Calories do count but you can lose weight without hunger....

Today's Post: Monday, 4-25-2011

This is actually a critical point. People who get extra hungry fail to lose weight and fat when they try to do so.

You can lose weight and fat without extra hunger. In fact, if you get extra hunger, you won’t lose any that you will keep off. Worse, if you have a lot to lose and get extra hungry trying, you won’t lose much!

In a new book about WHAT to eat and not eat to lose weight, I read in a review that author Gary Taubes said that exercise was ineffective in helping people lose weight. That reviewer also said Taubes said that reducing calories didn’t help people lose weight or fat.

If he did say that, he’s wrong!

However, his main point that he clearly DOES say is in three parts.:

1. When you eat protein foods and fats, it turns off your hunger.

2. When you eat sugar, refined grains, starches, and other high glycemic foods, it does a bad job of turning off your hunger.

3. Worse, when you eat or drink those things, your body releases insulin. And insulin tends to put the calories you eat into fat storage!

On those three things, he is quite correct!

If you eat enough protein to make your body work right and enough of the essential oils you actually need, you tend to not get hungry until you actually need more.

The calories do count. But you wind up not taking in enough of them to be or stay very fat. And, you tend to have normal blood sugar and low blood insulin levels so your body tends NOT to add to your fat stores.

(Al Sears, MD thinks of it this way. Since your body is getting what it needs every day, it does NOT think you are in a famine even if your calorie count is a bit lower than it was. Your metabolism stays high.

In fact, research shows this is correct. People who get enough protein even with fewer calories stay healthy and feel OK and do NOT get extremely hungry.

BUT, the same amount of calories and little or no protein is a disaster. Your mood and energy and metabolism all go into a nose dive. And, your health begins to get worse! You get extremely hungry too.)

So eating at least a minimum of protein foods and fats or oils each day DOES allow you to lose weight with extreme hunger.

2. When you eat sugar, refined grains, starches, and other high glycemic foods, it does a bad job of turning off your hunger.

When you drink a soft drink or even a glass of real fruit juice, it does little or nothing to make you feel less hungry. You did take in calories but still feel hungry! Oops!

But there’s worse to come. Once your body releases enough insulin to try cut your blood sugar back to normal so your cells stop getting more sugars than they can use, it goes too far. Then you get low blood sugar and feel hungry!

Sugar, high fructose corn syrup, refined grain foods, and starchy foods do the exact same thing. But since they do have some protein or a bit of fiber in some cases and are thought of as foods, at first you get less hungry. But they too produce that insulin surge and you return to being hungry.

So, in both cases, you wind up still hungry despite taking in a lot of calories.

This is the total reverse of what you need to lose fat and keep it off!

You eat way more calories! And, you have a great deal of trouble if you try not to while ingesting these “fast carbs.”

3. Worse, when you eat or drink those things, your body releases insulin. And insulin tends to put the calories you eat into fat storage!

So, his point is simple.

If you eat fast carbs, too little protein, and hardly any fat, you will be fat and easily made hungry.

If you eat plenty of protein and at least some fat or oils, you will get far less hungry and can lose fat and weight.

So, there is indeed a great deal he has right.

4. But, if you eat nonstarchy vegetables and cooked beans and lentils too, it becomes easier to eat fewer calories without feeling hungry. Both kinds of food are high in fiber which turns down hunger. And, cooked beans and lentils have protein too!

Eating those foods is essential too if you want to lose fat. They help you cut calories without hunger.

I’ve not yet read Gary Taubes book. But if he missed that or says it isn’t important, he’s incorrect.

5. Vigorous exercise even if it is relatively brief causes your body to burn calories for up to several hours after you do it. And, that’s in addition to the calories you burn doing the exercise. Also, strength training builds muscle mass. (I does build less in women; but it does add some.) Both of these effects mean that you can eat more total calories and still lose excess fat.

Similarly, getting in a lot of walking or other moderate exercise -- if you also have time for it, allows you to eat more food without gaining fat.

So exercise allows you eat more while burning less calories or burning only what you actually use. That makes it easier to get good nutrition and NOT feel hungry as well.

People who lose fat and keep it off virtually all exercise.

Exercise also helps with motivation. People who even start an exercise program feel better and their self esteem goes up.

And, there’s more. Even before most of the fat comes off, exercise begins to give you many of the health benefits you’ll get from the fat loss!

In short, calories do count. But if you know how, you can lose fat without hunger!