Calorie question

[djgeneral]

I know I always read and see people saying that a calorie is a calorie at the end of the day. If you're allowed to eat 1,900 calories a day, technically they can come from anywhere but of course it is smart to pick filling and healthy foods. My question comes from the fact that I get scared eating my actual calorie limit for the day because my carbs or fat intake is so high.

For example. Today I'm really trying to eat 1900 calories and I'm at 1893 but Everyone says a 2000 calorie diet your fat shouldn't be over 65 and carbs 300

And I'm at

85 g fat
231 carbs

my carbs are in line but my fat is high. Is that still okay? Some days it's flipped where carbs are almost 300 or higher and fat is low. So I guess it balances out ? But at the end of the day is it true that I can eat 1900 calories from anywhere and still lose weight if that's my set goal?

[FitBeforeFifty]

Yes, it's true -- it really doesn't matter. Those numbers are very similar to my numbers when I was losing weight. 

[A_Lurker]

I'm in no way recommending this diet, here's someone who lost 56 pounds eating his 2000 calories a day at McDonalds.

http://www.today.com/health/man-loses-56-pounds-after-eating-only-mcdonalds-six-months-2D79329158

[JohnRi]

For the most part a calorie is a calorie. 

Your body runs on glucose.  To get the glucose your body converts the carbs, protein and fat you eat every day.

Any extra glucose in your body, is then coverted to glycogen.  Glycogen is stored in your liver, and your muscles.  Extra glycogen is converted to FAT and stored in your FAT Reserves.

When we exercise, our bodies burn glucose.  Then once that runs low, it converts that glycogen into glucose.  When that runs out, runners often call this hitting the wall, as you body now has to convert fuels you've eaten into glucose.  The wall usually hits when it they run out of the easy and ready to convert carbs, protein, and fat you have eaten.

Your body converts Carbs to Glucose, as this is the easiest convertion almost 1 to 1.

Your body uses protein to repair muscle damage from exercise.  After carbs run out, you body converts extra protein to glucose.  This is a little harder to convert.  Something 1 to .9.

Once your body runs out of carbs and protein, then it makes a decision.  If your diet is too low in total calories, you body now converts MUSCLE to glucose.  It starts with muscles you don't use much!  Muscle you use all the time, don't get converted.  Extra fat you eat is STORED.  This is why people who eat too little get fatter!

If however, you are eating enough, then you body will convert fat to glucose.  But this is a harder conversion.  Something 1 to .5 to .8  The more active you are the better your body is at converting to glucose.

Once your body runs of fuel you eat, then it again looks at the calories you are eating.  And if you eating enough then it starts to convert your FAT reserves.  If you aren't eating enough, then it starts burning muscle.

Too lose weight, when you exercise, you have to run out of the fuels you have eaten, eaten enough calories, so that you start burning stored fat.  Even better, after you stop exercising, your body need to rebuild the glcogen in your liver and muscles.  So it will convert stored fat to rebuid this.  So exercising 10-20 minutes on a treadmill does nothing.  But running for an hour, or walking and biking for over an hour.  Those burn fat reserves, assuming you aren't over eating!

So the bottom line, what you eat doesn't matter that much.  What matters is how much you eat.  Eat enough calories and not too many to lose weight.

So you can get fat by not eating enough.  You can get fat by eating nothing but carbs.  You can get fat eating nothing but protein.  You can get fat eating fat.  And of course, you get fat if you eat too much.

I eat a diet around 18% protein, 25% fat, and 60% carbs.  I've lost 76 lbs since August 2015.  I used to eat 1800 calories a day, now that I am 22 lbs from my goal, I'm eating around 2100-2200 a day.  I've had to increase my diet to avoid burning muscle. 

Eating is not bad.  Just eating too many calories is.  Don't worry about the macros...

[Bobbinyc]

My understanding is that the medical researchers no longer say "a calorie is a calorie".  It is now known that calories from different sources have different impacts on our hormones and that directly effects whether our bodies store fat, burn muscle, etc.  

You didn't say what you are eating.  It matters if it is junk, processed carbs, high glycemic foods that will raise your blood sugar, etc.  Healthy fats or not so healthy fats?  Seems to me we all need to be learning a bit more about the research being done over the last 10 years.  This is one article I just read from Harvard Magazine.

http://harvardmagazine.com/2016/05/are-all-calories-equal

http://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20120626/all-calories-not-created-equal-study-suggests#1

[GershonSurge]

I'm not sure how a person on a normal diet would get a low fat - low carbohydrate diet like the one they researched in the second link.

