Diets Do Work

How many times have you heard the phrase diets don’t work?

I’ll be honest I’ve said this myself so many times.

Then in 2019 I went to Martin MacDonald’s Nutrition Tour and he said something that turned my thinking on this totally on it’s head. I’ll have to paraphrase because I don’t have the exact quote.

Diets do work, weight maintenance is what people fail at.

When we say diets don’t work, as fitness professionals we are saying it from a good place, as a way of trying to protect clients, but it isn’t actually what we mean. It’s a simplified statement to generalise what we mean.

Because the fact is diets do work. Or at least they can if you follow them.

Firstly let me clarify here when we talk diet we generally mean a way of losing weight. I’ve said previously in it’s most accurate term your diet is whatever you happen to eat, but as a society we hear diet and we think weigh loss effort. That is how I’m going to use the word today.

I’ve also said before all diets, no matter how they are dressed up, work by creating a calories deficit in some way. If you create a calorie deficit you will lose weight. Some ways are healthier than others. Some ways are more likely to promote unhealthy relationships with food than others. Some ways provide more education as to how you are losing weight than others and some pedal myths that you are in fact losing weight because of a pill or a shake or your food combinations instead of calorie control. But, the fact remains you burn more calories than you consume you create weight loss.

Therefore diets do work.

I can say oohhh don’t do Herbal Life, Weight Watchers, Slimming World or whatever diet you want to put in place of that, but fundamentally if you do them and follow them you will lose weight. It would be wrong of me to lie and say that is not the case.

So why do I and so many people say you shouldn’t follow a diet when they do work?

Because what we really mean when we say that diets don’t work is that diets, as opposed to educated lifestyle changes, work whilst you follow them. When you stop following them and go back to previous eating habits they will stop working, and the issue with diets is that they are very often not sustainable in the long term or if they are sustainable they tie you into contracts with that brand.

Some diets are restrictive. Anything very low calorie or which cuts out certain foods for no other reason than weight loss is hard to maintain forever. Especially once you have lost the weight and the scale coming down every week no longer exists as motivation. I’ll tell you from experience no matter how much you believe staying at your ideal weight will be motivation enough it really isn’t. Therefore very restrictive diets are difficult to maintain long term and so if you don’t have the knowledge and acquired skills on how to maintain weight once you reach your goal it is the maintenance part you may struggle with, and this is often why we see people yoyo diet.

Other diets are certainly less restrictive and I do see that there is honestly no reason why once ready to maintain weight you could not continue with them. The issue with these is they very often tie you into a product. Weigh in groups for instance (Slimming World, Weight Watchers and so on). You could continue to attend these and eat in this way quite comfortably to maintain but you must continue to buy into the method because there is a lack of education included to allow you to go alone.

Equally things like Herbal Life, these can be promoted by PTs who also provide education around nutrition. But they integrate their products into that education, so you believe you not only need a protein shake and a herbal tea and a pre workout and a meal replacement shake to lose then maintain weight, but you need that particular brand. I believe that psychologically if we have succeeded in losing weight on those products we will believe even more so that they are important to remaining on track. This essentially means to maintain weight loss you are tied into a product for however long you maintain. If you suddenly can’t afford that product, mentally it is a lot easier to then lose that maintenance.

So when a PT says diets don’t work what we really mean is the diet phase is really not that important in the grand scheme of things.

You want to lose 3 stone. You think that that is the hard part and then keeping it off will be easy. Nope, at 1lb a week allowing a few weeks where you lose nothing you can comfortably lose 3 stone in a year (less if you are very focused but actually you don’t want to be obsessed with losing weight). Say you are 25 and live to 98, that is 1 year of weight loss and then another 72 keeping that weight off. If you are successful at this the majority of your life is in the maintenance phase not the diet phase (obviously not taking into account life changes etc).

So when we say don’t diet, we mean diet if you wish to lose weight, but don’t follow a fad. Learn about calories, get a coach, not a diet plan (PTs can provide advice and education not diet plans unless they are qualified nutritionists), get an idea of how much energy you need to eat. Then eat that food in a way that suits your lifestyle (by the way that could be paleo, via fasting or another method if you are also aware of your calorie consumption). If you do that once you hit your goal you adjust your calories slightly and just continue as you were. The key here is all the time you have eaten normally, in a way that really suits you – not in a special magical way that has helped you lose weight but requires a lot of thought every day / week or a lot of money. The key is you’ll know why you lost weight and don’t attribute it to magical speed foods (yes Slimming World I’m looking at you) or a magical pill (there might well be a product out there you love that makes you feel great and that’s cool, use it, feel great but all the while know that product is not the reason for your weight loss).

A decent PT knows if they do their job well you won’t need them forever – if they try and make you reliant on them forever they pretty much just want your money. We might retain clients for a long time because they feel the benefit of our support or thrive from the accountability, valid reasons to see a coach, but we want clients to understand where their results come from – not to mystify them so they remained chained to us. Whether you chose to continue working with a coach or not you should be given the skills that if you went it alone you have knowledge and are empowered to do so.

