Showing posts with label research and studies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label research and studies. Show all posts
When I don't sleep well, I am hungrier and more prone to want those fast food baddies. Don't know why, but it's true. If I sleep well and deeply and at least 8 to 9 hours, I do better with my eating and exercising. When I sleep poorly, I crave salt and I crave sugar and I can barely get through a training session. Yesterday's Pilates class was a struggle punctuated by cramps and having to stop and start several times, whereas the ones when I was getting up earlier were hard, but doable. And I've been practically sucking on the salt shaker.
Disgusting.
So, today, I'm gonna go get some veggie and fruit smoothies and try to mitigate some of the damage from all the sodium. I feel bloated and I have dark circles under my eyes. Not nice.
Of course, to add insult to bloaty injury, I read this: Weighing the Evidence on Exercise. This is a really interesting article, and I recommend any of you who are struggling with diet AND exercise to read it. It's not the happiest news for us ladies, though, because, as we already knew, when it comes to weight loss, biology favors the gents and royally screws us. The article highlights how, especially in women, exercise increases ghrelin which increases appetite. (I can attest to this. I'm always FAMISHED after a hard workout and hit Starbucks for a sugarfree latte posthaste.)
But it's not all grim news in the article, though it is still grim for those of use with BMIs higher than 25 (and if you're obese, yeah, your BMI is way over 25). (see page 2 of article).
If you plan to lose the weight and keep it off, you (and I) better learn to either love to exercise A LOT or just buck up and do the exercise, love it or hate it. Why? Cause exercise isn't just about calories out. It seems to do something to your very physiology:
Scientists are “not really sure yet” just how and why exercise is so important in maintaining weight loss in people, Braun says. But in animal experiments, exercise seems to remodel the metabolic pathways that determine how the body stores and utilizes food. For a study published last summer, scientists at the University of Colorado at Denver fattened a group of male rats. The animals already had an inbred propensity to gain weight and, thanks to a high-fat diet laid out for them, they fulfilled that genetic destiny. After 16 weeks of eating as much as they wanted and lolling around in their cages, all were rotund. The scientists then switched them to a calorie-controlled, low-fat diet. The animals shed weight, dropping an average of about 14 percent of their corpulence.
Afterward the animals were put on a weight-maintenance diet. At the same time, half of them were required to run on a treadmill for about 30 minutes most days. The other half remained sedentary. For eight weeks, the rats were kept at their lower weights in order to establish a new base-line weight.
Then the fun began. For the final eight weeks of the experiment, the rats were allowed to relapse, to eat as much food as they wanted. The rats that had not been running on the treadmill fell upon the food eagerly. Most regained the weight they lost and then some.
But the exercising rats metabolized calories differently. They tended to burn fat immediately after their meals, while the sedentary rats’ bodies preferentially burned carbohydrates and sent the fat off to be stored in fat cells. The running rats’ bodies, meanwhile, also produced signals suggesting that they were satiated and didn’t need more kibble. Although the treadmill exercisers regained some weight, their relapses were not as extreme. Exercise “re-established the homeostatic steady state between intake and expenditure to defend a lower body weight,” the study authors concluded. Running had remade the rats’ bodies so that they ate less.
As someone whose fat is primarily that dangerous abdominal adiposity, this is actually something that offers a bit of comfort. I may really hate aerobic exercising (though I enjoy Pilates), but the fact that it might have an effect on my worst fat issue--that deadly abdominal fat--is something of a spur.
I'm gonna go check Netflix and On Demand for doable aerobic exercise for big me. I hate to sweat, but I hate this huge, deadly belly more.
It's not good news. Good news would be, "NewsFlash: We've found the magic bullet and you can all be trim with one daily pill with no bad side effects that also happens to make you look younger." :D
Until then--we know, we know--eat wholesome food and move, move, move.
So, let me finish watching THE DOCTORS (they have the Eat This, Not That dude on today, and he's kinda cool), finish my second cup of java, and then do a shopping list for debloating and defatting this week.
Later...from the bloated Princess...
