The obese are not fat because they overeat...

[gonnabskinny]

they overeat because they are fat.

I just read that today in Gary Taubes book 'Good Calories, Bad Calories'.

People that have weight issues have to overeat, because they are storing fat, not using it for energy. The reason is an excess of carbohydrates, that overproduce insuline, that convert it to glucose, and then store it as fat in the adipose tissue instead of making it available for energy. Therefore you stay hungry, because you need more food for energy, and then you eat more carbs and store that as fat, and over and over and over again, goes the cycle. The only way to break the cycle is to figure out how to start burning the fat that has already been stored.

Thankfully, we have figured out how to do that. It is called Atkins! Limit the carbs, and you start burning fat for energy as it was meant to be.

[hopejoy]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Isn't it wonderful to have this terrible thing figured out? I was soooooo tired all the time and I thought eating would give me energy and it never did... nothing ever did! Until I stayed on this WOE for about the first month or so then slowly I began to have more energy and the wt started falling off! It's a miracle! Yeah for Dr. Atkins! I thought it was depression but that overwhelming exhaustion was the beginning stages of diabetes! Thank goodness I'm not ever going back there again!!!!!
liz

[Hudson]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Yes, when I read that it was like the light bulb came on. And then got bright - very bright. That is exactly how I got fat. And I could eat incredible abounts of carbohydrates- and eat again in a hour or two. Never having a clue what was going on.

[Brook]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Honestly, I find that statement to be frustrating.

Yes. I've read the book. I think Gary Taubes is an amazingly smart man, but that doesn't mean I agree with everything he says.

We get fat and store fat when we eat more than our bodies need. Yes. It's easier for our bodies to store the carbs- obviously. But it can and will do the same thing with protein and even fat as anyone who is over eating on a low-carb plan can tell you. No one starts out fat and then over eats.

It's not a chicken/egg debate. There's an excess of insulin when you eat the wrong things *and*/or over-eat. I don't know anyone that hit the 240-ish lbs I managed to get to by staying at or around 1500 calories, regardless of where those 1500 calories came from. I over-ate. I didn't over-eat because I was fat. I over-ate and ate all the wrong things and that's what got me to 240lbs in the first place.

Yes. I understand that 1500 calories of the wrong kinds of food will make you more hungry...but it's still eating more that gets ya in trouble.

[kate58]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

I agree with you to Brook, and I think Gary Taubes does too. Yes, if you stick to a restricted number of calories you will not get fat, but the problem for a lot of people is that they also don't get full. Hunger is the problem. Not greed, hunger - and they are very different things, although it took me until recently to realise that.

Hunger is a very, very powerful force. If you are going hungry to reduce calories, human nature being what it is, you wil eat. And the hunger in many people eating a high carb diet is constant. No energy, constant hunger. It's a recipe for overeating. And if you are following the standard dietary advice, and trying to be healthy, you'll eat lots of pasta or rice or potatoes, which we are constantly told are filling, in an effort to beat the hunger. But then it just comes back.

If you had TREMENDOUS willpower, you can resist that hunger for a time. For most people, and I was one, it was impossible to resist in the longer term. I'd load up on bread (wholewheat usually, but still) or a big bowl of mashed potato. And I mean load. The hunger just never went away in spite of my eating a so-called 'healthy' diet. I was not a big eater of sugar ever - I'd reach for the mash over sweets every time, or low-fat unsweetened popcorn or something like that and never cared about dessert in restaurants.

It was only be finally finding this way of eating that my appetite became normal. Almost instantly. And what a difference that made.

Now I know that what was happening is that I was storing fat like crazy from the carbs I ate, but had very little of them available for immediate energy. So my body responded to this lack of energy by making me hungry. So I ate more, only for most of it to be stored away and very little available for energy ........ and round and round you go. I was very efficient at storing fat, which made me hungry, so I overate. But not from greed (which I always believed) but from real hunger.

[gonnabskinny]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Honestly, I find that statement to be frustrating.

Yes. I've read the book. I think Gary Taubes is an amazingly smart man, but that doesn't mean I agree with everything he says.

We get fat and store fat when we eat more than our bodies need. Yes. It's easier for our bodies to store the carbs- obviously. But it can and will do the same thing with protein and even fat as anyone who is over eating on a low-carb plan can tell you. No one starts out fat and then over eats.