Diets do work. We struggle with maintenance. That’s why dieting in a sustainable and suitable way paves the way to a greater chance of success with maintenance, and if you are currently dieting or thinking about starting a weight loss journey know both that and this. Weight loss isn’t what you want. What you want is to be able to maintain that once you reach the goal. You don’t want it to be a short term thing so don’t look at short term options.

Fizz, fruit and veg

If you want to lose weight and follow any kind of fitness accounts chances are at some point you will have come across one of the many supplement companies out there. Herbal life, Juice Plus, Arbonne, these companies differ from slimming clubs in that they are sold more as a healthy lifestyle aid than a weight loss product (although they can also be targeted at weight loss). What they hope to persuade people is that by buying their products you will be healthier and fitter than if you used other products or none at all. When you’re feeling out of shape or overweight this marketing can be very persuasive.

Often they sell protein powders, vitamin type supplements and energy drinks (fizz seems to be a popular term) to be used as a coffee alternative. They look desirable to customers because the idea of a brand offering everything you need to fuel your fitness journey is let’s face it, alluring.

And there’s nothing wrong with any of these products. They’re the same kind of supplements PTs will recommend but branded and expensive.

Protein powder for instance, you’re generic brand will set you back around £20-£25 for a KG bag. These companies will often sell essentially protein shakes (marked up as other things perhaps) for double that. Vitamins, depending on where you get them can cost a few quid, except when you get them from a company such as this. Energy sticks? £20 or more a month for one drink a day, well it might seem less holistic but a coffee costs a fair bit less than that.

The fact of the matter is, having tried at least a couple of these companies products, some of them do taste good. For me Herbal Life vanilla protein is still the nicest one I’ve ever tasted. Does it do anything more than that to deserve the price tag? No. You’re getting nothing extra from buying these products instead of ones from places like My Protein.

Then there’s the claims the products can ‘make’ a healthy lifestyle. Juice Plus supplements with a range of fruit and veg (6 tablets a day) will set you back £69 a month. On top of food and any other supplements. Why not buy £18 of extra fruit and veg a week and bulk out your meals? Or put the £69 towards your shopping.

It might be you use these products and love them, and there’s nothing wrong with that. If you like the taste and can afford it then why not. If you’re on a budget and just want to feel better about yourself though, you don’t need to spend huge amounts on supplements or vitamins to start making progress.

It’s OK to be Uncomfortable

Something to remember about losing weight, or mastering a new lift or sport or class or starting anything new fitness releated.

I often write that it needs to be sustainable and allow for breaks and blips and not be super prescriptive.

Too often though we can take that message to mean that we shouldn’t feel any discomfort.

The fact is if you need to consume less or move more it is, at first at least, going to be a little uncomfortable. You will feel hunger or achey or a little deprived or tired.

If you stop as soon as you hit this point because, YOLO, you will never create the changes required to change your body and fitness.

When we say it’s about balance don’t forget balance has two sides to it and as well as giving yourself freedom within your diet and exercise you also need to be able to exercise restraint and spend some time in discomfort too.

2023 Goals

If you’re looking to make changes or set yourself some challenges for 2023, it isn’t enough to just want things to change, you need to work out what actions you need to take to make those changes happen.

Here’s a podcast all about goals, what, why and how…

https://anchor.fm/heather-sherwood/episodes/Goal-Setting-Your-Why-and-How-e1pver7

Christmas Shopping

Out for hours shopping in busy shops and streets. Means you’ll get hungry and need to eat and that can mean unexpected calories making it hard to stay on track with all the coffee shops and fast food places as pit stop options in most town centres.

Some ideas to help keep your diet on track when out shopping:

1/ Have a big breakfast before you go out then take some snacks with you (nuts, fruit) so you don’t get hungry and need to stop for a Macy’s

2/ Plan ahead and pick somewhere you can get a lower calorie lunch – coffee shops like Starbucks often do things like egg based meal boxes or you could grab a salad from Subway. Add a black coffee or water and you have a filling lunch whilst keeping within your calorie goal

3/ Allocate yourself enough calories from your weekly balance so you can have that Christmas coffee and huge slab of cake knowing your still on track

4/ Shop online so you can eat at leisure at home!

What other strategies do you have to stay on track?

When is a calorie deficit not a calorie deficit?

You might be surprised at how often people say to PTs, I’m barely eating anything and still not losing weight or I’m in a calorie deficit but nothing is happening.

This is when the idea that it must be your metabolism, carbs, the time you’re eating or the lack of random expensive magic juice in your diet that is stopping the weight loss.

Now I’m reality, on the odd week it might simply be water retention, not having a poo recently, your period or hormones affecting your weight.

But if your weight is consistently not coming down week on week even if you are in a calorie deficit here’s the reason for the scale not going down.

You aren’t actually in a calorie deficit.

– Are you actually tracking and if you are are you including EVERYTHING (sauces, coffees, left overs). You need to honest with yourself here.

