Do Fad Diets Exist?

I was having a chat about Sliming World today. If you’ve read or listened to any of my content before you’ll know I have both positive and negative views about the club.

Essentially, my view is, that in it’s true form it’s not a bad way to eat. It encourages making food from scratch, eating from multiple food groups ad eating processed foods in limitation. It’s also pretty balanced so you could eat like that well beyond losing weight.

What it doesn’t do is educate you as to why it works, leaving you in a catch 22 where if you leave and stop eating ‘to plan’ you may well put the weight back on. It doesn’t educate you you enough to provide the freedom to maintain weight loss without still subscribing to ‘the plan’. Life changes and if you understand the energy balance equation you can adjust your eating and training habits as life changes and still get results. If you are simply following a plan with no idea of how and why it works, adjusting it as your life changes is difficult and that’s when a way of eating becomes unsustainable.

What might be a suitable way of eating for one person could be a ‘faddy’ way of eating for someone else. By that I mean, if you are using a way of eating (let’s say Intermittent Fasting) as a way of managing your food intake and you understand how and why it works for you then if it becomes unpractical to fast you will likely have the knowledge to adjust how / what / when you eat to a way that better suits but still works. If you are IM Fasting because someone gave you a set of rules (which work but why you’re less sure) what do you do if following those rules no longer suits you?

So essentially, I’d argue, there aren’t bad and good ‘diets’/ ways of eating. It isn’t that Slimming World is evil and tracking in MFP is the way forward for everyone. It’s a case that without knowledge of why something is working almost any way of eating could be viewed a fad.

Fat?

Since Lockdown I have gained about 10kg, Actually, that’s a lie, since the end of the first Lockdown I’ve gained about 10kg.

There’s lots of reasons, gym closures, changes to routine, changes to work patterns, personal things going on this year, anxiety medication changes, injuries. All in all it’s created a perfect storm where my once fluctuating but generally sitting in a quite comfortable range for me body is bigger and heavier.

In itself that doesn’t bother me. What bothers me are the changes to me shape (like around my mid section), a few new stretch marks and the fact it’s just so much harder to run when you’re carrying an extra 10kg.

I want to be body positive about this and say it’s all ok. Because if I was happy with it then it really would be. I’m by no means overweight and even though I’m not as fit as I was I’m actually still fit, healthy and strong.

But I’m not happy with where I am and admitting that doesn’t make me a feminist traitor, slave to diet culture, hypocrite or anything else. Because I believe people should be able to strive to be what they want to (within the realms of it being safe and not harmful), so if that means losing weight, then so be it, because telling people to love and accept their bodies when they aren’t happy isn’t any more liberating than feeding people diet culture.

I’m on a commitment to myself now to lose some of the weight- not all of it, I think I’d be happy a bit bigger than I was, but enough that running doesn’t feel like I’m carrying a weight vest. It isn’t all weight based though – I’m not actually bothered by the scales, I want to look in the mirror and think ‘yeah’ again rather than ‘noooo’. I also want to be able to lift what I could lift before and enter a half marathon without training knowing it will be painful but I’ll get round. Really what I’m saying is I want to feel more like me again.

I think when people talk about gaining weight or other changes and how they want to reverse that we so often prescribe the idea of it being a bit shallow to the thought, actually most of the time we’re just trying to get ourselves back after tough times and there’s nothing wrong with that.

The Office Cakes

Office place snacking. It’s one of my downfalls.

I work in an office where there is always cakes, biscuits, snacks sitting on the side to take. I find it really hard to walk past a packet of Jaffa Cakes!

Pre Lockdown when I taught 14 odd classes a week this wasn’t so much of an issue as I was largely in enough of a calorie deficit anyway that the extra snacks weren’t the worst thing. Now though, having reduced my classes to get a bit more balance I’m finding the extra calories sneaking in here and there aren’t doing me many favours.

