Caloric Restriction

Caloric Restriction

Along time ago in a gym far far away……

Someone came up with “Calories in / Calories out”.

Then science came of age and macronutrients were popular to manipulate.

Then the internet accelerated availability of data correlating real world outcomes to trigger NofOne experiments.

Now mass influencers are bringing to light, old concepts applied with a modern twist to “bio-hack” the journey to big, cut and sculpted into the shortest time needed to hit a summit…thus its back to Calories in / Calories out!

I feel regarding nutrition there are a few steps to consider in finding your Goldilocks window of how many

-calories

-macros

-meal timing

-celebration indulgence

Calories:

There is a resting metabolic rate -sometimes referred to as BMR, that can be measured and is different with everyone based on the amount of energy (which we will refer to as food) necessary to basically sustain our body/mind in a vegetative state.  There are ways to calculate this in a lab like liveleanrx where they have you come in, sit in a chair, wear a mask without moving and in roughly less than 30minutes can determine what you should be having in calories daily to survive death. The problem comes during the day we get active, get stressed, get rested and contemplate with brain power that demands will increase or decrease over your designated RMR.  

-If you go over the vegetative allotment, in theory you will be in “positive” balance (meaning you took in more energy than was necessary for the day…thus end of day you will be STORING excess energy in fat) 

-If you stay under the RMR….you will be in/around a neutral to “negative” balance (allowing you to burn the energy in muscle taken for the day and NOT STORE energy in fat)

The problem (and conspiracy) is in the way the modern food industry has modified/morphed food as energy to look the same as stuff mom made in the 70’s but internally cause a cascade of hormone reactions that subtly brainwash you into desiring more of the same in a few hours to days:

-piece of chocolate at night

-one extra serving of carb heavy/sugar laden something on the plate

-the increase to 16oz from 7oz for a beverage

-sugar coating food without seeing white powder…cafe mocha latte frappe chino…coffee isn’t coffee anymore!

-a hamburger or hot dog that is impossibly just a plant with chemicals but tastes bleeds and feels like meat!

-family sized chip bags that are purchased to save money but actually just cause guilt when you bottom out the package while binge watching Netflix. 

The food industry is out to make money by creating addiction.  It can be argued that the food industry is in bed with the pharmaceutical industry that is out to make money by temporarily fixing your symptoms with medicines that cause weight gain!

Regardless of what you believe, “IF” you can cook fast and tasty, you can control your exposure to these hyper palatable foods and beat aging.  Yes accelerating the aging process is usually what happens in an energy positive state/fat accumulating lifestyle.  Cellular DNA in a constant fed state will not be concerned about preservation of the species, internal surveillance for cancer, building muscle vs building fat stores, or keeping arteries open vs clogged.  Can you hold your fork if exposed to other humans indulging while your stomach is growling and your brain is saying “indulge-you deserve it”?! 

The answer is NO…the typical reason most resolutions are broken by the 2nd week of January. 

Most people have a distant memory of losing a lot of weight by deploying a decrease in energy for a short amount of time…may have been for 

-a wedding

-a reunion

-the threat of medical illness

-getting married

-looking for a new job

-not having money to indulge 

-a bet

…and most people will default to that old routine from 20 yrs ago not knowing that aging will decrease your RMR even further so your old go to won’t work now that your post menopausal or low testosterone….

OR worse

-your muscle mass has decreased and there is not as much “engine” to burn the excess daily energy as younger years!

With all this doom and gloom-is there a go to diet concept that will allow return of muscle tone and loss of fat depot areas?

Yes and it varies person to person! Takes a lot of work to figure who the real client/patient is in the room but once a good base is established of:

-prior attempts/successes/roadblocks

-hormonal balance/age

-nutritional deficiencies

-restorative sleep quality

-weekly exercise volume

-gut dysfunction/balance 

-family/friend/community support

-genetic/environmental risk

Macronutrients:

The Randall Cycle from the 60’s used an answer of if there is enough fat around, glucose utilization will be halted.  Some scientist/doctor/nutritionist still believe this dividing the country in half. One half saying good to be on healthy carbs/plants and low fat….the other half believing if you push high fat you will preferentially bring insulin sensitivity back.
BUT

The anecdote I have found is most of my patients CANNOT sustain either extreme of the macro ideology. (This is the one reason I have developed a 3month deadline to count down to when we reassess your goal attainment).

I still say the ultimate fat/weight loss will come with caloric restriction so if you want to do keto vs ornish vs carnivore vs mediterranean….GO for it but maintain weekly calorie restriction. 

Fasting/timed restricted eating;

Works by same concept of caloric restriction…decreased total calories per week still “should” allow weight loss. THE PROBLEM is when we have the idea of Fat Burning AT THE SAME TIME as Muscle Building!

I am opposed to this line of thinking (unless you are a newbie to exercise -newbie gains anecdotally will see both but only for a finite time). One cannot be catabolic at the same time as being anabolic.  Honestly most older patients are just looking to cut weight as they are focused on the scale as their only metric. I look at

-insulin levels

-power to strength

-resting heart rate

-perceived exertion

-zone training

-RMR

-jump height

-cardiovascular fitness

-explosive power

-muscle mass/fat %

-oxidation of LDL

-fasting glucose

-BHB (if practicing fasting)

OMAD, Prolon, FMD, Intermittent Fasting…all honorable if done occasionally (monthly) but have a plan on what to maintain with. 

Carb cycling:

Not sure I believe this but most of my patients are not elite athletes so honestly don’t think this works and is more of an excuse for some to just munch out on carbs due to an altered food relationship. (I’m Asian, raised on rice daily as a carb staple with every meal…but at 60+yrs old I cannot maintain this too long unless I drop daily protein signal of 1gm/1lb goal body weight.)

Protein Signaling/Leucine Threshold

Highly follow this for myself and anyone older than 40yrs old. Very tough work to get this amount in daily for a target weight without increasing total calories daily!!! 

As most of my patients fit this age group, I find decades of not exercising has left patients in sarcopenia and dynapenia. (Muscle loss and Strength loss) So restarting the trajectory of exercise to build muscle is usually VERY S-L-O-W

So much that most give up when they see NO LOSS ON THE SCALE…in fact they may notice a heavier scale weight but interpret that as fat not muscle. I am so muscle centric that I am biased to lean into growing muscle initially to burn up more energy in the long run. (Be it fat or carbohydrate)

Ultimately its still a personal plan that must be designed in addition to the education process that ALL WILL STUMBLE coming out of the gate.  ALL WILL BURN OUT after a short time. MOST WILL DO BETTER with short tasks and frequent follow up. ALL WILL BENEFIT from a team of support (coaches) to reshape thoughts, expectations, fatigue, motivation. 

If this makes no sense or you disagree, fair ….. but has your team attained successful goals and does your data reflect health/longeivty?

DrRic