The 2016 Dieting Season is Off and Running...

After 22 years in this field I have to admit that I periodically get burnt-out on taking the time to read and review new diet books or websites!

Nearly 20 years ago Kelly Brownell PhD once likened fad-diets to trick candles that keep re-lighting when you try to blow them out. Each new crop of books (or websites) invariably claim, “to contain the REAL secrets to weight loss.” This of course is just basic marketing and it’s very effective, especially when the average consumer “knows” more misinformation than fact regarding human metabolism, energy balance, and body weight.

Since it’s January, I thought I’d take a look at what’s “hot” on the diet landscape

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“I’ll get back on my diet tomorrow…” but at what cost?

The most fascinating—and destructive—behavior pattern associated with dieting occurs when you break the “rules” of whatever diet you’re attempting to follow. Odds are if you have any history of dieting you’ll recognize this behavior pattern immediately. 

There are a host of cognitive distortions (irrational thoughts) that come into play—basically setting you up for a big fall over the slightest perceived transgression.

First a few definitions:

• All-or-nothing thinking: thinking in absolute terms like “always”, “never”, and “every”, which sets up both unrealistic expectations and a false situation that allows for only two alternatives (no shades of gray).
• Disqualifying the positive: ignorring everything you are doing right.
• Catastrophizing: blowing things out of proportion regarding anticipated ramifications of a perceived transgression (in this case regarding one’s diet).
• Emotional reasoning: resistance to shifting from emotional self-judgments, or emotional situational assessments, to analytical evaluation of factual details.

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Weight Loss Plateaus: How to reignite your weight loss

A common development after a few weeks of losing weight is that your weight loss stalls, or stops. The scale isn’t budging. This situation—a weight loss plateau—has all kinds of mythology attributed to it.

When you start a diet, you reduce your intake of calories and a big part of that reduction is from carbohydrates. The reduction in carbohydrates leads to the depletion of glycogen (how your body stores sugar) from both your muscles and liver. Each gram of stored glycogen normally holds 3- to 4-grams of water with it.

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Dorene Robinson RDN CDN | Post a Comment | Share Article Print Article Email Article

tagged low metabolism, weight loss, weight loss plateau in energy balance, metabolic rate, metabolism Permalink

"Fat-Burning" Workouts: Founded in Fact or Fiction?

We see a lot of claims about the so-called "fat-burning" properties of various eating styles, foods, supplements and exercise modes. On that track I am reposting my blog from a few months ago on "fat-burning" workouts. The rest of these fat-burning claims will be the subject of future blogs, so stay tuned!

At some point you’ve probably heard the term “fat-burning,” and if you’ve ever set foot on a piece of cardio equipment it probably had a “fat-burning” mode. The implication is that there is something especially important about burning fat in maximizing weight loss.

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Glycemic index, insulin and weight loss: what are the facts?

The glycemic index (GI) originated as a research tool more than two decades ago. It is a measure of how fast a carbohydrate food is broken down to simple sugars and absorbed into the bloodstream after eating.

GI became popularized through diet books that claim that controlling GI controls insulin and that in turn prevents hunger, fat storage, and weight gain.

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