Chapter 4: How to lose weight in a sustainable way (How to have better health to better serve Krsna)
The 4th part of my book about health: Many of us nowadays are quite a few kilos above our ideal weight. What to do about that?
Chapter 4: How to lose weight in a sustainable way
Many of us nowadays are a few (or many!) kilos above our ideal weight. As the years pass, we tend to progressively gain weight, up to the point that we can barely recognize ourselves in the mirror.
We hear that being overweight can cause so many health problems apart from making us tired, lethargic, and so on. Just the fact of having to carry all the extra weight is a big problem in itself. Imagine if you had to carry one of these big 20-liter water bottles all the time on your back or over your head, walking, running, going upstairs, etc. Surely your daily activities would be a struggle. If one is 20 kilos overweight it means that he is basically living like that.
There is also evidence that being overweight is bad for our spiritual advancement. Srila Prabhupada comments how Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati would severely chastise his overweight disciples, equating weight gain with a lack of advancement in spiritual life. At the very least, being overweight makes us lethargic, which means an increase in the influence of the mode of ignorance.
However, to lose weight is much harder than it may seem. There are many diets around and most of them have something in common: they don't work. One doesn't lose weight at all, or he loses weight at first, but later regains all the weight back with interest.
Actually, losing weight can be surprisingly easy, as long as you know the secret. An essential aspect to understand in this connection is the mechanism our bodies use to store fat and burn it. It's actually quite simple.
Every time we eat carbohydrates, the body produces insulin as part of the digestion process. The insulin signals to all cells in the body that it's feast time: that they should absorb and store the glucose that is being put in the blood circulation as quickly as possible. Although glucose is the basic fuel of the body, it is also toxic in high concentrations, therefore it can't stay in the blood for long.
In this way, all the cells in the muscles, brain, and other organs and tissues are flooded with glucose, and we have energy for our daily activities. We feel satisfied. However, there is a problem: the fat cells also absorb glucose and they store it in the form of more fat. It also happens that insulin will block the fat cells from releasing the stored energy for a period of six hours or more. Chances are that before this time expires, one is going to have another meal.
That's why most diets don't work: they focus on many small meals distributed during the day. This causes the insulin to remain active all the time, which in turn blocks the burning of fat in the body. One feels that he is starving, he suffers like hell, and still, he doesn't lose much weight. What is worse is that because the body is forced to work in a situation where it doesn't get enough energy from the food and at the same time can't tap on the fuel stored in the fat cells, it is forced to reduce the metabolism, starting to use less energy. Instead of burning, let's say, 2400 calories per day, the body may start burning 2000, 1600, or even less. As a result, when a person gives up the diet and starts to eat normally, he becomes inclined to gain much more weight than was lost. In other words: the more one insists on the diet, the more fatty he or she may become in the end. There are cases of persons that, after a succession of failed diets, have their metabolism falling to such low levels that they keep gaining weight even on a diet of 1200 calories per day.
However, there is a surprisingly easy solution for this problem: the process of intermittent fasting we have been discussing.
The longer periods without food allow the insulin to run its course, enabling the fat cells to release their stored energy. The body will then get all the energy it needs from the fat cells, and it will start to lose weight without having to reduce the metabolism. After passing a period of adaptation in the first weeks, one will not feel very hungry, because the body will adapt to the new eating schedule. That's the big secret.
Naturally, if one starts to skip breakfast but compensates by eating a lot of junk food in his "lunch" the effect will be limited and he will still suffer a great deal to be able to go without eating until the next day. For best results, the change in the timing should be accompanied by a change in the diet. One should eat more leafy greens, cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, etc.), roots (like beets, carrots, etc), and much less grains. Healthy fats (in moderation) are much better than grains from a weight-loss perspective.
