The best way to undermine his credibility, in my opinion, would have been to discuss this precise topic without their being journal articles he could cite.

It would also be off the topic of the book! Maybe he'll do that subject next book...

kneebrace, I admit I'm overzealous.

I've tried to avoid the battles I've witnessed on these boards about calorie deficits, metabolic advantage etc. But if one is willing to accept that a person may not gain despite eating a prodigious amount of calories, why would it be impossible to consider that they might lose despite not consuming a deficit? I think you're saying really the same thing.

I have no proof that a deficit is not required, but in my personal experience, when I lost my weight 4 years ago, it seemed that when I began LC I lit some kind of fuse and I started losing body fat at an incredible rate. My recollection is that I was still eating a pretty good amount of protein and fat, maybe it was a deficit and maybe not, but if it was a small defecit no way could it account for my rapid weight loss. 30 lbs in 10 weeks. That's ~105,000 calories (if my math and the conversion factor [3500 cal = one lb] is right). Divided by 70 days it's 1500 calories per day. No way was I eating a 1500 cal per day deficit. And I wasn't particularly physically active. Actually I was kinda afraid to exercise because I thought I was losing too fast, and my wife was upset by the haggard way I looked!

No doubt some of my weight loss was water, but I'd guess not much.. Unless all my water was hiding in my waist! 5 inches disappered.

I know my own experience doesn't really mean anything, except to me of course.

It seemed that when I went LC, I tripped some switch that changed my weight "set point" and my body tried to get to the new "energy stores" amount ASAP. At least, that's how I felt at the time.

And I apologize to the ladies who didn't experience the rapid weight loss that I experienced. It was exhilirating and a little scary. (You can tell I don't get out much).

Yes I think it's a great pity that the meticulously kept records of low carb clinicians aren't considered at least as compelling as the badly designed, short term, and woefully misinterpreted clinical 'studies' that poor Gary had to rely on for his research. And as for epidemiological studies, meta-analyses or otherwise, I've got no idea why anyone even bothers to notice them, apart from being hoodwinked by truly olympian statistical gymnastics and the need to employ a lot of 'highly qualified' statisticians.

And Cal, there are definitely reports like Diedra's, no doubt about it. But it's interesting that you choose the word 'lots' (of anecdotal evidence) to describe the frequency of no bodyfat gain in the context of a low carb calorie surplus, but 'some' to describe the incidence of LC calorie surplus bodyfat loss. If you read this forum as carefully as I have done over the last five years it is simply impossible to come to any other conclusion that they the 'some' is in fact very rare indeed. Who knows whether there is some metabolic mechanism that makes these rare reported cases of weight loss in the context of a calorie surplus anything but. I would tend to look there before started believing that these rare cases mean that it must be so....please, I sooooo want to believe it....

One thing is for sure, the low carb clinicians who earn there bread and butter doing this stuff don't believe it is anything more than a reporting over/under sight, or believe me, we would certainly know about it.

Low carb diets help people to eat less because they aren't as hungry. There is considerable evidence that the health consequences of overeating both fat and protein aren't as dire as overeating carbohydrate. And overeating fat if you eat much carbohydrate will almost certainly result in bodyfat gain which also carries its own health risks and aesthetic/quality of life penalty. And if you the less eating you do brings you into a calorie deficit, you will lose bodyfat, low carb or not. You have to get energy from somewhere, if bodyfat is the only energy available that's where it will come from.

And a very few, very unlucky people will use both dietary protein and muscle for energy before they release any energy from adipocytes. For them cyclical high fat, always low carb diets in the context of adequate protein are probably the best way to get the fat burning enzyme machinery humming along with dietary fat, and then reduce fat calories to EFA minimums, while keeping carbs low all the time. The initial high fat will not tend to be stored for reasons that both Gary Taubes, you and I are obviously in complete agreement about.

But Cal, can you see that a calorie deficit is still absolutely non negotiable for bodyfat burning?

