The Funky Orchard: August 2013

It's nearly the end of the summer now. Time to put away those bikinis. Some of us may look at the months ahead with dread, grab the nearest packet of biscuits, or crisps, or whatever our thing is, and munch away to comfort ourselves as the cold approaches. Then when we see summer coming again, we panic, and follow whatever fad diet we find first.

Well, today I'm going to talk to you about why doing this is bad. I'm a total hypocrite, but I'm also a Health Scientist, so let me share with you what I know, and you can then make your own informed decisions.

Basically, I want you to understand why the Cambridge Diet, the (unofficial) Mayo Diet, the Atkins Diet, etc, are not good, but in order to do that I'm afraid I need to give you a tedious biology lesson.

So let's start with the basics.

Food provides us with two things:

nutrients
fuel / energy

Nutrients

Our body's requirements are very specific. It requires certain amounts of various elements and compounds, in order to work. For example, an adult human being requires approximately 4700mg potassium, which is used by the body in protein synthesis, and muscle growth.

It is not impossible for us to look at what our body's nutritional requirements are, look at what the food we eat gives us, and make them match, but it is very difficult. For most of us, trying to do this with our diet would be silly. But understanding the effects of what we do actually eat, is important if we wish to be healthy (especially if you have your eye on a bikini holiday next year). I highly recommend vitamin and mineral supplements. It's extremely difficult to overdose on most nutrients.

Energy

Everything we eat falls into a few simple categories (food groups):

dietary fibre
protein
fat
complex carbohydrates
simple carbohydrates

To oversimplify:

A lot of dietary fibre comes from fruit, vegetables, and nuts.
Fibre is required to keep your digestive tract (intestines and colon) moving and healthy. In other words, without fibre you will become constipated.
Fibre is usually very low in calories / energy.

Protein

is found in meat, dairy products, eggs, tofu, legumes, nuts and seeds.
is required for cell regeneration. Your body's tiny little building blocks don't last very long, so you're constantly producing new ones, without even knowing you're doing it.
cannot be stored by the body (it is not stored as fat), so excess protein becomes part of your urine.
provides some energy.

Fats

Fats are complicated, so if you wish to understand more than my brief explanations here, have a look at some of the links at the end of the post.

Your body needs fat!

Fat contains essential nutrients which are used to make cells and hormones - and no, eliminating fats, doesn't suddenly make women sane at that difficult time of month, sorry.
The body makes it's own fat from unused calories.
Fat provides a lot of energy.

The complicated bit:

Saturated (BAD) fat, mostly comes from animals. For example, fat on a steak, bacon rind, etc. It raises cholesterol, which is bad for the heart, and can clog up veins and arteries.
Trans (BAD) fat, again, mostly comes from animals, but is often synthetic. Again, they can cause problems for the heart.

Unsaturated (GOOD) fats, fall into two camps:

Monounsaturated (GOOD) fat is found mostly in vegetables (sunflower, olive, peanut, sesame, etc).
Monounsaturated (GOOD) fats can REDUCE cholesterol already in your blood, and lower your risk of heart disease or stroke.
Polyunsaturated (GOOD) fats are found in seeds, fatty fish, and vegetable oils.
Polyunsaturated (GOOD) fats again improve cholesterol levels, and also decrease the risk of type 2 diabetes.

So to summarise:

BAD = animal fats and synthetic fats.
Good = vegetable / seed fats, and fatty fish fats.

Carbohydrates

Fairly often people think of carbohydrates as being things like bread, pasta, potatoes, rice, etc. But these are "complex carbohydrates". Sugar is also a carbohydrate though; "simple carbohydrates". So, most sweets you scoff, fall into the carbohydrate category.

the body needs carbohydrates to create fuel / energy, literally to keep the body running.
excess carbohydrate is stored by the body as fat, in the muscles and liver.
limiting carbohydrates essentially throws the body into "starvation".

Also interesting and useful to know:

excess fat is stored in the muscles
it can then be converted to muscle if more muscle is needed
fat takes up three times as much space as muscle (people often say 'muscle is heavier than fat', which isn't quite correct).
muscle will be converted to energy when there is no more fat available.
the body's metabolism requires a huge amount of energy. (Metabolism is a complicated process whereby the food we eat is converted into the energy the body requires, at a cellular level).
eating breakfast starts the metabolism each day.

