The Diet With No Name
This page should not be considered medical advice. Always consult your doctor.
At Christmas of 2009, I weighed 270 pounds and was very obese. Since then I have lost 80 pounds.
When I do what I'm supposed to do, I can lose about 2 pounds a week. When I screw up, I gain weight. It's really that simple. One of the most important things I've noticed about losing weight generally is that you have to WANT it. You have to want it more than you want to shove pie in your face. This is not some kind of starvation diet. You can eat whatever you want as long as you avoid certain things. This is not about quantity; it's about quality.
A lot of people ask me what I'm doing, and this page is to document my method. This is not a diet plan. It is not a pill. It is not magic. There is nothing to buy.
The first thing you need to do if you want to lose weight is to educate yourself and understand how your body works. If you don't know what happens in your body, you won't know what to put into it or not put into it. While you *think* you know how your body works, you don't. Your teachers, doctors, and government have mis-informed you. This page is the education you did not get in school. Go through each video and article in order.
To
get the complete picture, you need to start
with Fathead.
http://www.hulu.com/watch/
Then watch the videos in order:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
Then watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
An hour long presentation by Doctor Robert H. Lusting from USCF's Osher Center
for Integrative Medicine. This is not your usual crackpot. His
presentation is called "Sugar: The Bitter Truth." It's an hour
and a half long. Goes along nicely with Fathead, and is better in several
ways, even if Dr. Bob isn't as entertaining.
Read this very reasoned article about the video:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/
The article is written by Gary Taubes, which leads to a series called "The
Quality of Calories: What Makes Us Fat and Why Nobody Seems to Care".
It's by Gary Taubes, hosted by UC Berkeley. I found it fascinating.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
Gary wrote a couple of books you might want to read.
http://www.amazon.com/Good-
Gary just did a nice interview for The Skeptics Society & Skeptic Magazine.
Available here:
http://traffic.libsyn.com/
Gary also doesn't think exercise has anything to do with weight loss, but I
think he's missing some of the bio-chemical processes that come from exercise
and affect metabolism. Bob talks about those above.
The NYT article above is a good read because it gets you thinking about other
things.
Here's an un-associated paper:
http://www.pbrc.edu/pdf/bray-
This article shows some new insights into how insulin affects the brain:
http://www.doctoroz.com/
This article is loosely related to that:
http://www.businessweek.com/
If you sort of kludge it all together, eliminating fructose, reducing refined
sugar, eating no refined carbohydrates, and fewer carbohydrates in general
while eating more fat and losing weight is good for your weight, your health,
and your brain.
And of course, all of that leads to better memory:
http://kent.patch.com/
There are still some pieces of the puzzle missing, but this fills them neatly:
http://www.
Bottom line is that it takes about 4 weeks to stop feeling like crap from eating
a high fat diet while your body makes the transition. If your nutrition is
straight, you're good after that. Notice that the initial study
participants lost more than 22 pounds in six
weeks - although the study was NOT about weight loss.
Once you have completed the above education, you'll have the knowledge to lose
weight at will, down to whatever your body's biological limit is. My goal
all along hasn't really been to lose weight, but to gain my health. It's
an important distinction.
I am now going to describe my method, but you should clearly understand that what works for me may or may not work for you. Every person is different. I know some very skinny people, for instance, for whom this method would be a total disaster. You should listen to your body and make decisions that are good for you. This is what I do, and what I do might not work for you in the same way.
1. Drink water, and only water. Drink a lot of it. I drink 4 liters a day. You may need less, but you should drink plenty.
You
could drink diet drinks of various kinds, but they will just dehydrate you and
make you crave sweet things.
Yes, you can live without sweet
things. No, you will not die.
If you must have something other than
water, then squeeze half a lemon into your water.
2. Do not eat sweet foods, white foods, or processed foods. No pasta, rice, bread, potatoes, or any other refined food. Cut carbohydrates as far as possible until you are happy with your health. Read labels. Avoid corn syrup as if it was poison...because it is.
2a. Do not eat sweet foods. They will make you crave other sweet foods. Artificial sweeteners create the same sweet addiction that you've got going on. You need to break the sweet addiction. Don't believe in sweet addiction? Read this:
3. Do eat green foods. You can have all the green leafy things you want. Just watch that your salad dressings don't have sugar, corn syrup, or some other sweetener in them.
4. Do eat fat. Beef, chicken, pork... It's all good. Be careful of sauces. Most contain sugar.
5. Do eat bacon.
6. Do eat other things that you like. Beans, nuts, fish, and all kinds of other things don't have sugars in them.
7. Do eat in moderation. Eat until you aren't hungry, then quit.
8. Get up and move. No, exercise is not about burning calories. Exercise is also not about suffering. It's about adjusting your body to do work and consume energy. The best exercise for most people is simple walking. Walking 30 minutes a day really won't kill you. If it does, then you've got real problems and should be in a hospital rather than reading this.
9. Weigh yourself every day. When you weigh yourself, remember that you WANT it. Each week, write the numbers in a chart or spreadsheet and keep track. There will be some ups and downs, but you should start to see a general trend line down. If you don't, then you're doing something wrong.
10. Give the process at least six weeks. You will probably feel like crap for the first four weeks until your body adjusts to fat burning mode. Remember that you want it. If you don't make it, then you didn't want it enough. Your body will fight you in this time. Don't listen to the voices. They're trying to sabotage you.
11. After six weeks, eat something you really want one day a week. Saturday is usually my day... Don't take this to mean that you can go out and eat a whole cake, or drink a case of coke. Having one piece of cake, one coke, one sandwich, one bowl of pasta, or one candy bar one time a week isn't going to slaughter your diet. The important part is ONE. If you take Saturday as your 'off' day, and you gain five pounds on Sunday, then you're doing it wrong.
12. Do not try to convert your friends or family to your new philosophy. They don't care, and they will hate you if you try to make them eat what you eat. They will fiercely defend their ignorance. Yes, I know that you would love to tell them exactly how they can pull all that extra weight off and shrink their sagging skin over time too, but they really do not want to hear it. So don't try. The best thing you can do for your friends and family is lose weight and SHOW them that what you are doing works. If they express an interest, then direct them here and let them educate themselves.
13. Be aware that your friends and family will try to sabotage you at every turn. I have seen this very often both personally and in other contexts. If one person in an office starts to get fit, everyone else immediately starts a cycle of sabotage. They will come in with hot glazed donuts. They will try to take you to your favorite ice cream shop. They will buy you boxes of candy. They will bring you a cola. They will sometimes be directly hostile and tell you that what you are doing is dangerous, stupid, ridiculous, crazy, or worthless. They will invite you over and serve French fry sandwiches. Do not be alarmed. Smile politely and eat what you eat. Turn everything else down. If they don't like it, that's their problem, not yours. When friends or family confront you directly or indirectly, thank them for their concern and inform you that you are doing something for your own health that does not affect them and they have no right to be angry or upset with you. You are an adult and you can think for yourself. Be polite but firm.
14. If you start to have any ill effects, consult a doctor.
15. Take care of your skin. Wear sunscreen. Exfoliate.
16. Be creative. If you have to eat at a burger joint, for instance, order a double with cheese and tell them to hold the bun.
17. Bring your lunch to work. You will save money and be able to stay on track.
18. If you screw up and eat a piece of birthday cake or something during the week, don't use that as an excuse to blow the rest of the day, rest of the week, or rest of your life. Keep moving forward.
19. Listen to happy music.
20. Avoid stress.
That is all.
Shane