It's not a chicken/egg debate. There's an excess of insulin when you eat the wrong things *and*/or over-eat. I don't know anyone that hit the 240-ish lbs I managed to get to by staying at or around 1500 calories, regardless of where those 1500 calories came from. I over-ate. I didn't over-eat because I was fat. I over-ate and ate all the wrong things and that's what got me to 240lbs in the first place.

Yes. I understand that 1500 calories of the wrong kinds of food will make you more hungry...but it's still eating more that gets ya in trouble.

Brook, I don't agree with everything he says either, especially when it comes to exercise. The point that I think he is trying to make here, is that we continue to try to put people that are overweight on low calorie/low fat diets, because it is the overeating that got them into trouble, when overeating was more often than not just the symptom of why they overate to begin with. It is their metabolic makeup and something else going on internally that is causing the issue. For some it might be a thyroid regulation problem, for others either lesions effecting the hypothalamus, something that is genetic, or whatever. The underlying effect is still the same. That those that are obese are storing more fat and burning it, and it is because that they are storing more fat, that they have the need to ingest more to fuel our bodies, because it is not available for fuel. Then they eat more, because they need fuel, which in turn stores more fat, and so on and so on the cycle continues.

I don't disagree, that it doesn't give us a license to overeat. I think it is just easier to believe that if you take in more calories than you expend then you will lose weight. True, but what is causing that to begin with? That is what needs to be investigated. If it is because your adipose tissue is robbing your body of needed fuel, then you will seek out more food for fuel and the cycle will continue.

Put the obese on a restricted calorie diet that is low fat and they will continue to be hungry because they will still retain the fat in their adipose tissue. However for many, put them on a restricted carbohydrate diet, and they will go into ketosis and start burning their own stored fat for fuel, they will not be hungry, and hence they will take in less calories.

Now you have treated the cause and not the symptom. Dr. Atkins knew this to be true. That is why he says count the carbs, but not the calories. He didn't say that calories didn't count, he knew that they did. He just knew that once the carbs were under control, in the absence of some other physical issue, that the appetite would be greatly diminished, and that the caloric intake would take care of itself.

Either way, whether it is the chicken or the egg that came first, the good news for us, is that we can eat both!

[mystic]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Personally I think that whole theory is a semi-dangerous twist of reality. In the last 40 years, the human race, wait... sorry, the American genetic pool didn't somehow shift overnight to a place where suddenly millions of people now have some physical/genetic reason for their obesity. It's statistically impossible that you'd see this genetic shift globally, in 40 years, let alone segregated foremost in the US (where the population is a mixture from cultures all over the world).

The problem is our culture and the change in the ways we get activity during the day. In the early part of the 20th century, we were farmers and industrial workers - still fairly physically active workers that ate food picked from a garden and prepared on a stove. Today the population sits behind desks, in cubes, all day, and eats stuff that comes from a can or a box and that's nuked in a microwave.

To even suggest that US obesity is the result of some sudden mutation in everyone's genetics is absurd to me when the changes in our working lives and our culture of convenience stare you point blank in the face.

I agree with Brook in that the original problem starts when you don't get the activity[I] that burns the fat. Exercise burns fat, muscle burns fat. If you're eating more than you need, you're storing fat. If you get fat, then the process that Taubes describes kicks in, but it's definitely not the source of the problem unless you're one of the tiny percentages of people that actually has a tumor on your thyroid.

This is the one thing that bugs me about low-carb mentality. It tends to breed these beliefs that you aren't the one ultimately in control (and that exercise isn't the most important factor). That to me is a really sad lie to be propagating to a group of people already struggling to regain their sense of control and personal power.

[quotidianlight]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Mystic, I agree with you on several point but I am still reading Taubes book. I don't see it as a sudden genetic mutation, but rather our old evolutionary genes are reacting to our new culture in ways that would have made sense thousands of years ago; now it's just making us fat. So instead of hunting and walking cross country chasing veggies we need to exercise. Instead of eating meat in the winter and veggies in the summer and salmon in the spring we need atkins. I think the reason low carb works is because it works with our bodies by mimicing the way we would have eated in the wild.

