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Marie Osmond on Larry King Live last night.



 
 
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  #51  
Old August 15th, 2004, 10:30 AM
Annabel Smyth
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Concordia wrote in alt.support.diet on Sat, 14 Aug 2004:


Well, even my naturally thin friends (*) generally all tell me that
they do consciously watch what they eat when I quiz them a bit.


I was thinking about this last night; yesterday, we went out for brunch,
and then out to dinner in the evening. My husband, a naturally thin
person, was genuinely not very hungry in the evening, and contented
himself with one course, where I had two (although I didn't finish my
main course), which I didn't really need.

(All the same, I seem to have lost another lb, which is brilliant
considering we've had guests!)

That's what I'm going on. That, and observation. Certainly it is
easier to varying degrees for some people to do this, though. Not
disputing that. Having struggled quite a bit in the past with
controlling appetite myself, I certainly do understand how difficult
it can be! (It has gotten much easier over time, though)

It does get easier.

PS interesting website, btw. The pics are quite charming.


How kind, thank you!
--
Annabel - "Mrs Redboots"
90/88.5/80kg

  #52  
Old August 18th, 2004, 06:21 AM
Paul
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In article ,
Annabel Smyth wrote:

You wrote at 22:33:53 on Thu, 12 Aug 2004:

I didn't feel like reading all that. Was that person arguing that
Calorie counting is impossible or so difficult as to be impractical and
thus possible only in principle? Can someone give me the executive
summary on that because I can't believe anyone would seriously argue
that.

The latter, I think. The point is that to count the precise amount of
calories needed for your personal metabolism, you need to eat foods
whose calorific value can be determined very precisely. While this is
easy if you eat bought food, out of a packet, it is far less easy if you
cook for yourself - you can estimate, certainly, but at best it will
only be an estimate.
--


If you use a scale and don't cheat you can be very accurate in counting
calories for home-prepared foods. Further, if you do the above in
conjunction with a nutrition analysis website or software or even a logbook
you can tweak your intake ratios very easily. I use Fitday and find it
extremely helpful in tailoring my diets to whatever stage of training I'm
in, i.e., cutting, bulking, etc.

People who say that calorie counting doesn't work aren't doing it right or
are cheating or both. Outside of crap fad diet books no one says that it's
easy. It takes discipline and commitment for the long haul.

And as an aside I'll add that every calorie requirement estimator I've
ever seen has been way off. I'd start by knocking 500 off whatever number
they give you and even at that it's a safe bet that it'll still be too
high.

Paul

Annabel - "Mrs Redboots"
90/89/70kg





  #53  
Old August 18th, 2004, 06:21 AM
Paul
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In article ,
Annabel Smyth wrote:

You wrote at 22:33:53 on Thu, 12 Aug 2004:

I didn't feel like reading all that. Was that person arguing that
Calorie counting is impossible or so difficult as to be impractical and
thus possible only in principle? Can someone give me the executive
summary on that because I can't believe anyone would seriously argue
that.

The latter, I think. The point is that to count the precise amount of
calories needed for your personal metabolism, you need to eat foods
whose calorific value can be determined very precisely. While this is
easy if you eat bought food, out of a packet, it is far less easy if you
cook for yourself - you can estimate, certainly, but at best it will
only be an estimate.
--


If you use a scale and don't cheat you can be very accurate in counting
calories for home-prepared foods. Further, if you do the above in
conjunction with a nutrition analysis website or software or even a logbook
you can tweak your intake ratios very easily. I use Fitday and find it
extremely helpful in tailoring my diets to whatever stage of training I'm
in, i.e., cutting, bulking, etc.

People who say that calorie counting doesn't work aren't doing it right or
are cheating or both. Outside of crap fad diet books no one says that it's
easy. It takes discipline and commitment for the long haul.

And as an aside I'll add that every calorie requirement estimator I've
ever seen has been way off. I'd start by knocking 500 off whatever number
they give you and even at that it's a safe bet that it'll still be too
high.

Paul

Annabel - "Mrs Redboots"
90/89/70kg





  #54  
Old August 18th, 2004, 01:40 PM
Chris Braun
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On Wed, 18 Aug 2004 05:21:37 GMT, (Paul) wrote:

In article ,
Annabel Smyth wrote:

You wrote at 22:33:53 on Thu, 12 Aug 2004:

I didn't feel like reading all that. Was that person arguing that
Calorie counting is impossible or so difficult as to be impractical and
thus possible only in principle? Can someone give me the executive
summary on that because I can't believe anyone would seriously argue
that.

