Could collagen help with weight loss?

(Bob M) #1

The study:

Two groups, one which got 2 collagen-based bars per day, and one which did not. The one with the collagen-based bars supposedly ate more calories while losing more weight. Anyway, there are some issues, including that the group with collagen didn’t try JUST collagen, but instead bars that had collagen in them.

I have been drinking a (raw) milk drink with collagen peptides in it for a while. Initially, I was adding allulose too, and I had a lack of hunger sometime (a few hours) after drinking the drink. I was thinking the allulose did the hunger trick, but I dropped that after a while, and still got a lack of hunger.

I’m wondering if the collagen peptides actually do help with hunger? A better test would be without the milk, but I like the milk.

My problem is that I take the drink at lunch, and even if I’m not hungry for dinner, I eat with the family. I start small, then hunger kicks in, then I end up eating near or a complete meal. Ugh. Eating causes hunger for me, though I have been slowly losing weight using this system.

#2

YUP!

Was most likely because that pushed up their protein. They had other protein in their diet, so the fact collagen is incomplete wouldn’t have mattered, whenever my protein goes way up and cals don’t change otherwise, assuming they’re at a level that lets me lose, I usually lose a little more. Whether that’s me being fuller and really sticking with stuff because of that, or the thermic effect, which I’d never count because it’s small, it is technically there. Either way collagen’s great and noticeable when you take it all the time if you have a skin, joint hair or something like that, especially if your protein intake isn’t optimal. Only time I pull it is when I really crank up protein since then I’m making up for it with total amino load.

(Bob M) #3

Excellent points, which I did not think of. In looking at research for protein, more protein is almost always beneficial for weight loss. I didn’t think of that, because I always think of collagen peptides as being something “special” and not protein for some reason.

#4

I don’t have much experience with collagen peptid, I am only at my second bag (early on the second and I shared my first with my SO) but as everything else, it’s not magical to me. The protein potentially helps me but if I eat a lot, of course I stay fat. Lean things may lower my energy intake, still no fat-loss but if I do it more, it will happen. Some lean red meat is WAY more effective as I can eat a lot of that (but not too much) while more than 10g peptid a day is tricky… I won’t drink it and gag, I am too much of a hedonist for it. (Okay, I don’t gag but it’s yucky. The previous kind was somewhat better, only my SO complained a lot.)

But it’s just me, it easily can have some other, more pronounced effect on some others. I like collagen peptids because it’s a cheap enough protein (well I buy a cheap one) and helps a tiny bit to keep my fat percentage low enough. And it’s one of my flours in cooking, I use it in moderation due to its bad flavor (but I don’t feel it in small amounts, similarly to gluten. gluten could help much more in my fat-loss if I was willing to eat it galore, most probably. super effective for satiation).

Usually not for me as more protein tends to bring more fat. But as I wrote, a lower fat/protein ratio is helpful. I don’t need more protein, I merely want to lower the fat by switching some fatty protein with some leaner one.

(Bob M) #5

It takes a while. I had an age spot, which was quite dark. It’s gone now. But that took a long time. It slowly decreased in darkness, and now you can’t tell it’s there.

(Ava Carter) #6

Collagen doesn’t directly cause weight loss, but it can support muscle health and make you feel fuller, which may help with your efforts. Still, real weight loss depends on diet and exercise

(Bob M) #7

That diet and exercise idea is…old? When I first stayed keto (tied keto multiple times before, but though I needed carbs for exercise), I ate as much as I wanted, dropped my exercise, and lost 30+ pounds. One theory why is that I dropped my insulin, which allowed my fat cells to start giving up fat, instead of locking fat away (caused by high insulin).

And in the book Burn, they used doubly-labeled water to gauge how many calories people were burning per day. They found that the Hazda (a hunter-gatherer group of tribes in Africa) burnt the same calories as Western people who worked in offices.

I think one benefit to exercise is that it provides a carb sink, meaning that if you exercise and eat carbs, some/all of those carbs go to your muscles, which helps limit blood sugar and insulin excursions.

But I’ve reached the conclusion that exercise is basically useless for losing weight.