[Dominique]

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@djgeneral wrote:
I get scared eating my actual calorie limit for the day because my carbs or fat intake is so high.

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Carbs and fats only get stored as fat if you are overeating (= eating more than you expend). If you eat at a caloric deficit, they will be used as fuel, not stored as fat. If you are very active and therefore expend a lot, you can afford to eat more calories without getting fat. It doesn’t matter (from a weight loss point of view) what macronutrients these calories come from, nor whether they come from junk food or healthy food. Of course, as you said, it’s a good idea to favour healthy food for other reasons, but it’s perfectly possible to lose weight eating junk food.

[A_Lurker]

@GershonSurge - they did three diets, one low-fat, one low-carb, and one low-glycemic index.  Of course, the study was for one month weight loss, two months follow-up.  The doctor running the study went in with his own ideas:

Ludwig has long studied the low-glycemic-index diet and is one of the diet's main proponents.

He says while people often lose weight on very-low-fat and very-low-carbohydrate diets, the vast majority end up gaining the weight back very quickly.

There's also very litte information about how controlled the study was.  I figure until they lock people up and control their intake and output there will never be a definitive answer to what is better to lose weight.  And then there would be the return to the real world and how people cope.  There are tons of way to lose weight, maintaining is the real trick.

She says since the participants were only followed for the three months that they followed the highly controlled eating plans, it is not clear if one diet really is better than another for maintaining weight loss. (Nutritionist Elisabetta Politi, MPH)

[GershonSurge]

There is this persistent myth supported by the Meat and Dairy Association that carbs can make people fat. The propaganda goes something like this. People who eat too much sugar get fat. (Generally true.)

Carbs turn into the same sugar that fat people eat. (Generally true.)

The excess sugar turns into fat, and excess carbs turn into fat, so people who eat too many carbs get fat. The only think left to do is consume more meat and dairy products to avoid excess carbs and getting fat.

This is scientifically impossible. The reason people who eat too much sugar get fat is they generally consume it in foods with fat.

IT IS SCIENTIFICALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR SUGAR TO TURN INTO FAT!!!! (Read the section titled Excess Starch Does Not Turn to Body Fat.

The human body does not have a process to turn carbs into fat except in tiny amounts. Excess carbs are burned off as heat. 

Excess proteins are excreted through the kidneys and in excessive amounts (over 15% of calories eaten) can eventually cause kidney and gallbladder probems. Animal proteins cause a loss of bone mass.

The only thing that readily turns to fat is FAT. 

[GershonSurge]

A_Lurker,

The diets they used would not be possible to duplicate with food.

[A_Lurker]

Yes, they are possible, but it would require a lot of work and effort.  The first one they mentioned was low-fat, so I did a quick and dirty menu.

Breakfast:
  oats
  1% milk
  blueberries
  egg whites
  spinach
  salsa

Lunch
  Mixed raw vegetable salad
  fat free dressing
  kidney beans

Dinner
  roasted vegetables
  roasted potato
  olive oil
  chicken breast (3oz)

Total: 1618 cals (23% fat, 22% protein, 55% carbs)

I did this very quickly in FitDay, using some generics like 'raw vegetables'.  I could have tweaked it a bit to hit the 20/20/60, but close enough.  It is possible to hit those macros, just not something I personally would want to try.

[GershonSurge]

23% is NOT low fat for health purposes. Somewhere around 10% is. 

[GershonSurge]

It's not difficult at all to get a low fat diet. Here is the food I've eaten so far today. I'll be eating about another 1800 calories today.

Food Log 20160814
Meal	Food	Calories
Breakfast
	Banana	104
	Oatmeal, Dry	242
	Apple Sauce	26
Morning Snack
	Bagels, Plain	250
	Cucumber	4
	Tomatoes	5
	Spicy Brown Mustard	5
	Cut Corn	100
	Southwestern Black Beans with Cumin & Chili Spices	125
	Chili Sauce, Sriracha, Hot	18
	Rice, Brown, Raw	353
Daily Totals
	Calories	1,232	7%
	Fat	9 g
	Fiber	23 g	81%
	Carbs	250 g
	Sodium	1,186 mg	12%
	Protein	38 g
	Water	0 fl oz

[USAF-Larry]

From the Healthy Eating page of SFGate:  "Your body uses mostly carbohydrates as well as fats for energy. Because the body doesn’t store carbs efficiently, they’re used first. Carbohydrates turn into glucose, which your body burns immediately or converts to glycogen to be stored in the muscles and liver for between meals. If you eat more calories from carbs or other sources than your body can use, the cells store the excess as fat."

