Today was a typical ER shift with all the usual stuff. My last patient was one that I see very frequently just with many different names. He came in for chest pain and had hypertension, elevated blood sugar, central obesity and high chol/triglycerides. This is known as metabolic syndrome. Over the past 4-5 decades this diagnosis has skyrocketed. The average overweight person has been on numerous diets only to ultimately fail and gain the weight back (plus more). The person is made to feel that it is his/her fault for failing, when in fact they are set up to fail because for so long they have been told the wrong shit. When I was in medical school they taught the wrong shit about nutrition and they continue to do so to this day. The food pyramid released by the USDA could not have been more wrong.
There is a ton that can be written about this subject, but the main concept to understand is that 'when' we eat is just as (if not more) important than 'what' we eat. The main culprit to blame when we get fat is INSULIN. When we eat, we take in more food energy than we can immediately use. The part we do not use WILL be stored away. Insulin is the absolute key hormone involved in this storage. Insulin stores this energy in 2 ways. Carbohydrates are broken down and stored (as glycogen) in the liver and muscles. However, there is a meager limit as to how much can be stored this way. The rest of the carbohydrates are converted to FAT and stored. So the equation looks like this: Eat Food----> Increase Insulin-----> Store Glucose(sugar) and Produce and Store FAT.
When we do not eat for an extended period the equation runs in reverse: No Food-----> Decrease Insulin-----> Burn Stored Sugar and Burn FAT
So our bodies are basically in one of two modes: either storing energy and storing fat or burning energy and burning fat.
Of importance to note is the decreased insulin. This MUST happen for us to be able to burn fat. High insulin levels block our body's ability to burn fat. Guess what happens if we are shoving food in our face every 2, 3 or 4 hours? Our insulin levels remain high and we remain in a state of making and storing FAT. Our balance between storing fat and burning fat is way off.
What's the answer? The answer is to get our body in the burning fat mode for a longer period of time than the storing fat mode. There are many different protocols but probably the easiest to start with is the 16:8 plan. You have an 8 hour window out of 24 hours to eat all the food for that day. The remaining 16 hours are spent in the not eating (fasting) state. The effect this has on the body with regard to how we store and burn fat is nothing short of dramatic. It's not a diet. It's eating essentially how we were designed to eat. For anyone interested in further info, probably the best source IMO is Dr. Jason Fung. You can read his book or pull up some of his youtube videos.
There is a ton that can be written about this subject, but the main concept to understand is that 'when' we eat is just as (if not more) important than 'what' we eat. The main culprit to blame when we get fat is INSULIN. When we eat, we take in more food energy than we can immediately use. The part we do not use WILL be stored away. Insulin is the absolute key hormone involved in this storage. Insulin stores this energy in 2 ways. Carbohydrates are broken down and stored (as glycogen) in the liver and muscles. However, there is a meager limit as to how much can be stored this way. The rest of the carbohydrates are converted to FAT and stored. So the equation looks like this: Eat Food----> Increase Insulin-----> Store Glucose(sugar) and Produce and Store FAT.
When we do not eat for an extended period the equation runs in reverse: No Food-----> Decrease Insulin-----> Burn Stored Sugar and Burn FAT
So our bodies are basically in one of two modes: either storing energy and storing fat or burning energy and burning fat.
Of importance to note is the decreased insulin. This MUST happen for us to be able to burn fat. High insulin levels block our body's ability to burn fat. Guess what happens if we are shoving food in our face every 2, 3 or 4 hours? Our insulin levels remain high and we remain in a state of making and storing FAT. Our balance between storing fat and burning fat is way off.
What's the answer? The answer is to get our body in the burning fat mode for a longer period of time than the storing fat mode. There are many different protocols but probably the easiest to start with is the 16:8 plan. You have an 8 hour window out of 24 hours to eat all the food for that day. The remaining 16 hours are spent in the not eating (fasting) state. The effect this has on the body with regard to how we store and burn fat is nothing short of dramatic. It's not a diet. It's eating essentially how we were designed to eat. For anyone interested in further info, probably the best source IMO is Dr. Jason Fung. You can read his book or pull up some of his youtube videos.