Still Counting Calories? Your Weight-Loss Plan May Be Outdated

The New York Times is finally acknowledging something I (and others) have been saying for quite a while now: Calories aren’t everything!

The old adage “everything in moderation” is just simply wrong. There are some things you can eat in abundance, whereas other foods you should avoid as much as possible. As one doctor puts it in the article, “The notion that it’s O.K. to eat everything in moderation is just an excuse to eat whatever you want.”

The gist of the article is summed up nicely in this excerpt:

“This study shows that conventional wisdom — to eat everything in moderation, eat fewer calories and avoid fatty foods — isn’t the best approach,” Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, a cardiologist and epidemiologist at the Harvard School of Public Health and lead author of the study, said in an interview. “What you eat makes quite a difference. Just counting calories won’t matter much unless you look at the kinds of calories you’re eating.”

Once again, conventional wisdom isn’t always all that wise!

Some other interesting findings from the article:

• People who eat a lot of nuts and yogurt had the most weight loss over a four-year period.
• Full-fat dairy has a neutral effect on weight loss.
• Metabolism takes a hit from refined carbs — meaning that people who consume a lot of them have slower metabolisms (how many calories are used at rest).
• People who sleep less than six hours a night tend to gain the most weight.
• Predictably, TV watching and alcohol intake (aside from a glass of wine a day) were linked to weight gain.

All in all, an interesting article proving that what we think we know about health and weight loss is constantly evolving.