Moralizing about Food; Joy of Eating; Benefits of Moderation

[Ann2]

The topics in the title of this post are addressed in a recent New York Times article by an M.D. / med school professor who studies and writes about dietary principles. Here's a link to the article and an excerpt:

How I Lost Weight and Learned to Love Thanksgiving Again

"Studies of diets show that many of them succeed at first. But results slow, and often reverse over time. No one diet substantially outperforms another. The evidence does not favor any one greatly over any other.

"That has not slowed experts from declaring otherwise. Doctors, weight-loss gurus, personal trainers and bloggers all push radically different opinions about what we should be eating, and why. We should eat the way cave men did. We should avoid gluten completely. We should eat only organic. No dairy. No fats. No meat. These different waves of advice push us in one direction, then another. More often than not, we end up right where we started, but with thinner wallets and thicker waistlines."

Here's another article by the same author, entitled "Simple Rules for Healthy Eating", which focuses on eating principles, not good vs. evil foods.

For the record, I'm no longer losing weight but now in maintenance (I'm 3 years, 3 months post-op and consistently maintaining a 100+ pound weight loss post-VSG). Therefore, these issues may be of more interest to those approaching maintenance or in maintenance. On the other hand, folks out there who are wondering what life will be like post-WLS down the road are probably interested in these issues, too.

Thus far, my personal WLS eating philosophy is that our bodies are not all identical and respond in different ways to specific eating regimens. I also have found that I must be aware of when and if my body starts to respond differently to eating patterns I've been following and that I must be willing to experiment and change if/when I need to do so to remain at a healthy weight.

What do y'all think about these two articles and this approach to eating? Do you think it can eventually work for you?

[psparks]

I have a question i am sure that all are different but at what point does one start "maintenance" cycle and no longer loosing i am only 2 months out so i was wondering.

I find that this suggestion below : fits my old life to a tea; as i start introducing more foods into my diet this is what i would do prior to surgery. Grab something on the go. Now i have to be more choosey and i find that i am cooking more which is great! and when i prepare ahead of time i can freeze for meals through the week.

1c. Eat heavily processed foods even less often. There’s little high-quality evidence that even the most processed foods are dangerous. But keep your consumption of them to a minimum, because they can make it too easy to stuff in calories. Such foods include bread, chips, cookies and cereals.

[Christie13]

I have a question i am sure that all are different but at what point does one start "maintenance" cycle and no longer loosing i am only 2 months out so i was wondering.

I find that this suggestion below : fits my old life to a tea; as i start introducing more foods into my diet this is what i would do prior to surgery. Grab something on the go. Now i have to be more choosey and i find that i am cooking more which is great! and when i prepare ahead of time i can freeze for meals through the week.

1c. Eat heavily processed foods even less often. There’s little high-quality evidence that even the most processed foods are dangerous. But keep your consumption of them to a minimum, because they can make it too easy to stuff in calories. Such foods include bread, chips, cookies and cereals.

Maintenance starts when you have lost all the weight you want to lose. Sometimes you will continue to lose weight even when you have arrived at your "goal" weight. So you either have to enjoy the lower weight or attempt to get the weight loss to stop.

[Christie13]

Interesting articles Ann. Especially the 2nd about the rules for eating. Those probably make the most sense of anything I have read. I do agree that it is about eating in moderation and healthy non processed foods first. Eating very little processed foods. The whole clean eating principles. It also goes along with the diets don't work theory. We all know that it just makes us lose initially and then gain weight back and then some.

[Dutchie]

Thanks for this great post and for this "food for thought".
What a coincidence I was just thinking along the same lines, about doctors and surgeons, giving us diets, and all having a different point of view.

I agree with the things he says.
All diets work up to a certain point.
And most of the "inventors" of diets that exclude certain foods (i.e. carbs or meats) are not open for change.
Whole imperiums are build around diets (Atkins or others), with the selling of their own products.
And now I have the feeling that we, bariatric patients, are next in line as potential new "customers".

I think the smartest one is still Weight Watchers, which is constantly working on their formula and not afraid to change their believe system.
But also all on a very commercial basis.
Diets are big business.

I agree with his point of view on the (heavily) processed foods.
I eat them sometimes, because there is also an element of convenience.
But I limit them to the best of my abilities.
Just like he mentioned in his article, use with caution, not too often.

What he says, works for me.
Ik started this journey doing keto, lost a lot of weight, and slowly re-introduced carbs back into my diet, first the fruits and veggies, then the complex carbs and whole weat breads.

I've noticed, when I was in the US, that eating out is a large part of your culture.
We don't do that in the Netherlands.
We eat out, only on special occasion, like birthdays, or vacations.
My husband and I go out to dinner or lunch maybe once in 4 months or so.
I love cooking and I know what ingredients I put in our food.
I like it that way.

[Stacey03]

I really liked the article 'Simple rules for healthy eating' I thought it made a lot of sense. Very interesting.
In my experience pre WLS I lost 40kg and kept that off and maintained it by 'not eating anything with a barcode' and exercising. I think there is a lot to be said for ditching processed food :-)