As I sat on my back porch early one morning in October, 2008, there was no way for me to realize how this one crazy moment would completely change my life. Over the weekend, I attended a meeting in Philadelphia and on the last night proclaimed to a friend that I was about to do the most odd experiment in my life. I wanted to get to the bottom of “metabolism” and “burning calories.” I wanted to understand why it seemed so difficult to lose a couple of pounds and yet I could easily GAIN a couple in a weekend. Read Full Article →
Beauty Sleep
Over the last 6 months, we’ve spent a lot of time on macronutrients and food. I believe (and can prove) the common protein-carbohydrate-fat speak paradigm is broken. These macromolecules are all well understood scientifically, and yet conceptually, real food doesn’t come in simple little packages; macronutrient density/percentage varies from food to food. Even when we attempt to cluster foods together with the these labels, it doesn’t capture the dynamic and interchange of the overriding metabolic rules and microbiome influence.
Generally speaking, the more refined one or more macronutrients in a “foodstuff,” the more unhealthy ingestion becomes. Take natural “sugar” for Read Full Article →
Fat – Part 2
In Fat – Part 1 I explained some details about our body’s use of lipids (fat) and the role it plays in both survival and diet. The most important concept to take away is that you MUST go on a naturally “high-fat diet,” digesting your OWN adipose tissue, to lose weight. This may seem so incredibly obvious, but if you take a few minutes each day to think about it, I believe it will have profound impact on your results.
Why? because every calorie you put into your mouth will fuel your body and that will result in the part Read Full Article →
Carbohydrates – Part 3
We’ve covered a lot of ground. What we’ve discussed is that carbohydrates come in the form of simple sugars (monosaccharides) and more complex carbohydrates (polysaccharides). We know that the sugar names all end in “ose” (glucose, fructose, lactose, etc…). Polysaccharides are many of these monosaccharides linked together in a chain and are a common way plants store energy (similar to our fat) for later use.
I’m suggesting you stop thinking about “Carbs” as a food group; instead categorize meat, vegetables, grains, dairy, etc… Starch (potato) and Cellulose (wood) are made from IDENTICAL glucose molecules. They have a different saccharide bonds Read Full Article →
Burn, Baby, BURN
As we discussed in the last post, I want you to suspend all that you know about carbohydrates, proteins, and fat. I want you to clear notions of glycemic index and eating for blood type. I’m asking you to not have conclusions about our paleolithic ancestors. No, let’s talk about the very basics of energy in our body, but check the Chakras at the door.
Today we’ll take a rather geeky-side step. We are going to talk about energy, oxidation, and heat (not temperature). These are all things that we can see, measure, and repeat. Let’s reserve comments to questions and clarifications Read Full Article →
Pyramid Schemes
Personal perspectives are always plagued with some set of bias. For example, there are those that look at the great Egyptian pyramids as incredible acts of engineering prowess and still others that see the same building as representing a society that built with diminishing ambition (psssst, a joke). There is always an absurd way to categorize things and any time you base a theory, concept, or idea on a false premise, eventually that idea will crumble.
People can sell “snake oil” for a while, but eventually it will catch up with them and the facts (not opinions, perceptions, or feelings) Read Full Article →
The heat is on!
Last week, one of our site members posted a comment to Ch-Ch-Changes about the benefits of heat and cold in losing weight. I think that 36 months ago I would have completely agreed with his comments; now I am not so sure. With his permission, I turned this dialog into a post, because I think there is widespread confusion on our thermoregulatory system and its effect on metabolic rate.
BATgirl to The Rescue (Part 2)
We learned in Part 1 that not only do human infants start out with more fat than any other species, a higher percentage is brown adipose tissue (BAT). Women, in general have more than men and as Humans age, BAT seems to dwindle. It’s likely if you have ever been obese, you have less BAT then your skinny friends.Custom gummibåt
I have dozens of papers here on BAT. My interest with BAT began after Tim and I discussed it at length and started exchanging ideas and data. Honestly, I came to my conclusions from the complete opposite (but complimentary) approach – it was much more of a 30,000 ft level view on the subject. Read Full Article →
WIRED March 2013
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