Stuart

I am so jealous! I need a new metabolism!

I think that's what Gary Taubes assumed as well L.C . The difference is that dietary calories are immediately available for energy. And if you eat regular meals, that's a constant supply of energy. If it's more energy than you are burning, there's no need to go through the vastly more metabolically complicated routine of mobilizing bodyfat.



So what do you think your body was doing with the still at least equilibrium dietary energy? It can't be used up in a futile cycle unless it's first absorbed into some bodily cell. Which ones? I'm not saying you are lying, just interested. Why you would access bodyfat when their was plenty of dietary energy to use?

Stuart

It seems that fat loss as well as fat gain can be controlled hormonally, regardless of calories consumed. These men were given Human Growth Hormone and lost an average of 14.4% of their fat mass.(As well as putting on 8 pounds of muscle without exercising) The men were instructed to not change their dietary habits.


http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/323/1/1#T4

So, what do you think the 60 lbs that I've lost were if not fat? I haven't been able to exercise at all for many years now. It also wasn't from fewer calories, I eat all the time now.
glennette

That's a wonderful result Glennette. Congrats . I'm just wondering what advice you would give to the vast majority of low carbers who have to reduce calories as well as carbs to lose body fat. Are they just not reducing carbs enough possibly?. Your experience and LCFP's are certainly interesting. It's just that it seems to happen only rarely. There's always going to be the exceptions that prove the rule.

I'd really like to understand what makes you the lucky ones .

JL. I've no doubt at all that bodyfat loss can indeed be controlled hormonally if you try hard enough. But it seems that just reducing carbohydrate without also reducing calories will not be a powerful enough hormonal influence for most human beings.

I think the most important aspect of this is that calories obviously exert a very powerful hormonal influence as well. For a lucky few the carb hormonal factor seems to outweigh the calorie hormonal factor.

Does this sound reasonable?

Stuart

Since starting Atkins. I've never reduced calories to lose weight. I worked out once, when I was doing weight loss that on some days I was eating as much as 4000 and still losing. In my ignorance (maybe??), I've put it down to the fact that I eat a lot of fat and it isnt being digested!!???? But maybe its the insulin thing, no carbs to produce insulin, therefore no hormone to turn excess energy into fat????

Stuart,
I really enjoy your posts--so articulate and informed (although some of your abbreviations leave me confused). I wish I could take that axe you have been grinding and cut down my forest of questions.

Like you, I can't see any way conceptually out of the calorie-reduction trap. I am not able to be methodical enough in my eating habits to figure out why I sometimes lose, sometimes plateau. If I knew the calorie/carb range and ratio that I should be aiming for, I'd be a happier camper.

I lost half of what I want to lose very quickly and with no APPARENT calorie reduction. I assume that I have stalled now either because of carb or calorie creep OR because now that I weigh less, I need fewer calories and I am not effortlessly acheiving that. But Taubes does suggest that calories may not matter and only the hormonal/metabolic stuff (scientific word) matters. But he indicates that we don't have the whole picture. I would cite the page, but I have a cat on my lap.

Anyway, this is a crucial and fascinating discussion and I am so glad you are all willing to have it.

Thanks

My point is that there is indeed anecdotal evidence of people - few and far between though they may seem to be - who do lose weight on LC, despite no apparent reduction in calorie intake or increase in activity level... and in some cases, despite increased calorie intake while not increasing activity level, or even decreasing activity level.

Why?

I dunno.

I"m no scientist, and I'd think that in order to figure it out, you'd have to do some serious scientific studies into the exact diets (not just macronutrient breakdown, but also micronutrients, and exactly what sources the nutrients come from - because it may be that 20 carbs of romaine lettuce and spinach simply isn't in any way equal to 20 carbs of zuchinni and tomatoes in their particular body), as well as the individual metabolisms and body chemistry of those particular people who have had this result - as opposed to the exact diet, metabolism, and body chemistry those who seem to also need to reduce calorie intake to lose weight on LC.

