Stop Counting Calories
This post is for all of those people who STILL think that cutting calories & starving themselves is the best and/or only way to lose weight.
You are wrong, wrong, wrong….
According to another new study, when you reduce your calories, your body responds by reducing your levels of physical activity. It’s a natural response to starvation.
And it’s happened to every yo-yo dieter for the past 999 years.
So, for the last time, it’s not just how much food you eat…
- it’s the type of food you eat (nachos = bad)
- it’s when you eat that food (carbs before bed = bad)
- it’s where you eat that food (in front of tv = bad)
- it’s how you move or don’t move your body (watching tv while eating nachos = bad)
.
Thus endeth the rant..
Brad Gross
April 14, 2010 at 1:53 pm
Before I was losing weight, I was taking in on average, 6,000-8,000 calories a day. I have since moved down to 2,400-2,800 per day and I lift weights for an hour a day and do some metabolic-conditioning workouts (crossfit style) a few days a week now and I’ve been losing weight very steadily.
So are you saying I could still eat at 6-8K and just eat different food?
healthhabits
April 14, 2010 at 8:19 pm
So are you saying I could still eat at 6-8K and just eat different food? – NO WAY!!!
What I am saying is that a diet that focuses solely on cutting calories is shortsighted and doomed to failure
What you eat + How much you eat + when you eat it
All 3 should be addressed
Brad Gross
April 15, 2010 at 10:48 am
OK, that’s what I thought you were saying. I’ve seen some things on the interwebs where people are posting, if you just eat a certain style of food you can eat as much as you want and still shed all the weight.
I totally agree with you.
By the way, I love this website! Hope you’re doing well and thanks for the quick response!
TR
May 5, 2010 at 12:22 pm
HH/Others,
I’m not sure if “when you eat it” matters in the grand scheme of things, although you could make the argument that when you sleep, it’s a form of mini-hibernation where you live predominantly off of your fat stores (when I train people, I note that this is your biggest fat burning zone!: sleep). During the day, we eat more than we expend, in essence, we are socking away a little more energy to get us through the evening. Jacques Le Magnen pointed this out (brilliant, blind, photographic memory, interesting guy who has done a great deal for the science behind hunger and nutrition – I would recommend reading “Hunger”).
In that regard, if we are supplying a great deal of calories right before bed, we may be utilizing this food instead of our fat stores while sleeping, but I will argue that it wouldn’t really matter if we were eating what we evolved to eat.
And I would argue that “what you eat” determines “how much you eat.”
For instance, many of the studies conducted comparing a low-carb, “Atkins-type” diet vs. the Standard American Diet (SAD), the former is ad libitum, and the latter is restricted in calories. Almost without fail, the ad libitum, low-carb group reduces their caloric consumption below their pre-study baseline. They’re fueling their bodies on less calories.
So, I don’t think it’s necessarily “you just eat a certain style of food you can eat as much as you want and still shed all the weight” as Brad Gross said, but if you eat a certain style of food: Paleo, Atkins, Low-Carb, you will shed excess weight because you won’t require more calories and thus will eat less in the long run relative to a high refined carbohydrate diet, for example.
The SAD is too high in carbohydrates, notably of the refined, easily digestible, sugary, high-fructosy nature that induces the body to store relatively more calories into the adipose tissue. More calories being stored = less calories available for the body to perform its functions = more calories consumed.
We’re eating too much food because we’re eating the wrong food.
And I’ve mentioned it before, but to your point about sedentary behavior, i.e., eating nachos in front of the TV/not moving your body can also be determined by “what you eat.”
More consumed calories being stored as fat = Less calories available for utilization = less energy to move.
rh1661
June 27, 2010 at 9:34 am
If you wanna loose bodyfat it all comes down to this:
You gotta burn more calories than you consume!!!
Kinda simple really….
Have a nice day
Tron
July 11, 2010 at 4:10 pm
@Rh1661: all you’re doing is restating the obvious (and the laws of thermodynamics). It’s like a club owner asking me how he can increase the number of patrons and I tell him that he needs to have more people enter his establishment than exit it.
