WHY "EATING LESS AND EXERCISING MORE" DOESN'T WORK!

by Nicklaus Millican MS, RD, CES

Your Body Doesn't Count Calories!

Most people think about their body-fat in terms of a simple model: the Calories-In - Calories-Out = Body-Weight model. The concept of the calorie has done more to influence what we think we are supposed to eat than any other nutritional concept I can think of. Calories are the reason we're told to "eat less and exercise more." However, most people don't really know what a calorie actually is.

We speak about calories almost as though they are an ingredient in food--we eat those calories and they become part of us--we exercise and burn them away. But this is far from the true definition of a calorie.

In reality, a calorie is more like the reading on your thermometer; it is a measurement of heat. To find how many calories a food has, that food is burned in a "bomb calorimeter" and measured for how much heat is produced. Can you imagine how many calories are in a block of wood!?

I'm being sarcastic, but only slightly. Now that you know what a calorie is, ask yourself if you think the food you eat is actually burned over an open flame...like a marshmallow over the campfire. Of course not! Your body's metabolism is the product of billions of interconnected biochemical cascades taking place every millisecond of every day. To reduce that beautiful harmony to a bomb calorimeter is inaccurate and harmful.

We are getting fatter and fatter! Some people would say this is because we are NOT eating less and exercising more. But the truth is that we are getting fatter because we ARE (trying) to eat less and exercise more! The real problem is that eating less and exercising more doesn't work.

Why ELEM Doesn't Work!

There are at least 4 major reasons Eating Less and Exercising More (ELEM) does not work!

1. Body-Fat doesn't come from eating too much and/or exercising too little.

According to energy-in - energy-out, you get fatter when you eat more calories than you burn; it is a quantitative idea. But again, what happens in your body is infinitely more complex than this. If you want to understand where body-fat really comes from, you need to take a qualitative approach.

Think of your food in terms of signals: some signals tell your body to get fatter, and some tell your body to lose body-fat. Thinking this way isn't as hard as it may seem. Imagine eating 500 calories from a steak and some vegetables...this meal is going to send some type of signal(s) to your body. For now, we're not worried what that signal is. Now, instead imagine eating 500 calories of a candy-bar. Even though the amount was identical in the 2 meals, you can probably accept that your body reacts completely differently to these two meals.

So more than amount, we see type is far more important in regulating your body-fat. The same goes for exercise: some types of exercise are great at reducing body-fat, other are not; however, the amount is far less important than choosing exercise that sends the correct signal. This concept of signals also applies to other factors you may not expect--like sleep, stress, and numerous others.

2. Weight lost with ELEM doesn't only come from body-fat.

I think one reason ELEM is so destructive is that it seems to work...for a while, anyway. Many people do lose weight when they start to ELEM. However, the keyword there is "weight."

Weight is simply a measurement on the scale. It does not show you if that weight is actually coming from body-fat. In fact, most of it isn't. More than half of the weight lost with ELEM comes from non-fat parts of your body, like muscle or blood volume.

Maybe this wouldn't be so terrible if it weren't for 1 simple fact: muscle burns fat! When you start to lose your muscle, and other fat-burning tissues, you gradually become less capable of reducing your body-fat.

3. Energy-in and Energy-out always balance!

Initially, this statement may not make total sense. But let's get into it.

Know that energy is your body's most valued asset. You have incredibly sensitive and powerful mechanisms to detect your body's energy status. When your energy runs too low, as in ELEM, your brain and body adapt by:

• Increasing your drive to eat
• Making your tired, lethargic, and depressed
• Deceasing the amount of fuel you burn; for example, your may get cold easily because your body doesn't create as much heat

These changes are NOT negotiable. You cannot forever "will-power" yourself to through this biology of your body. It occurs in deep levels of your brain and in every cell of your body, beyond the reach of discipline.

Conversely, when you provide your body with enough food and the right signals, you:

• Increase energy expenditure
• Decrease appetite

4. ELEM makes you regain all of your lost body-fat (plus more)!

Let's recount some key points:

1. Body-fat is regulated with signals--types more than amounts
2. ELEM decreases your body's ability to reduce body-fat
3. ELEM causes you to develop an unhealthy relationship with food and encourages binge-eating

It's important to keep these in mind because they create a vicious storm once you can no longer tolerate ELEM.

After a long bout with ELEM, your fat-cells become incredibly sensitive to absorbing fat. Not only that, but once you break ELEM, you are likely to start binge-eating foods that are full of fat-gain-signals...with less muscle to help buffer the fat-gain. This causes a rapid regain of your body-fat.

If that isn't bad enough, the speed at which you regain that body-fat is a signal to your body to create more fat cells. Now, you have an increased capacity to carry body-fat and likely end up with more body-fat than when you started.

Conclusion

ELEM is an unsustainable, ineffective, and harmful strategy for fat-loss. Since it's conception, we have not become thinner and healthier--we have become fatter and sicker! THIS IS NO COINCIDENCE. When 99% of people eventually fail with ELEM, you must ignore those who insist on this strategy...you must realize, you have not failed if you've tried to ELEM but are still overweight--rather, it is the advice to ELEM which has failed you. The only excuses for continuing to insist on ELEM by those who should know better are either arrogance or insanity.