Hi, everyone. I watched the documentary "Super-size Me" on TV last night (the one about the guy who eats nothing but McDonald's food for a month). I know he was eating plenty of carbs, but he was also consuming a massive amount of fat that caused major liver problems. I'm pretty new to LC dieting and I have read the Atkins book, but I do worry about all the amount of fat I am consuming. Should I?

If you are concerned, perhaps you should have your doctor test your liver enzymes? And then test them again in a few months?

The whole idea behind Atkins is that dietary fat has very different effects in the absence of (certain quantities of) carbohydrate. So eating fat with lots of carbs will cause problems, but eating fat without lots of carbs is a different story altogether.

That movie is great, except for one thing. It's focusing on the wrong thing. They talk about sugar some, but it's very obvious the main enemy in this movie is fat.

By the way, take a look at his vegan girlfriend. Anyone else notice how stringy and unhealthy she looks?

What they should have focused more on is the fact that he consumed that insane amount of sugar. Consuming alot of fat in conjunction with sugar is what caused his problems. That, and I'm sure he consumed a good amount of trans-fat from Mcdonalds.

Eliminate all carbohydrates from the diet, and the trans-fat, and you'll see exactly the opposite happen. I've been eating over 200 grams of fat per day for several months, and about half of that is saturated and all of my tests are superb over where they were before. My triglycerides dropped sharply, my cholesterol is high but cholesterol has zilch to do with heart disease anyway. Not to mention circulation. My arteries are as clean as they were the day I was born, now. Before they weren't.

I wish they had focused more on the sugar. I know they call it out, but they don't focus on it like they do fat. Look at all the sugar those kids eat, and I used to eat that way when I was younger too. All the Gatorade and snack cakes and candy bars, and then for veggies they eat french fries. Fried starch. Are you kiddin me?!?!

If you are concerned about your liver, then eating low carb is the best diet. Fatty liver is caused by carbohydrate intake, not fat. One liver specialist, http://www.liverdoctor.com/newslett.../fattyliver.asp, recommends a low carb diet as the first step in making the liver better.



The first time that I had liver tests done that showed all parameters to be within the normal range was after I started low carbing and eating more fats.

Exactly. Because this diet mobilizes the fat and kicks the liver into fat burning mode.

high carb diets store fat everywhere, including the liver.

This is also the same reason low-fat/low-cal diets can cause fatty liver and eventually cirrhosis. Your body is starving on those diets and will do everything it can do retain the fat, so your liver accumulates the fat but can not burn it because your body is trying to keep it. Viola. Fatty liver disease.

There have been other people that have tried is experiment and none of them could duplicate his poor health results, even with the insane amount of carbs and transfats. it appears that there may have been something hinky going on. You don't suppose that he and his vegan girlfriend had an agenda, do you?

I have always loved how he drinks a giant, HFCS-filled soda, eats a large, fried in transfats and polyunsaturated fat, carby fries and a burger, which is mostly carby bun and yet the small beef burger patty gets all of the blame.

We all know his vegan girlfriend probably did have an agenda. I don't know about him. But this is a movie I've been intersted in since it came out, and at first agreed with it, until I found low-carb and then eventually no-carb.

Vegans piss me off to no end. Can't stand them.

I love the scene where she tries to argue with him about eating meat. Trying to compare ham to heroin. HAHAHA.... propaganda anyone?

What's ironic is that I bet in several years she'll have some serious nutritional issues, or quite possible could end up diabetic/insulin resistant eating basically nothing but carbohydrates. Complex or not. I would never wish that on anyone, but eating the way she does can sure lead to it.

I took the movie as: Fast food isn't good for you. LOL.. Obviously. There really are people who eat McDonalds, Taco Bell, Burger King, etc EVERY DAY.. Believe me, I was one of them, lmfao. And I got so f-ing fat. I'm back down to the body I graduated with, still fat, but at least its 30 pounds less than it was a few months ago.

I don't remember his girlfriend looking THAT unhealthy, really. She was slim, yeah, but I didn't think she looked sick. Maybe I'm just used to seeing really thin/sickly looking people that I don't notice it anymore *shrug*.

It doesn't make sense that they would focus on the fatty burger patty.. When I go to McDonalds I get 2 double cheeseburgers and eat the patties out of them. So, I eat 4 patties and I'm fine YAY! LOL.. Maybe we should write them a letter...

Dr. Mike blogged about this awhile ago as well as a counter-point documentary that is being made:

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/?p=266

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/?p=268

Also note the guy who consumed burgers, almost daily there - skinney....he wouldn't touch the french fries!

Why is it that people are always shocked to consider hamburgers a healthy food? Not for me with my blood sugar issues, but the macro breakdown and the calories of a hamburger (no fries, no sugar drink) are fairly spot on for a healthy person.

Because fast food isn't as easy as beef and a few spices.. There are preservatives and fillers and other weird things we've probably never heard of.. Just like any other processed food. Have you ever looked at a plain mcdonald's patty? It looks nothing like my family's burgers LOL

I actually have this movie- I didnt really see it as attacking fat, just the fast food industry. They call attention to all the chemicals and weird things in McDonalds food when they compared the nuggets to "frankenstein" and when they put individuals sandwiches in jars and compared them to a 'real' burger to see how long they would last. The fries never got a spec of mold on them. I like the movie, for some reason, I like watching it, its calming...

Just keep in mind that fat wasnt the only thing in the food that made him so unhealthy. It was fat in combination with carbs/SUGAR. There is no way Atkins is similar to a McDonalds binge.

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Exactly. We are used to seeing overweight people. We are surrounded by them. We are them in many cases. She ate a healthy vegetarian diet. I doubt she ate much grains and that made her thinner than what is considered normal. But she's the size most Americans were in the days before easy fast food.

The point of the movie was that fast food is bad food. The only reason I go into a McDs is to steal salt packets.

I dunno. It just seems to me that she was frail. No muscle at all. Not that she needs to be built, just it looked like she had less muscle than a healthy person should. Maybe it was just my perception.

In my findings on "healthy" vegetarian diets, it's that they are actually far from healthy. Most vegans I've read on, and the two that I knew who are now no longer vegans, were very unhealthy. Slim sure, but very tired all the time...irritable and always hunger. Not to mention no muscle mass what so ever. Vegans can't stay that way for too long without getting sick, the two I knew got sick and had to stop.