Why Are Thin People Not Fat?

[Katycakes]

Did anyone else watch this Horizon TV prog last night? I thought it was really interesting, but raised a whole lot more questions than it answered... it talked about thin children turning into thin adults (er, no... how come we have an obesity epidemic then? We can't ALL have been overweight kids!)
Scariest of all, it talked about our bodies adjusting to a weight we were 'meant' to be at, and doing everything in its power to pull us back to that weight. Which may mean that some dieters find it very difficult to maintain because their bodies 'want' them to be heavier. I wanted to ask... if you've lost weight with CD & maintained for a while, does that mean living with a degree of hunger, always? The prog said your body will still 'feel' hungry until it is back up to the weight it wants to be... arghhh!!!!
I didn't find this discouraging, though my family were pretty horrified by it... just want to know what it all means for those of us trying to re-set our bodies to a new 'ideal weight'. Can it be done?
It also said chocolate was the 'easiest' way for the testers to pack in the required amounts of calories each day, as you could eat so much of it before feeling 'full'. Well, that bit I did know... chocolate. Wish it had never been invented!
xxx

 

[miss jelly tot]

I saw it too. The man eating the clotted cream from the pot :yuk: It did make me think though, everytime I finish a diet I always put on and sit at a certain weight, perhaps that is the weight I am ment to be
Why didn't they use a couple of bigger people for the experiment? All the volunteers were stick thin.
It was interesting though.

 

[KD]

I saw it too. The man eating the clotted cream from the pot :yuk:

Yum I've done that

It did make me think though, everytime I finish a diet I always put on and sit at a certain weight, perhaps that is the weight I am ment to be

Not the weight you are meant to be, but the weight your body will try to make you.

Why didn't they use a couple of bigger people for the experiment? All the volunteers were stick thin.
It was interesting though.

Because most research has been done on overweight people. We find out more when they work out why thin people stay thin. For one thing, maintenance is easier if you emulate thinnies rather than the overweight

 

[Katycakes]

Clotted cream... my family were howling with disgust, so I didn't tell them how I used to secretly binge on thick cream and sugar when I was feeling low. I see it now as pure self-harm, but at the time I had tons of excuses... (confession for the day over).
I think they were trying to see if they could make very thin people into fat people. Well, it's possible. I know from experience - it just takes a lot of dedication and determination. You keep at it. Chocolate, clotted cream, whatever it takes.
I think our bodies do have an attachment to being a certain weight but I believe I can re-set that somehow... no idea how!!!! I got myself into this mess and I am going to get myself out of it...

 

[KD]

if you've lost weight with CD & maintained for a while, does that mean living with a degree of hunger, always?

I'm not answering that Mainly because it will depend on many other factors. The progamme was interesting, but very simplistic view of it all.

A lot will depend on how big you were in the first place, male or female, your leptin, T3 or other hormonal changes etc. What might be for me, might not happen to you.

Most of what I've read over the last couple of years refers to people being in a state of semi-starvation. That's too strong a word.

But! Katy! Knowledge is power, but how you use that knowledge is mightier

 

[Katycakes]

KD you know I am impatient and always want all the answers now... but I KNOW you are right, it's what you DO that defines you, not what you think. I just want to have all the knowledge I can to help me succeed in this, because I want so badly to turn my life around.
Reading between the lines... well, a degree of hunger, maybe. I can live with that, if I have to, but I'd rather know. And it's just another consequence of something I did to myself, after all, and a small amount of hunger won't kill me, but eating the way I did almost certainly would have in the end. I have too much life I still want to live.
Thanks for posting... for being there!
xxx

 

[KD]

KD you know I am impatient and always want all the answers now... but I KNOW you are right, it's what you DO that defines you, not what you think. I just want to have all the knowledge I can to help me succeed in this, because I want so badly to turn my life around.
Reading between the lines... well, a degree of hunger, maybe. I can live with that, if I have to, but I'd rather know. And it's just another consequence of something I did to myself, after all, and a small amount of hunger won't kill me, but eating the way I did almost certainly would have in the end. I have too much life I still want to live.
Thanks for posting... for being there!
xxx

You're thirsty for knowledge and I love that. Very much like me. I want to know the ins and outs of things that I am doing because then I can find the right tools to help myself. You sound like that too

 

[jacsprat]

I haven't watched this yet.

