Please Don't Diet

[brynndragon]

Via the_xtina, a discussion of the Minnesota Starvation Study, the most comprehensive study on the psychological and physiological effects of semistarvation we have ever done. Semistarvation in this case is defined as getting 1600 calories per day; MyPyramid.gov indicates that a 25 year old male who is active 30-60 minutes/day should get 2800 calories/day. To give you an idea how harsh that sort of restriction is, this study could not be repeated today because it would be deemed "cruel and possibly life-threatening".

I want to note one of the psychological effects these men experienced while doing what we would consider pretty standard (even generously proportioned) dieting: "self-critical with distorted body images and even feeling overweight". Now, these men were not overweight when the study began, much less so while they were losing 2.5lb/week. Yet somehow dieting caused them to perceive themselves as overweight. Hmm. . .

(I'd put The Biology of Human Starvation (Keys two-volume book that seems to be the published paper of the study and its results) on my wish list if I could actually find a copy)

Comments

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

so let's say i have 25 lbs i must get rid of.

how do it do it then without eating less?

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[benndragon.livejournal.com]

Me thinks you're missing the point. Let me ask you this: what makes you think you need to lose 25 pounds?

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

don't want to sound confrontational... the body has methods for adding and reducing fat. also muscles [1]

well, i weigh myself twice a day "morning" and "bed". i have data. Over a period of time, which is not terribly unreasonble, weight has increased. due to various factors like lack of exercise due to lack of motivation due to ...

thus, i've gained 25 lbs, my clothes don't fit well, and my motorcycle suit is REALLY uncomfortably tight, on their own simple measurable factors. i do not wish to spend $1500 on new clothes/etc.

now that there's more light, and i have more motivation and energy (apparently i'm a winter slug this year), i'm doing things overall to my large muscles, sustained heart rate, lifting, squats, punching, kicking. my ideal is at least 5 times a week. currently i'm two days on, two days off. this will move to three days on, two days off, and then i'll slide it around to shake up things. i'm also not changing how i eat, which is fairly healthy for the most part. i don't eat hohos and chips or hotpockets as food. the simpler the better for food. going to be reading poulan's _defense of food_ book soon i suppose too.

so, there we are. i KNOW i need to lose it. it's interferring with stuff. thus far, it's not really budging.

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[1] as well muscles weigh more, which makes things pesky. i am not thin and twiggy even at 9% body fat. i have huge frame, and dense bones, and put on muscles easily. plus i'm definitely working those everyday in various ways (shovelglove with a 8 lb hammer, 25 lb free weights) - they say load bearing exercise is very good right?

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[randysmith]

You do things to shift your body into a higher calorie processing mode. Exercise is the obvious thing; I believe the baseline (non-active) calorie consumption of muscle mass is much higher than other tissues. There's some suggestion that walking/hiking/running (bone impact) triggers some hormones that specifically increase metabolism rate. And you make sure to eat reasonably healthfully and not eat things your body doesn't need. That has two wins: a) if you're getting all your micronutrients, you're less likely to feel hungry when you have enough calories (mind you, habit can be a bitch to break), and b) I believe (no evidence here) that just being in better health will tend to improve your weight.

But I have an intense aversion to starving yourself. It strikes me as being based on an extremely (and obviously) simplistic view of this large collection of feedback systems known as the human body.

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

see above...

i've always been suspicious of how they calculate your calorie #.

ideally, over a certain term, you'd calculate it based on measured food intake, everything else being constant, and observe when weight remains dead stable. then you know. that can be really hard.

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