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Metabolism
Jun. 30th, 2011 07:00 pmI attended a presentation on metabolism at work yesterday. The speaker was a nutritionist, which I didn't think was a perfect match for the topic, but then I realized nutritionists probably do study physiology.
She said calories in minus calories out equals weight gain (or loss). But calories out depend not only on your activity but also your metabolism. The higher your metabolism, the more energy you burn doing the same things.
There was an obvious bias to the talk: that people would want to keep their metabolism up. She listed some ways to increase your metabolism in the short term:
* caffeine (she recommends green tea, which is also an appetite suppressant)
* spicy food - you sweat to cool down, thus burning an extra 7 calories
* drugs (she's never seen an obese crack addict, though of course this method is not recommended)
She listed some longer-term factors:
* increased muscle mass
* exercise
* breakfast
* regular, adequate food intake
On breakfast, she says that when you sleep, your body goes into repair mode and during this time, cortisol reduces your metabolism. Having breakfast (with any carbs at all) leads to the production of insulin which shuts off the cortisol and thus raises your metabolism again.
She said it takes three hours to digest a meal (I actually know that meat takes longer to digest than other things) and therefore if you eat every three hours, you get a continuous release of blood sugar and thus keep your metabolism up.
She said you train your body to expect to get a certain amount of calories and to expect to use a certain number of calories. For example, athletes who work out six days a week tend to lose weight on their rest day because the body uses just as many calories but they tend to eat less. And if you go on a low-calorie diet, your body gets more efficient in using the calories so that when you reach your goal weight and go back to eating a more reasonable number of calories, you will gain weight at first because the body is still being efficient.
She says aging tends to reduce your metabolism for two reasons. First, it takes more work to keep up your muscle mass because your body just isn't as good at it. (I suspect that your workouts have to be longer because your non-workout periods are more sedentary.)
The other reason is that there are more barriers to physical activity. I was thinking arthritis, longer colds, etc., but her examples were children and full-time jobs.
She did address the "rule" about not eating after 7 pm. She says that it doesn't really matter when you eat (besides breakfast), but that most people, after 7 pm, aren't eating because they're hungry. They're doing boredom eating or mindless eating in front of the TV and they're eating mostly junk foods.
Someone asked why you lose weight overnight. She said dehydration.
Someone asked what some good snacks would be. She said in the afternoon, she recommends almonds and dry fruit as energy boosters, but warned that they are high in calories.
She also likes light popcorn, crackers, fruit, and veggies with low-fat, sour cream-based dip. To get protein, she likes string cheese, turkey slices, beef jerky, turkey pepperoni, and the new fad of eating Greek yogurt with fruit.
She also likes tortillas with hummus. She specifically recommended Smart and Delicious whole wheat tortillas (available at HEB) because they are large, have 12 grams of fiber, and don't fall apart when you roll them up like most whole wheat tortillas do. I wrote that down because my tortillas are a little hard to roll up, but then it turned out that's what I was using.
She also likes hummus chips (available at Target), pretzels, and beans and rice.
**
So am I going to try anything new after seeing this presentation? At first I thought there was a lot of interesting information here, though I'd heard much of it before, and I was so happy to finally have a blog topic, but after a thorough review, I feel less thrilled about this stuff, I got bored writing it up, and the only idea I might try is to see if I still like beef jerky and maybe bring that or turkey pepperoni and cheese to work for a snack instead of just the carb-based snacks I usually bring.
She said calories in minus calories out equals weight gain (or loss). But calories out depend not only on your activity but also your metabolism. The higher your metabolism, the more energy you burn doing the same things.
There was an obvious bias to the talk: that people would want to keep their metabolism up. She listed some ways to increase your metabolism in the short term:
* caffeine (she recommends green tea, which is also an appetite suppressant)
* spicy food - you sweat to cool down, thus burning an extra 7 calories
* drugs (she's never seen an obese crack addict, though of course this method is not recommended)
She listed some longer-term factors:
* increased muscle mass
* exercise
* breakfast
* regular, adequate food intake
On breakfast, she says that when you sleep, your body goes into repair mode and during this time, cortisol reduces your metabolism. Having breakfast (with any carbs at all) leads to the production of insulin which shuts off the cortisol and thus raises your metabolism again.
She said it takes three hours to digest a meal (I actually know that meat takes longer to digest than other things) and therefore if you eat every three hours, you get a continuous release of blood sugar and thus keep your metabolism up.
She said you train your body to expect to get a certain amount of calories and to expect to use a certain number of calories. For example, athletes who work out six days a week tend to lose weight on their rest day because the body uses just as many calories but they tend to eat less. And if you go on a low-calorie diet, your body gets more efficient in using the calories so that when you reach your goal weight and go back to eating a more reasonable number of calories, you will gain weight at first because the body is still being efficient.
She says aging tends to reduce your metabolism for two reasons. First, it takes more work to keep up your muscle mass because your body just isn't as good at it. (I suspect that your workouts have to be longer because your non-workout periods are more sedentary.)
The other reason is that there are more barriers to physical activity. I was thinking arthritis, longer colds, etc., but her examples were children and full-time jobs.
She did address the "rule" about not eating after 7 pm. She says that it doesn't really matter when you eat (besides breakfast), but that most people, after 7 pm, aren't eating because they're hungry. They're doing boredom eating or mindless eating in front of the TV and they're eating mostly junk foods.
Someone asked why you lose weight overnight. She said dehydration.
Someone asked what some good snacks would be. She said in the afternoon, she recommends almonds and dry fruit as energy boosters, but warned that they are high in calories.
She also likes light popcorn, crackers, fruit, and veggies with low-fat, sour cream-based dip. To get protein, she likes string cheese, turkey slices, beef jerky, turkey pepperoni, and the new fad of eating Greek yogurt with fruit.
She also likes tortillas with hummus. She specifically recommended Smart and Delicious whole wheat tortillas (available at HEB) because they are large, have 12 grams of fiber, and don't fall apart when you roll them up like most whole wheat tortillas do. I wrote that down because my tortillas are a little hard to roll up, but then it turned out that's what I was using.
She also likes hummus chips (available at Target), pretzels, and beans and rice.
**
So am I going to try anything new after seeing this presentation? At first I thought there was a lot of interesting information here, though I'd heard much of it before, and I was so happy to finally have a blog topic, but after a thorough review, I feel less thrilled about this stuff, I got bored writing it up, and the only idea I might try is to see if I still like beef jerky and maybe bring that or turkey pepperoni and cheese to work for a snack instead of just the carb-based snacks I usually bring.