Matt Metzgar

Spitting in the Wind: John Berardi's Fasting Experiment

John Berardi recently did some fasting experiments that got a lot of attention.  He tried one-day-a-week fasts, short daily fasts, along with some combinations and variations of those two.  Reading through the document, however, there are a number of statements that don't seem to add up.  He didn't seem to consider hunger in general, or eating to hunger and satiety, as important tools in weight loss.

John's goal was to lose 20 pounds, even though he was already lean.  Here's one quote from the article when he did an intermittent fasting protocol.  It shows that this is a mechanical diet, and that there is no connection to hunger or satiety in the plan:

"Because you have to meet your daily calorie quota within fewer meals, you sometimes have to eat until you’re feeling more than 100% full.

At times the meals felt too big, like I was force-feeding myself."

Okay, so let me get this straight: he is trying to lose weight, but yet he is force-feeding himself at meals??  That doesn't sound very logical to me.

This came from a forced schedule that he followed:

"Noon Workout session with 10 g BCAA during session

1:30 PM Eat first meal, largest of the day

4:30 PM Eat second meal, moderate sized meal

8:30 PM Eat third meal, moderate sized meal"

Why not just eat to satiety during the 8-hour window?  How could that be any less effective?  Why eat at these exact prescribed times if he's not hungry at these times?  And above all else, why force yourself to overeat at meals if you are trying to lose weight??

Even if he was looking to cap total calories for the day, I don't see any benefit to strictly scheduling the food intake.  Better to eat to satiety and at least not be hungry some of the time. 

This leads me to my next point.  He generally limited the calories per day and tried to consume a similar number every day.  Why not add some flexibility to this?  You could cap the total number of calories for a week, and still allow some day-to-day flexibility.  Hunger is not 100% equal every day - some days the body might need more or less calories.  Even when aiming for a weekly calorie deficit, I don't see any benefit of rigid day-to-day calorie caps.

Something else that was prominently mentioned in the document was moodiness and food cravings.  In my view, this goes hand-in-hand with not eating to hunger and satiety.  You are not giving the body what it wants when it wants it. 

You could argue that what he is trying to do, going from 10% bodyfat to 4%, isn't natural and cannot be obtained by natural eating to hunger and satiety in the first place.  This could be true.  Even given that, there is no reason to totally ignore hunger and satiety (i.e. force yourself to overeat or eat only at prescribed times) during this period.  After all, he states in the document that he wants to remain at this new weight long-term.  I would argue that in the long run, you can't do this by ignoring the body's signals for hunger and satiety.  To do so is just spitting in the wind. 

Eating to Hunger and Fasting

One issue that has come up with my eating to hunger is skipping meals.  Sometimes I'm not hungry for a meal, and so I skip it.  This naturally leads to some type of intermittent fasting, though it's done on a random basis.

After skipping a meal/fasting, I usually feel better the next day.  This is different because in the past, when I've done scheduled fasts, it never seems to work that well.  And this is the key difference for me: if you're not hungry and you skip a meal, I see that as a positive.  But if you are hungry and you skip a meal, I see that as a negative.  I think that in general, if you frequently skip meals when you are hungry, that this will backfire.  It is the metabolic equivalent to dieting, and so eventually hormones will adjust and promote weight gain.  (I would say an occassional mismatch between hunger and food intake isn't necessarily bad.)

But here's where I get stuck with all this: you can "train" your body, so to speak, to not be hungry at certain times.  In other words, if a person consistently skips breakfast and eats larger dinners, then it should be no surprise if that person isn't hungry in the morning.  But this is an artifact of previous eating patterns, and so maybe isn't "natural" (at least in the way I'm thinking of it).  It seems a person could just as easily train themselves to eat big breakfasts and skip dinner.

Based on Cordain's analysis of hunter-gatherer meal patterns, the most common meal pattern was leftovers for breakfast (or no breakfast at all), no lunch, and a larger afternoon or evening meal.  So I guess this might be the most "natural" meal pattern, if there is such a thing.

What I don't like is taking this natural pattern and making it into a rigid one.  Even if a person regularly skips breakfast, if they wake up hungry one morning , then why shouldn't they eat?  This is where a rigid plan conflicts with a flexible, more natural plan in my view.

Still, I haven't put all this together to my liking yet.  My general thought is that a condensed eating window/intermittent fasting should naturally fall out of a eating-to-hunger-and-satiety eating style.   I'll have to think and experiment more on this one.

 

 

Two Months In: Eating to Hunger and Satiety

I've now two months into in my effort to 1) eat only when actually hungry, and 2) stop eating when satiated.  Over the last month, I've become more adept at both skills.  I'm eating to satiety probably 80-85% of the time.  I'm eating only when hungry probably 60-65% of the time.

I've lost another few pounds, though again, I was not looking to do so.  My energy levels have been solid.

The most interesting thing to come up this month is fasting, which I will talk about in the next post.

Skinny Suits

I don't claim to be an expert on fashion, but I have become enamored with fitted suits.  I am calling these "skinny suits" for lack of a better term.  Above is actor Matt Bomer from the show "White Collar" in such a suit.

