Truisms: Approaching a "No Diet" Diet

Well, maybe I wouldn't go THAT far....

There are certain truisms emerging after writing this blog for 2+ years, so this post might bore the 2 or 3 of you who've been reading it religiously. When you start believing something as true that shapes  your world, you start seeing it everywhere, but it's eery when articles in the media direct address it in the span of a week or so.

This past week, yet another signpost that in the battle to lose weight, forget about exercise.

A 2011 meta-analysis, a study of studies, looked at the relationship between physical activity and fat mass in children, and found that being active is probably not the key determinant in whether a child is at an unhealthy weight. In the adult population, interventional studies have difficulty showing that a physically active person is less likely to gain excess weight than a sedentary person. Further, studies of energy balance, and there are many of them, show that total energy expenditure and physical activity levels in developing and industrialized countries are similar, making activity and exercise unlikely to be the cause of differing obesity rates.
Moreover, exercise increases one’s appetite. After all, when you burn off calories being active, your body will often signal you to replace them. Research confirms this. A 2012 systematic review of studies that looked at how people complied with exercise programs showed that over time, people wound up burning less energy with exercise than predicted and also increasing their caloric intake.

I would never tell anyone not to exercise -- my exercise regime of bicycling and weight lifting is key to retaining sane, happy, focused, productive and communicative with those I love....but it doesn't help me lose weight. For many years a good friend would ask, "You ride you bike so damn much, why you still so fat?" Because it's about eating less and better, not doing more. Consume and spend less: less on food, and no need to waste your time in gyms and running around in circles.

I had to dig unspeakably far through Google Image Search for a "Fat Racist" to find this image.

Oddly related to fighting consumerism to aid in weight loss and public health, the recent racist mass-murder  in South Carolina saw an interesting response that neither blames racism or gun culture directly, but anti-intellectualism that allows simplistic, fearful thought to grow and discourages the shame that should be applied to those who espouse fundamentalist views in public and in politics.

Corporate influence on climate and environmental policy, meanwhile, is simply more evidence of anti-intellectualism in action, for corporate domination of American society is another result of a public that is not thinking critically. Americans have allowed their democracy to slip away, their culture overtaken by enormous corporations that effectively control both the governmental apparatus and the media, thus shaping life around materialism and consumption.

The drive to eat more is profitable. Offering any solution other than eating less is profitable. Reason and truth that contradicts the drive to eat more is unprofitable. Anti-intellectualism is the solution to keep the stock price high. Who care if a few eggs, or church goers, or entire classes of little kids, get broken in the process?

But to get back on track, as we're not trying to solve all of the world's ills, but just lose some weight and keep it off. So truisms so far:

• Eat less to lose weight, exercise for other reasons.
• Capitalism will do anything to make you eat more.

and thirdly,

• Diets don't work.

Diets don't work for a variety of reasons, from biology to psychology. Mann points the finger, first and foremost, at human biology. "Genes," she writes, "play an indisputable role in regulating an individual's weight: Most of us have a genetically set weight range. When we try to live above or below that range, our body struggles mightily to adapt."
Second to biology, Mann blames a combination of neuroscience and psychology. Our brains are hard-wired to want food for survival, she explains, so restricting calories creates a psychological stress response, which facilitates weight gain, not loss. Also, she adds: "Studies show that willpower, the thing we all blame ourselves for not having enough of, is in many ways a mythical quality and certainly not something that can be relied upon for weight loss."

Books about a "no diet" diet address the question I occasionally get asked as I've maintained a significant weight loss for a few years now: "How did you do it?" Modern "diets" that are published in books with snappy hooks don't really answer it other than "stay forever uncomfortable on this cockamamie scheme we put on you." Eat cabbage soup for 2 meals a day for the rest of your life? Pretend to eat like a caveman? Cut out all carbs/fat/protein/food of a certain color/randomly chosen villain? Balderdash.

You just have to work with the biology, psychology and resources you're given. Anti-intellectual magical thinking will profit someone other than yourself, and will literally and figuratively keep you on a treadmill to prevent you from actually becoming engaged in life in a meaningful way, but it won't help you lose weight and keep it off.
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WEEKLY AVERAGE: 2720
Very much an up and down week, a lot going on.

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MONDAY COUNT: 3550

SLEPT: 11pm-6:30am, 7.5 hrs
Hungry -- probably still in calorie deficit from the 100 miles I rode yesterday.

AM SNACK: 6:45 am, iced green tea

BREAKFAST 1: 9am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 10:45am, steel cut oatmeal, 450 cal

LUNCH: 1pm, sardines and avocado on whole wheat toast, health salad, pickles, momma salad, chests, 1010 cal

PM SNACK: 5pm, ice cream sandwich, 430 cal

DINNER: 7pm, mahi mahi, asparagus, poppa salad with dressing, 600 cal

EVENING SNACK: 7:30pm, popcorn, +/- 400 cal

EVENING SNACK: 8pm, 3 kid granola bars, one kind bar, 500 cal
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RIDE CREDIT: 740 cal
TUESDAY COUNT: 2925

SLEPT: 9:30pm- 5:30am, 8hrs

AM SNACK: 5:45 am, iced green tea

BREAKFAST: 9am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 10am, Greek yogurt with honey, almonds, vanilla, 450 cal  

BIKE SNACK: 2pm, homemade granola bar, 290 cal

PM SNACK: 3:30pm, momma salad, cheezits, 310 cal

DINNER pt 1: 5:15pm, poppa salad, dressing, veggie straws, 330 cal

EVENING SNACK: 5:45pm kind bar, 200 cal

DINNER pt2: 8pm, Chipotle burrito, chips & salsa, ice cream 1925 cal
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WEDNESDAY COUNT: 2970

SLEPT: 9:30pm - 12:30am, 3 hrs

AM SNACK: 4am, iced green tea

BREAKFAST 1: 9:15am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST: 10am, steel cut oatmeal, 450 cal

LUNCH: 1pm, chicken meatballs, lentil curry, steamed string beans, pickles,  650 cal

PM SNACK: 3:30pm, momma salad, cheezit, 310 cal

PM SNACK: 5pm, poppa salad with dressing, 200 cal

PM SNACK: 6pm, slice of streetza, +/- 300 cal

DINNER: 8pm, burger, fries, oysters, sticky bun, water, +/- 900 cal
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THURSDAY COUNT: 2660

SLEPT: 10pm-6:30am, 8.5 hours

AM SNACK: 7am, iced green tea, 

BREAKFAST 1: 10:45am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST: 1:45pm, Fage yogurt with honey, almonds, vanilla, 450 cal

PM SNACK: 4:30pm, momma salad, cheezits, 410 cal

DINNER: 7pm, stuffers french bread pizzas, poppa salad with dressing, flourless chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream, +/-1640 cal

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BIKE CREDIT: 715 cal
FRIDAY COUNT: 1495

SLEPT: 9pm-12:30am, 3am-5:30am, 6 hours

AM SNACK: 6am, iced green tea

BREAKFAST 1: 10am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 11am, Fage yogurt with honey, almonds, vanilla, 450 cal

BIKE SNACK: 2pm, homemade granola bar, 290 cal

PM SNACK: 4pm, momma salad and cheezits, 310 cal

DINNER: 7pm, mussels over pasta in wine and oil, ice cream and flourless chocolate cake, glass of wine, +/- 1000 cal