Posted: Wednesday, March 7, 2012 12:15 am | Updated: 9:24 am, Wed Mar 7, 2012.
How to obtain rapid weight loss safely and not create nutrition deficiencies.
In my previous editorials on weight loss, Part I and Part II, I discussed the following:
1. Weight loss is not natural; our physiology favors fat storage, not fat loss. The mere act of losing weight, skipping meals, decreasing our food intake and hyperinsulinemia (too much insulin) all either signal our bodies that we are in famine, or cause the enzymes that control fat burning or fat storage to favor fat storage.
2. Losing weight most often is really losing lean tissues such as muscle, organ tissues and hormones, as well as fat, which slows our metabolism and sets us up for fat storage as well as is dangerous. This is one reason why 95 percent of those who lose weight will gain it back.
I also discussed how ultimately it is a dysfunctional pancreas that causes too much insulin to be released in our bodies, leading to insulin resistance (type II diabetes), high cholesterol, high blood pressure and central obesity (abdominal girth greater than 40 inches in males and 35 inches in females). These are known as the "deadly quartet," metabolic syndrome or Syndrome X which has skyrocketed in the past 30 years. (Even though my waist was a size 34, my abdominal girth measured 39.5 inches just prior to Thanksgiving 2009 and I am sure it exceeded that following the holidays. I believe in walking the walk if I talk the talk so I went on the Ideal Protein diet Dec. 27 and lost 25 pounds within six weeks!)
So what is it that causes a dysfunctional pancreas? It is the typical North American diet, grossly disproportional in its share of saturated fats and sugars such as in breads, cereals, muffins, cakes, pastries, pasta, rice, corn, fast foods and surprisingly diet soda, that has caused this cascade of physiologic events and a host of other related conditions including several types of cancers, sleep apnea, arthritis, gout, stroke, heart disease, etc. And once on the medications prescribed for these conditions we are told that we will be on them for life. We are told that we must lose weight to prevent or maybe reverse these conditions. If we are even told how to lose weight we are usually led to these three ways:
1) Eat less
2) Eat a balanced (healthy) diet
3) Exercise
See more here:
The Skinny on Weight Loss: Part III
