Low Carb in the UK

So, you want is fast eh?

I just read this on Lora's Guestbook
Post by Katina on posted April 26, 2001 16:32
"Im 15 yrs old and i need to loose 25 pounds as soon as I can im on the atkins and am on day 9. I hear stories about people who lost 15 pounds in a week ive only lost 3 or 4? Am i doing something wrong?"

It got me to thinking, why do people, especially young girls, want to lose weight so fast??? We know it is not safe to do so, but everyone does... In our heart of hearts, we *all* want to be instantly skinny!

Lets face it, the world we live in holds up "Skin and Bones" Female models and "Muscle Hunk" Male models, and redicules anyone that deviates from this norm even slightly... We are taught that "Thinness" equates to "Sexyness", "Success" and "Glamour". Case in point of this at present is the story of the Bridget Jones actress Renee Zellweger. She ate pure Junk to gain 2st to play the role, and has now dropped the junk food, and has lost the weight again. Now, in itself, this is no bad thing, but IMO, she now looks too anglular, like a bag of bones. I read the Metro on the Train every morning, and they praised her "newly regained slimness". I am not the only person that thought she didn't look "fat" for the film, she just looked a "normal" size. There have been at least two readers letters every day this week in the Mail@Metro section, that have agreed with my view point.

Being "Thin" opens doorways that being "Fat" means you are too big to get through... and you know I am not just talking doors made of wood here. Kate Winslett recently complained that she needed to be ultra skinny to get Hollywood directors to even consider her for Roles, and that although she does not want to diet, she has to constantly monitor her food intake, to maintain the "stick thin" image that Hollywood desires.

You are seen as "Lazy" if you are not willing to work to achieve this "Perfection". However, we also live in a Consumer society, where we are trained to expect nigh on instant results, with only minimal outlay of effort or cash. For example, consumer electronic products and white goods wear out far faster than they did just 20 years ago, because it is easier to replace than repair. The Fridge your parents bought 30 years ago, will have cost a large amount of money and is just about reaching the end of its usefull life about now. The one they buy to replace it now will be cheap, and expected by the manufacturer to last no more than 5 years tops!

So, this sociological training will make us want fast, easy results on our "diets" as well... In-fact, this is why the Ultra low-calorie crash diet is probably so popular with teenagers (who really have no need to diet half the time), For them, with their growing metabolisms, it is a fast result, for not really a lot of work.

However, when you crash diet, you slow your metabolism down, and you body goes into "stavation mode."

What is Starvation mode? Good question. Stavation mode happens when your body sees that its calorific intake has been lessened, so it slows the metabolism down to make the autonomic body functions run more efficiently. A body in stavation will also release hormones to *prevent* fat loss and break down muscle tissue, to liberate fast acting Glucose as enery. It does this as the body does not know how long the lean times are going to last, and it working to keep you alive as long as possible.

And of course, by losing muscle, you slow the metabolism down even more, and it is a downward spiral from there. You can recover this muscle tone when the "famine" is over, by increasing the proportion of Protein you eat, and exercise, however, as the amount of calories needed to run the body is now lessened, more of the caloric energy taken in is stored instead of used.

In practise, what this means is that whereas before your crash diet, if your body needed say 1500 cals per day just to perform autonomic functions, such as keeping your heart beating, breathing, peristalsys etc, afterwards it will only need say 1200. The Extra 300cals in sweets that you have gone back to eating (because of course, no-one sustains a crash diet for ever... It is just a temporary thing, right?) will get stored rather than used, in preparation for the next lean time, making you (literally) fatter than you were before. This is called metabolic rebound.

As an aside to this, this process is more efficient in some people than others. This has been nicknamed as the "Thrifty gene" by some researchers, is related to a propensity to have insulin resistance, which is now being linked to PCOS as well. This efficiency is a metabolic advantage, as you and your children will survive in a famine far longer than your Skinny friends, and this makes you genetically superior to them! (Isn't that a nice thought?)

However, in these days of refined Carbohydrates, and sugar laced processed foods, this metabolic advantage becomes a staggering disadvantage, as the food we eat is making us far fatter than the unprocessed diet of our forebears ever would have! You only have to Look at the Eskimo and Native American populations to see the Thrifty gene in Full action. They have changed their diets from a natural "hunter gather" diet (low carb/protein adequate/high fat) to a typical high-carb/low-protein/low-fat Western Diet, and their incidence of High Blood pressure, Diabetes, Heart attack and Stroke have gone through the roof, in the "standard" 20 years!

This 20-year phenominon is not new. When Sugar filled Coca-Cola was introduced to America in the 1890's, about the same time as White flour milling was invented, there was virually no known incidence of heart disease. It was so rare that cardiac doctors cross trained from their main field of expertise, and did not get practical experience in seeing heart problems!! 20 years later, and lo, myocardial infarction and hypertension start to make a major appearence. It has been getting worse ever since.

Back to the point, before I rant. The Metabolic rebound effect that teenagers put themselves through when they crash diet will probably not have a visible effect on them until they reach their mid twenties. The usual "Crash-Regain" cycle will probably have slowed their metabolism down to a point where a crash diet of anything more that 500cal per day will not see them lose, and a "normal" diet of 1200-1500 cals *will* make them gain weight. They condemn themselves to "watching what they eat" and if they wish to retain their waistline, they have to eat like birds for the rest of their lives. However, the metabolic damage caused will almost certainly turn them into "tubs of fat" as they have wasted their muscles (including the heart muscle) so well.

So, What is my point I hear you say... indeed. My point is that *any* diet where your intention to lose "a couple of Stone (28lbs or 12Kg) fast" is a bad thing. The reason why some people record "mamouth losses" in their first couple of weeks of Low-carbing is that they usually have a *significant* amount of weight to lose, The heavier you are to start with, the more dramatic your first loss (on *any* diet) will be. The loss in the first week of a diet is mostly Water, and on low-carbing your glycogen stores (which weighs about 3-6lbs)as well. If you are Large, you have a lot of water stashed away, if you are small, you have less...

So, to the Young lady above, I personally would say that a 3lbs first week loss she shows is just about right, as she only have a small amount of weight to lose. Of course, as she does not say what weight or height she is, she is probably trying to gain "stick-thinness" which on a natural low-carb diet she will just not achieve.

On a natural, healthy, Non calorie restricted, low-carb diet, your body will never be the shape held up as perfection these days, as it is not a natural human body shape. As you gain muscle, lose fat, and probably end up around half a Stone (7lbs or 3Kg)from the unrealistic "goal" weight, what you will achieve is to look far more shaped and toned than your low-fat diet counterparts will ever achieve, with better skin and hair tone, from the good fatty acids and ammino acids in our diets.

But, this takes time, espeically if you have to heal the metabolic damage caused by crash dieting. Most "live fast" teenagers will not wait that long, pronounce low-carbing a failure, and go back to the low-cal crash, that they know will help. Short term. *sigh*

This of course, means that the Sugar/low-fat diet industries retains an addict, and the Medicine industry will still continue to make the drugs to cure the ills caused by a Sugary low-fat diet. So, they are laughing all the way to the bank. *Even bigger sigh*

Us low-carbers, have seen the light and we know that, like our Parents and Grandparents, anything worth achieving take time, effort, and we will make something of our bodies that lasts. "Old" values are the best eh?.