But how do you say no when everything makes you want to say YOLO. Work stress can make you want to snack on nice thigs, watching others grab something, seeing you favourite cakes, that 3pm energy slump, missing breakfast; office place cakes are always more appealing.

Of course I try to bring in my lunch and snacks for the day so I’m not hungry but that doesn’t stop me wanting the sweet stuff.

The way I see it there are two ways to approach this. I could just say no, even if it makes me sad at the time or I can plan my meals for the week allowing for a little leeway each day so that I can add in a few unplanned snacks without going over my calorie goal for the day. The second option is the way I’m trying to go at present, which will hopefully allow me to stick to my targets without feeling like I’m missing out.

Things like snacking in work can sometimes feel like obstacles to reaching your goals but there are almost always work arounds to these type of issues if you’re able to be a little flexible with yourself.

Beating yourself up

“I was good all week but then had a takeaway on Friday”

“I planned to exercise every day but only managed three times”

How often are you guilty of muttering a phrase like this? I do it all the time. We set ourselves up to have a great week and be really positive and good then berate ourselves for falling short.

What we forget though is that, in very broad terms, to stop gaining weight we need to consume less than we have been, to gte fitter we need to do more than we have been.

So if you’ve eaten less than normal on five days out of the week, then you’ve improved on the previous week, even if a couple of days didn’t go to plan. If you’ve trained three times more than normal your workign to imporving your fitness.

Fitness and weight loss are not magic switches where a perfect week will suddenly make you drop three dress sizes and become an Olympic athlete. Even a perfect week will not, in issolation, create dramatic results. A consistent good but not perfect routine will over time create far superior results and make you feel far better, than one of two spot on perfect weeks then going back to normal will.

Aims are great and setting the bar high is commendable, but beating yourself up when you’ve not been perfect but have actually made progress is bonkers.

Calories are fact

There’s been lots of content around calories and calorie tracking in the news and on social media recently (at least there has on my feed). The announcement that restaurants will have to display the calorie content of dishes in an effort to tackle rising obesity levels in the UK has been met with a variety of reactions. Notably anti dieters have argued it could have a negative effect on some people, those with or recovering from eating disorders for example. Others have argued that, much like the super skinny waif super models of the 90s, the emphasis could have a negative impact on young people (mainly female it is generally assumed) perception of themselves.

I struggle with the anti calorie counting movement if I’m honest. That’s a slightly against the trend thing to say but hear me out.

Of course there are people for whom calorie counting is not beneficial and if your doctor or any medical professional you are seeing advises against it you should follow their advice. Nor do I advocate obsessively tracking every last morsal of food nor restricting youself in the amount of type of food you eat. I don’t believe you need to be a certain size or weight to be happy and I think you should eat what you enjoy eating, and be a meat eater, vegtarian or vegan for whatever reasons you so choose.

The fact remains however that being aware of the energy values of what you consume daily is useful.

People who are at a happy healthy weight for them probably consume about what they expend on an average day, either without thinking or conciously. People who want or need to lose or gain some weight for their health probably do not. Yes there are exceptions, but generally the majority of us are not genetic marvels, the majority of us who wish or need to change of current mass are simply eating either too much or too little.

Again, I’ll say that anyone with any form of disordered eating should seek professional advice and follow that, not what someone on the internet says, but if you are an average Joe, then being aware of the energy balance equation is likely all you need to make any changes you either need or desire.

I was flicking through some recipes the other day, there were purposefully no nutritional values given because the author wanted to promote a non diet culture. I respect that, it goes with their ethos and fits in with their values (and the recipes look lush), but I couldn’t help thinking, man it would be easier if they were provided so I didn’t need to add each ingredient into MyFitnessPal. Because for me, knowing what I’m eating is useful, it’s like knowing how much fuel is in your car rather than just driving with blind hope you’ve enough to get to your destination or paying for things without knowing how much cash is in your bank account.

