Carbs don't matter, it's only the calories

[salinqmind]

I was on the South Beach diet some years ago and though it was an adjustment, I eventually got used to no bread or sugar. There was a cake you could make with jello or pudding and a can of white beans that was fabulously tasty! I had a lot of energy because for me, eating lots of starch and sugar makes me groggy.

Then I was reading a list of foods and recipes with a low glycemic index that were suitable for the South Beach diet and at the end were the words “watch the total number of calories”. Not that I thought the low glycemic foods were permission for ‘all you can eat’, but it made me think, maybe I should forget all this food jiggering and just go on a regular old low-calorie diet that does allow carbs. It would be a lot easier, after all, to have the half cup of cereal for breakfast, etc. than mercilessly stamping out every grain of sugar and every cookie forever and ever.

[Wesley_Clark]

@Epimetheus

Yeah, let’s trust an article that is written about protein supplements, on a website that makes it’s money selling protein supplements. With no citations, no backed studies, and put them on equal footing with webmd.

Sure…

If you actually read the article you’d have seen the info was lifted from a published paper in the Annals of Nutrition & Metabolism.
DRAMATIC NEW RESEARCH
One recent study by R.H. Demling and L. DeSanti made a direct comparison of whey and casein. The report, “Effect of a hypocaloric diet, increased protein intake and resistance training on lean mass gains and fat mass loss in overweight police officers,” was published in Annals of Nutrition & Metabolism (44[1]:21-29, 2000) and indicated that casein was significantly better than whey in promoting fat loss and in producing gains in muscle and strength.

http://content.karger.com/ProdukteDB/produkte.asp?Doi=12817

[Epimetheus]

No, I saw the name of the website, what it was, scrolled down to see the references and there were none, why should I read every single bodybuilding crap site there is?. Maybe they should stick with proper referencing styles. Or link the study with a hyperlink, all of the hyperlinks I clicked were to their products.

As for not thinking there are actually studies… I’m all for increased protein and aware of all the studies saying so (just not the 1.5-2g per lb that is often “recommended”), my only beef was you linking the “Argument for buying my product” rather than the actual study. After all, we are on the SDMB, not bodybuilding.com.

[rhubarbarin]

@gazpacho

I think that it goes beyond the snaking. Bread and potatoes are tings that tend to come in large portions with meals. If you cut or greatly limit them you are reducing the calories you eat.

I’m not, because I count my calories, whether they are from fat, protein, or carbohydrates.

[Deeg]

My understanding is that you can play minor games with the types of food you eat but the overwhelming factor between diet and weight loss/gain is the number of calories consumed. The major benefit of low-carb diets for some people is that it’s easier for them to stick to the diet and has little to do with the chemistry of carbs.

[bdgr]

I’ve been able to lose weight two different ways. 1st was starvation…I didn’t have money, so i didn’t eat. i lost a lot of weight and kept it off for a good year or so. I was hungry, 24 hours a day, but I didn’t particularly like myself so i felt I deserved to be miserable. It worked…sorta…but as soon as i got any self esteem I gained it all back.

second was low carb. I had a decent job so I could afford large amounts of meat. I ate steak several times a week, ordered microwave pork rinds by the case, and I could have lived that way forever. I had more energy, could think more clearly and I was generally pretty happy. Then I lost my job. Potatoes and pasta are a lot cheaper than meat. I’ve put on probably 75 pounds or so over the past few years and i wish I could afford to do low carb again.

[Dangerosa]

@DrDeth

High protein/low carb works mainly (IMHO) as there are few snack foods that aren’t heavy on the carbs.

Thus one eats plenty, but snacks rarely. It seems to work.

I’m gluten intolerant - so while I’m not on a low carb diet, a lot of “carbs” are wheat based - bread, cookies, pizza crust.

And so I need to watch my intake of candy as an easy to reach for snack and not reach for soda when I’m thirsty - but its “easy” for me to “eat as much as I want” and lose weight - because so much that is readily available (donuts and birthday cake at work) I can’t eat without feeling like crap. And because I really can’t eat a huge hunk of meat or a lot of cheese without feeling queasy.

A lot of the high fat content things mate with the high carbs. I’m not putting whipped cream on a lot of baked desserts, or eating a lot of bread slathered with peanut butter.

[Wesley_Clark]

@Deeg

My understanding is that you can play minor games with the types of food you eat but the overwhelming factor between diet and weight loss/gain is the number of calories consumed. The major benefit of low-carb diets for some people is that it’s easier for them to stick to the diet and has little to do with the chemistry of carbs.

