Linguists are right: you should not “sit on diet”
2009-05-26
Many of you probably have made it certain for yourselves that short-term diets give nothing positive to our life quality. Weight is regained after some time, often even exceeding that before dieting. How many diets the humankind has invented in the recent decades: “Bible Diet”, “Deadly Diet”, “Lollipop Diet”, “Hollywood Diet”, “English Diet”, “Total Diet”, etc. If I were a poet, I could create a new hit using diet titles only. :)
Such abundance of them only proves once again that there is no one and only diet that would fundamentally solve your fat problem once and for all. Such and similar diets are only a short-term, purposive change of nutrition habits aimed at producing fast but short-lived effect. Well, for example, you are preparing for some important event and want to look a little nicer, healthier. Then these are suitable. But you cannot “sit on diet” for all your life – sooner or later you will have to return to normal nutrition.
For this reason there is really no point in constantly torturing yourself by short-term diets – it troubles both physically and psychologically, furthermore, it is unpleasant and creates various inconveniences, while the result is short-term only. In principle, poor is the diet that you cannot follow for a long time.
Many of you probably are exasperated by this philosophizing already and want to ask: “Can I, instead of speaking in trivialities, give some real advice on how to get rid of “apple shape”? My answer is: in many cases I can, if only a person has will and desire to change something. It is difficult to give any help only to the persons who have disorder of natural hormone activity. Activity of our organism is regulated by hormones. Speaking figuratively, some hormones are responsible for accumulation of fats, others for conversion of fats into energy (i.e., fat burning). And when this balance gets disrupted, no diet will help. If there is a possibility, hormone balance must be restored by means of traditional or non-traditional medicine. Only then things can start improving.
But if everything with hormones is OK and you are firmly determined to get rid of some unnecessary kilograms on your waist or hips, you certainly should start from the head. That’s right – weight reduction starts from the head. A person must realize what he wants and what he can, must set realistic aims and seriously pursue them. It means that from now on you will have to change your nutrition habits, some food products and food preparation methods, and maybe even visit a gym twice a week.
I think that for many people it is really unclear how many kilograms of weight can be lost without making harm for organism in, say, a week: three, five, or ten? I answer: quite a lot of kilograms can be lost. Let’s say, five, but of them fat will comprise only about five hundred grams. The remaining portion of the lost weight will be fluids and muscles. And their loss is not wanted, so there should be no joy about that. Scientists have estimated that one kilogram of human body fat, during transformation into energy, burns approximately 7000 kilocalories. For the sake of convenience, let us simply call them calories. Therefore, half a kilogram is 3500 calories. By dividing this number by seven days of a week, we get 500 calories for a day. This is your first task: to create such calorie deficit per day. It is not difficult. We can “steal” a part of calories from fatty food, and we will burn a part by exercising. Or we can steal everything from food. You choose. If you exercise, the things will progress faster.
Therefore let us begin to understand the word “diet” correctly. In Greek language this word means “nutrition plan”. This is how it should be understood, instead of interpreting it as punishment, self-coercion, torturing or simply something unpleasant. It is your long-term strategic nutrition plan, not a short-term caprice It is not necessary to live on diets – only to eat right all the time. This must become a good habit and not discommode, but liberate from overweight and many related problems. The essence of many “working” diets can be generalized in one sentence: everything can be eaten (there is no poison in nature, there are poisonous doses only), but not in large amounts, often and with low fat. Actually, you do not even need to count the calories you use; unless you are skilled you will not even be able to do that properly, especially when you do not know how many calories you use. It is enough to simply rely on your intuition and common sense.
So, what to eat ? Undoubtedly, natural food products grown in your latitude. You all know very well that in nature there are three groups of nutrients energetically valuable to human: carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. There also are fibers, vitamins and minerals that assist in digestion and are simply a must to human organism, as well as the most important product – water, but it has no energy value.
CARBOHYDRATES. Let us discuss the first group of nutrients that is most valuable to human organism: carbohydrates. They are the best “fuel” for human organism. They are virtually all vegetable-origin food products: fruit, vegetables, and grain products. The sweeter a product is, the simpler is its molecule structure, what means that it absorbed into blood very fast and immediately increases sugar level in it. This is not good, because organism releases much insulin that is responsible for accumulation of fat. Therefore the best choice is not so sweet fruit, all vegetables and various groats, grown in our latitude and processed as little as possible. Ideal source of carbohydrates is rolled oats, especially little processed (i.e., the cheapest). Rolled oats clean blood, they contain plenty of dietary fiber, vitamins and microelements. They are “long playing”, the best carbohydrates. Vegetables and fruits are certainly great, but we should choose not imported ones, but those grown in our latitude. We should be moderate with exotic fruits and vegetables, because they are not encoded in our genes. Also think about chemical substances used to grow them. Of course, exotic fruits and vegetables are sources of vitamins and savouring mandarins from time to time is good, but apples from a small, individual farm is much better. It is advisable to buy fruits and vegetables from private old persons, because it is unlikely that they use chemicals in their own gardens. Cereal and vegetables should comprise the largest part of carbohydrates we use, and fruit should comprise the smaller, because most of them are sweet. We have already discussed what sugar does in our organism.
