Why Dieting Makes You Fat - a.k.a. Setpoint Theory

The article in this link on the Big Fat Blog is one lady's opinion, one that I, and thousands of others like me, subscribe to. Dieting Makes You Fat! Period!

57 in 2011; 500 in 52

I now have a goal of losing just a bit over a pound a week for a total of 57 (and a half) pounds by this time next year. I splurged a bit this holiday season, and was unable to exercise as much as I needed to.




I also have a goal of getting the equivalent of 10 miles per week of exercise, too. I know that some weeks I'll get in more, but I'm a realist and realize that due to circumstances I may not get in even half that on some weeks, especially if an injury occurs. My exercise will be a combination of Leslie Sansone and Richard Simmons aerobics, the treadmill, the exercise bike, and qigong.

I might continue the McDougall food plan when it comes to food choices, but, again as a realist, I know I have to calorie count if I want to lose any weight.

I might just eat a wider variety of foods, including meat and dairy, and just keep the unhealthier choices, like hamburgers and peanut butter cups, to a minimum. I might use the Richard Simmons Foodmover to keep track of it all.

I also realize that I may do all of the above and not lose another ounce, thanks to my still uncontrolled hypothyroid condition, ravages of age that contribute in injuries, and decades of dieting that have left me with the metabolism of a sea sponge.

Or a large rock. Sure, it will reduce its mass, but only after a few millenia of constant pounding on it by running water.

I don't have a few millenia, only a few decades left. In my first 24 hours of life my family was told I was too big, to cut my food in half. And for the majority of my time on this planet I was eating less than my body required for optimal health, yet my size remained about twice that the BMI charts says I should weigh. I have a list of medical problems that can be proven to be caused by these food restrictions, from the thyroid woes, through all the musculo-skeletal problems, and now various nutritional deficiencies.

The doc phoned to say my Vitamin D level is lower than any patient he ever saw, that the lab phoned him to say they ran it twice, it's not a mistake, that even they never saw a level that low. He couldn't wait until my office visit next Monday - he wanted me to start supplementation immediately. If you do a web search for Vitamin D deficiencies you'll find that everything I've complained of the past few years could have been caused by it, including my heart thing from September 2009 AND the lack of weight loss AND the inability to find the right dose of thyroid replacement meds.

When I have that vitamin level retested in a few weeks he's also going to test me for a few other vitamin and mineral deficiencies that usually go along with the Vitamin D one.

I'll find out Monday how the rest of my lab work went - liver profile, lipid levels, thyroid. He said on the phone that a few other things were not normal but they could wait until we spoke in person.

And when I see him Monday we're going to have a serious talk about my food plans. Obviously the low fat vegan one isn't working out as well as hoped. If eating this way leaves me with nutritional deficiencies and I'm still not losing weight, why continue with it? Remember Einstein's definition of insanity!

Pathetic and Apathy

I'm still struggling to maintain my weight. Right now I really don't care too much about losing - I just want to stop gaining! I go for follow-up blood work next week and see the doc the week after, and I'm sure he's going to need to increase my thyroid med again.

Besides the weight gain I'm still very, very tired. I fall asleep during the early evening (during Jeopardy, some times!), go to bed for the night by 8:30pm the latest, and when I wake up to hit the bathroom around 2am just can't get back to sleep most mornings.

I ache. My sciatica that affects my also arthritic right hip makes most even low impact aerobics painful, and a few weeks ago I hurt my left leg doing a T-Tapp exercise known as a Hoe-Down.



The human leg was NOT made to move in extreme side directions, especially not the leg of post-menopausal women with osteoarthritis in her spine and various other joints! I still can't move my left leg/hip in certain positions and it's been about a month now.

The 2 above problems also contribute to my lack of restful sleep every night. Who can sleep when her hip is in pain?

As for the weight, I gave up trying to lose anything eating the McDougall way and for the past week have been sticking to strict Phase 1 of the Rice Diet program, the plan people who actually attend the Rice House get put on for the duration of their stay, the original plan devised by Dr. Kempner back in the 1940's. By starving myself on less than 1000 calories a day (I was already keeping sodium low since childhood) I'm now back down to the weight I was at for one day in November, about 2 weeks in March before that. But I'm starving morning, noon and night. I have increased brain fog, worse than on a bad CFS day. I have less energy than ever. I need to follow The Spoon Theory even closer than usual if I want to continue to eat this way.