Its a factor, but it is not the only one. I can’t find them onhand, but I have seen studies on pubmed of overfeeding and underfeeding and despite giving everyone in the group X fewer or more calories per day than they need, the amount of weight they gain or lose (and whether it is muscle or fat) varies wildly. If you give 1,000 people an extra 1,000 calories a day for 3 months then some will gain 25 pounds of fat. But some will only gain 5-6 (because their bodies adjust and their energy levels go up to burn the excess, etc). Same with restrictions. Some lose tons of fat and almost no muscle, some lose almsot no fat but lose tons of muscle. And the amount of fat and weight lost varies. If I can find the studies I will post them up.

Plus the study I posted earlier compared 2 low calorie diets. Both groups ate about 1100-1200 calories a day. One ate half the calories for breakfat and seemed to follow a lowfat diet while the other followed a low carb diet. At 4 months the losses were the same, at 8 months they were totally different.

Health & Diet

At the four-month mark, the dieters eating the modest breakfast dropped about 28 pounds, while those on the big breakfast plan lost 23 pounds.

The real differences showed up at the eight-month mark, when the low-carb dieters had regained an average of 18 pounds and the big-breakfast eaters continued to lose, dropping another 16.5 pounds on average.

In all, members of the big-breakfast group lost more than 21% of their body weight; low-carb group members lost 4.5%.

The point is that macronutrients do matter for weight loss. Eating 500 calories of casein protein and fiber for breakfast is not the same thing as 500 calories of glucose eaten for dinner for weight loss and weight maintenance.

Genetics, macronutrients, time of day you eat them (and probably a half dozen other factors) go into this issue. If calories in = calories out then obesity would not be a serious medical issue with no known cure (short of major surgery).

[Vihaga]

I don’t really like that they limited the amount of calories consumed on both diets, when the big advantage of atkins and other low carb plans is that you aren’t supposed to have to count calories. If you’re giving up all carbs AND having to watch your calories, too, you’re going to be in a worse mood than someone who can have all the fats they want, even if the way the diet works is that you end up eating fewer calories than you were before. It’s the feeling of deprivation that affects how happy you are on the diet.

Edit: You’re probably also going to be in a worse mood than someone who’s only really counting calories, but can have some amount of high-carb things that most people consider “comfort foods” in small amounts.

[salinqmind]

@Vihaga

I don’t really like that they limited the amount of calories consumed on both diets, when the big advantage of atkins and other low carb plans is that you aren’t supposed to have to count calories. If you’re giving up all carbs AND having to watch your calories, too, you’re going to be in a worse mood than someone who can have all the fats they want, even if the way the diet works is that you end up eating fewer calories than you were before. It’s the feeling of deprivation that affects how happy you are on the diet.

Edit: You’re probably also going to be in a worse mood than someone who’s only really counting calories, but can have some amount of high-carb things that most people consider “comfort foods” in small amounts.

Yes, what I mentioned earlier! I’m either giving up all carbohydrates OR counting calories of regular food. Not doing both!

[DrDeth]

@gazpacho

I think that it goes beyond the snaking. Bread and potatoes are tings that tend to come in large portions with meals. If you cut or greatly limit them you are reducing the calories you eat.

That is certainly a factor, too.

[RTFirefly]

@Discipline

This wasn’t a study about how many calories you want to eat.

The argument for low-carb diets isn’t that if you consume X calories per day but with fewer carbs, you’ll lose more weight. It’s that you’ll be more satisfied with X calories, and less likely to wind up exceeding X calories if you don’t have someone doling out your food to you.

Any healthy diet is going to work pretty well in a controlled study. The question is, what works best for people in their daily lives, absent such controls and supervision?

[Liberal]

What works for me is eating what I like, but reducing the portions while finding work around the house and yard to do. Good, exhausting sweat-work. I just hit my 80 pound mark three days ago. From 316 to 236. I aim to lose about 35-40 more pounds. I’ll continue to use the same method since it works for me.

[Stranger_On_A_Train]

@John_Mace

Did they look at diets with different types of carbs? All carbs are not equal. I’m pretty convinced by the work done on Glycemic Index, that unrefined carbs are not the same as refined carbs-- ie, that they convert to glucose at different rates and so affect your appetite over time differently.