The general advice given by many health agencies, that one should eat more carbohydrates and less fats is largely based on flawed research from the 1950s and 1960s. The situation was that since the 1920’s the rates of heart disease were increasing in the US, and nobody knew exactly why. When President Eisenhower suffered a heart attack in 1955 the trend became a motive for public hysteria. A nutritionist called Ancel Keys published a study that pointed to saturated fat and cholesterol as the culprits. Now we know that actually, the problem was the rise in smoking and in the consumption of hydrogenated fats (like margarine), but at the time the debate was not so clear and the party led by Ancel Keys won the debate.
Despite the inconsistency of his evidence, he was able to convince many in the high circles, which lead to the establishment of public guidelines about what one should eat. As a result, most of the medical guidelines from there on advised people to go on a high-carb, low-fat diet, eating more grains, sugar, refined carbohydrates, margarine, and refined vegetable oils, and less butter and saturated fats in general.
This campaign was largely successful. The message was passed on and people started to follow the advice. Butter was outlawed, avocados and nuts were frowned upon, margarine and cheap refined vegetable oils were promoted as “good for the heart”, sugar was not seen as an enemy, and the idea that a calorie is a calorie (and therefore from a weight gain perspective, doesn't matter what one eats) prevailed. This led to the explosion of cases of obesity, heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, Alzheimer's, and other modern diseases. Only recently the damage started to be undone, with new studies proving that these previous theories were flawed, and that actually the greatest villains are sugar, refined carbohydrates, and refined vegetable oils.
Examining the situation from a weight gain perspective, foods that are rich in starch, like many types of grains, potatoes, and practically all industrialized products, result in a huge spike of insulin. They make the body store fat and make one hungry, and therefore should be avoided as far as possible if one wants to lose weight. Wheat flour especially should be carefully avoided, because it's one of the ingredients that have the highest glycemic index of all. White bread, for example, has a GI of 75, higher than even pure sugar, which has a GI of “just” 65. For comparison, cooked chickpeas have a GI of just 28, and peanuts are even lower, at just 14.
Foods that are rich in protein (like legumes, lentils, or even cheese) result in a moderate release of insulin, while foods that are rich in fats (like nuts, avocados, ghee, and butter, etc.) result in the release of very little insulin. Therefore, a rule of thumb for weight loss is to eat a lot of vegetables, a moderate amount of fat and protein, and very little carbohydrates. This will keep the insulin low and force the body to burn fat. Doing like this, everything works: you will feel hungry during the first two weeks, when the body is transitioning from burning glucose to burning fat, but after that there will be very little hunger, and the weight loss will be quick and maintainable. I lost a total of 23 kilos during my first year following this system, and was able to maintain the weight afterwards without much trouble. Not only that, but my health also improved tremendously.
The main point is to maintain good habits after the weight loss, continue to avoid junk foods and high glycemic foods, and continue to eat lots of vegetables during the maintenance phase, after the diet. The change should be permanent. If you start to fall back into your previous habits, eating in an uncontrolled way, going back to junk food, etc. the easiest fix is to fast for a few days. This helps to “reset” our eating habits and gives us the chance of starting again with better choices.
This is actually a new approach to nutrition that started to become well-known only in the last ten years or so, but this is in line with what people were following for most of human history. We tend to think that people from past centuries were uncultured idiots, but actually many times the idiots are us. Because in most cultures people discarded the traditional wisdom that was accumulated over thousands of years, we commit so many obvious mistakes. In the Bhagavad-Gita Krsna mentions: “That understanding which considers irreligion to be religion and religion to be irreligion, under the spell of illusion and darkness, and strives always in the wrong direction, O Partha, is in the mode of ignorance”. Unfortunately, this pretty much defines many aspects of our current society.
One of the first doctors to point out this mechanism was Jason Fung, who started by using this system to treat his diabetic patients and later noticed that it also works very well for people wanting to lose weight or to improve their health in general. If you are interested, you can check his book “The Obesity Code” or find some of his seminars online.