As opposed to skinny suits, you have the standard "michelin man" type dress suits.  These give men the inflated look.

The last few conferences I've been to, most men had "michelin man" suits (myself included).  I did see one person with a skinny suit in Vancouver, and he really stuck out.

Are there any suit experts out there?  Is there any way to get a skinny suit without breaking the bank?

Paleo Physical Therapy

The other day I slipped walking down the stairs while carrying something.  I sort of tweaked my knee a bit, and so it felt somewhat weak thereafter.

After a couple days, my knee still felt weak.  Then, I noticed my young son doing some "calf raises" (raising up on your toes).  He does them periodically, and they aren't done for any specific purpose (like to reach something high).  I'm assuming this is a built-in behavior which probably helps eventually develop the arch muscles.

I figured, what the heck, I would try them too.  So the last few days, I did a quick set of 20 calf raises in the morning.  Almost instantly, my knee felt better.  Now this could have been a coincidence, but my other knee actually felt stronger as well!

I wonder if this kind of "Paleo" physical therapy, consisting of simple, natural movements, is on the horizon.   I know there are people out there doing similar things already, but I wonder if this could the next branch of the overall Paleo movement.

Is Sitting the New Smoking?

Here's a short article with that title that discusses the dangers of sitting.  I do think the prolonged sitting at most jobs is going to get more research attention in the future.

Sleeping Time versus Darkness Time

As I wrote about a while back, it is still amazing to me the benefits of turning out the lights earlier at night.  Just by pushing the lights out time a half hour earlier, I feel better and more energetic the next day.

What I've come to realize is that the benefits don't come from more sleep, but seemingly from just more time spent in the dark.  I tend to sleep the same total amount even when turning out the lights earlier.  From this, I would argue that there are two nocturnal evolutionary needs in humans: sleep time and darkness time, which are separate concepts.

Here's some wild speculation on the subject.  When I don't get enough darkness time but do get enough sleep, here's what I observe: an occassional and slight deficit in coordination.  By this, I mean that I am more likely to say, knock something else over when I'm reaching for something.  Or stumble.  Something along these lines.  Now it's not like I'm fumbling and tripping all day, but I do notice it is more likely to happen when I don't get enough darkness time.

I would say that this points at some sort of hormonal, HPA axis-type stress that is involved with lack of darkness time.  Darkness time is a time for the central nervous system to rest, whether you are sleeping or not.  Cutting into this CNS recovery time (even given sufficient hours fo sleep) can leave you at a coordination deficit the next day.

This reminds me of a friend from college who had to periodically work the night shift.  He said the next day he was always so clumsy.  When he tried to fix cereal, he would drop the spoon, spill the milk, etc.  At the time, it was obvious to attribute that to lack of sleep.  But now I think lack of darkness (given that he would sleep in the afternoon) played a role.

In the evolutionary era, the amount of darkness time was "pre-determined" by the seasons, as and such no one could avoid it.  Nowadays with electric lighting and devices, obviously it can be avoided.  By the way, I know this has all been said in the book "Lights Out", which I read a decade ago.

After testing, I think it would be cool if some authority-type group added darkness time to health guidelines.  For example, they could say that the average adult needs 8 hours of sleep and 9 hours of darkness (or something like that). 

Are there any studies out there on darkness time (as opposed to sleep time)?  I didn't find any, but hopefully it has already been studied in some form.

Don't Blame the Portion Sizes

I believe I previously linked to this study that looks at eating occasions and portion sizes and their links to overweight/obesity.  After thinking about it for a while, I think the results of the study can easily be misinterpreted.

The study primarily concludes that larger portion sizes have directly contributed to weight gain in the US.  So the solution is for restuarants/food manufacturers to offer smaller portion sizes, right?  Not so fast in my opinion.

I view the portion size effect as indirect evidence that most people are no longer to satiety.  Eating has become dysregulated and so people eat past satiety. 

In other words, if a person is eating to satiety and not beyond that point, then larger portion sizes should have no real impact.  If you're full, then you're full.  Just because there is more food leftover doesn't change anything (except maybe some personal/social guilt).

For example, I was at a restaurant the other day, and I was given large portions.  I really wasn't that hungry to begin with, so I didn't finish the meal.  It really wouldn't have mattered if they doubled the portion size, once I was full I quit eating.

Instead of public policy focusing on reducing portion sizes, I feel it would be a better use of that energy to instead get people eating to hunger and satiety again.

Play and ADHD

Here's an article about a neat approach to ADHD.  The focus is on "self-generated" play.  WHat they do is basically turn kids loose in nature and let them do what they want.

The authors believe that self-generated play, as opposed to scripted play, is crucial for brain development.  This is what Peter Gray, over at Freedom to Learn, has been arguing for years.

Empty Hollow Sensation

Here is a link to an interview with Dr. David Lovell Smith, who recently researched hunger signals.  What's interesting in this short interview is that he ties dysregulated eating (eating when not hungry) to a host of problems. 

But what really surprised me is that he connects it to autoimmune disease.  He discusses how an overloaded digestive system (not eating in tune with hunger) can have spillover effects on the immune system.