Read full article here What Happens to Unburned Carbohydrates?

[A_Lurker]

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@GershonSurge wrote:

23% is NOT low fat for health purposes. Somewhere around 10% is. 

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The article had people hitting 20% fat, 20% protein, 60% carbs.  They were defining that as low fat.  This is not what someone else would call low fat. The entire point of these studies is that they really don't mean anything.  One person tracks by eye, another person tracks by scale.  One person buys processed items with counts on the package, another eats out and estimates their intake.

They honestly don't mean anything.  They likely have people present a food log and take them at their word.  I say this because I was in a challenge at work.  Three of the guys in the challenge were using MyFitnessPal to log their food so each of them could see what the other was eating.  Three of us had dinner in a restaurant in Port Huron.  I logged the burger at 660 (picked some random burger out of the log) and another logged it at 750, but one of the guys logged it at 500.  I'm guessing I might still have been low.

I had added a 1 hr walk down by the lake before dinner, and did another after dinner, so I wasn't concerned about accuracy (even off with lots of guessing, I ended up more than 2000 calories down from what I burned).

The only way anyone will every truly decide which diet is better is to lock people up and feed them pre-portioned meals, then control their exercise as well.  And it would have to be for a period of time, like 3 months on the diet, then 3 months of someone monitoring them 100% of the time.  Just because you tell people to eat a specific macro doesn't mean that they'll hit it.  And if it's not what they like eating they are almost certainly not going to continue it.

ETA: Pritikin defined low fat as less than 10%, Ornish defined it as under 15%

[A_Lurker]

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@JohnRi wrote:

I eat a diet around 18% protein, 25% fat, and 60% carbs.  I've lost 76 lbs since August 2015.  I used to eat 1800 calories a day, now that I am 22 lbs from my goal, I'm eating around 2100-2200 a day.  I've had to increase my diet to avoid burning muscle. 

Eating is not bad.  Just eating too many calories is.  Don't worry about the macros...

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I whole-heartedly agree with that last line.

I've lost 64.8 lbs since February (I have a lot to lose) and at the moment I eat a diet of 20%+ protein and I don't pay too much attention to the others.  I used to aim for 30% protein but as I realized I would have to eat way more of it then I'd have to lay off some of the stuff I enjoy.  Looking at the last couple of months I'm running around 20% protein, 40% carbs, 40% fat.  My last bloodwork was good, and my sugar levels are within range without the medication I was on before the weight loss started.  Without focusing on the macros I realize that I've ended up in a rough range that I find easy to maintain.  This is a good thing.  This is probably the most important thing.  We can all argue about what the best diet is, but if you can't maintain it then following it is pointess.  You may lose the weight, but as soon as you go off it you're likely going to regain.

Oh, and I'm maintaining a 1000 cal/day deficit, although I max the calories in to 2500 even on days I'm well over 3500 calories burned.

[GershonSurge]

@A_Lurker,

I agree many of the current studies don't mean anything because they are too short and people don't accurately log their food. That's why you have to look at populations that ate homogenous foods because there was nothing else. They have pretty much disappeared now as they have been tempted by the snares of the Standard American Diet (SAD.) 

If you would take the time to watch these twelve videos by Dr. McDougall, they might just save your life. The other option is to throw up your hands and eat what you want while claiming nobody can define a healthy diet.

There are so many fallacies floating around like "carbohydrates are the first thing burned." Not true as the supply of carbohydrates is limited. At a heart rate less than 160 minus a person's age, 70% fat is burned and 30% carbs. It goes up quickly to 50/50 and near the max heart rate it is 30% fat, 70% carbs. 

To answer to the original question is for the purposes of weight loss, the calorie equation works well enough as long as a person eats at least enough calories to cover their resting metabolic rate (RMR.) If they are active, they may need to add some more. However, those who attempt to use high fat diets may not live long enough to lose the weight. 

[A_Lurker]

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@GershonSurge wrote:

If you would take the time to watch these twelve videos by Dr. McDougall, they might just save your life. The other option is to throw up your hands and eat what you want while claiming nobody can define a healthy diet.

