’ve gotten some higher quality protein to add to the proteins I get from plant sources. Best of all, milk has been accessible, convenient, and relatively cheap.

Nonfat cottage cheese has most of these positives and does NOT spike insulin. So, I’ve begun to experiment with working to replace half my milk intake with nonfat cottage cheese and filtered water.

These are two “stealth” pieces of information because both fruit real fruit juices and nonfat and 1% lowfat milk are basically good for you foods otherwise! And, a key principle of effective fat loss is to stop ingesting health harmful foods and drinks and replace them with health supporting ones.

But for some people, including me, they don’t work too well for fat loss, particularly for removing the last few pounds of fat from my belly.

I hope I’ve cut back enough to see results! Over the next few months, we’ll see.

3. Just a few days ago, I learned that having blood sugar averages or spikes above the desirable level tends to partially block adding muscle and strength even if you do the right exercises.

This one I have less evidence for than the first two. But if it’s true, it may well mean that cutting back on fruit and fruit juice will help me gain some extra muscle from the exercises I already do. If it does, that will remove inches from my belly also!

My monthly personal report is mixed again -- since February.

I gained a pound on the scale; but none of my measurements went up. So, it might have been that I added muscle.

However, it was NOT paired with losing a pound or two of fat as I would have much preferred!

And, the trend is not good. I was well below my desired weight on the scale in November by two or three pounds. Now I’m two pounds over. So I’ve gained about a pound a month since then.

The good news is that the food changes I just listed should lose me at least a pound of fat a month for a bit.

The other news is that my left arm injury might yet heal properly and for sure is no longer holding me back from doing my kettlebell exercises and beginning to do more of them.

So, by a few months from now I expect that will add a few pounds of muscle and lose enough fat from the greater calories used to lose some fat and gain some muscle. So that too has promise of taking inches off my waist.