That said, I would probably spend every day just lying in bed, but I do have responsibilities. I do have to shop, hit the laundromat, do the cooking and bare minimum of housework. Right now I don't even have the energy to get away from this computer and go refill my water glass.

I'm in a Catch-22 situation regarding next week's bloodwork. In order to have a great lipid profile (Cholesterol) I have to continue to eat a no-fat-added, no sugar, no animal products food plan and get a minimum of an hour a day of cardio/aerobic exercise. But if I eat enough to have enough strength to do that much exercise I'll gain weight, making my cholesterol and triglycerides go back up, making my doctor very disappointed in me.

What the heck, he's disappointed already because near starvation levels of calories aren't making my weight go down. He's been after me for over 27 years now to lose weight. Why can't either one of us accept the fact that it's just not gonna happen in this lifetime?

To assist me in accepting this, I'm first going to have a decent breakfast, once I finally peel myself off this seat. I'm going to re-read Dr. Linda Bacon's book, Health At Every Size. Last week I finally got to order Beyond A Shadow of A Diet, another book that promotes the same philosophy as Overcoming Overeating.

I already planned the labwork for before Christmas so this year I can have some indulgence for the holiday without feeling guilt. That's a start, I guess. Hopefully the TSH will prove to the doc that my thyroid med needs to be increased yet again, and my lipids will be as perfect as they were back in March so he'll leave me alone about the weight for a while.

I know, I sound like a broken record, writing the same things over and over again, year after freaking year. Does it ever stop? Will I ever not care? I was there summer 2009, then had the stress-related heart event that has me now labeled as a cardiac patient and sent me back to square one. I would love to get back there again.

Half Asleep

I wish my doctor would believe me when I tell him my thyroid is low and I not only need another lab test but an increase in my meds. I'm so tired I'm napping every afternoon and still falling asleep in front of the tv, some nights as early as 7 pm. I can't do the amount of exercise I need to do, even want to do, because I get part way through and experience severe muscle aches and tiredness as well as loose my "umph." Exercise isn't effective if you're just going through the motions without putting any effort into it. But the doc says I've been stable for 3 months and he feels there's no need for a test, no need for a med increase. Although even LabCorp finally dropped the reference range, my doc is one of those who feels any TSH level under 10 is fine and dandy. It doesn't matter if a patient has a TSH as low as 1.x and still feels like shit. His prescription is to eat less and exercise more. He gave me the same orders when I first complained about my chronic fatigue and hypoglycemia 25 years ago. Ah, an old story on this blog, not worth rehashing again.

Our main car, a 1996 (?) Toyota Corolla, is still at the garage as they try figure out why the brake lights stay on even though the brake isn't being depressed and the headlights aren't turned on. They already changed all the fuses and did a few diagnostics, but I guess it's going to take a while. A few years ago our other car, a Toyota Camry Wagon LE, had rear lights that wouldn't light, the opposite problem. It took four different garages before the cause was found and even then it was only partially fixed - the lights now come on but the inside light doesn't. That was the car that was hit twice in the left front bumper as well as was involved in the fireball when it was parked next to the garage when the gas station we had it at (for those electrical repairs) exploded. Aside from a few minor dings and discoloration in the back tinted windshield from the heat of that of that fire in 2003 the car is going as good as new.

Soup and homemade bread for dinner yesterday and today again. Butternut squash soup and bread yesterday, minestrone soup and sun-dried tomato bread today. Tomorrow is our 31st anniversary - pizza!

Gotta go get my Amazon order in. MXC discs 4 and 5 finally came out today, as well as Scrubs season 7. I still didn't finish watching season 4 on DVD. As soon as those discs were delivered the episodes started playing in constant rotation on Comedy Central. But MXC - a.k.a. Most Extreme Elimination Challange? We've been waiting for these discs for ages and will watch them at least a dozen times, then start with season one and watch them all over again.