When Diets Don't Work…
...and why proper nutrition does not always help to lose weight
Many popular diets promise fast weight loss and a perfect figure. The problem is that when the dietary restrictions end, a person is likely to not only return to his weight, but also acquire several new kilograms and health problems. We tell you how to eat right, why it's better to keep your weight and not experiment with diets.
Originally from childhood: where do people have problems with excess weight?
The fact that you gained a couple of kilograms during the May holidays, quite possibly, is not your fault. One of the reasons for gaining excess weight is rooted in our deep childhood, starting from the prenatal period. It is then that adipose tissue is laid, and the number of fat cells in the body will directly depend on the quality of our mother's nutrition during pregnancy. If a woman's weight gain during pregnancy greatly exceeds the norm (30-40 kg instead of the prescribed 9-15 kg), more fat cells are formed in the fetus than necessary. Pregnant women who do not eat properly, carbohydrate metabolism is disrupted and gestational diabetes mellitus develops. It passes after childbirth, but at the same time the child's risk of type II diabetes increases, and the probability that the children of such mothers will need an endocrinologist's consultation in adulthood is 4 times higher compared to children whose mothers ate properly during pregnancy.
A large baby weight at birth also increases the likelihood of weight problems in the future. At the same time, insufficient weight does not exclude that such problems may still arise. Premature babies with a weight deficit were studied on the example of children carried out by prisoners of Dutch concentration camps. It turned out that people who received insufficient nutrients in utero are more prone to obesity, diabetes and other metabolic diseases. According to the hypothesis of the economical phenotype, the development and growth of the embryo is primarily influenced by the environment, its influence explains many pathologies that occur already in adulthood.
In general, the influence of external factors on weight gain is huge even in adulthood. If they affect a person at the most important moments of his life, then sooner or later he will show a predisposition to gain excess weight – the only question is when exactly. In women, as a rule, this occurs against the background of hormonal changes – at puberty, after childbirth, during or after menopause. In men with a sedentary lifestyle, testosterone levels drop after 30 years, and this also creates conditions for weight gain.
Is it possible to inherit a tendency to fullness?
In addition to the influence of environmental factors, the tendency to gain excess weight may be due to genetics (from 40 to 70%). To better understand what type of food suits you, you need to know the nutritional and endocrine history of your kind at least before great-grandmothers and great-grandfathers.
It happens that a person suffering from overweight turns to a nutritionist or endocrinologist, follows all the recommendations, but still does not lose weight. Then the reason may lie precisely in the family history, and you can find out about it today with the help of indirect calorimetry (metabolography). For example, it was found out that the metabolism of people who have lived in Siberia for a long time and inherited a certain metabolism from their ancestors is not ready for the predominantly carbohydrate diet of the Russian middle zone.
A well–known example from endocrinology is the case of the Pima Indians living in the United States and Mexico. Under the influence of the eating habits of Western civilization, the Indians began to gain weight quickly, suffer from obesity and diabetes, although these diseases are not typical for them at all.
Nevertheless, from the point of view of epigenetics, the expression of genes responsible for weight gain can be changed. To do this, it is necessary to carefully monitor the BCG – the ratio of calories, proteins, fats and carbohydrates entering the body with food, and also do not forget about physical exercises and an active lifestyle in general. But we must understand that these changes will be fixed only if they affect three generations.
How do popular diets work?
Each of us has a predisposition to a certain type of nutrition and metabolism, dictated by our genes. That is why, instead of going on one of the popular diets, it is better to deal with your genetic map.
Nevertheless, Yandex query statistics show that about 2.8 million monthly users are interested in diets, and only 368 thousand are interested in proper nutrition. Among the most popular requests are buckwheat, Japanese and keto diet. Let's try to figure out what popular diets promise, how they differ and how they work.
Mono-diets (buckwheat, kefir and others)
A diet based on one or more products of the same group. For example, the buckwheat mono diet assumes that for a week, a couple of weeks or a month a person will eat only buckwheat. At first glance, everything is not so bad: cereals contain a lot of fiber, and thanks to complex carbohydrates, you can not feel hungry for a long time, and the weight really goes away. The problem is that such an unbalanced diet can lead to a deficiency of nutrients and be accompanied by weakness and bad mood, and the dropped kilograms will quickly return back at the end of the diet.
Diets with a predominance of a certain component of BZHU (protein, carbohydrate, low-carb or keto diet)
The basis of the protein diet menu consists of products with a high protein content, which contribute to simultaneous weight loss and muscle gain. However, in people who do not exercise, at the same time as getting rid of excess weight, a high-protein diet increases the risk of developing gout, as well as liver and kidney pathology. One of the most famous protein diets is the Dukan diet, created in the late 1990s, which limits the consumption of carbohydrates and fats. On the contrary, carbohydrate diets are based on the predominant consumption of slow (complex) carbohydrates, which are found, for example, in vegetables, unprocessed cereals and whole-grain bread. According to the well–known carbohydrate diet – the system of Professor Dean Ornish - 70% of the diet should be carbohydrates.