ETA: Well, I found this on sleep and weight loss in a Washington Post article:
What do we know? Scientists have an idea for how lack of sleep might contribute to obesity. In two studies, lack of sleep was found to influence two hormones that help control hunger. Leptin, made by fat tissue, tells your brain when it's time to stop eating, while grhelin, which is made in the stomach, signals that you ought to eat more. Both studies -- one involving 11 subjects, the other more than a thousand -- found that restricted sleep led to suppression of leptin and increased grhelin activity, two states that could make you want to eat more.
At least one doctor is willing to take the leap and recommend that people who want to lose weight should get a handle on their sleep. Michael Aziz, author of "The Perfect 10 Diet" (Sourcebooks, 2010), writes, "Getting enough sleep is the cheapest and simplest advice I can give for losing weight."
Let's not kid ourselves. Portion/calorie-contol is key and necessary, but for those of us with deadly visceral fat--especially if you're like me with an apple-ish physique, big belly and all and with Metabolic Syndrome--exercise is ESSENTIAL:
--from "Exercise Keeps Dangerous Visceral Fat Away A Year After Weight Loss, Finds UAB Study"
In the study, UAB exercise physiologist Gary Hunter, Ph.D., and his team randomly assigned 45 European-American and 52 African-American women to three groups: aerobic training, resistance training or no exercise. All of the participants were placed on an 800 calorie-a-day diet and lost an average 24 pounds. Researchers then measured total fat, abdominal subcutaneous fat and visceral fat for each participant.
Afterward, participants in the two exercise groups were asked to continue exercising 40 minutes twice a week for one year. After a year, the study's participants were divided into five groups: those who maintained aerobic exercise training, those who stopped aerobic training, those who maintained their resistance training, those who stopped resistance training and those who were never placed on an exercise regimen.
"What we found was that those who continued exercising, despite modest weight regains, regained zero percent visceral fat a year after they lost the weight," Hunter said. "But those who stopped exercising, and those who weren't put on any exercise regimen at all, averaged about a 33 percent increase in visceral fat.
"Because other studies have reported that much longer training durations of 60 minutes a day are necessary to prevent weight regain, it's not too surprising that weight regain was not totally prevented in this study," Hunter said. "It's encouraging, however, that this relatively small amount of exercise was sufficient to prevent visceral fat gain."
The study also found that exercise was equally effective for both races.
I've known more than a handful of ladies who swear they hardly eat and yet can't seem to lose/keep gaining weight. From my own observation of these gals, it's obvious they are in denial about how much they eat in terms of calories. They assume that having a regular salad for lunch is healthful and "lite", but don't consider that that quarter cup of dressing is loaded with calories and fat. Or they split the fatty entree with a friend/hubby, but don't consider that the entree was 1800 calories to start with, so if it's halved, it's now 900 calories (and this doesn't count sides, rolls, beverages, etc.)
Well, my observations are borne out by a study (flawed or not, it rings true to me), and the emphasis is mine:
If you're having trouble losing weight, even though you think you're not eating that much, I suggest you visit on online food tracker--whether the one at Weight Watchers online, or eDiets online, or Fitday, or SparkPeople, and put in EVERY SINGLE THING THAT PASSES YOUR LIPS, solid or liquid or mint or gum, no matter how small. Look at how the calories come out at the end of each day. Do this for a week or more. (If you've ever been to a dietitian/nutritionist, you probably have done this, as this is part of making an appointment. They ask you to keep a food diary. An honest one.)
Be scrupulously honest. Weight and measure stuff if you are not experienced at eyeballing portions. One thing I learned decades ago is that 1/4 cup is a tiny amount, much less than you think. Measure 1/4 cup of shredded cheese and see how small it is. A cup of cereal is puny, but some cereals have a serving size of 3/4 or 1/2 cup (especially dense granolas).
Some Metabolic Mysteries are not mysterious. They're simply a matter of ignorance.