Something to avoid
In the previous chapters, we saw much information about why sugar and refined carbohydrates are bad and why they should be replaced by low-glycemic carbohydrates, like boiled sweet potatoes, barley, buckwheat and oats. People that don’t have a problem with the waistline can eat such low-glycemic carbohydrates without much concern, provided they also take a sufficient amount of vegetables and fruits, but for the ones that want to lose weight, it’s better to combine vegetables and healthy fats, reducing the carbohydrates as much as possible.
The worst possible combination however, that should be avoided by all, is the combination of refined carbohydrates and fat (even healthy fats, like ghee). This is essentially a combination that exacerbates the bad qualities of both the refined carbohydrates and fats. It may be an efficient way to gain weight, but if you want to maintain good health, it is not very useful.
When starches are combined with fat and heated to high temperatures, they form acrylamide, a type of stick molecule, that is very oxidative and difficult for our body to absorb. It can do a lot of damage, especially for the cardiovascular system. Many believe that saturated fat causes heart disease, but this is a theory rebuked by recent studies, that show that the problem is not the saturated fat, but the combination of fat and refined carbohydrates. By avoiding refined carbohydrates, and especially avoiding frying, one avoids this problem.
Saturated fat (like found in butter and coconut oil) is actually neutral. The body needs a small quantity to supply its needs of essential fats, and what comes in excess is just transformed into energy. The problem is that the body is not capable of metabolizing fat in the presence of insulin. Every time we eat refined carbohydrates, there is a spike in insulin, and the metabolization of fat stops for a few hours. During that time, the body still absorbs and processes fat, but it can’t transform it into energy. As a result, the fat is just stored in the fat cells. We have thus a situation where the refined carbs are quickly stored as fat (since it’s are quickly transformed into glucose, and the glucose in turn is stored as fat because of the spike of insulin) and the fat is also stored as bodily fat (since the body can’t burn it because of the insulin). To make things worse, insulin causes hunger, therefore after a few hours one will have an appetite to eat more, repeating the cycle.
This cycle is actually a mechanism programmed in our bodies and minds to make us gain weight for times of scarcity. It may sound strange nowadays, but our ancestors were much more concerned with starvation than with obesity. In their case, it made a lot of sense to eat as much as possible in times of plenty and become a little fatty, since they would probably need the extra reserve in the next winter. Our bodies are thus programmed to be attracted to foods that allow the storage of fat. One example is foods rich in fructose (therefore we are attracted to sweets), another is this combination of fats and carbohydrates. The problem is that our ancestors would indulge in it for a few months and then face a time of scarcity. People nowadays indulge continuously, and this has a serious impact on their health.
Recent studies point out that the most addictive type of food is the one that combines an equal amount of calories from fats and carbohydrates. This is a secret largely used by the food industry to create recipes of biscuits, snacks, ice creams, and other types of industrialized foods. Not only do they carefully combine fats and refined carbs, but usually also add sugar, creating products that are highly addictive. Once one is hooked, it's difficult to quit. People are not just manipulated to overeat, but also to eat frequently, making things even worse.
What can we eat then? Actually, it is very simple. If we replace the refined carbohydrates with low glycemic options (such as the above-mentioned barley, buckwheat, oats, sweet potatoes, etc. combined with healthy fats and plenty of vegetables) then everything works normally. Low glycemic foods don’t create huge spikes of insulin, and therefore the body can continue metabolizing the fat normally. The carbs are also absorbed slowly (that’s the whole point of being low-glycemic) and without the spike of insulin, the hunger will come again only when the body finishes using the energy. This is the secret to moderated eating.
We can see thus that the combination of healthy fats with refined carbohydrates is bad. However, If one combines refined carbs with unhealthy fats (like refined vegetable oils or trans fats) his problems are going to be much worse. A diet rich in refined vegetable oils and refined carbs is not only fattening but highly inflammatory, which causes all kinds of health problems, up to cancer.
