To count calories or not to count calories for weight stall


(Richard M) #1

Yes, I know this topic has been beat to death. But not since June of 2018. So why not resurrect it.

I have been doing this WOE for 3 years. Out of everything i have researched, read, watched, etc… The one item or science that i am the most confused about is Calories. One person says count calories, but the majority of what I research says DO NOT count calories, because you don’t want to restrict your body of calories(food, Marcos, Nutrition how you want to call it), or your body will go into “survival mode” and NOT want to burn fat to lose weight. I quit counting macros and calories a long time ago.
Then, Dr. Rob Cywes comes out with this video.


I realize, as you lose weight you need to re-adjust your calorie intake.
From what I interpret from the video, eat a reduced portion of food. Take a break. Then, if you are still hungry, eat some more until you are full.
This sounds very doable, but my concern is eating to little of calories/food and your body “shuts down” and doesn’t want to lose weight aka burn fat.
What is you take on the video? Am I looking at it the wrong way? Your opinion on counting Macros and calories?

Maybe I need to start counting Macros/Calories.


(Chuck) #2

This last Thanksgiving I gave up on counting calories, carbs, protein, and fat. I also gave up on using an app for keeping up with my fasting time. I also put the scales away and just paid attention to how my clothes fit, and how I felt.
My lab work has improved to the point I am now in the normal range blood work and kidney function across the whole spectrum. My blood pressure is now well within the acceptable normal range. I don’t eat processed foods or fast foods. I don’t normaly eat any thing with wheat.
Oh did I say that I am 76 years old? I have never been hospitalized, never had any surgeries and I am prescription drug free.
I listen to my body’s needs as to what to eat and when to eat. My weight is dead on what I weighed for my military service. I am active with hiking and light resistance training and daily house and yard work.


#3

Sorry, I wrote very much as it is my wont.

I haven’t watched the video yet {it was short so I did later} but I have my opinion (well, my knowledge, actually, I know how my body and mind works in this regard).
It doesn’t matter if I count, it matter if I eat little enough to lose fat. That’s it. Even carbs don’t matter except their impact on calories (if I eat much carbs, I WILL overeat. under normal circumstances, at least. I am pretty sure I would slim down with a 20 minutes eating window even with carbs. but that would require no access to food in the remaining 23 hour 40 minutes).

You need to eat enough, true but it doesn’t matter to me as NO WAY I could ever undereat. But yep, you shouldn’t have a too big calorie deficit as that doesn’t do good to your metabolism, muscles, mood and probably zillion other things. Even if we have much fat to lose, we do need nutrients - and even some energy, more if we have little fat to lose so it can’t provide much energy per day to help us out. It has probably a huge personal factor, some people handle a big deficit better than others with a similar or bigger extra body fat.

Impossible to me but for the ones who are able to stop eating when starving, not a bad idea necessarily. If they have problems to eat little enough otherwise as some people just need to stuff themselves 2-3 times a day and they still will lose fat. If I get satiated twice, I probably overeat but much depends on my chosen food and the distance between my meals. That’s why I try to keep my 2MAD (when I do that) in 3-4 hours if possible.
I never want to be full but that may be difference in terminology. I want be perfectly satiated and satisfied. With a nicely half-empty stomach. Or IDK, I have no way to feel what is the state of my stomach, I don’t care about that.
But even for me, sometimes yes, I can take a break and satiation may arrive later. It’s often 2+ hours though so I only do the break if I already ate a lot of food and I am not hungry anymore (even if not satiated yet) or just a little. Virtually nothing can stop me if I am truly hungry including myself. Fasting is easier than stopping during a meal.

I don’t readjust calorie intake as I can’t and it’s not how I work. I heard about people (a lot) who have some fixed calorie intake and they can even reduce it by 50 kcal! Wow. I can’t even track accurately enough to tell if I ate 1500 or 1700 kcal! (Sometimes it’s even worse.) And what if I ate my usual calories and I have hungry for 1200 kcal more (or 100g extra protein but that brings a ton of fat)? Of course I eat that, I follow the wishes of my body for good reasons. Erm but I didn’t want to talk about my macros all over the place (except low. only my carbs may do that).