A low-carb or ketogenic diet is based on a significant reduction in the amount of carbohydrates consumed and an increase in the proportion of fats and proteins in the diet. As a rule, it is prescribed to people suffering from epilepsy, and in the process, all metabolic parameters, urine and blood tests are necessarily monitored. Under the influence of a ketogenic diet, the body begins to use fats as the main source of energy, not carbohydrates, as it usually happens. Fat in the liver is converted into fatty acids and ketone bodies (acetone). An increase in their level in the blood, that is, ketosis, and leads to a decrease in the frequency of epileptic seizures. And one of the types of ketones suppresses the production of the hunger hormone ghrelin, so appetite decreases in parallel. Today, the keto diet is common in the fitness community, but there are studies according to which its long-term observance (more than two months) is impractical and unsafe for health: the state of ketosis can develop into life-threatening ketoacidosis. In addition, against the background of low-carb diets, the risk of cardiovascular disasters increases.
Diets with a strong calorie reduction
One of these diets – the so-called skinny diet, was originally developed as a method of weight loss for people whose weight is much higher than normal (100 kg or more). It is based on a sharp decrease in daily calorie intake: instead of 1600-3000 calories per day – from about 500 kcal (on a strict version of the diet) to about 1200 kcal per day. Due to the lack of nutrients, this diet is contraindicated for people with chronic diseases, and completely healthy people are not recommended to stick to it for longer than a week.
Diets by blood type and genetic profile
In the mid-1990s, the American naturopathic physician Peter D'Adamo suggested that in the process of evolution, the composition of people's blood changed depending on eating habits, and popularized nutrition based on blood type. According to D'Adamo's concept, all people can be divided into "hunters" who historically are more suited to protein products, "farmers" who mainly ate plant foods, "nomads" who began to eat dairy products, and a mixed type is also distinguished, in which the diet includes both plant foods and milk. Despite the popularity of this diet, there is no scientific evidence that blood type can influence dietary recommendations. Scientists are no less skeptical about many modern commercial services that promise to analyze genetic data and make an individual diet.
The Traffic Light Diet
The food system divides all foods into several categories: red (foods prohibited for consumption), yellow (foods that can be consumed in moderation) and green (food that should form the basis of the diet). The latter category includes many types of vegetables and fruits, mushrooms. Occasionally it is allowed to include low-fat meats and dairy products, fish and cereals in the menu. The diet prohibits the consumption of fast food, pastries, sweets, butter and mayonnaise. Unfortunately, like many other diets, "Traffic Light" has no proven effectiveness.
When a diet won't help you lose weight and you need to go to the doctor?
By the way, in medical practice, a diet is not a way to lose weight, but a supportive method of treating various diseases. There is a direct link between nutrition and some diseases. For example, a lack of fats in the diet leads to disruption of the normal activity of the stomach (dyspeptic disorders) and vitamin deficiency, and insufficient intake of iron, copper and vitamins B9 and B12 can be fraught with anemia. It is known that an excess of fast carbohydrates in the diet contributes to metabolic disorders, for example, the development of diabetes, but if there are fewer carbohydrates at all, then most likely the amount of fiber will decrease and the risk of colon cancer will increase. Therefore, the diet is prescribed as a method of treatment, which, as a rule, works for a certain time. So, a diet with a limited intake of fats (trans fats, animal fats) is mandatory prescribed to people suffering from cardiovascular diseases. If a person has aggravated erosive gastritis or stomach ulcer, he is prescribed a sparing diet that excludes certain foods. However, when the disease goes away, in agreement with the attending physician, a person will be able to expand his diet, no longer observing strict medical frameworks, and will simply return to a rational diet (more on this below).
Popular diets are based on calorie reduction, often excessive, and unjustified refusal of a certain type of food. This, for example, is often the sin of monoproduct diets. Restrictions lead to a shortage of useful nutrients, and then to a rollback effect. Returning to his usual type of diet, a person quickly gains weight back, often adding even more than it was before. This is the so-called yo-yo effect.
Athletes, for example, know firsthand about such "weight swings". They often have to "drive" their weight back and forth, and when they stop exercising, it can be very difficult for them to maintain a normal body weight. If a person loses weight by a couple of sizes, then at the end of the diet he will not be able to simply return to his previous lifestyle in his weight: so he will not only gain even more kilograms, but will eventually get a violation of glucose tolerance and in the future – diabetes mellitus. Therefore, it is more reasonable to keep one weight during life, once and for all changing the stereotypes of nutrition, something to lose kilograms, then gain them again.
Constant diets and strict prohibitions often lead to eating disorders, which, in turn, provoke breakdowns. To prevent this from happening, it is advisable to work with a family doctor or therapist when losing weight, and in difficult cases – with a whole team of specialists: therapist, cardiologist, endocrinologist, nutritionist, psychotherapist, trainer or exercise therapy doctor.
Of course, you can lose weight without doctors. But then it will not be possible to find the cause of weight gain and it will not be possible to keep weight without constant restrictions. They can be removed only if the very situation that provoked the weight gain changes (for example, the hormonal background normalizes or certain medications are canceled).
Are all diets bad?