I almost feel like being so against calorie counting is as much of a red flag as obsesively calorie counting. If the idea of knowing how may calories is in your food on a menu really does trigger something and stop you eating it (as opposed to heping you making an informed decision) then perhaps that is also a sign you need to look at your view of food. Because eating what the fuck you like because you enjoy food is great, but if the idea of knowing the energy number attributed to that freaks you out there’s still an issue. The goal is surely to know that sometimes you’re eating higher calorie foods but you’re just aware of your overall energy balance so allowing yourself to mainatin your energy levels, feel good and remain nurourished and healthy.

For every person who has struggled with an eating disorder where calories are a trigger word there are plenty of people that just aren’t really sure how the energy balance works. All the media coverage around diet clubs like Slimming World attest to this. Fitness professionals argument against these clubs is that they don’t properly educate people, bringing the notion of calories more to the forefront of people’s conciousness could help change that. There will be people for whom calorie counting is not beneficial, they can ignore those numbers.

In fact that’s the issue isn’t it. Almost every policy in the world will not benefit some people, but will benefit others. We need to know how to ignore things that don’t help us, to learn how to not get affected by things that we may see as opposed to be outraged that something that could benefit someone else but doesn’t benefit us is visible to us, even if it upsets us.

That isn’t saying not tracking calores is wrong or that you should track every day. It’s saying that for some people who want or need to make a change undertsanding and being aware of their consumption is vital and clouding a realtively simple process of tracking with intuitive eating, mindful eating, anti diet ideas doesn’t help them. Those concepts all work, they are all valid but if you are eating intuitively and not happy with the direction you are going in you need to retrain your intuition. When you learn something new you follow rules and methods and don’t follow intuition, eating isn’t much different in this case. If you are happy and feel your energy levels are great you can crack on with what you are doing.

The crux of the matter is calorie counting isn’t the thing that causes disordered eating. Deciding you wat to lose some weight because you’d like to or because you’ve been advised I would help isn’t the sign of disordered eating. Caloires in v. calories out is a simple fact, like gravity. The issue isn’t that it’s all the stuff we have constructed around it.

Listening v. Learning

Listening to your body / eating intuitively / being kind to yourself. All buzz words and phrases in recent years. And as I’ve written many times before, a perfectly valid way to eat if in doing so you are in a position where you are happy with your body and your energy levels.

I can eat and stay on track without tracking quite easily. I do track, largely as a habit that I don’t find particular cumbersome or triggering, but I could not track and still roughly know how my week’s food intake was likely to affect me. I maintain, as I have written previously, that is largely because I have mastered tracking, got an idea of what I need in terms of food.

But to move beyond the arguing what works best to lose body weight thing for a moment, you know what I personally could not do via intuitive eating. Listen to what type of food my body wants.

Because the idea of feeling like I need xyz so that’s what I’ll give my body allows me too much freedom to eat things that will derail my goals and in portions that at no point would my body actually intuitively be asking for. All I’m saying is my body rarely screams at me in needs vegetables.

Perhaps I need to be more in tune with myself. Maybe I could teach myself to think hmmm I feel fatigued my body is craving carrots instead of god I’m knackered I really need a tub of ice cream. Point is though I do know what my body needs. Over the years I’ve learnt what my body needs, what works, when, what actually makes me feel sluggish even though I think it won’t, what times of day I prefer exercising on an empty stomach and when I need to be fed first and so on. That was by trial and error and planning and tracking rather than eating when my body told me and what it old me. I mean apart from anything else I think with my brain how would I even plan my shopping eating intuitively! I’m flexible of course I am, sometimes I don’t feel like whatever I’ve planned, sometimes I need extra food than what I planned, or more sugar or more carbs.

The fact remains I think by understanding my body by seeing what works and then sticking to the systems that have worked and suit me and my taste buds and make me feel good when I train, I mat not be listening to my body but my body is probably more grateful that I’m doing that over eating what it thinks it want (it seriously only ever think it wants cake I tell you now). Is what I do more onerous that intuitive eating? I really don’t think it is.