I have 2 things to do when I stall (but I do the third and just wait. I have more important things than worrying about my fat). Changing my food choices (or the ratios) or my timing (number of my meals but more importantly, the size of my eating window). I do track now and then and I usually have a good idea about what is the problem (it’s always overeating fat). If one just don’t lose fat, they may not need to lower calories. I do. I always do. And move more, I can’t stay active enough ever :frowning: But that’s another thing and not so important in fat-loss though it probably helps a lot for many of us. And not for others.

The waiting for satiation is sometimes useful but it’s not so nice. It’s best to just eat until we don’t want to (as we got some fabulous stop sign after eating meat, oh that’s the best but I don’t get it all the time) and hopefully we aren’t hungry when that happens. And after the super short hungry time we get blissful perfect satiation and contentment for long… Merely great food choices can give me this. No deliberation, waiting unsatiated, none of that. I am not good at that as a hedonist who loves eating. And who wants to eat 20 minutes later when the baby hunger grew? Maybe some but it’s not convenient. So I am all for some great timing and perfect food to make things fall into place. It still has its challenges… But it must be very individual, some people are fine with some stricter, less pleasant quick fat-loss phase and I have zero chance to do that ever (and I couldn’t lose fat quickly anyway. I can’t even gain quickly. I am good at maintenance but I never did it while being slim as I never was that). I like a pleasant easy fat-loss that just smoothly becomes maintenance.

Even if one eats too little and the metabolism slows, the body doesn’t “shut down”. And it still needs energy and it’s pretty unrealistic not to lose fat when starving but some people have that range somewhere. But it doesn’t matter, we just shouldn’t do unhealthy things like that. (Unless it’s the best option for some reason, I don’t judge in that cases…) It makes maintenance way harder anyway, at least for a while. But I have heard one can do permanent harm if they do it for long enough (and probably some people are more sensitive than others). If one wants to go so very low, they should fast instead, much better and probably feels better too.
If one simply has problems with eating enough, they should change their woe or timing.

Oh people who are prone to undereating should track now and then to see if something is wrong. If they don’t have a body who screams bloody murder when undereating happens. Mine does that in the super rare case when I don’t get proper urges to eat a decent amount. But some people don’t feel at all if they ate enough or too much or what.

And now I watched the video. Oh it’s like the smaller plate thing too. It works for some and not at all for me. I don’t put too much food on my plate, I put too little (except when I, like, fry up 800g fatty pork and put it on a plate as it’s so tiny food it fits. but meat often has the stop sign so I usually don’t worry) and then I eat 3-5 other courses as I am still hungry. But if someone only eat that much because the “finish the plate” urge is that strong (I had that too but lost it somewhere. but it’s fine on OMAD anyway, I typically need to stuff myself there but it’s to avoid overeating so if I wanted to lose fat badly, I would put up with even the fullness I dislike)? It may be a great idea for them. As those people apparently ignore hunger/satiation signals, it may be a way to learn to focus on them more. As always, if we have a problem, we should find what is the problem and what could be the solution in our individual case.

Chopsticks don’t slow down eating so much if you ask me :smiley: They are very handy utensils. Maybe not for people unused to them… Not like I have much experience but some. My satiation isn’t that easy to trick anyway. I do have very long slow meals sometimes, they can be useful as I tend to eat more during them, my lunch ends later too so there is a chance I will last a day.

Binge eating is a complex problem. I have it if I eat some super triggering items, hunger and satiation doesn’t even play much of a role there and taking a break is tricky and in vain anyway. We just should avoid those items if possible. I usually ate so much because I was hungry. Some of us can’t just eat the right amount if the macros are wrong. And the right macros are sometimes odd or at least, not what people think is right for them. And it’s not just the macros, of course, there are other things, some protein sources just don’t work and eating a lot of cheese will result in overeating, for example. Or some carbs are fine while others make us hungry and uncontrolled, I experienced it on keto and this is why carnivore was so much better, the animal sugars don’t mess with me even if the carb amount is the same. So I still consider food choices the most important key for me and for many others.