[Hudson]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

mystic

For me it makes a huge difference. It's not a genetic defect. It is a defect in our food. Too many refined carbahydrates or just potatoes maybe and before long you have too much insulin. The insulin sends everything you eat to fat. So you are still hungry. You eat a bag of cheetoes and the insulin sends that to fat and produces more insulin. This is a vicious cycle that absolutely explains my getting fat. And I think the general population as well. It's the over abundance of carbs that many of us cannot handle.

In my opinion no one that is on this insulin/carb/fat cycle can get out with willpower. You must change what you eat.

NOw it is possible to over eat without eating carbs. And possible to gain some weight. But the control issue is way different.

And for me, Taubes is exactly right on exercise. It is not a factor in my weight control. Exercise or not I do about the same.

[Brook]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Brook, I don't agree with everything he says either, especially when it comes to exercise. The point that I think he is trying to make here, is that we continue to try to put people that are overweight on low calorie/low fat diets, because it is the overeating that got them into trouble, when overeating was more often than not just the symptom of why they overate to begin with. It is their metabolic makeup and something else going on internally that is causing the issue. For some it might be a thyroid regulation problem, for others either lesions effecting the hypothalamus, something that is genetic, or whatever. The underlying effect is still the same. That those that are obese are storing more fat and burning it, and it is because that they are storing more fat, that they have the need to ingest more to fuel our bodies, because it is not available for fuel. Then they eat more, because they need fuel, which in turn stores more fat, and so on and so on the cycle continues.

I absolutely, whole heartedly agree.....but.... (LOL)

For me it makes a huge difference. It's not a genetic defect. It is a defect in our food. Too many refined carbahydrates or just potatoes maybe and before long you have too much insulin. The insulin sends everything you eat to fat. So you are still hungry. You eat a bag of cheetoes and the insulin sends that to fat and produces more insulin. This is a vicious cycle that absolutely explains my getting fat. And I think the general population as well. It's the over abundance of carbs that many of us cannot handle.

This is the part of this paragraph that jumped off the page at me. No, most of us cannot handle an over abundance of carbohydrate in our system - but that most certainly goes back to the personal responsibility aspect that the statement "Obese people are not fat because they overeat. They overeat because they are obese.". We *all* know, regardless of whether you subscribe to the USRDA guidelines or Dr. Atkins (or any controlled carb approach for that matter) that we should eat turkey instead of a twinkie. We should eat a salad instead of a french fry. We *all* know this. The truth is that people make crappy decisions on a regular basis because they are ..and this isn't going to be popular....being lazy. It's MUCH easier to swing through MickeyD's and grab a Super sized #3 than it is to go home and make a pork loin roast with steamed broccoli and cheese. It tastes better to eat a ginormous cinnamon roll than it does to eat a hard boiled egg. My issue with the way Gary Taubes said what he said is that people are using it to escape the personal responsibility aspect of their problem. If I don't put the garbage food in my system- the food I know is garbage food or a less than optimum choice, then I don't have insulin regulation issues to begin with.

I don't think that was Taubes intention with the statements he made, but I certainly see a huge segment of his fans using it that way- and that is where my frustration stems from.

In my opinion no one that is on this insulin/carb/fat cycle can get out with willpower. You must change what you eat.

NOw it is possible to over eat without eating carbs. And possible to gain some weight. But the control issue is way different.

The physiological control issue is different, but it all starts in the same mental place. You have to make a conscious decision to do what we all basically know is the right thing to do. THEN the control issues/emotional issues come to surface and must be dealt with - and they will change.

And for me, Taubes is exactly right on exercise. It is not a factor in my weight control. Exercise or not I do about the same.

Taubes didn't say that exercise wasn't a factor in weight control. He said it wasn't a factor in weight loss. There's a difference and I think it's an important one.

Taubes argues that exercise makes you more hungry. He's right. It does.

Taubes argues that it's not necessary to lose weight/fat. He's right. It's not.

However, he does not argue against it as a tool for health. We all know that exercise builds lean muscle mass. We all know that muscle burns more calories at a resting rate- not many more, but more none the less (I'll take all the help I can get, thank you!). It helps us to maintain bone density, regulate sleep, decrease stress, makes us look better, gives us energy...the list goes on and on.