Starvation

When the body is thrown into "starvation" it is forced to create energy by converting the fat stored in the muscles (and, eventually, the liver).

The short term effects of this are that the individual will suffer from low energy levels. They will also suffer fatigue, dizziness, headaches, toilet problems, and irregular periods.

The long term consequence of the body going into starvation is that it expects to do so again in the future. You've given it the message that food is scarce. As such, it stores fat at a higher rate than it previously had done. Your body doesn't have a consciousness, so cannot understand that you chose to starve it. It's role is survival, keeping you alive; if there's a risk that you could starve, it wants to combat it. Your body really doesn't care if you get fat.

Some people will go in to a severe form of shock when carbohydrates are eliminated for a prolonged period of time.

Understanding Fad Diets

Most of these diets instruct you to cut out all carbohydrates and fat, some require you to eliminate meat too. They usually have added twists. I've seen one stating that adding a grapefruit in the morning speeds up your metabolism. I've seen another stipulating in detail exactly what carbohydrates to eat each week. Such details make diets look more authentic to the uninformed. What you need to remember is that every single person is different, so a diet written for the masses is not tailored to anyone.

So, using the information above, you can start to understand how these diets work.

By cutting out carbohydrates, both complex and simple, your body is no longer receiving it's main source of fuel / energy. It is therefore forced to rely upon secondary sources; the smaller amount of energy produced from eating fat and protein, and energy from converting your fat deposits.
By cutting out fat, then fat as a secondary source of energy is eliminated.
If the diet stipulates that you cut out meat too, then another source of energy is eliminated. Each time a source is eliminated it places more pressure on the body to produce it's own energy.
If the diet stipulates that there should be an increase in exercise it is increasing the amount of energy required, and therefore placing even more pressure on the body to convert fat to energy. (I'm not saying people shouldn't exercise).
Removing so many foods from the diet will inevitably mean that people are losing vital nutrients they require in order to have a healthy body.
Those that give a milkshake are providing those nutrients, but by giving the dieter milk they're making the diet take longer.
By telling the dieter that they can eat as many fruit and vegetables as they can manage they are making sure the metabolism is kept going, tricking the body into thinking it is receiving a lot of fuel to turn into energy.

Why I hate these diets:

Firstly, most of them point you towards your Body Mass Index (BMI) to show you how much you should weigh. Most people look at their BMI with horror. The BMI does not take into account muscle mass. Most of us have muscle mass of some level; we wouldn't be able to stand up and walk around otherwise. So, when you look at your BMI, take it with a pinch of salt. According to their BMI, weight lifters are obese.
Secondly, I mentioned previously that some people's bodies go into severe shock when carbohydrates are with-held for a prolonged period of time. I've first hand experience of this, and do not want to ever see anyone go through it again. Yes, weight loss was drastic, but the suffering was immense, and as I've also previously mentioned, weight gain afterwards was very fast.
Many people who use these diets are desperate to lose some weight. They are deeply unhappy with how their body makes them feel, both physically, and emotionally. These diets do not warn people that once they return to eating carbohydrates they are likely to retain fat at a higher rate than previously, so they are doing more harm than good.
The majority of these diets do not cover the consequences associated with suddenly changing ones diet (either at the beginning or the end), of eliminating food groups from the diet (removing nutrients will lead to deficiencies), or any of the health risks that can be associated with dieting.
They do not take into account, in any way at all, an individual's needs, let alone any health conditions.
Their mere existence feeds the illusion that there is an ideal body type.

I will discuss, at another time, the way I encourage people to lose weight. For now I will give you a simple and brief outline:

do not expect weight loss to be fast.
eat when you wake up, to start your metabolism.
reduce meal sizes.
have dinner at lunch time, and a snack at dinner time.
swap out sugary snacks for fruit and vegetables.
reduce the complex carbohydrate proportion of your meals, but do not eliminate it.
increase the amount you exercise.
make all changes slowly.

It is important to understand that we are not all designed to look the same. And none of us are designed to look like Barbie. The posters and magazines you see are not real; I'll show you in another blog post how they create those looks.

People who are fit and healthy, who don't have to make any effort in order to be so, often do not believe that others find it difficult. I advise ignoring unkind comments from such people. Yes, there are glandular conditions that can cause slight or severe weight gain. And of course, there are illnesses that mean people are a lot less mobile; the inability to exercise off energy inevitably leads to weight gain.

So, don't aspire to be something you cannot be.