The latter, I think. The point is that to count the precise amount of
calories needed for your personal metabolism, you need to eat foods
whose calorific value can be determined very precisely. While this is
easy if you eat bought food, out of a packet, it is far less easy if you
cook for yourself - you can estimate, certainly, but at best it will
only be an estimate.
--


If you use a scale and don't cheat you can be very accurate in counting
calories for home-prepared foods. Further, if you do the above in
conjunction with a nutrition analysis website or software or even a logbook
you can tweak your intake ratios very easily. I use Fitday and find it
extremely helpful in tailoring my diets to whatever stage of training I'm
in, i.e., cutting, bulking, etc.

People who say that calorie counting doesn't work aren't doing it right or
are cheating or both. Outside of crap fad diet books no one says that it's
easy. It takes discipline and commitment for the long haul.

And as an aside I'll add that every calorie requirement estimator I've
ever seen has been way off. I'd start by knocking 500 off whatever number
they give you and even at that it's a safe bet that it'll still be too
high.

Paul

Annabel - "Mrs Redboots"
90/89/70kg


I've lost 121 lbs. by counting calories. Did I count perfectly all
the time? No, of course not. Did I do it well enough? Apparently.
It's possible to be quite accurate with home-prepared foods by
weighing ingredients. But it is some work, so I tended to do this the
first few times I made a particular dish, and then assume future
incarnations were the same. (I don't mean things with set recipes
that should be exactly repeatable, but things like meatloaf or pot
roast.) Packaged foods with nutrition labeling are, of course, a
no-brainer. For restaurant meals, or meals in friends' homes, I just
guessed. I also created database entries for dishes I order often
(like an awesome seared tuna salad at a favorite restaurant) so I can
just enter that dish each time I have it. (I use a rather
sophisticated Excel spreadsheet -- DH and I are computer geeks -- but
I'm sure one can do everything that's needed with Fitday.)

I've never paid any attention to calorie requirement estimators. I
think there's too much individual variation for them to be useful for
everyone, anyway. I just picked a starting calorie goal per day and
then adjusted based on whether it was giving me the desired results.
I'm still doing it that way now that I've been in maintenance for a
few months. (And am still working on getting it right -- have lost a
bit more than I'd planned.)

Chris
262/141/ (145-150)
  #55  
Old August 24th, 2004, 12:21 PM
Lictor
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Default

"Paul" wrote in message
...
If you use a scale and don't cheat you can be very accurate in counting
calories for home-prepared foods.


I don't think so. You're assuming the values for the base components are
accurate when they're not. Does your calorie table distinguish between a
Golden apple and a Granny Smith? Does it make a difference between
spring-summer beef (fed with thick grass, hence fatter) and winter beef
(slimmer)? Does it list both American corn and traditionnal corn (less
sugar)? Does it differenciate between African and Carribean bananas? If it
doesn't, you can't claim to have much accuracy, you're just getting a rough
estimate.
Moreover, the calories per gram are themselves estimates, rounded to the
nearest digit. A gram of protein is not 4 calories, it's 4.2. A gram of
carbs is 3.74, not 4. Likewise, fat is 9.3 per gram. A lot of sources do not
even take that into account, and that's almost a 10% margin of error
already.
Obviously, some people do not understand that. I mean, I see people posting
their daily diet down to the single digit. That's a level of precision that
is just impossible to get.

Further, if you do the above in
conjunction with a nutrition analysis website or software or even a

logbook
you can tweak your intake ratios very easily. I use Fitday and find it
extremely helpful in tailoring my diets to whatever stage of training I'm
in, i.e., cutting, bulking, etc.


This means you have to plan your meal in advance. It makes it hard to eat
daily at the restaurant or at friends. It means weighting your food
precisely. Otherwise, you will only have a very rough estimate of the
calories you ate.
Compared to the brain natural ability to count calories, it's a very very
weak substitute. Your taste buds are able to distinguish sugar content down
to the single calorie (like, sorting several tea cups per sugar content).
Your brain has a four way feedback to adjust for your food intake (real-time
estimation, 15 minutes mark during the meal, from meal to meal, from week to
week).
I would rather devote energy to restore proper function of that fantastic
tool rather than waste it on trying to make a shaky substitute work.

