Weight and eating habits
Mar. 19th, 2010 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenayThere is an interesting thread on one of the Ravelry boards at the moment
about people who are over-weight and long-term under-eaters. It's really
opened my eyes to a few things. I knew vaguely at the back of my mind that
the body's metabolism slows when we don't eat and that is why people on
diets are advised not to skip meals (breakfast and lunch are the ones
usually skipped) because our metabolisms need that kick-start to start
processing and using calories.
I had never put that together with the idea of chronic under-eating forcing
the body into starvation mode, where it hangs onto every bit of fat that it
can and keeps the metabolism as low as possible. Most of the people in this
thread are overweight to some degree (many describe themselves as obese) and
yet they're eating very low calorie diets. Quite a number of them have also
at some stage forced themselves to eat more in addition to exercising and
seen the weight start to drop off. Unfortunately a lot of them seem to end
up back in that "must not excede 1000 calories a day" mind-set and the
weight-loss has stopped or reversed. Tellingly, most of them at some stage
in their teens or twenties had been regularly put onto low-calorie diets
restricting them to 1000 (or sometimes less) calories a day.
The reason I find this interesting is because of my mother. She's a
wonderful, beautiful woman who has struggled with her weight ever since I
can remember. She tells me that she's been overweight and dieting on and off
since she was in her early teens. My sister and I cannot understand it. She
eats less than we do, is paranoid about fat and sodium, rarely snacks and
definitely eats far few calories than either of us. We're both six inches
taller than her and weigh less than her. Veggies are big in her diet, even
the low-fat spread almost never appears in things like sandwiches (regular
margarine is only used for baking and when she really cannot get away with
leaving it out of recipes, butter is unknown) and one small container of
low-sodium salt can last her three years.
Mum has been on every diet out there. Some of them haven't done much, some
have done something and with Weight Watchers she got down to within a few
pounds of her target. Sadly she's put all the weight she lost with WW back
on.
This is what my sister and I cannot understand. She's not eating any
differently from what she ate on WW. If anything, she's eating a bit less.
She doesn't exercise regularly, but she's up and around and about all day
long in a sort of whirlwind that exhausts us both to think about.
Then I started reading this thread and remembered something funny. My mum
must be the only person around who has ever been told by diet people to eat
more salt and fat. I'm not kidding when I say that she's paranoid! I was
studying at home when she was going through WW and one of the things I
remember is that we used to struggle every day to actually get her eating
enough points. She was too full and didn't want anything long before she
reached her target points. We'd go out for celebratory Chinese after her
weekly weigh-in and it never seemed to slow her weight-loss. The WW diet was
the best she'd ever gone on because the weight came off so well.
Since she stopped the diet, the only real change she's made is to cut out
one or two of the snacks she was having and return to the total fat-and-salt
paranoia. With her busy day, I also rather suspect that she's skipping lunch
sometimes. Somehow, despite eating a 'healthy' low-fat, low-calorie, high
veggie diet and not exactly being a couch potato, she's heavier than she was
before Weight Watchers.
I now wonder whether the issue isn't that she's eating too much, but rather
that she's not eating enough of the right things and her body has gone into
starvation mode, clinging onto and retaining everything it can get rather
than letting her burn things off.
It might be interesting to track her food for a few days and see what is
really going on. As I get older, I become more aware of the struggle she has
and I'm trying to keep my weight down so that I never get into her
situation. It is tempting to follow the path of strictly limiting my
calories and being paranoid about my fat intake as well as trying to
increase my exercise, but I may need to be careful about how strict I get
with the diet. If her problem is actually that she's too strict about her
diet then I may already be starting follow her mistakes - over the last few
months I've been conciously eating less, cutting out snacking, going for a
glass of water when I'm hungry rather than reaching for the nibbles and I've
been wondering over the last couple of weeks whether I really need that
second small dinner roll for my lunch.