Well, my observations are borne out by a study (flawed or not, it rings true to me), and the emphasis is mine:
In a 12-month weight maintenance study (other details of which are being discussed in this recent post), the subjects kept diet diaries, which were examined by the researchers at regular intervals. However, the researchers report that "it was apparent that, on average, women in both study groups had underestimated their food intake."
And not by a little bit. On average, the women reported having consumed 1370 calories per day. The researchers calculated that their actual calorie intake was 2044 calories per day. That discrepancy of 674 calories a day adds up to over 5 pounds a month!
The men, on the other hand, were spot on: They reported average intake of 1765 calories, the researchers estimated actual intake at 1771.
If you're having trouble losing weight, even though you think you're not eating that much, I suggest you visit on online food tracker--whether the one at Weight Watchers online, or eDiets online, or Fitday, or SparkPeople, and put in EVERY SINGLE THING THAT PASSES YOUR LIPS, solid or liquid or mint or gum, no matter how small. Look at how the calories come out at the end of each day. Do this for a week or more. (If you've ever been to a dietitian/nutritionist, you probably have done this, as this is part of making an appointment. They ask you to keep a food diary. An honest one.)
Be scrupulously honest. Weight and measure stuff if you are not experienced at eyeballing portions. One thing I learned decades ago is that 1/4 cup is a tiny amount, much less than you think. Measure 1/4 cup of shredded cheese and see how small it is. A cup of cereal is puny, but some cereals have a serving size of 3/4 or 1/2 cup (especially dense granolas).
Some Metabolic Mysteries are not mysterious. They're simply a matter of ignorance.
Two-thirds of Americans are overweight or obese, and there’s no end in sight to this dangerous trend. According to the Centers for Disease Control, in 2007 25.6 percent of Americans were obese. But in 2008, it crept up to 26.1 percent.
There are six states that can dubiously boast the fact that over 30 percent of their citizens are obese: Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and West Virginia.
Colorado is the only state in which less than 20 percent of its citizens are not obese.
Man, this is scary stuff. If risk of stroke and heart disease and diabetes were all not enough, add the increased risk of cancer to the worries of the obese--like moi.
Yeah, read it and weep:
I go in for an endometrial biopsy in three weeks. I think this finding will be weighing on my mind until I get those results.
And for a while after.
It may be what I needed to make a good choice for supper tonight, too.
Have a healthful weekend, folks!
Yeah, read it and weep:
A new report released yesterday by the World Cancer Research Fund and the American Institute for Cancer Research states that most cancers are preventable.Full post on the study is at Dr. Sharma's blog.Poor diet, lack of exercise, obesity and smoking account for the vast majority of cancers; the role of genetic factors is by far overrated.
Indeed, the dramatic impact of obesity on cancer is now increasingly appreciated – one in three cancers may be caused by obesity (or as a result of lifestyle factors that promote obesity). It is therefore perhaps not surprising, that large prospective studies have shown an almost 60% reduction in deaths from cancer with bariatric surgery.
I go in for an endometrial biopsy in three weeks. I think this finding will be weighing on my mind until I get those results.
And for a while after.
It may be what I needed to make a good choice for supper tonight, too.
Have a healthful weekend, folks!
While I totally believe that stress screws your body and mind up, and destressing and learning to do things that involve quietness and meditation are healthful (they prove so to me), I can't get too excited about that study recently reported all over the diet world online. You may have heard about it, the one that says that destressing with meditation and Yoga and such is better for weight loss than diet and exercise.
The destressors kept off the five pound weight loss for two years, while the nutrition info and the diet/exercise groups didn't lose or keep off.
When you're big like me and five pounds barely registers, this is not big news. If the women in the study had lost and kept off 25+ pounds (just with destressing), I might perk up.
But I've struggled to keep off 25 lbs. I had lost 29, then regained, then lost, then regained a bit, then lost. After my last bout with asthma (3.5 weeks of ickiness), I'm up again. For me, 25 pounds is an ongoing battleground. Makes me nuts. So, excuse me if a five pound loss after two years doesn't make me go yippee for Yoga.
Five pounds. This is gonna solve the obesity epidemic? I think not.