One can not argue against exercise as an integral part of a journey to a healthier lifestyle or the importance of it in regards to our health. You just can't. Taubes didn't either.

You can lose weight without exercise, but you can't do it and maintain your lean muscle mass, your bone density, and frankly....you're much more likely to look like a skinny fat person than the picture of health if you choose to avoid it. I'd much rather weigh more and look great nekkid than weigh less and look like a deflated elephant.

It's another spin on what Taubes said regarding exercise being used to as an excuse by many, many people to avoid doing it (not directed to anyone here!) - and I don't believe that was ever Taubes intention either.

/ LOL

[mystic]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

You guys aren't actually contradicting what I'm saying. Or were you adding to my argument? It's absolutely starts with what you stick in your mouth. But if you do not burn off what you stick in your mouth, surprise, you store it as fat.

I don't think our genes are reacting at all - they're doing exactly what they've done for eons. They process food exactly the way they always have. People 100 years ago ate apples and bananas and ice cream and pie. They fried potatoes in a pan of butter and their bodies produced insulin the same way our bodies do today. But they, in general, worked much harder physically during their days so I think it's less of our food habits changing versus a significant change in our activity levels changing that has spawned the obesity epidemic.

It's a combination of both, but at the end of the day, it's absolutely about the choices you made for yourself - your culture, your mother, your dog, your XBOX, your hi-def football, your stressful job, your inability to resist Twinkies... sorry, you can't blame any of them. Unless you're one of those who actually have a physical problem, you control your destiny. No one and nothing else does.

Diet is only part of the equation. The math and science prove that if you don't burn off what you eat, you store the excess. Your activity level absolutely has everything to do with that, and it's crucial for maintaining sufficient lean body mass. If you burn off your muscle, you've lost the #1 asset you had as far as burning energy during your day.

[quotidianlight]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

You guys aren't actually contradicting what I'm saying. Or were you adding to my argument? It's absolutely starts with what you stick in your mouth. But if you do not burn off what you stick in your mouth, surprise, you store it as fat.

I don't think our genes are reacting at all - they're doing exactly what they've done for eons. They process food exactly the way they always have. People 100 years ago ate apples and bananas and ice cream and pie. They fried potatoes in a pan of butter and their bodies produced insulin the same way our bodies do today. But they, in general, worked much harder physically during their days so I think it's less of our food habits changing versus a significant change in our activity levels changing that has spawned the obesity epidemic.

True, but not everyone had access to those foods and the upper classes considered fat attractive and a sign of affluence. So while they ate those foods they were fat. This epidemic didn't just start, it's at least 100-200 years old at it's start (we are at critical mass though). Yes, activity does have something to do with it but I thing it has more to do with it but there are loads of skinny people who don't lift a figure and look like veal. Our bodies were made to react a certain way to food and during the revolution and industrialization of farming we began eating in ratios that our bodies weren't built for. So it reacted the way it was supposed to and started storing stuff and making people hungrier but famine never came.

Diet is only part of the equation. The math and science prove that if you don't burn off what you eat, you store the excess. Your activity level absolutely has everything to do with that, and it's crucial for maintaining sufficient lean body mass. If you burn off your muscle, you've lost the #1 asset you had as far as burning energy during your day.

I think exercise is important for being healthy in anyway but I don't think it is as important for weight loss as it is for maintained and not in the way most people agree to. I think it's important because people who exercise regularly tend to pay better attention to their bodies on a daily basis and take care of themselves overall making gaining just less likely. A person who choose not to exercise and embrace vealness can still stay slim they may not be able to eat as much but they can stay slim. I have a really hard time thinking weight loss is just calorie in and calorie out because I can lose eating a lot more on this WOL than I could when I was eating low fat. To lose I had to eat about 1200-1300 a day. Now I am losing on 1600-1800 and that isn't something I can ignore.

[Brook]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

You guys aren't actually contradicting what I'm saying. Or were you adding to my argument? It's absolutely starts with what you stick in your mouth. But if you do not burn off what you stick in your mouth, surprise, you store it as fat.

LOL. Both.

It does start with what you stick in your mouth, but it doesn't end with activity nor is it as simple as burning off what you put in your mouth. It's impossible to burn off what you put in your mouth. What you eat and how you eat it has everything to do with where your body pulls the energy from.