(KM) #4

I think it might have been Jason Fung who made a good point. There used to be a lot of talk about how to lose weight by simply cutting a small number of calories for a long period of time. “If you cut out one soda a day, that’s 58000 calories a year, which is sixteen pounds lost”! … Which, if the advice were true, would mean that by cutting out a soda a day, in 8 years I would weigh less than 0 pounds. :skull_and_crossbones:

The body adapts as we get smaller. I don’t know about counting calories per se, but I’d say as we shrink, our fuel needs should decrease.


(Geoffrey) #5

I’m carnivore and don’t count anything. I just make sure I eat fat and meat until I’m satiated and then only when I’m hungry.
There did come a time when my weight got down to what I figured was my optimal weight. I’ve been there now for two months. So I started counting just to see if I was getting the right fat to protein ratio and to see if I was getting enough calories. Well my fat to protein ratio was pretty spot on but my calorie intake was a little low for maintenance. So this showed me where changes needed to be made. I’m back to not counting anything again because I know what I need now.
There is a lot of confusion, even in our world about counting calories and macronutrients but I’ve learned to not overthink it all.
Count as a tool to see where you might need to make adjustments but don’t get obsessed with it.
Also, plateauing or staling can often just be you body adjusting to the changes going on in your body and just sticking to what has worked up to this point can start working again in time.
I’ve also heard good things about fasting to kick in weight loss again.


#6

I do that when I track. I saw obsessed ones and felt sorry for them. “I am so hungry/would need some milk to sleep but I am already 1g over my fat target!”. Sigh. And the fat target is some fixed number given by a stupid calculator not knowing anything about the one in question. Who is a human, not a robot anyway. No matter if it’s tracking or fasting, it’s quite bad when people force things, ignoring the distress calls of their bodies or minds. I do some fasting but if I need food, I eat. Some others suffer some hunger, still may be good, we are different… But some fast, NO MATTER WHAT. Being underweight and wanting to fast for many days? (Ambulance came there.) Being so hangry that they yell at their bosses and clients? They still are “strong”, keep fasting and face the consequences. (I saw a reddit thread with everyone but me encouraging the one that clearly couldn’t handle the fast. Fanatics to a very unhealthy level.)

Some people have a personality where tracking can do much harm. They can’t not get obsessed.
It’s like weighing ourselves. I can do it twice a day without problem (I don’t as my weight is almost always the same every morning for years) while others can’t handle it well and shouldn’t do it often. Or at all.


(Chuck) #7

I counted calories for about 12 years and came to an important conclusion our bodies adjust to what we provide it for fuel. If we short change it it lowers it metabolism rate to make it the difference, if we give it too much is stores the extra for a rainy day. The key I have found is simply to listen to our bodies needs. It will tell us how much, it needs, what it needs,and when it needs it. We just have to pay attention and work with our bodies and not against it. So To be blunt we go against our bodies when we force feed it artificial sweeteners, highly processed carbs, and in my opinion any so called food , from a fast food place, anything that comes Ina box. So stay away from power bars, protein bars, etc. As much as possible only eat really from nature food. An another thing forget the scales and weight charts, your body will seek its own healthy weight and composition as long as you remain active.


(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #8

Given that the body adjusts the metabolic rate to compensate for changes in the energy value of the diet, cutting calories is not a good strategy when one is on a low-carbohydrate, low-insulin diet. Dr. Phinney has data showing that fatty-acid metabolism increases by around 300 kcal/day, once fat-adapted. Prof. Bikman has demonstrated that a lot of this is from “mitochondrial uncoupling” in fat cells, where the adipocyte’s energy consumption becomes greater than the amount it needs to live (i.e., uncoupled from its metabolic requirements).

Moreover, the body increases energy expenditure on hair and nail growth, and most especially on the reproductive system. Hyperinsulinaemia/insulin-resistance causes a decline in the metabolic rate and interferes with the proper functioning of the reproductive system, which is why insulin-resistant women very often have PCOS and why the first symptom of insulin-resistance in men is often impotence (or, if you prefer the prissier term, erectile dysfunction).