– Are you consistently in a deficit. If you are Monday to Friday but waaay over calories on the weekend you probably aren’t actually in a real deficit.

– Maybe you are being honest about what you’re eating but overestimating how much your burning each day.

If this is the case you could try dropping your calories by a small amount each day (250 calories to start) and seeing what happens, you might need to drop a bit further but by bit until you start to see movement.

If you are in a calorie deficit consistently you will overtime drop weight so if you aren’t seeing progress you are not in a calorie deficit. Good news here – now you know that’s the issue you can work to change it.

Day 1

There’s always so much hype about ‘Day 1’.

You start a diet or a gym regime and people praise the ‘Day 1’ posts. Of course Day 1 is tough, starting anything can be daunting and finding the motivation to start is a positive which should be cheered.

Day 1 is also shiny, new and novel enough to actually be easy though. Those first few meals, gym sessions, days of change have a novelty to them that can help you stick to it.

It gets tougher as the days go by. As people perhaps stop asking how it’s going, as you have long days or challenging days and want to revert back to comfortable habits to make yourself feel better, it becomes harder to stick to your new habits and actions.

It’s not just that. In the early days and weeks results will likely come quick and fast. Depending on how much weight you have to lose you might find the pounds drop off quickly at first. If you are just starting lifting or running you might find the PBs come thick and fast for a while.

As the weeks and months go on and you establish your new habits, those results will slow. This is natural, but it’s also challenging for your motivation, as it gets harder to see progress it also becomes harder to stick to things when times get tough.

Day 1 is tough, starting is tough, but I think staying with it and never having another ‘Day 1’ again is far more challenging and yet also the ultimate goal. Fitness will always be a rollercoaster of ups and downs, peaks and being less at your peak, we don’t need to have a ‘day 1’ every time we have a down though, we just need to keep going with a healthy habits.

Gym sayings that should be scrapped

Not all calories are equal

Different foods have different nutritional values, some can offer more more nutritional benefits than others, may be more or less filling, may affect your energy levels in different ways. Fundamentally though a calorie is a unit used to measure the food we eat, a unit of energy if you like and the calories in a 200 calorie salad are the same number of calories in a 200 calorie chocolate bar. In terms of energy in v energy out all calories are equal.

No carbs after 6pm (and other timing rules)

Whether it be this rule, Intermittent fasting, the 5:2 diet or any other rule that suggests when you eat will be the magic ingredient to weight loss. Whilst setting yourself eating windows may help you eat less and therefore lose weight you don’t suddenly store more fat by eating after 6pm or having breakfast.

Muscle weighs more than fat

Whilst it’s true the same volume of fat will take up more space than an equal volume of muscle (hence you can drop a dress size but remain the same weight as your body composition changes, a useful thing to remember) a pound of fat and a pound of muscle of course both weigh a pound.

Never miss a Monday

If you want to train 3 times a week why would it matter that one of those in on Monday? Whilst the concept of starting the week positively makes sense if Monday is inconvenient for you it really doesn’t matter.

Go hard or go home

Yes you want to work hard during your workouts, but life happens. Some days we are tired, have little niggles, we might be recovering from a cold. Some days we might be fatigued from previous sessions. On those days going hard could be more detrimental than positive. Listening to your body and resting, stretching or taking a de-load week when needed can help improve results more than simply pushing through.

‘Baby Weights’

No matter what you lift to someone out there it will be ‘so heavy’ and to someone else ‘their warm up weight’. Judging your weights in comparison to others won’t help you progress or make you feel good about yourself in the gym. Others might be lifting more of less than you but sticking to weights we personally find challenging for the rep ranges we are doing and working on progressive overload in relation to that weight range is the best way to progress.

Do the basic things really well

How are you feeling about your nutrition right now?

It’s really tempting when you aren’t feeling on top of things to look for radical solutions. But what we really want to do at times like that are revisit the basics.

If you’re currently feeling a bit lost think about

– Your TDEE

– Macros / proteins

– Your calorie deficit

– Your habits and anchors that make you feel better

Remind yourself of the most important principles.

You don’t need to drastically cut calories or change what you’re eating just remind yourself of the basics. Once they are in place you can think about more in depth aspects of your nutrition, but until then you will likely be sabotaging your own results by ignoring the foundations in an attempt to build the house quicker.

The top of the Pyramid

My last two posts have focused on the Nutrition Pyramid. Here’s a little one on the rest of the Pyramid.

1) Micro Nutrients

2) Meal Timings

3) Supplements

These are the things you can start to look at once you’ve nailed the basics at the bottom of the pyramid. They can help you tweak your energy levels but looking at any of these in isolation when you haven’t got a hold of energy in v energy out will not bring you great results.

One of the most most common questions asked around these topics is what protein shake should I use?

Put simply, shakes are not a necessity – they may help you top up the protein that you are getting from food and can be simple and quick but if you hate the taste and prefer to get all your protein from food you aren’t missing out on anything! What brand should you use? The one that you like the taste of ideally!