The important thing, in so many different areas and on so many different levels is ... what WORKS?
That's what my blog is all about. Doesn't matter what the researchers (and dilettantes) philosophize -- if theory (actually, hypothesis) doesn't fit what happens in real life, it ain't true. And i'm not calling genetically-engineered rodents "real life." For flesh-and-blood humans who want to shed a few pounds, what WORKS?
What kind of alternate universe do some "scientists" inhabit? My guess is, it's one where there are no actual physical NEEDS -- just ***ideas*** tra la la....
How many times has a certain philosophy "made sense" and yet turned out to be 180-degree WRONG? [cough **lipid hypothesis** cough...] "Just logical" reasoning put us in the position we now inhabit: ELMM! CICO!
Raspberries. The shoe doesn't fit.
Showing posts with label theory/hypothesis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label theory/hypothesis. Show all posts
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Sunday, March 11, 2012
still benefitting from the magic, a tribute, and more
I am completely flabbergasted by the way "Strong Medicine" is STILL working. If you follow Dr. Donaldson's directions perfectly, you lose weight at a steady predictable rate. If you occasionally make a minor diversion, you MAY do even better.
Yesterday, my porky breakfast was overlarge, and my lunch appetite didn't appear; i varied things up with half a small acorn squash with butter and a couple of ounces of sake in mid-afternoon. Then i had my freshly-crockpotted chuck roast for supper (without the coffee) ... and found myself down a WHOLE pound this morning.
Why, in the names of all the gods at once, is this book not still in print?! I'm forever in the debt of that dear lady, H, who recommended it -- and i'm going to change the template of my post in her honor, because she mentioned the current one bothers her eyes!
***
So far, today has already been stellar in the blogging world, with Pal Jabekk and Zoe Harcombe contributing intelligent, fact-rich, applicable-in-vivo-as-well-as-in-theory articles. One can read a long time without picking up stuff that one can actually USE....
As a matter of fact, Mr. Jabekk wrote a very good essay last year, on the subject of "setpoint theory" which i agree with intellectually as well as through experience. I've always HATED the acceptance this HYPOTHESIS has so long enjoyed, as it's absolutely unfathomable by my "instincts of rightness" ... or call it "intuition"! Sorry, but when my subconscious mind puts the brakes on believing in something, i've learned (over 56 years) that it pays to heed it!
Enjoy the rest of the weekend, everyone!
Yesterday, my porky breakfast was overlarge, and my lunch appetite didn't appear; i varied things up with half a small acorn squash with butter and a couple of ounces of sake in mid-afternoon. Then i had my freshly-crockpotted chuck roast for supper (without the coffee) ... and found myself down a WHOLE pound this morning.
Why, in the names of all the gods at once, is this book not still in print?! I'm forever in the debt of that dear lady, H, who recommended it -- and i'm going to change the template of my post in her honor, because she mentioned the current one bothers her eyes!
***
So far, today has already been stellar in the blogging world, with Pal Jabekk and Zoe Harcombe contributing intelligent, fact-rich, applicable-in-vivo-as-well-as-in-theory articles. One can read a long time without picking up stuff that one can actually USE....
As a matter of fact, Mr. Jabekk wrote a very good essay last year, on the subject of "setpoint theory" which i agree with intellectually as well as through experience. I've always HATED the acceptance this HYPOTHESIS has so long enjoyed, as it's absolutely unfathomable by my "instincts of rightness" ... or call it "intuition"! Sorry, but when my subconscious mind puts the brakes on believing in something, i've learned (over 56 years) that it pays to heed it!
Enjoy the rest of the weekend, everyone!
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
cut and dried, and packed in a nutshell
Yesterday i read a blog which caused me to say to myself: THIS IS IT. The tag-team match is over, and Taubes' group wins. I raise my cup of tea with coconut milk in it to Peter at Hyperlipid (i'd raise a glass of good French champagne, but it's not on my diet for at least another couple of weeks)!
Check out this post, and this one, too -- Peter's own words are worth reading. If you want the short version, it goes like this: INSULIN DRIVES FAT STORAGE, ergo obesity. Yes, you can screw with your fat cells' receptivity of insulin via the brain, but that doesn't mean the brain is the key organ of people's weight problems.
Don't want to gain weight, keep your fasting insulin low. Keep your fasting insulin low by keeping your blood sugar low. Keep your blood sugar low by being careful of what carbohydrates you eat, AND HOW YOU EAT THEM*. If you once develop a metabolic handicap you'll have it for years, possibly to the end of your life, whether you lose weight or not.
Oh -- to fine-tune, make sure you don't damage your hypothalamus (brain end of the equation) with the common toxins of aspartame (Equal) or MSG (which hides under many different names on ingredient lists) -- that's one of the ways the researchers screwed with the rat brains.
* Apparently, those who use the Kitavans as poster children for a high carbohydrate diet didn't tell the whole story of HOW the islanders eat: one big meal a day. They store the carb as fat, then live on the fat taken from storage for the next 23 hours. [sarcasm alert] Yeah -- that's similar to how people here eat high carb....
