There are few things as frustrating as gaining weight and not being able to take it off.
You with me on that?
It may be the dead hand of our past fathers and mothers but then of late, these last 30 years, obesity is a western diet plague.
Genotype may matter but we can do pretty well dining by ourselves without waiting for our endomorphic preferences to kick in.
Nonetheless, over the past period following a low carbohydrate diet I've been notching up some big numbers on my weight loss account.
And it was easy...until it all suddenly stopped happening.
The conundrum was I needed to get rid of more of what I was a carrying on my body if I wanted to impact further on some of my health issues.
What to do. What to do...
I spent the best part of a year in limbo. No matter how much I exercised -- and I do more than you I'm sure, unless you are an athlete or gym junkie -- I was still tipping the scales at figures I didn't want to know about.
I needed a push to get back to my preferred path: my yellow brick road.
Low carbers like me will be told that the way to get past a plateau is to reduce your carbohydrate intake further for a short time so that the body's metabolism is forced to re-negotiate its consumption. This is cellular level stuff aligned to what substance -- fat, carbohydrate or protein -- the body decides to break down first. The diet shift supposedly should move into true ketogenic mode and shock the bod into catching up.
There's a logic in this. The maths has been done. The paradigm is shifting -- even on the question of eating saturated fats.
I have written here before about the dietary regime of LCHF -- Low Carbohydrate High Fat. But to give you the drum the logic is simple:
LCHF (Low Carb, High Fat) means you eat less carbohydrates with a higher proportion of fat. The most important point is to minimize your intake of sugar and starches. That way you can eat other delicious foods until you are satisfied – and still lose weight.
A number of recent high quality scientific studies show that LCHF makes it easier to lose weight and control your blood sugar. And that may just be the beginning. -- LCHF For Beginners
That's the drill. Simple stuff. You don't have to obsess about your food, just follow a few basic principles.
I was already lowish (average maybe of 70-110 grams/day) on my carbohydrate consumption....so I was in the groove: vulnerable to further suggestions.
I was already lowish (average maybe of 70-110 grams/day) on my carbohydrate consumption....so I was in the groove: vulnerable to further suggestions.
So off I went -- to the kitchen -- and started cooking and eating with a heavy hand on the dairy fats and oils while I cut back further on my vegetable matter .
I tried taking tablespoon fulls of coconut oil as a supplement but it caused abdominal upsets.
And to cut a long menu short. it worked: I'm losing the weight again.
I find the turn around quite amazing. After only a couple of weeks I'm much less the man I used to be: already.
The ideological adjustment is a bit hard after a lifetime of being told to ease up on the fatty foods. But being a naughty boy has proven rewarding and I'm liking the cheese and cream, eggs and bacon.
Of course there's a point to be made here:
If I am losing weight on a high fat diet maybe what we assume rules weight gain is ass about? The problem in our diet may not be the fat we eat (although some much used processed/artificial oils are very problematical: the trans fats) but rests with our carbohydrate choices, especially the high carb density grains, fruits and frank sugars. The point being, that no matter what plant you put in your mouth it is going to end up as so much glucose by the time it gets put to work...or queued for storage(as fat).
Don't just nod you head or believe everything I say, go do your own homework like I did.
But for now, I'm laughing... and look forward to the many happy hours carrying less of me around.
I'm not going to make a ruling on what may be the physiological preferred diet for humans a la 'Paleolithic' or 'traditional' perspective. Anthropological research may be interesting but not conclusive -- although people eating a traditional or hunter gatherer diet don't suffer as we do from high rates of obesity, heart disease, arthritis or diabetes. These diets are, nonetheless, often higher in fat and lower in carbohydrate than the standard contemporary Western diet.
