There’s a lot of conflicting chatter about the obesity epidemic and body-positivity.
The diet and fitness industries are booming and have been for quite some time.
With so much health-conscious advice and programs available to us, how is it that the obesity rate seems to keep climbing? Shouldn’t people be healthier than ever? Shouldn’t diabetes and heart disease be a thing of the past if all this advice works?
Diets are Designed to Fail
Let me share my personal experience with you.
I am 5′ 4″ and have been 240+ pounds, 112 pounds, and everywhere in between. I have been anorexic and bulimic. And I have run the gamut of diet trends. Restricting, binging, and being completely addicted to food in general was a way to cope with issues in my life.
Having meticulously counted calories, fat grams, and carbs, and having tried low-fat, low-carb, Keto and Carnivore diets, I can speak pretty confidently about this subject.
Both times that I lost a significant amount of weight, I did so by restricting my food intake. It definitely works for weight loss. But it is not, has never been, and will never be, a sustainable way of life.
Eat less, move more, right? No.
Please stop doing that to your body. Do not punish your body for doing what it is designed to do.
Self Love and Body Positivity
These days, there is so much talk of self love and body positivity, but the meaning of those phrases is being twisted.
Self-love should not be conditional and body positivity should not take precedence over actual health.
It’s one thing to love who you are as a person at any size. But the reality of the actual health of a person of any size – overweight or overly thin – is something different.
Malnourished at Any Size
In the first photo, I am approximately 240 lbs. Even at that weight I was malnourished from eating tons of sugar and processed foods.
In the second photo, I am approximately 140 lbs. Despite being an average weight, I was malnourished from eating tons of keto products and restricting calories.
I was not eating for nutrition in either situation. Yes, I felt better about my body and the way I looked in the second photo, but I didn’t feel great.
I felt better, for sure. But not great.
When you see an overweight person, it’s easy to assume they are not lacking nutrition. But in most cases, they are.
For example, on Thanksgiving when you eat all the things. Indulging in not only the turkey but the potatoes, the rolls, the stuffing, the sweet potatoes.
After your meal, you are absolutely stuffed, yet you manage to squeeze in a piece of pie or two, and whatever other desserts catch your eye.
A few hours later you’re back at it, picking at the turkey, having another helping of your favorites. And you may actually feel hungry, even though you know your stomach is at capacity. How?
Stuffed but Starving
One Thanksgiving a few years ago, I made sure I stayed Keto/Carnivore.
I had turkey, devilled eggs, and made PSMF rolls. PSMF rolls are a protein-sparing modified fasting recipe made from eggs. I ate until I was stuffed – yet I still felt like I needed more.
Prior to that, for the entire month of November, I had been eating beef only. I was satisfied, happy, nourished, and thriving every day. But on Thanksgiving, everything I ate was from poultry.
My stomach was completely full after eating so much. After dinner, I ‘treated myself’ with my favorite keto ice cream. I could NOT stop eating!
I literally made myself feel sick and my body was crying out for the nutrition it had been getting all month. But I threw it a curveball that day.
I love turkey, chicken, and eggs – don’t get me wrong. I eat one of those things almost daily. But I can’t get by just eating those things.
I had starved my body of whole nutrition for too long all those years of eating what we were all taught was healthy.
Nutrients > Calories
Chances are that an obese person is not that size because of the whole one-ingredient foods.
They are likely eating very processed foods. That was definitely the case for me! It’s not really about the calorie content of a food, but the nutrition.
If you are consuming both carbs and fat, your body will use the most readily available fuel (carbs) first and save the slow-burning fat in case of actual starvation.
If you have been restricting calories in an effort to lose weight, your body doesn’t trust you. Your metabolic system has no brain or logic. It reacts based on your actions. Or lack of action.
Whether I was eating low-fat, low-calorie, low-carb, or everything I wanted, I was eating a lot of processed, manufactured food. I always felt deprived, tired, achy, lethargic.
When I began my health mission on Carnivore, I started out still using zero-carb sweeteners and diet sodas. While I was feeling better than I ever had on any other way of eating, there were still times my energy would plummet. Those ‘natural’ and artificial sweeteners were still causing an insulin response. And I still had some minor carb cravings. When I cut those things out, I have consistent energy and zero cravings.
Proper Human Diet
Eating meat and animal products has allowed my body to trust me again. No more glucose spikes and dips.
I have nice, level energy and mental clarity that I thought I would never experience.
I am now 51 years old and I feel better than I did at age 20!
Ready to try Carnivore?
If the above story resonated with you, you can book a 1:1 exploratory coaching session with me.
We will evaluate your diet history together and determine which path forward is best for YOU!