The more relevant question is ‘why’? Why do people become obese? And to say it’s because they take in more than they expend just restates the question.
healthhabits
July 11, 2010 at 5:02 pm
well said Tron
pranali
July 22, 2010 at 12:11 pm
need to loose about 5 kgs of weight in 5 months period please HELP.
healthhabits
July 22, 2010 at 1:04 pm
Get the free Paleo Diet ebook
Rich
August 16, 2010 at 2:41 am
I love it. Watching TV + Eating Nachos. So right on. It’s about choices and people are making poor choices. That’s the bottom line.
ishan
September 18, 2010 at 7:15 am
put your feet on the track,consume less,work more and u will definatly get the results.gym can never reduce your body fat,its aerobics.mind it
healthhabits
September 18, 2010 at 10:00 am
eat less, move more…..boy oh boy, will I ever get tired of that old chestnut
Read this please – http://www.healthhabits.ca/2010/04/30/losing-weight-isnt-as-simple-as-eat-less-move-more-2/
Nancy
October 22, 2010 at 6:06 am
Counting calories has been the single most effective tool for me with regard to weight loss and control. I do also eat very clean, unprocessed food now, but that wasn’t the case when I first started losing weight. The nutritional tweaks in my diet happened after I saw results from calorie reduction and I wanted to maximize weight loss and improve my overall well being. Frankly, portion control cannot happen unless we count and measure, particularly in western countries. The size of a common US dinner spoon is 2x that of many other countries I have travelled to, and we all don’t need another rant about how 3 decades ago, it occurred to Coca Cola and coffee companies and friends that they could sell a 250 calorie 12oz. drink next to a 370 calorie 20 oz. drink with limited cost to them and major profit, all the while making customers feel like geniuses for getting a great bargain. Well, geniuses that we are, we are a nation of death by obesity. I do believe in only eating things that are not processed, but that choice took me a great deal of time to achieve. In an effort to sell books and CDs and supplements, trainers and fitness experts will love to tell us that unless we are eating a whole foods diet, we are doing it all wrong, which is really discouraging and can give a person reason to give up. So, for the person who is reading this and feels that way: I’ve been there. The fact is there is plenty of evidence from the medical community supporting the principle that exercising cutting back calories to create a deficit will reduce body fat, which will in turn reduce risks related to obesity related illness. The more you count those calories, the more you’ll realize you’ll get far more satiety out of chicken with broccoli than a few cookies, and then you’ll be using your head in no time.
Roger Boisjoli
November 24, 2010 at 3:05 pm
I started a program called “30 days to better health” last Wednesday. Lost five lbs in the first five days. It concentrates on eating foods with a low Glycemic index. Those are mostly non-processed products. You co not count calories and exercise moderately. See http://www.releasingfat.com for more details.
I agree that if you burn calories than you take in you will lose weight, to a point. Lets face it, if you eat 5,000 calories a day, how will you ever do enough exercise to burn that off?
Adam
November 28, 2010 at 12:35 am
Awfully ignorant post.
Twinkie Diet.
Bob Kaplan
April 14, 2011 at 6:58 am
@healthhabits
Never gets old, right?
When you think the CAUSE of obesity is an energy imbalance, you have a pretty foolish looking cure:
This is from boston.com: “Taubes insists, though, that the calories in-calories out theory of weight gain and weight loss is just plain incorrect. Of course, most nutritionists — which Taubes is not — would say that he’s the one who’s wrong.
“The problem is people’s inability to know how many calories they burn and eat,” said Dr. George Blackburn, associate director of the Division of Nutrition at Harvard Medical School in this article written by Globe contributer Judy Foreman. “If you put a person in a metabolic chamber, where you know exactly what they eat and what they burn, the calories in, calories out idea is always reconfirmed.”
Nobody is denying that a system gets bigger when it takes in more energy than it expends, or vice versa, the point is that it is inane to use this observation, as Blackburn seems to be implying, as causal, because it says absolutely nothing about why we get fat.
Why does Yankee Stadium sell out in October? Because more people occupy the seats than vacate it. Why is Morton’s steakhouse so crowded on a Friday night? Because more people enter the restaurant than exit it. Why did the toilet overflow? Because more water left it than stayed in. Why did Oprah get fat? Because she took in more calories than she expended. While all of these statements are accurate, they tell us nothing about the cause.
The calories we take in and the calories we expend are side-effects of the type of food we eat.
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Naila@juhub_foods
August 16, 2012 at 10:56 am
We must remember that food is a source of energy. The more you eat, the active you should be. Why? To burn energy. Or else it converts to fat. Also avoid eating late at night; another great way to loose weight.
StrikeAyr
December 1, 2012 at 12:27 am
I hate the whole ‘eat less calories’ idea!
Build more muscle and eat a healthy diet speread throughout 6-7 smaller meals a day. Plan your food. In turn you will look great and raise the level your body burns calories even when sitting. Don’t be scared to chuck in a couple of tabata sessions each week either. Losing weight isn’t as difficult as made out to be. Change habits to good ones and stay positive.