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Although I appreciate your committment to Dr McDougall's plan, it's not for me.  I tried a low fat vegetarian diet years ago and I ended up lighter, but with thinning hair (like clumps every time I showered) and in the hospital with a pleural effusion.  Not necessarily from the diet, but as a result of over exertion without eating enough.  So I dieted myself from 407 to 300, hospital, back to 330 once well, dieting again down to about 250, hospital (low iron, dangerously low), off the diet train for years then started back at 360 with high sugar levels.  The first 50 pounds lost addressed the high sugar.  I have neither high blood pressure or cholesterol.  Actually, on these I never did.  My resting rate is in the 50s. For someone who is just under 300 lbs at the moment, this is fairly decent.

On the current eating plan I'm following I'm happy with what I'm eating.  It may not be your idea of a perfect diet, but the one you continually push would just end up with me going off it and regaining weight.  I admit, I'm a omnivore, and if it means I'm not eating the healthiest diet (as defined by your guy and his 12 videos) then so be it.  I don't demonize carbs, in fact I don't really worry about anything except keeping my protein levels over 20%.  However, I find diets with more fat and protein make it easier to control my hunger signals.  Without that I overeat.  So again, the plan that helps me lose weight is (for me) the healthiest.

Genetically, my mother's side of the family is long-lived.  They love their protein and fat, and most of them live into their 90s.  When my grandmother (in her 90s) didn't want to give up her chip pot, the family talked her into it by promising every weekend meal she spent with them would have chips.  Now, I'm pretty sure they fried them in oil - she fried them in lard.  My mother herself would be far more active if not struck by an impaired driver at 85 (when she was walking around a half mile to the bank).  The consesus at the time is that she was lucky she wasn't killed.  My father's side of the family, same basic diet (different region of Europe, but still a love of protein and fat) are a completely different story.  With few exceptions most didn't hit 70.  Jury's out on which side I'll eventually fall on.  Neither side had people into the obese category so nobody really to compare to.

[djgeneral]

Wow thanks for all of the responses guys !!

[Ukase]

Too bad so many of the responses are based on anecdotal evidence. 

The truth is - each and every one of us will metabolize foods differently and at different rates. 

When we think of food, some of us think of things that taste awesome - like pizza or chocolate chip cookies. 

And then there's the ...unusual bunch that think of food as "oral nutrient delivery". The truth is - and I don't know who said it first - our food isn't necessarily supposed to taste good. At least, not so fantastic where we shovel more in than we need. It tastes good to motivate us to eat it for the nourishment it provides. If it doesn't provide a nutritional payoff, I no longer eat it. This saddens me, because peanut butter and nutella are awesome foods, especially when combined. But - even though peanut butter has protein, the calories are high for the amount of food involved. 

There is no hard, fast, one way gets you thin response. One thing I can tell you is that a calorie is a unit of heat. Not an amount of food. We call 'em calories to make it easier on our brains, but there is no precision when it comes to calculating the caloric value of various foods. 

You take a 3 oz. portion of chicken. And - then you take another 3 oz. portion from a different chicken. 

Even if their diets were identical and both were lived in some utopian chicken village where they got to eat whatever it is chickens eat instead of what companies like Purdue and Tyson feed them, they are different chickens. Each will have different amounts of macro and micro-nutrients, resulting in a similar, but slightly different caloric value. 

Can I prove this? Heck no. But it does make sense, right? 

Same thing with an apple. I do think produce that grows from the same plant will likely have more identical values - but who buys two apples that weigh exactly the same? There's always variation. 

There once was this guy who had a 10 candy bar a day diet. Each bar was 220 calories, and he would only eat 10 candy bars every day. He did lose weight. But, as I've said before, being an appropriate weight for your height does not make you healthy. Nor does being over a certain weight make you unhealthy. Being fit, trim and healthy doesn't necessarily equal happiness, either. And - isn't that the real end goal? To be happy? 

Some of us, if we have "body issues" will never be happy unless we're fit & trim. We could be dying on the inside, with blood pressure being 160/102, but if we're thin and fit, who cares? 

So, I would tell you that if you're eating healthy foods - preferably organic, whole foods - even  though my own upbringing makes my wallet cringe at the notion of spending that extra money on products that look and taste identical - then no, you probably don't have to worry about macros - as long as your body is getting the right nutrients in sufficient quantity and quality. 

But, hey, if you're eatin' twinkies and candy and that has your fat intake high - I'd say it's a bad idea. 

If you're having avocados and Kefir with some fresh organic blueberries, and some sockeye salmon, I'd say you're okay - regardless of how many calories you're taking in - within reason, of course.