RE: Gary Taubes book "Why we get fat"

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  • #5814

    Eric Shaw
    Member

    So just finished Gary's book “Why we get fat”, great read, very informative, and yet just further supports much of what Keifers protocols are about.But I have a question for anyone who has read the book. The whole underlying basis of the book is that the calories in/calories out model is just flat wrong and doesn't hold up to rigorous study despite what the so called experts want us to believe about eating less equals long term weight loss.But one thing I was hoping he would have touched on but didn't regarding this, is why is it then that people who have Gastric Bypass surgery tend to lose so much weight and it seems they tend to keep it off, but I'll admit I haven't actually researched how many keep it off for how long. But am just going off those that I have seen in the media and in my own family who for all intents and purposes, seem to have stayed way leaner than pre-surgery for years. A few examples would Al Roker from the Today show and that black panelist from American Idol whose name I forget. Also my aunt who lost about a 100lbs has seemed to have kept it off for about a year so far.  What are other peoples opinions on this? Because if in fact they are able to keep it off it seems that the reduced calories from the reduced ability to consume food due to the smaller stomach, has allowed them to lose weight and keep it off.

    #126103

    t0x
    Member

    In my opinion gastric bypass surgery isn't that effective. I don't know where exactly I heard/read it, but there was/is a (former?) Yankees coach I think who went down this road and after losing some weight rebounded pretty hard. Caloric deprivation works in some amount because you starve your body and the result is weight loss - not particularly (just) fat loss. The energy you need still has to come somewhere and you will (also) lose fat that way but destroy your body in the process. There are much healthier ways.For an athlete there is nothing worse than that sort of shit. You will not only be deprived calorically but in addition these people strongly tend towards very poor food choices because they think they don't have to care abount food anymore at all and will screw up their micronutrient profile that way pretty severe..

    #126104

    Phatty
    Member

    In my opinion gastric bypass surgery isn't that effective. I don't know where exactly I heard/read it, but there was/is a (former?) Yankees coach I think who went down this road and after losing some weight rebounded pretty hard. Caloric deprivation works in some amount because you starve your body and the result is weight loss - not particularly (just) fat loss. The energy you need still has to come somewhere and you will (also) lose fat that way but destroy your body in the process. There are much healthier ways.For an athlete there is nothing worse than that sort of shit. You will not only be deprived calorically but in addition these people strongly tend towards very poor food choices because they think they don't have to care abount food anymore at all and will screw up their micronutrient profile that way pretty severe..

    Gastric bands stop working once the patient finds ways to "eat around" the band. There was a woman in the UK that had a gastric sleeve surgery IIRC, yet continued to eat like she did pre-op. Eventually she filled her esophagus with food and died."Fatties gonna fat".

    #126105

    d3spwn
    Participant

    Taubes never said that calories don't matter. What he's saying is that the calories-in-calories-out model is ignoring biology.

    #126106

    Fairy
    Guest

    I know someone who's relative died after having some kind of surgery like this. According to Wiki: 15% of patients experience complications (sounds fun), 0.5% die within 6 months. If you care about Kiefer's opinion, he recently tweeted this:@DHKiefer: “Calories in, calories out,” as we think about it for fat loss, is almost total crap. http://t.co/OjNNQYIl #DangerouslyHardcore #Fitnesstip----I agree with him. If you consider that depending on which energy pathway and which macro nutrient is passed through it, can mean the difference between a single molecule of that macronutrient creating 2 ATP molecules, or 32, you should be able to figure out why that is.Oh, and there are 9 widely accepted energy pathways in humans alone. Good luck predicting how many ATP you will yield from 1g of glucose. That doesn't even take into account how your hormonal status influences how, where, and if different macronutrients are stored or turned into usable energy. I wish everyone would get over the simplistic 'calories in, calories out' model. Humans are not coal furnaces. We're a little bit more complex than that.Thanks for the book recommendation.

    #126108

    Fairy
    Guest

    Oh, and obviously, if you stop eating and severely restrict calories you will lose weight…. Just like a prisoner of war, or an anorexic. That is not rocket science. It's an extremely primitive, and practically barbaric way of treating the human body. I don't know if I would rather be obese, or be 'thin' with a gastric band. Both sound equally unhealthy.

    #126107

    Lauren Norfleet
    Participant

    In the beginning of the book Taubes does describe “why” calorie deprivation works with carb restriction. If you lower the amount of food you take in, you tend to lower the amount of carbs too. So people tend to eat “healthy” after an expensive surgery. Then they might keep it off because they stayed away from the junk for long enough that it doesn't taste good anymore. But I did watch a coworker keep the weight off for almost two years. Then they woke up one day way bigger than she ever was. Its a quick fix with no education.

    #126109

    tzanghi
    Participant

    Layne Norton recently did a video on metabolic damage.  He supposedly has seen figure competitors who were eating 1000 calories and doing what was upposed to be 1000 calories of cardio per day, and they weren't losing weight.Norton said that it takes 1-1.5 years to repair that type of metabolic damage, where his protocol was adding ~5g/day of carbs every week until they are recovered.  Inferentially, it seems like it would take a long time for the body to adapt to caloric restriction.  Now I think it would happen a lot faster than that, but I think the answer is that it just takes time for the body to adapt to caloric restriction.

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RE: Gary Taubes book "Why we get fat"

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