New way to prevent weight regain....

Today's post:  Thursday, 12-1-2016

The key to permanent fat loss has long been to prevent gaining it back.

We very well may now have an effective solution to this!

1.  Our posts up until now have been about stopping the foods and drinks that add fat with lifestyle upgrades that tend to keep you lean and then maintaining them.

(This entails stopping soft drinks and wheat and all packaged foods and eating organic vegetables and fruit and health OK fats and oils and protein foods instead.  It also includes stopping hydrogenated oils and pro-inflammatory foods and MSG and replacing them with foods and oils and spices and supplements that lower inflammation.

The wonderful added benefit is that each of these actions protects your health and prevents diseases that cost billions to treat and which cause death, disability, impaired mobility; and prevent people from working or enjoying life.)

We have also posted how strength training and eating enough health OK protein foods can help remove fat and prevent that fat from returning AND also prevents gradual fattening from muscle and bone shrinkage in people who do not do this.

For some people, those are enough to remove the fat they want to get rid of; and these methods DO tend to ensure that fat lost stays off.

But some people don’t lose fat or lose enough fat or lose it fast enough with only those methods.

Eating a LOT less for months does remove fat.  That has been what people have done. But it always triggers the failsafe famine response which lowers their energy levels and metabolism and makes them super hungry and worse most hungry for fattening, high energy foods!

(This was recently showcased by this happening to The Perfect Loser contestants almost all gaining it all back from exactly this effect.

They almost all gained back their fat and now must do even more to lose it again.

The failsafe famine response they triggered is very powerful.)

2.  Now there has been a huge advance as carefully managed fasts when they are long enough have been shown to remove fat but NOT increase hunger or lower metabolism.

(I’ve posted on this lately and am doing it myself and will continue to because it is such an important breakthrough!)

3.  But it seems there has been a third way that any fat lost tends to be regained.

When I saw the report of this research I had just been on a 5 day fast and the following week I’d gained ALL of the lost weight back.

That caused two things:  I immediately set up to go on a 12 day fast because the work of Dr Jason Fung and his clinical experience suggest the fat I’ll lose in the extra 7 days I will NOT gain back as I will the fat lost in the first five days.

But it also sensitized me to watch for any other information on how to prevent fat regain.

Mercifully, I just found exactly that in a study reported by Medical News Today.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/314379.php

[The bolding below is mine. I added it due to the importance of the data highlighted.]

“In a new study, researchers reveal how the gut microbiome may play a crucial role in post-dieting weight regain, and they may have uncovered a way to stop this from happening.”

Oh really!

“Elinav and team note that up to 80 percent of people who initially lose weight with dieting will regain their lost weight - and sometimes gain even more - within 12 months.

This weight loss and regain can occur in cycles - a phenomenon known as the "yo-yo effect" or "weight cycling," which studies have shown can carry significant health risks.

A recent study reported by Medical News Today, for example, found that yo-yo dieting can increase the risk of death from heart disease.

But exactly why do so many individuals have trouble losing weight and keeping it off?

New research suggests it may be down to changes in the gut microbiome - the abundance of microorganisms in the intestine - in response to dieting.

Altered microbiome reduces flavonoids to lower energy expenditure

On further investigation, the researchers found that the altered gut microbiome played a role in reducing levels of two flavonoids - apigenin and naringenin - in response to dieting, which are plant compounds that boast a number of health benefits.

What is more, the team found that this reduction in flavonoids interfered with expression of UCP-1 - a gene that plays a role in energy expenditure, or the amount of calories we burn. It is this process, the researchers speculate, that likely drives recurrent weight gain.

The researchers say their findings suggest a "post-biotic" therapy may be effective against weight regain after dieting, whereby flavonoids are introduced to the gut to replenish those lost by dieting. 

This strategy was found to be effective in mice, the team reports.

While further research is needed to determine whether such a strategy would be effective in humans, the authors believe their results hold promise....”!

My own 5 day fast was effective by itself. I did lose 4.7 pounds during that week. 

But because I gained it all back the next week, I decided to try a 12 day fast next.  

Dr Fung has found that people who do not get results with a shorter fast often do with a longer one.  

Secondly, once the first two to four days of fasting use up your glycogen stores from cars it begins to remove your body fat for fuel at about half a pound of fat a day.  

So, I think that means that where the 5 day fast may only have removed half a pound of fat, a 12 day fast, 7 days longer, will remove closer to 3.5 or 4  pounds of fat that I won't gain back.

Dr Fung has found fasting doesn't cause reduced metabolism or low energy leaving it the same or a bit better instead!

Similarly, it does not cause rebound hunger.

So, if adding a way to keep the kind of gut bacteria trim people have after a fast can solve this remaining problem, it may help enormously!

These researchers found a way that tested to work in mice.  They found that fatloss triggers a reduction in the flavonoids, apigenin and naringenin -- and that somehow this boosts the fattening bacteria and fat gain.

They then added those flavonoids to mice that had lost fat and the fat regain apparently stopped!

But eating all the orange zest from an organic orange or eating the peel of half an organic lemon provides these flavonoids -- plus any co-factors needed I suspect.

So in addition to the 12 day fast, the next week I'll eat the peel of half an organic lemon each day.  (I tried that once; and it was decent to eat because the harsh taste is in the juice only. I can do it every day for a week!)

And, Dave Asprey of Bulletproof says it has also been found that eating dark greens boosts the bacteria that trim people have.

So, I'll also eat a serving a day of organic kale or chard each day the week after my fast.

*So, if the 12 day fast plus this second step does help me keep off 3 or 4 pounds and I can do one a month,  I can lose enough fat to look different and trimmer; and my reflux and too high blood pressure will be much less by simply doing it every month for 3 to 5 months.

Then, I may need one every other month to keep the fat off.

This third way to keep fat regain from happening added to no rebound hunger and no metabolism drop from effective fat removal from fasting long enough now look to be the solution to obesity, particularly when added to the lifestyle upgrades long known to help create this effect.

[There is at least one drug now being developed that has been tested to boost metabolism safely that may help by speeding the process.  (It boosts thyroid a bit while protecting the liver from this effect.)

If this drug does prove to be safe and as effective as it sounds,  it may be a great add-on for these two new breakthrough strategies.]

But with these strategies to lose fat without any triggering of the failsafe famine response and eliminating the fat regain from gut bacteria we may finally have a real solution to the problems of obesity and the typical 80% plus fat regain.

This is very significant good news indeed!