PROTEINS. The second group of nutrients is proteins. It is hard to overestimate their importance to human organism. Protein forms the basis of life. Proteins consist of smaller items: amino acids, these are like “building blocks” of our body. Though vegetarians will certainly begin to argue against, but the best source of proteins is of animal origin. The matter is that proteins consist of twenty-one amino acids, nine of them are irreplaceable – organism cannot produce them by itself. We must get them with food. Plant food lacks them, therefore we must eat food of animal origin. Not necessarily meat. Eggs and milk products are sufficient. Dietary supplements that contain amino acids are a good choice as well. But the most suitable sources of proteins are veal, beef cutout, breasts of birds, white sea fish, lean dairy products, eggs, protein milkshakes and seafood. Quite a lot of proteins are found in some products of vegetable origin: soy, nuts, pulses, but for an organism it is more difficult to absorb them and, as I have mentioned, they do not contain certain amino acids or have insufficient amounts of them. Naturally, a question may arise: what about other meat products, why are they not suitable? When reducing body fat, they are not suitable because they are too fatty and contain much cholesterol, therefore people should not eat them every day. The previously named food products have most proteins and least fats, for this reason they are most appropriate.
FATS. The third group of nutrients that is of great interest for us is fats. For those who try to get rid of some extra kilograms this word probably sounds like curse. Human organism needs fats very much for all processes and reactions of vital importance to take place smoothly. Fats participate in hormone production, speed up transmission of nerve impulses, lubricate joints, etc. With lack of fats, sexual function is disturbed, skin becomes rough, hairs and nails break, a person feels worse. However, people must choose suitable fats: local oil (in Lithuania it is made from rapes, linseeds, sunflowers) that is cold-pressed and refined as little as possible. Certainly, it also has more familiar taste and when preparing food it is enough to pour half the indicated amount. Many think that after animal fat is replaced by oil, all problems with excess fat will be solved. But you probably have ascertained that nothing like this happens, because excess oil is converted into body fat, only with higher caloric expenditure. In addition, once oil reaches boiling temperature it becomes carcinogenic, thus you should not overuse it. Not all fats are “evil”, some are particularly beneficial. I talk about fish oil that contains omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. All fish, salmonids and tunas in particular, have these. People who dislike fish can use fish oil that is available in capsules; this is a great substitute. We get enough fiber if we eat more vegetables and fruit. However, water amount will have to be increased if eating more proteins, because water is very necessary for absorption of proteins. Regardless of all the liquid foods used, additional amounts (approximately 20 grams for one kilogram of body weight) of pure, non-sparkling water should be drunk every day. This makes about 1.5-2 litres. Basically, this is all we need.
What should food proportions be in a plate ? When reducing weight, we will decrease amount of carbohydrates in a serving as well. We will refuse animal fat as much as possible, they will be replaced by oil and fish oil, and we will increase amount of proteins a little. We will also raise the volume of water drunk. The contents in our plate should look so: 40% of carbohydrates, 40% of proteins, 20% of fats. We should not forget and delude ourselves, as one gram of carbohydrates produces 4 kcal., one gram of proteins gives 4 kcal., but one gram of fats gives 9 kcal. For this reason plate contents should be such: one third – protein products (lean meat), two thirds – vegetables. There are really enough fats in lean protein-rich food, therefore it makes no sense to seek them from other sources. Certainly, smaller plates should be used. This will make it easier not to overeat.
How often to eat ? Nature has arranged this and it is pointless to go against it. In human organism approximately every three hours sugar level in blood changes and “hungry” blood begins to trigger hunger center located in brain. Therefore we should eat a little at such intervals. Exactly eat a little, not stuff the face. It would be ideal to eat hot food three times a day and have a light snack three times between these meals. For this purpose fruit, vegetables, container of yoghurt or curd are a perfect choice. It is highly recommended to eat a little, because otherwise organism switches to saving mode and stops decomposing fats. Its logic is such: “I did not get dinner, so possibly I will not get supper as well”. In addition, after a small meal likeliness to overeat at dinner or supper becomes lower.
What to eat at what time ? Bringing in hormones, nature made it so that most people are most active from 7 8AM to 3 4PM. Consequently, food should be selected accordingly. Before afternoon more carbohydrates should be eaten, as evening approaches products containing more proteins should be chosen. As I have already mentioned, carbohydrates is the best source of energy, therefore, speaking figuratively, it is no use to fuel a car if we are about to park it in a garage for a night.