Case in point:

If I sit down and eat a meal that has ..let's say 1000 calories for simplicity sake. A single meal- 1000 calories.

If that meal is the USRDA 40/30/30 - then (again, for simplicity sake) 400 of those calories are going to morph into glucose in my blood stream *very* quickly. 300 of those calories are protein calories and some of it will convert to glucose, but most won't. The 300 fat calories will take their sweet time making it through my digestive track. -Unless I am sweating like a farm animal immediately after eating that meal and am doing so for quite some time, I'm not going to burn off those 100 grams of carb. The insulin response is going to do what it does and it's going to shuttle off what's not being required for immediate energy needs to fat cells. The protein and fat are going to take their sweet time being broken down and will be used for the long-haul energy needs.

Let's take those same 1000 calories and make them 65% fat/30% protein/5% carb - the carb will be converted and used up quickly assuming we're active enough after consumption to burn them up. The rest will take their sweet time and be used for the long-haul.

Now, if I eat 1000 calories and spread it out throughout the day in 5 200 calorie meals, I'm not going to have the same insulin response to it, it's not going to require as much activity for me to burn off the glucose in my blood stream at the immediate time either.

How we eat, what we eat, how much we eat, and when we eat it can be equally - if not more so- important to the exercise portion of the equation. This is why the old addage "Great abs are made in the kitchen" is true. It's not going to matter how much muscle mass you have if it's covered in a layer of fat. The food *is* a bigger part of the fat loss equation than the exercise is.

I don't think our genes are reacting at all - they're doing exactly what they've done for eons. They process food exactly the way they always have. People 100 years ago ate apples and bananas and ice cream and pie. They fried potatoes in a pan of butter and their bodies produced insulin the same way our bodies do today. But they, in general, worked much harder physically during their days so I think it's less of our food habits changing versus a significant change in our activity levels changing that has spawned the obesity epidemic.

It's a combination of both, but at the end of the day, it's absolutely about the choices you made for yourself - your culture, your mother, your dog, your XBOX, your hi-def football, your stressful job, your inability to resist Twinkies... sorry, you can't blame any of them. Unless you're one of those who actually have a physical problem, you control your destiny. No one and nothing else does.

Diet is only part of the equation. The math and science prove that if you don't burn off what you eat, you store the excess. Your activity level absolutely has everything to do with that, and it's crucial for maintaining sufficient lean body mass. If you burn off your muscle, you've lost the #1 asset you had as far as burning energy during your day.

The quality of our food is also a huge factor. 100 years ago, people's icecream was made from cream, sugar, vanilla, and a pinch of salt. Today icecream is made from MILKFAT AND NONFAT MILK, SUGAR, CORN SYRUP, HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP, WHEY, NATURAL VANILLA WITH VANILLA BEANS, MONO AND DIGLYCERIDES, GUAR GUM, CALCIUM SULFATE, LOCUST BEAN GUM, SODIUM CARBONATE, CARRAGEENAN.

Our food habits have changed ENORMOUSLY - as have our activity levels.

The math and science do say you have to burn more than you take it - but it's not just that simple either. If it were, a calorie would be a calorie would be a calorie, but we all know there is a metabolic advantage to eating low-carb vs low fat. It's a less energy efficient process which is why a low-carb eater can take in about 300 calories on average more than a low-fat eater can and still have the same results. That has nothing to do with activity levels. That's all about food and chemistry.

[gonnabskinny]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Brook, we agree on the exercise part and I believe you are right on taking personal resposibility. It is not an excuse.

However, for many of us that tried to take personal responsilbity and did other "diets" that were lower in calories as well as lower in fat, we were still destined to fail. Lower the fat, and the carbohydrates go up. I think we are hung up only on where to place the blame.

I just wish I could have found out this information decades ago. I could have saved years of frustration from doing so called "sensible diets".

[mystic]

Re: The obese are not fat because they overeat...

Excellent explanations as usual Brook. Man I wish I could assemble my thoughts like you.

I agree, Taubes never intended his beliefs to be skewed into a one-sided, silver bullet. This is definitely a tendency for people however. And I agree - it's a lot of laziness at the bottom of it all. I know for me, being overweight increased that problem tremendously. I cared less and less the worse it got. It was a vicious cycle.