Insulin and glucagon
As mentioned, every time we eat carbohydrates (or protein, to some extent) the blood sugar rises, and the body reacts by releasing insulin. The insulin causes the cells in the body to absorb glucose, which makes the levels in the blood drop. We feel hungry again after a couple of hours and start to eat again, repeating the cycle. As long as we are eating refined carbohydrates, this mechanism will just work as a rollercoaster, with the blood glucose going up and down, and we feeling hungry (and eating) every time it crashes.
However, when we reduce or eliminate the refined carbohydrates, adopting instead a diet rich in resistant starches, healthy fats, soluble fibers and so on, the release of glucose after the meals will be much slower, which will provoke a much gentler insulin response from the body. This will cause the blood glucose to remain steady as the insulin fades, and thus enable the operation of another mechanism of the body: the release of glucagon.
Glucagon is a hormone that has an effect opposed to insulin. It makes the cells stop using glucose from the blood and instead start to burn fat. Insulin promotes hunger, while glucagon suppresses it. As soon as this mechanism starts to work, one will not only start to lose weight, but will feel much less hunger, and will thus be able to follow his intended diet with much less difficulty. Hunger stops being a ravenous urge and becomes more like a gentle reminder that it's time to eat. The secret is to continue avoiding refined carbohydrates, since the system stops working as soon as one starts eating refined carbohydrates again.
In other words, refined carbohydrates don’t kill one’s hunger. Just the opposite: they just make us feel more hungry in the long run. To feel satisfied, a person needs to eat foods that are rich in nutrients and also a good amount of fiber and healthy fats.
How to avoid loose skin when losing weight
One problem with losing weight, especially when one needs to lose a lot of weight, is flaccidity. Many of us know cases of people that lost weight, but got a lot of loose skin in exchange. This may seem like a normal consequence, since it's logical that when we lose the fat, the extra skin is going to be around. However, there is actually an easy way to avoid that.
Loose skin is a consequence of calorie restriction diets. In such diets, one is advised to make several small meals during the day, totalizing 1000 calories or so. The body doesn't get enough calories and therefore starts to burn fat to fill the gap, resulting in weight loss.
It's possible to lose weight by using this approach, although not very easily, as discussed previously. The problem is that with several meals around the clock, the body will never enter in a state of autophagy. As a result, the fat may go away, but everything else will remain, including the loose skin. Another problem is that one will lose a lot of muscle, because the frequent meals trigger the release of insulin and the insulin blocks (or at least limits) the fat burning, forcing the body to burn muscle to fill its energy requirements.
To avoid that, we need to change our approach, combining the calorie restriction with the idea of intermittent fasting. Instead of several small meals during the day, one should have just two meals, with an interval of not more than 6 hours between them (the 18:6 system)
Even if one eats exactly the same foods and the same portions, this simple change in the timing will result in a big difference. Not only he will lose weight faster and with less suffering, but in the end there will be no loose skin! This apparent miracle happens because the fasting time activates autophagy, a system that is suppressed when we eat frequently.
The word "autophagy" comes from Latin, it means "to eat oneself.” It may sound strange at first, but that's exactly what happens. When there is a long interval between the meals, especially if combined with caloric restriction and exercise, the body starts to look for alternative sources of fuel and raw materials, targeting non-essential parts of the body.
This system gives us two advantages: first is that it allows the body to preserve muscle (allowing one to lose the fat, while preserving his lean mass, and without slowing down his metabolism). Second is that it allows the body to destroy and assimilate the cells from the extra skin as one loses weight. As a result, the skin shrinks proportionally as he loses weight and in the end he will have fit skin, just like if he was never fat.
The difficulty is that autophagy starts only after many hours without food, therefore any diet that does not have provision for relatively long periods without food is destined to result in loose skin and other problems. That’s why intermittent fasting (especially if one is also restricting carbohydrates) can be so successful in promoting weight loss: not only reducing hunger, but also preserving muscle mass and shrinking the extra skin as one loses weight. To potentialize the autophagy, and thus increase the results, it’s useful to combine the intermittent fasts with a few short fasts, of two to four days.