This is exactly right. The refined carbohydrates that spike your insulin response will cause you to feel more hungry and consume more overall calories. Low GI carbs, and especially those that come with a lot of dietary fiber and flavonoids, will reduce insulin spiking dramatic and contribute to healthy weight maintenance and long term health. There are also combinations of foods that will lower the overall GI rating; adding citrus to a higher GI food, for instance, significantly lowers absorption for reasons that are not fully understood.

Fats are a critically important part of a healthy diet, but they should be ingested in moderation, and skewed toward monounsaturated and polyunsaturated plant lipids rather than saturated animal facts with dietary cholesterols. High fat diets, while may result in quick weight loss, are definitely contraindicated for long term health, especially cardiovascular health. High protein diets may also have long term detriments, especially in regard to kidney function and arthritis among other chronic complaints.

The recommended balance of 50-55% carbohydrates (mostly low GI), 20% fats (mostly unsaturated plant lipids), and 25-30% proteins (mostly lean non-red meat, low fat dairy, or plant sources like soya and pulses) is the dietary recommendation almost universally recommended by experts in nutritional biochemistry, with the calorie content adjusted to match activity level. Athletes who are intensively weight training may increase both protein and carbs in a 1:2 proportion to support muscle growth, but diets that heavily skew away from carbs are unhealthy and not recommended by anyone who is cognizant of the fundamentals of nutritional science.

Stranger

[rhubarbarin]

I myself follow a high-fat diet (70% of calories from fat, mostly from cream, butter, lard, and whole meats) with little carbohydrate and about 1 gram of protein per pound of my body weight. I feel wonderful (need less sleep, never get ill any more), and furthermore all medical measures of health are ideal: resting heart rate in ‘athletic’ range despite little exercise, blood pressure on the low end of normal, total cholesterol was 156 at last test, trigs 54, HDL 71, LDL 74. The one thing I need to change is my vitamin D level, which was only 40 at last test, because I do not get much sun. The higher the better with that, up to 100.

Personal results would be more than enough for me to continue to eat like this, but I find what research there has been and also epidemiological evidence to be indicative that this is a perfectly healthy way to eat, if not the most healthy.

diets that heavily skew away from carbs are unhealthy and not recommended by anyone who is cognizant of the fundamentals of nutritional science.

Actually, more and more doctors and dietitians are recommending a diet lower in overall carbohydrates with a larger proportion of animal fats, in particular for people who are overweight, are diabetic/pre-diabetic, or suffering from insulin resistance and other symptoms of Metabolic syndrome.

A few of the famous ones (some with websites) are Dr. Michael Eades, Dr. Mary Eades, Dr. Kurt Harris, Dr. Gil Wilshire FACOG, Dr. Dan Pescatore, Dr and Professor Richard Feinman, Dr. Keith Berkowitz.

There are also many physicians, who while they don’t support a low-carb diet per se, are openly discussing the fact that sugar has a poisonous effect on the body, and fructose consumption is probably the main factor behind the obesity epidemic. See this presentation by Robert H. Lustig, MD, UCSF Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology.

[overlyverbose]

I crowd out junk food (cakes, cookies, etc.) with healthier food (veggies and fruits) and don’t count carbs or calories at all and that’s what makes me feel great. I tried a low-carb diet once and by day four was a raving bitch. Not only were my moods completely unpredictable, I had these intense headaches that never went away until I started consuming whole wheat bread and pasta again.

I think it’s silly to assume that everyone’s body works the same way with respect to weight loss or really anything else. I have yet to meet more than one or two people who have perfectly-functioning bodies at all - everyone has a medical “thing,” whether it’s depression, seizure disorder, hormonal imbalance, etc. It seems that someone without a medical anomoly is the exception rather than the rule, so it stands to reason that assuming that everyone’s bodies would work the same way in weight loss is shortsighted.

In my experience, you have to find what works and do that, not prescribe the exact same treatment/weight loss recommendation for everyone because it worked for a subset of people.

[Max_Torque]

@Hello_Again

Having followed Atkins at one point I don’t think the actual proponents of low carb diets say any different. There is nothing special about carbs other than the fact they make you feel hungry. They do say that by eliminating insulin spikes associated with white/processed high carbohydrate foods, you will feel less hungry and it will be MUCH easier to reduce your calorie intake. It is a cornerstone of these diet plans that you eat at least 6 times a day, and eat whenever you feel hungry.

Having tried low-carb diets before, my take on them is this: they actually work by lowering overall calorie intake, not merely carb intake, because you rapidly become so bored with the limited food choices that you simply eat less. Not very elegant, but it works for some folks.