Ultimately I don’t think we need to get caught up in the idea that tracking and planning and eating mindfully is bad. It may not suit some, there may be some it isn’t a good option, that’s the case for most things though. Like anything intuitive eating might not be the solution to all diet problems.

Is Calorie Counting Restrictive?

One of the most commonly quoted objections to calorie counting is the lack of freedom, the feeling that it is a restrictive way of eating.

Yet if you eat intuitively but find yourself saying I can’t eat ‘that’ I think that’s more restrictive than tracking how many calories are in ‘that’ as you eat it.

‘That’ might be bread or pasta or ‘bad’ carbs. ‘That’ might be chocolate or cake or crisps. ‘That’ might be a takeaway or other type of junk food.

We often put lots of rules in place with our own diet, have our own ideas of what constitutes a ‘good’ diet and what is ‘bad. If we find ourselves saying we mustn’t eat certain foods or eating them and then feeling guilty that is not a non restrictive diet. Whether you track or eat intuitively if you find yourself avoiding certain things you enjoy that is still a restrictive way of eating.

In fact, if you track your calories to work towards your goal and eat all the foods you enjoy whilst doing so I’d argue that that is much less restrictive than not tracking but having a list of avoid / bad foods.

Calorie counting for all it’s apparent simplicity causes a great deal of debate amongst some people, but I think sometimes it gets a bad rap for restrictive ways of eating when it can actually be a way of eating much more freely and removing some of the guilt from eating certain foods.

Calories Counting v Intuitive Eating

I’ve written previously about intuitive eating and how I feel like you cannot eat intuitively until you understand calorie tracking. Two ever so opposite end of the scale things but they kind of work together.

I get why people don’t necessarily want to track calories. I get that for some people it could get a bit obsessive. I get that you don’t just want to make food about numbers. I get that it’s time consuming and dull. I get that there’s so much more to life than how many calories you eat and constantly thinking about what you have left in your calorie bank.

But. But but but.

If you want to lose weight… or gain weight for that matter… you have to be eating the right amount of calories compared to how many calories you expend each day / each week.

Now you might be someone who is happy with their weight. If that’s the case you probably can just eat intuitively, because what you are eating right now is keeping you where you want to be. This post is not for you!

If you want to change your weight, up or down, that indicates that what you currently eat right now either provides you with too many (if you want to lose) or not enough (if you want to gain) calories. Before you say it, yes maybe you are that rare person who is struggling because of a condition and the reason is far more complex, but harsh truth – the majority of us are not that person, the majority of us just aren’t eating the right amount for our goals.

So if you aren’t eating the right number of calories right now you can’t eat intuitively. Because to do something intuitively requires knowledge of how to do it in the first place. At work, do you do tasks you’ve done many times before instinctively, without thought- looking at a problem and knowing the issue and solution before you’ve really even thought about it? Can you answer the question before it’s even been asked because you know what they’ll ask because it’s what everyone always asks? Could you do that on your first week of the job? Of course not. You learnt your job and over time through doing your actions became more instinctive, more confident.

Same with calories. You need to understand how much of the type of foods you eat is right for you to reach your goal. To do this you need to track. The more you learn about this as you track the less you need to rely on tracking, because you can learn to start reading you own body and hunger and getting used to the right kind of portion sizes for you and your goals.

So over time you can track less, maybe just checking in occasionally to check your still in the right zone, or using it as a refocus if you’ve found yourself going a bit off track. You don’t have to commit to a lifetime of strict tracking everything that passes your lips. But to get a handle on where you are at and work out where you need to be you do need to be aware of what you are really eating, and tracking is really the only way.

If you don’t want to track you don’t have to of course, but if you’re frustrated you aren’t reaching you goals and aren’t tracking you may want to reconsider because whether you track or eat intuitively calories do count.