People who say that calorie counting doesn't work aren't doing it right

or
are cheating or both. Outside of crap fad diet books no one says that

it's
easy. It takes discipline and commitment for the long haul.


Calorie counting works to lose weight, because the deficit is high enough to
absorb the lack of precision. If you burn 2400 calories a day and are trying
to eat 1500, even a +30% error keeps you in deficit. So, it does work during
that phase. The problem comes when you're tying to maintain weight. That 30%
margin of error then becomes enormous.
It does take more discipline and commitment to tune your own brain; there is
no software to help you and you can't press F1 for help. But I still feel
the reward is worth the extra troubles compared to calorie counting, in
terms of results, stability and flexibility.

And as an aside I'll add that every calorie requirement estimator I've
ever seen has been way off. I'd start by knocking 500 off whatever number
they give you and even at that it's a safe bet that it'll still be too
high.


That's precisely what I have been saying... As you have noticed, the whole
process has a wide margin of error. The "correction" you're making doesn't
correct that error, it just makes sure you always end up in deficit. That's
fine for losing weight, but you can't count on it for maintaining.
If you did any chemistry or physics, you know what to think of these
experiments where you "just add/substract random number, and it works
exactly as in the formula, so it's a success"...


  #56  
Old August 24th, 2004, 12:21 PM
Lictor
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

"Paul" wrote in message
...
If you use a scale and don't cheat you can be very accurate in counting
calories for home-prepared foods.


I don't think so. You're assuming the values for the base components are
accurate when they're not. Does your calorie table distinguish between a
Golden apple and a Granny Smith? Does it make a difference between
spring-summer beef (fed with thick grass, hence fatter) and winter beef
(slimmer)? Does it list both American corn and traditionnal corn (less
sugar)? Does it differenciate between African and Carribean bananas? If it
doesn't, you can't claim to have much accuracy, you're just getting a rough
estimate.
Moreover, the calories per gram are themselves estimates, rounded to the
nearest digit. A gram of protein is not 4 calories, it's 4.2. A gram of
carbs is 3.74, not 4. Likewise, fat is 9.3 per gram. A lot of sources do not
even take that into account, and that's almost a 10% margin of error
already.
Obviously, some people do not understand that. I mean, I see people posting
their daily diet down to the single digit. That's a level of precision that
is just impossible to get.

Further, if you do the above in
conjunction with a nutrition analysis website or software or even a

logbook
you can tweak your intake ratios very easily. I use Fitday and find it
extremely helpful in tailoring my diets to whatever stage of training I'm
in, i.e., cutting, bulking, etc.


This means you have to plan your meal in advance. It makes it hard to eat
daily at the restaurant or at friends. It means weighting your food
precisely. Otherwise, you will only have a very rough estimate of the
calories you ate.
Compared to the brain natural ability to count calories, it's a very very
weak substitute. Your taste buds are able to distinguish sugar content down
to the single calorie (like, sorting several tea cups per sugar content).
Your brain has a four way feedback to adjust for your food intake (real-time
estimation, 15 minutes mark during the meal, from meal to meal, from week to
week).
I would rather devote energy to restore proper function of that fantastic
tool rather than waste it on trying to make a shaky substitute work.

People who say that calorie counting doesn't work aren't doing it right

or
are cheating or both. Outside of crap fad diet books no one says that

it's
easy. It takes discipline and commitment for the long haul.


Calorie counting works to lose weight, because the deficit is high enough to
absorb the lack of precision. If you burn 2400 calories a day and are trying
to eat 1500, even a +30% error keeps you in deficit. So, it does work during
that phase. The problem comes when you're tying to maintain weight. That 30%
margin of error then becomes enormous.
It does take more discipline and commitment to tune your own brain; there is
no software to help you and you can't press F1 for help. But I still feel
the reward is worth the extra troubles compared to calorie counting, in
terms of results, stability and flexibility.

And as an aside I'll add that every calorie requirement estimator I've
ever seen has been way off. I'd start by knocking 500 off whatever number
they give you and even at that it's a safe bet that it'll still be too
high.


That's precisely what I have been saying... As you have noticed, the whole
process has a wide margin of error. The "correction" you're making doesn't
correct that error, it just makes sure you always end up in deficit. That's
fine for losing weight, but you can't count on it for maintaining.
If you did any chemistry or physics, you know what to think of these
experiments where you "just add/substract random number, and it works
exactly as in the formula, so it's a success"...


 




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