Check out this post, and this one, too -- Peter's own words are worth reading. If you want the short version, it goes like this: INSULIN DRIVES FAT STORAGE, ergo obesity. Yes, you can screw with your fat cells' receptivity of insulin via the brain, but that doesn't mean the brain is the key organ of people's weight problems.
Don't want to gain weight, keep your fasting insulin low. Keep your fasting insulin low by keeping your blood sugar low. Keep your blood sugar low by being careful of what carbohydrates you eat, AND HOW YOU EAT THEM*. If you once develop a metabolic handicap you'll have it for years, possibly to the end of your life, whether you lose weight or not.
Oh -- to fine-tune, make sure you don't damage your hypothalamus (brain end of the equation) with the common toxins of aspartame (Equal) or MSG (which hides under many different names on ingredient lists) -- that's one of the ways the researchers screwed with the rat brains.
* Apparently, those who use the Kitavans as poster children for a high carbohydrate diet didn't tell the whole story of HOW the islanders eat: one big meal a day. They store the carb as fat, then live on the fat taken from storage for the next 23 hours. [sarcasm alert] Yeah -- that's similar to how people here eat high carb....
Monday, January 9, 2012
experience
One of the things that influenced me to start blogging was my own need to find information about what dietary "tricks" work for people like me. All the world knows, there is NO dearth of nutritional advice to be had! What's the good of standard dietary recommendations, though, which have obviously encouraged the obesity epidemic? Of plans which have a 95% failure rate? Of strategies which show, upon analysis, 99% recidivism?
What good to me is the regimen which a 25-year-old male gym-rat finds effective? Or even a 55-year-old male gym-rat? Young women's experiences aren't much more helpful -- these things were great when i was 30, but don't work well any more.
I did what any modern seeker does: i googled it. "Middle-aged woman weight loss low-carb paleo blog" brought up a number of websites for me to check out, but only one of them resonated (hi, Steph!). She's more than a decade younger than i, but i think we have more in common than not. Reading what she has to say has been instructive and uplifting. I want to pay forward with any of my experiences that can possibly be of help to another person in analogous circumstances.
Most people can agree that context matters. Not only do other baby-boomers have a more similar nutritional background to mine (than someone much younger), but they're at a comparable hormonal place, AND a great many of them will have tried to lose weight over the last quarter-century. It's not a stretch of the imagination to think that, what they have experienced and succeeded with is more likely to be useful to me than the theoretical knowledge of someone just out of college.
"If you are wounded, look for a man with scars." I don't guarantee i got the quote quite right -- i haven't seen that episode of Dr Who in a long time -- but the concept made an impression on me. If one has a problem, someone who has also dealt with the problem (maybe even solved it) is my first choice for advice.
There are LOTS of good paleo/primal/ancestral websites to read, so if you have limited time so spend on them, how do you choose which ones to follow? You won't agree with ANY of them all the time! Some aren't as well-written, though the content may be outstanding, and some which are highly readable and entertaining don't offer information that is really usable. Try a lot of them; frequently, the websites THEY link to are the most valuable thing on the page.
Above all, choose your go-to sites for applicability. If their philosophy gibes with your experience, you're bound to benefit more from their recommendations than from those of the theoreticians, promoting the hypothesis-du-jour.
What good to me is the regimen which a 25-year-old male gym-rat finds effective? Or even a 55-year-old male gym-rat? Young women's experiences aren't much more helpful -- these things were great when i was 30, but don't work well any more.
I did what any modern seeker does: i googled it. "Middle-aged woman weight loss low-carb paleo blog" brought up a number of websites for me to check out, but only one of them resonated (hi, Steph!). She's more than a decade younger than i, but i think we have more in common than not. Reading what she has to say has been instructive and uplifting. I want to pay forward with any of my experiences that can possibly be of help to another person in analogous circumstances.
Most people can agree that context matters. Not only do other baby-boomers have a more similar nutritional background to mine (than someone much younger), but they're at a comparable hormonal place, AND a great many of them will have tried to lose weight over the last quarter-century. It's not a stretch of the imagination to think that, what they have experienced and succeeded with is more likely to be useful to me than the theoretical knowledge of someone just out of college.
"If you are wounded, look for a man with scars." I don't guarantee i got the quote quite right -- i haven't seen that episode of Dr Who in a long time -- but the concept made an impression on me. If one has a problem, someone who has also dealt with the problem (maybe even solved it) is my first choice for advice.
There are LOTS of good paleo/primal/ancestral websites to read, so if you have limited time so spend on them, how do you choose which ones to follow? You won't agree with ANY of them all the time! Some aren't as well-written, though the content may be outstanding, and some which are highly readable and entertaining don't offer information that is really usable. Try a lot of them; frequently, the websites THEY link to are the most valuable thing on the page.
Above all, choose your go-to sites for applicability. If their philosophy gibes with your experience, you're bound to benefit more from their recommendations than from those of the theoreticians, promoting the hypothesis-du-jour.
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