Cheat Meal Time

Cheat Meals. Two very emotive words that muttered on Facebook always tend to create debate and bring out two very polarised camps of people.

Generally as a PT I would fall into the don’t think on meals or days as ‘cheats’. You can manage your calories and how much you eat across a week to be able to have what society would generally deem a ‘cheat meal’ and still stay within your calorie goals and reach whatever goal you may have.

More than this, classing a meal as a ‘cheat’ can lead to you thinking of foods as good and bad can be damaging to your feelings around food. Guilt about eating a certain type of food does nothing for your mental health, how you view yourself or your eating habits in general.

Equally however it’s actually really hard not to fall in the habit of referring to foods as ‘treats’ or ‘cheats’. Personally, I know a takeaway isn’t an automatic bad thing and that actually some days I could end up eating fewer calories after a fast food meal than I would have had I made a ‘healthy’ meal. Some people do not know this. Some people might know but not be quite willing to accept it, so throw away comments about cheat meals, whilst not a big deal for me could create a bigger barrier in someone else’s mindset.

For me there are two issues relating to the idea of cheat meals. Teaching people that foods do not need to be grouped into good and bad and working on our own language and how we absent mindedly refer to food.

But there’s one more issue to add to this mix. We’ve noted a lot during the Pandemic that obesity is an issue in the UK and that it causes health issues. We’ve largely noted beyond that (unless your Boris who prefers the less educated approach) that education on nutrition and the energy balance is key to this.

Now here, at a very basic level, the good / bad food list can be useful. If you want to educate someone about the benefits of a balanced diet and the benefits of eating fresh foods then there is going to be a little bit of a good / bad rhetoric. Cheat meals are essentially the idea of people who have a relative understanding and interest in health and nutrition and would benefit from understanding the restrictions this mentality can place on you. For someone with a very limited knowledge of the energy balance equation we are essentially going back to the food pyramid which does promote an element of good / bad foods.

We need to acknowledge that yes essentially weight loss can be incredibly simple, that does not mean there are not lots of obstacles we can nee help with at various points. Sometimes the simplest things can be quite tricky.

Boris, please stop talking

Wow – I saw a video today where Boris talks about what he’s been doing to lose weight and what the Government plan to do to help people lose weight.

Now if you follow me on any of my other Social Media you’ll know I’m not a Boris fan, but I think I’m pretty open minded and I’m capable of not being a fan of a person but seeing where they make a positive impact. But really Boris, really?

Last year he admitted after he was hospitalised with Covid that his weight was an underlying condition that affected how he reacted to Covid (I know a lot of people not from the UK read this so bit of background- Boris Johnson is our Prime Minister who caught Covid and was taken into hospital with breathing difficulties). The fitness industry has been vocal throughout the pandemic about our importance to the nation, not just with Covid but the Health Service in general would benefit from people being healthier. Obesity is a problem for this country and so combatting that quite rightly should be an objective for the Government.

But how are they combatting this? We’ve seen word of links with Slimming Clubs and now the PM is telling people he’s gone low carb. Seriously. Seriously.

We are all so aware now about how dangerous fads and extreme diets can be for people. Promoting diets that cut out food groups completely or encourage eating in systematic ways without providing any education as to either why that might help them drop some pounds or the effect it might have on them is incredibly irresponsible.

Reality TV stars get called out all the time on Social Media for promoting fads to their followers, but its seems the Government is allowed to to the same in the name of policy?

I wholeheartedly agree with the overall mission statement behind the initiative, but they have access to advisors, surely someone should have thought to give Boris a script or just tell him to shut up.

We need to learn as a nation the basics of the energy balance, that to not put weight on we need to not consume more than we burn. Teach it in schools, create tools that GPs can use that teach it to adults, promote that on TV shows rather than 800 calorie diets that create a media storm to increase ratings. Be responsible, which I’m pretty sure is what Government is meant to be.