I still think that it's a holistic thing that's gonna get us there--ie, dealing with sedentary habits and moving into movement; dealing with excess calories and outsized portions and learning to eat less; cutting down or out the junk and non-nutritive foods and snacks and focusing on whole and clean foods; working with internal/emotional issues and learning how to tap into the self-control we all have to some extent; tapping into our spiritual power (if we believe in such); creating support systems in and even beyond our family/friendship circles; committing to a lifestyle change that is lifelong; changing the societal landscape so that it is fashioned and structured to support healthful living; encouraging employers to make room for exercise at work and offer healthful snacks instead of junk on the jobsites; incorporating stress management techniques; eliminating all junk from schools; adding penalty taxes to junk foods and using that money to offset health care costs for obesity; tax deductions for gym memberships and buying at-home health gear (bikes, ellipticals, treadmills, etc); making health a top family and personal priority for life.
Destressing, as you see, imo is part of that holistic approach. But without diet and exercise and support, etc, I'm sorry, the very overweight and obese and superobese can't be satisfied with losing five pounds doing yoga. That's not gonna cut it.
So, I'll take the study for what it's worth. Yes, I'll continue to incorporate mind-body/destressing times and activities into my life. But that will not solve my obesity problem--or the nation's. Or the world's. Life is stressful, no matter what we do. Destressing helps, but when you'r mom is dying or your husband leaves you or your kid gets a major illness, or your car is totalled or your country is at war or your house is foreclosed on or someone robs you at gunpoint or a hurricane is coming--stress is hard to eradicate. I think the researchers who de-emphasize or pooh-pooh (or seem to) the role of diet and exercise ain't helping us as much as they might think.
They probably just make us worry about destressing enough. :)
The destressors kept off the five pound weight loss for two years, while the nutrition info and the diet/exercise groups didn't lose or keep off.
When you're big like me and five pounds barely registers, this is not big news. If the women in the study had lost and kept off 25+ pounds (just with destressing), I might perk up.
But I've struggled to keep off 25 lbs. I had lost 29, then regained, then lost, then regained a bit, then lost. After my last bout with asthma (3.5 weeks of ickiness), I'm up again. For me, 25 pounds is an ongoing battleground. Makes me nuts. So, excuse me if a five pound loss after two years doesn't make me go yippee for Yoga.
Five pounds. This is gonna solve the obesity epidemic? I think not.
I still think that it's a holistic thing that's gonna get us there--ie, dealing with sedentary habits and moving into movement; dealing with excess calories and outsized portions and learning to eat less; cutting down or out the junk and non-nutritive foods and snacks and focusing on whole and clean foods; working with internal/emotional issues and learning how to tap into the self-control we all have to some extent; tapping into our spiritual power (if we believe in such); creating support systems in and even beyond our family/friendship circles; committing to a lifestyle change that is lifelong; changing the societal landscape so that it is fashioned and structured to support healthful living; encouraging employers to make room for exercise at work and offer healthful snacks instead of junk on the jobsites; incorporating stress management techniques; eliminating all junk from schools; adding penalty taxes to junk foods and using that money to offset health care costs for obesity; tax deductions for gym memberships and buying at-home health gear (bikes, ellipticals, treadmills, etc); making health a top family and personal priority for life.
Destressing, as you see, imo is part of that holistic approach. But without diet and exercise and support, etc, I'm sorry, the very overweight and obese and superobese can't be satisfied with losing five pounds doing yoga. That's not gonna cut it.
So, I'll take the study for what it's worth. Yes, I'll continue to incorporate mind-body/destressing times and activities into my life. But that will not solve my obesity problem--or the nation's. Or the world's. Life is stressful, no matter what we do. Destressing helps, but when you'r mom is dying or your husband leaves you or your kid gets a major illness, or your car is totalled or your country is at war or your house is foreclosed on or someone robs you at gunpoint or a hurricane is coming--stress is hard to eradicate. I think the researchers who de-emphasize or pooh-pooh (or seem to) the role of diet and exercise ain't helping us as much as they might think.
They probably just make us worry about destressing enough. :)
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