The set point thing is interesting. I remember years ago my weight never went above 12st. I could eat what I liked and always stayed between 11st10-11st13lbs. Then suddenly(or so it seemed) it shot up to 12st10lbs but went no further for a while. This trend continued upwards over the years. Just before Christmas I was around 17st 7lbs I really ate unrestricted amounts throughtout the festive period and into the first few weeks of Jan. I dreaded getting on the scales but was surprised to find I was 'only' 17st 11lbs as I really expected to be well over 18st. The most I have ever weighed is 17st13lbs. Its like my body tries and tries to stay below a certain weight but once that weighed has been breeched it continues increasing till a new set point is reached.

I do remember reading something about re setting your set point. I may have this wrong but I think it has something to do with building up more muscle mass so your resting metabolic rate inreases and at the same time consuming more protein and less carbs to balance your blood sugar.

Jac

 

[Katycakes]

KD... can't tell you how much I hope I am like you! You are such a brilliant role model and you have acres of patience with people like me! I SO want to succeed an maintain as you have, and you prove it can be done, and that demons can be conquered along the way. Thanks for staying a part of the site, I know I am not the only one who is glad to have you around!

Jac, so glad to see you posting again, it's been quiet without you & I've missed the Daily Thread! My story of weight gain has been much like yours. There was once a time when I'd have said my 'set weight' was 9st 7lbs, then it hopped up to an 11st zone, then a 12st one, then it all became a bit of a blur but of course each time I was pushing beyond my 'heaviest' and creating a new 'comfort-zone' for my body. I so badly want to re-set this, but if I can't do that then I will live with the hunger because I am not going back there, I really am not.
If you didn't see the prog, one of things that struck me was experiments they did with seriously obese patients, getting them to lose 10% bodyweight and then feeding them exactly enough cals to keep them at that size. They all reported huge hunger, which was their bodies insisting on more cals to push them back up to where they had started from. My heart sank, but then again if that's what's behind the diet yo-yo thing I would rather know and be aware. Maybe after a long while the body will re-adjust? They didn't seem to study that.
Anyway, I did find it interesting!
xxx

 

[icemoose]

I did watch it and I can see how depressing it could be if you believed that it was always about physical hunger.....

For me I overate because I was psychologically hungry...I needed food as a sticky plaster for other issues in my life.

I also can honestly say hand on heart that I have now been slim for three years and I am not hungry all the time!

The only times I get hungry are when I haven't eaten for a while and need some food! Hence I go have some....

M.

 

[Katycakes]

I identify, Icemoose, as my problems haven't come from 'love of food' but from emotional overeating... I know that I need to sort this out if I am going to get to the place I want to be & stay there, so that has become my major goal now. The CD thing is just a tool, although it is obviously rescuing my body from illness and lethargy as well, and that's no small feat.
I am determined, and find a lot of inspiration in people like you & KD. I noticed there had once been an NLP forum on the site, has that now folded? Do you think it will ever re-open? Have tried to read up on it, inspired by your newsletters, but found myself quickly out of my depth!
Anyway, thanks for the news that maintaining doesn't equal constant hunger!
xx

 

[Devoted2beingSlim]

I found the programme to be almost discouraging for overweight people. It claimed that once you have excess fat cells that you have them for life & that they only shrink, therefore making weightgain easy once weight is reduced. I am doing 2 Diplomas in Weight Related Subjects and I feel they have to do alot more research before they can come to conclusions. I also felt the programme was too simplified in the fact that it was very biased.

 

[KD]

I found the programme to be almost discouraging for overweight people. It claimed that once you have excess fat cells that you have them for life & that they only shrink, therefore making weightgain easy once weight is reduced. I am doing 2 Diplomas in Weight Related Subjects and I feel they have to do alot more research before they can come to conclusions. I also felt the programme was too simplified in the fact that it was very biased.

But, how much more research is needed? There has been loads of research pointing to what they said in the programme. Yes, it was simplified, but the facts on the physiological side were still there. All the programme did was to get those facts and tell people.

Discouraging? Possibly, but I need to know facts so I can find answers. Not for an excuse to get big again, but so I can work out how to stay slim and so I don't think I'm just going barmy.

Dieters often don't want to know. They want the fairy tale conclusion at the end of the story (meaning to them...the end of the diet!) Is that fair?

Promise to post something positive in a mo

 

[KD]

KD... can't tell you how much I hope I am like you! You are such a brilliant role model and you have acres of patience with people like me!

Thankyou Katy. Don't need to pull out anything from my patience store for you. It's messages such as yours that make me feel useful around the place

 

[KD]

As for the hunger thing, it really does seem to vary from person to person.

when I first started looking into all this...leptin, insulin response etc, I found some people didn't appear to have much of a problem at all. Others had more, but those who I talked to found it all liveable with.

My first year was harder. I spent a lot of time clearly defining the difference between physical and psychological hunger. Maybe I analyse too much, but I only analyse things that pertain to me. In other words I wanted to know why I still felt hungry, even though I was eating the right amount of calories for my body. I had to be sure it when it was physical and when it was psychological to know how to deal with it.