I've already signed up for a website so that I can start tracking my own
intake. I'm going to be brutally honest, put in every darned thing and see
what my nutritional intake really is. I love my mother a great deal, but I
don't want to follow in her footsteps when it comes to my weight.
about people who are over-weight and long-term under-eaters. It's really
opened my eyes to a few things. I knew vaguely at the back of my mind that
the body's metabolism slows when we don't eat and that is why people on
diets are advised not to skip meals (breakfast and lunch are the ones
usually skipped) because our metabolisms need that kick-start to start
processing and using calories.
I had never put that together with the idea of chronic under-eating forcing
the body into starvation mode, where it hangs onto every bit of fat that it
can and keeps the metabolism as low as possible. Most of the people in this
thread are overweight to some degree (many describe themselves as obese) and
yet they're eating very low calorie diets. Quite a number of them have also
at some stage forced themselves to eat more in addition to exercising and
seen the weight start to drop off. Unfortunately a lot of them seem to end
up back in that "must not excede 1000 calories a day" mind-set and the
weight-loss has stopped or reversed. Tellingly, most of them at some stage
in their teens or twenties had been regularly put onto low-calorie diets
restricting them to 1000 (or sometimes less) calories a day.
The reason I find this interesting is because of my mother. She's a
wonderful, beautiful woman who has struggled with her weight ever since I
can remember. She tells me that she's been overweight and dieting on and off
since she was in her early teens. My sister and I cannot understand it. She
eats less than we do, is paranoid about fat and sodium, rarely snacks and
definitely eats far few calories than either of us. We're both six inches
taller than her and weigh less than her. Veggies are big in her diet, even
the low-fat spread almost never appears in things like sandwiches (regular
margarine is only used for baking and when she really cannot get away with
leaving it out of recipes, butter is unknown) and one small container of
low-sodium salt can last her three years.
Mum has been on every diet out there. Some of them haven't done much, some
have done something and with Weight Watchers she got down to within a few
pounds of her target. Sadly she's put all the weight she lost with WW back
on.
This is what my sister and I cannot understand. She's not eating any
differently from what she ate on WW. If anything, she's eating a bit less.
She doesn't exercise regularly, but she's up and around and about all day
long in a sort of whirlwind that exhausts us both to think about.
Then I started reading this thread and remembered something funny. My mum
must be the only person around who has ever been told by diet people to eat
more salt and fat. I'm not kidding when I say that she's paranoid! I was
studying at home when she was going through WW and one of the things I
remember is that we used to struggle every day to actually get her eating
enough points. She was too full and didn't want anything long before she
reached her target points. We'd go out for celebratory Chinese after her
weekly weigh-in and it never seemed to slow her weight-loss. The WW diet was
the best she'd ever gone on because the weight came off so well.
Since she stopped the diet, the only real change she's made is to cut out
one or two of the snacks she was having and return to the total fat-and-salt
paranoia. With her busy day, I also rather suspect that she's skipping lunch
sometimes. Somehow, despite eating a 'healthy' low-fat, low-calorie, high
veggie diet and not exactly being a couch potato, she's heavier than she was
before Weight Watchers.
I now wonder whether the issue isn't that she's eating too much, but rather
that she's not eating enough of the right things and her body has gone into
starvation mode, clinging onto and retaining everything it can get rather
than letting her burn things off.
It might be interesting to track her food for a few days and see what is
really going on. As I get older, I become more aware of the struggle she has
and I'm trying to keep my weight down so that I never get into her
situation. It is tempting to follow the path of strictly limiting my
calories and being paranoid about my fat intake as well as trying to
increase my exercise, but I may need to be careful about how strict I get
with the diet. If her problem is actually that she's too strict about her
diet then I may already be starting follow her mistakes - over the last few
months I've been conciously eating less, cutting out snacking, going for a
glass of water when I'm hungry rather than reaching for the nibbles and I've
been wondering over the last couple of weeks whether I really need that
second small dinner roll for my lunch.
I've already signed up for a website so that I can start tracking my own
intake. I'm going to be brutally honest, put in every darned thing and see
what my nutritional intake really is. I love my mother a great deal, but I
don't want to follow in her footsteps when it comes to my weight.
