I’ve had it with telling people telling me that there’s not more to it than that. Sure, for most people that haven’t been yo-yo dieters their whole lives and have a healthy metabolism, it’s true. However there are some exceptions, and I’ve come across plenty of clients who have struggled with this diet myth. Speaking from personal experience, I know that it’s the kinds of foods that I choose and at what time I eat them, rather than the calories in them, that make a bigger impact on my weight and energy.

When I worked as a weight loss counselor for another organization, their approach was to balance blood sugar and to cut calories and fat way back. Balancing blood sugar is right on. When your blood sugar is steady, you’re much less likely to experience cravings.  Cutting fat way back is dead wrong. Yes, it’s true. You’ve got to eat the right kind of fat and enough of it, to lose body fat. Completely eliminating trans fat is essential for weight loss and minimizing omega 6 inflammatory oils from vegetable oils like sunflower, safflower, canola, and soybean oil is a good idea too. But eliminating avocado, nuts, seeds, butter, olive oil, coconut oil, and oily fish is self-sabotage. You might lose weight initially, but you’ll be moody, dried out, wrinkly and miserable. 

Also, based on activity level, body size, and gender, 1200 calories daily for an extended period of time can shut down the body’s metabolism, making it harder to maintain weight loss down the line. Sure, you might lose weight initially, but a large portion of that will be metabolically active muscle. When you lose muscle mass, your resting metabolic rate drops down. That means that you burn less calories over a 24 hour period while you’re at rest. The more muscle you’ve got, the more calories you burn doing absolutely nothing but sitting on your behind.

Food is information and your body is a complex chemistry lab. Let’s say you eat 200 calories worth of frosted flakes. All the sugar and carbohydrates are going to spike your blood sugar, causing you to release insulin which is…guess what? A fat storage hormone! Choosing a higher protein snack with a healthy fat would be a much more intelligent choice for fat loss. A handful of nuts would be a great option, for example.

Besides the ratio of carbohydrate, fat, and protein and the time of day at which you eat (try to front-load as much as possible with larger meals earlier in the day so that your liver can detox at night rather than digest), there are a few other factors to consider:

Food allergies and sensitivities: If you eat foods that you’re sensitive to, your body retains water weight, making it difficult to lose inches and pounds.

Thyroid imbalance: With chronic low-calorie dieting, the thyroid can become sluggish. Thyroid regulates how many calories you burn on a daily basis. Get your T3, T4, and TSH levels all checked out to make sure. Testing for thyroid anti-bodies is also a good idea to differentiate between Hashimoto’s and hypothyroidism. Many people are currently being misdiagnosed with hypothyroidism rather than Hashimoto’s.

Hormonal imbalance: A salivary hormone profile can test for cortisol levels as well as other sex hormones. High cortisol will prevent weight loss. Excess estrogen may make it difficult as well.

Lack of Sleep: Not enough sleep (anything less than 8 hours per night) can increase ghrelin (the hunger hormone) and decrease leptin (the satiety hormone). So if you’re tired, you’ll feel more hungry and less full.

Heavy Metal Toxicity: The body protects the brain and nervous system from heavy metals by storing toxic metals in fat cells.

Over-exercising: Yep! Too much time on the treadmill can raise cortisol levels. Your body senses it’s in fight or flight mode and weight loss is put on hold. If you burn out your adrenal glands, this can lead to thyroid issues long term. The better solution is to practice interval training, strength training, and stretching.

Losing weight is hard. There are many psychological, social and emotional factors involved. Calories in, calories out only addresses the body and in a very naïve, mechanistic way. New research is coming out on how sugar works in the brain. Turns out that sugar is more addictive than cocaine! There are some people who are wired differently than others and we are discovering genes that make a person more likely to be an addict. So give me a break about calories in and calories out. To simplify weight loss in this way is an insult to the intelligence of all the folks out there who struggle with their weight on a daily basis. It’s like telling an addict or an alcoholic to just stop using drugs because it’s bad for them.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. I’m currently working on a 12 week mind, body, spirit “learning to love and respect your body” program for women who struggle with their weight. I’ll keep you all posted!