But, it's not all to do with hunger anyway. Remember the small children who were 'drawn' towards food even though they weren't hungry?

There was that to deal with, along with habits, satiety etc.

When I first started maintaining, I kept to the recommended carbs of about 55% give or take a few

After that, I worked out satiety was much improved with less carbs and more protein. I'm not on a low carb way of eating, just find it's better, when given a choice to go for a higher % of protein. Too many carbs seem to turn me into a zombie. Carbs aren't the enemy, and I still have a place for plenty in my diet, but protein helps any hunger.

So, now I'm not usually hungry, but there again, I never get more than satisfied, let alone full. Tend to stay at mildly satisfied

But, this is okay, because I want to stay slim more than anything else. The benefits far outweight the cons, and I can live with it. People put up with far worse in their lives.

Knowing I wanted to stay slim, meant that all I had to do was find a way to make it possible. That included a load of head work, plus a little more protein.

Others with a different insulin response could well find that loads of carbs would suit them better. Very much an individual thing according to how their bodies work (hence the SW people who do better on the high carb green day diet and vice versa)

 

[Katycakes]

Thank you. So much there I needed to know. I would like to imagine an idyllic 'end' to this journey but the truth is better... like you said, no fairy tales. And the truth is something you can work with, if you want to. Whether you like it or not, it's still the truth - I have had enough of self-deception, I am expert in it now, and it never brought me happiness.
KD, you say that those you spoke to all found the hunger 'livable with'. I guess those that didn't put the weight back on. So I will find a way to live with it too, on the basis that living is where it's at! I wonder if over-eating was a kind of sedative to dull the happy/sad stuff of life? Better to feel it, even if it's sometimes scary.
I have loved to binge on carbs in the past, so suspect that putting more protein into the picture is what may work for me long-term. Years ago I did slimming world and did lose weight eating carb-heavy 'green' dishes, (no choice as I am veggie), but learned little from it except that it was OK to eat vast plates of rice/veg stew. And when I tried again with SW, nothing happened at all... The lasting message from that diet was that my portion sizes went up! So eat less is the key, and much less carb, and I will be very interested to see how the protein balance thing works out for me. CD has showed me that I can eat lo-carb and still be veggie, that there are always options.
And I want to be slim too, so much, and also to be at peace from the years of bingeing and over-eating. And I am going to do it.
Thanks KD.
xxx

 

[jacsprat]

Jac, so glad to see you posting again, it's been quiet without you & I've missed the Daily Thread!

Thanks Katy its nice to be missed. We had the builders in last week and it was mayhem. By Thu I finally admitted defeat and packed up the whole of downstairs so couldn't get near computer.

Right I've watched the prog now and thought it was very interesting though not terribly scientific. I mean we only had their word that they were eating all the cals everyday. I would have liked to have seen the same experiment carried out on overweight/obese people to see how much weight/fat they gained.

I was interested by the man who put on an average amount of weight but a very small percentage of fat. Just by increasing his cals he managed to raise his metabolic rate and his muscle mass(I think). He looked exactly the same by the end of the 4 weeks whereas most of the others had increased their girth considerably.

Jac

 

[Devoted2beingSlim]

wow KD you really know your stuff, brilliant posts x

 

[KD]

wow KD you really know your stuff, brilliant posts x

Thankyou. I do a lot of reading, talking to people, physiologists and dieters/maintainers...anyone who will answer my questions

Right I've watched the prog now and thought it was very interesting though not terribly scientific. I mean we only had their word that they were eating all the cals everyday. I would have liked to have seen the same experiment carried out on overweight/obese people to see how much weight/fat they gained.

Agreed, it wasn't very scientific, but the science part as already been done numerous times, on both the overweight and the naturally slim.

I guess they just wanted to repeat the experiment in a way that would grab the interest of the general public.

 

[FromFat2Wow!]

I watched the program and it was a bit disheartening with its message that overweight people are destined to be just that.

I guess it's too late not to eat chicken. I think I've already got the virus.

Perhaps they should do more research into how different peoples bodies respond to different kinds of food. For instance, my younger sister and her family eat a heavy carb diet and the only one putting on weight is her husband. Everyone else is slim to stick thin.

Another sister, before menopause got a hold of her, could eat massive amounts of food without weight gain. No exercise involved either. I, on the other hand, had to cut back on food and increase exercise just to lose a couple of pounds a week!!!

It would be interesting to know what happened to the guy in the 1960s experiment who lost 200+lbs on a diet of water and vitamins.