But... the thing is, you can't say that the need for calorie reduction for fat loss is "non-negotiable" when there's any evidence to the contrary... can you?

I don't know... maybe you can - seems this is the kind of logic we're battling with the whole saturated fat/cholesterol causes heart disease thing - That just because they've seen some minor improvements in some instances with satins/low fat diets, they came to the conclusion that everyone should be severely limit fat and cholesterol in their diets and have their cholesterol levels as low as possible - and yet the vast majority of the data doesn't come anywhere near that conclusion.

If some people really do benefit from statins and reduced dietary fat - who are we to insist that they don't? And just because some do, does that mean that everyone has to fit into the same mold?

In the same way, if some people still drop weight even though they're eating way above their calorie expenditure, even though the majority still need to eat a deficit, does that mean that it's non negotiable that everyone needs to eat a calorie deficit to lose weight?

~~~

I really need to one of these days figure out how many calories I was taking in before LC, as compared to what I'm eating now... and compare all that to what I supposedly expend in the course of a day.

Unless Eades has done some controlled studies that's still anecdotal, right?

Thanks for the congrats, but I don't feel that I've actually "earned" it. Outside of resisting an occassional carb crave and that's easy because my DH has to do the shopping, I've not used will power or gone a moment hungry.

Perhaps it is due to a hormonal influence. I was rendered hypothyroid by RAI and 18 months ago dx'ed as type 2 diabetic. So I'm sure this "could" be the explaination. However, the DH has no hormonal issues and has lost 30 lb and I'm sure that if he didn't have to go to a place that has carby sweet treats all over the place, tempting him for 10 to 12 hours a day. He'd be be downright skinny again. He's only 15 lbs from that now so I married an exception too!

Love to see a poll on it to see if LCFP and I are really the exceptions. While a poll doesn't prove anything perhaps it can serve as a starting point for real scientific study for some brave soul.

I have a theory that some people who say they can't lose weight without a calorie reduction might just mean that they are not happy with the "amount" that they lose. For example I remember one lady on another forum that lost nearly 50 lbs but was very upset that she'd been stalled for quite a while. She was 5' 7" and weighed 140lbs but...she had been a skinny model when she was young and felt she should still weigh between 100 to 110lb. now! So she felt low carb didn't work for her.

I really do believe that we are all different and what works for me may not work for you. But I do think that it's wrong to say that something that works for me will not work for others or that because it works for me, that makes me an exception. It may be you that's the exception??

glennette

Yes , I apologize for being so absolutist. There do seem to be some people who can lose bodyfat by reducing carbohydrate without also reducing total calories. But low carb fora just keep confirming that they are very rare. Who knows whether it is a reporting or even measurement problem, or whether some people's bodies just seem to prefer to mobilize bodyfat rather than use available dietary calories. I'd love to understand the mechanisms involved in these people.

I've probably confused the issue a little by making this a debate about whether or not a calorie deficit is needed for bodyfat loss (in a L.C. hormonal environment) always, because there do seem to be exceptions. But the real issue is surely that in making a calorie deficit seem irrelevant to the bodyfat loss when it is clearly usually essential.

And in failing to identify this typical situation, Taubes has done Low Carb a great disservice, because he is saying that bodyfat loss has nothing to do with a calorie deficit.

It might have helped if he had recognized that whether you are in calorie deficit, equilibrium, or surplus has a huge hormonal impact. So in a kind of funny way, what he said about bodyfat loss/gain being hormonally mediated is true, but in failing to clarify that in the case of bodyfat loss, that hormonal environment is hugely affected by whether you are in calorie deficit or not has meant that he kind of missed the point about bodyfat loss.

Anyway, great discussion. Thanks Calianna .

Time2, so perhaps the hormonal influence of a calorie deficit becomes relatively strong in comparison with the hormonal effect of restricting carbohydrate depending on how much excess bodyfat you have? Which gets confirmed every day on this board alone, so I guess we shouldn't be too surprised.


Stuart