It is logical to assume that if the extra pounds are due to the influence of environmental factors, the genetic history of a person and his eating habits, then the choice of eating style should be based on an individual approach.
However, some universal eating habits still have proven benefits, so if you have no problems with excess weight, you can just stick to the basic principles of healthy nutrition. For example, the Mediterranean style of eating, which is based on slowly digested carbohydrates: bread, pasta, cereals. In fact, this is a hypolipidemic, that is, a low-cholesterol "diet". It involves regular consumption of complex carbohydrates (cereals, fruits, vegetables, olive oil and nuts), the balance of animals, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, moderate consumption of dairy and meat products: preference is given to fish and seafood, which should be eaten several times a week, as well as white meat, which is recommended to eat one once a week. The diet prescribes to limit the consumption of red meat (only a couple of times a month) and sugar (no more than 50 g per day). People who eat "Mediterranean-style" are less likely to suffer from atherosclerosis and diabetes, cardiovascular and oncological diseases, are less susceptible to obesity and Alzheimer's disease, are generally healthier and live longer.
The Mediterranean style of eating has been studied a lot. From 1961 to 2001, we even conducted a large study in seven countries at once: Italy, Greece, Norway, Japan, the USA, Finland and Yugoslavia (Serbia and Croatia). For 40 years, scientists have been observing how the inhabitants of these states ate. Greece was the first to become the leader in terms of life expectancy of the population. The indicators were especially good for small Greek islands, where people have a minimal level of stress, where there are few cars and almost no gas pollution. And the inhabitants of these places eat the way their ancestors ate.
By the way, the vegetarian style of eating, which does not exclude animal protein, is quite similar to the Mediterranean. According to the study, life expectancy is higher in people who have removed meat from their diet, but continue to eat dairy products, fish and eggs: they contain essential amino acids.
Vegetarianism is a style of eating that involves the rejection of meat products. Depending on the specific restrictions in the diet, it is customary to distinguish different types of vegetarianism. For example, ovolactovegetarians do not eat meat and fish, but eat eggs and dairy products, and lactovegetarians leave only milk and dairy products in their diet as a source of animal protein. Vegans exclude all animal products from their diet in general. Pescetarianism (refusal to eat meat of warm-blooded animals), flexitarianism (rare consumption of meat for food) and pollotarianism (eating poultry) are not considered subspecies of vegetarianism.
WHO and the American Dietetic Association recommend reducing the consumption of red meat, but not giving it up completely. If you completely remove animal protein from your diet, you will need to be monitored by a nutrition specialist and constantly monitor your metabolic status, that is, the amino acid composition of the blood. Vegans need to be additionally injected with vitamin B12.
Our body is also in dire need of iron. For some reason, it is believed that its best source is red meat, that is, lamb, pork or beef. In fact, with red meat, offal, shellfish and legumes, we get only heme iron, and besides it there is also non-heme iron, that is, the one that we can get from plant food. In addition, meat is digested with great difficulty, which is why iron is poorly absorbed. In principle, it is poorly absorbed from food, and the overall level of iron in the body cannot be raised only with the help of certain products. Unfortunately, a real iron deficiency will not always be eliminated even with the help of tablets – in this case, they put droppers with iron.
What is the right nutrition?
General dietary recommendations are as follows: from 50 to 55% of the total caloric intake should be based on complex carbohydrates – it has been proven that this reduces the risk of mortality. The range of recommended fat intake is from 15 to 35%. We are talking about mono- and polyunsaturated fats; saturated and trans fats should be excluded from the diet. The rest of the diet should be proteins, and their recommended amount depends on the presence of concomitant chronic diseases, age and physical activity. For example, pregnant women or athletes may need more protein. But there are cases when everyone needs to consume more protein – for example, with a general increase in physical activity or if a person suffers from sarcopenia. A certain percentage of proteins in our diet should be animal proteins.
If you are still faced with excess weight, then the only working way to lose weight that nature has prepared for us is to create a calorie deficit, but with the preservation of a sufficient amount of nutrients, so it will not work to limit yourself to apples and buckwheat. A competent diet will help to make a doctor. As soon as you lose weight, you will have to recalculate the calorie content of the diet to keep the weight. Today, you can calculate the required amount of calories and nutrients using special applications.
Despite the claims about the benefits of fractional, that is, frequent meals in small portions, this method has no scientifically proven benefits and cannot guarantee either weight loss or the absence of side effects for health. Moreover, in response to each meal, we release insulin, and when a person eats too often, he gradually develops insulin resistance, against which diabetes can develop.
It is known that if a person wants to lose weight, it is better to eat three to four times a day. Scientists have found out that it makes sense to eat breakfast in the first two hours after waking up and be sure to include protein in it. It is recommended to have dinner two to four hours before bedtime and also not to neglect protein foods. This is due to the fact that milk protein (contained, for example, in cheese) stimulates growth hormone, which promotes weight loss.
Regarding the no less fashionable interval fasting today, the opinions of scientists currently differ (we have described this in detail in another text). According to some studies, fasting improves the health of a certain group of people and has no side effects, but many scientists claim the opposite or at least do not consider interval fasting more effective than other diets.
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