I love it when the universe works in my favor. It doesn’t happen often. In fact, I’d argue, it’s rare. I have this little thing called the red-headed curse. It’s the kind of curse where I put my foot in my mouth a lot, I find the long road to every destination (usually after getting lost a few times) and I find myself in awkward situations no one else would ever land in. On the upside, I have lots of opportunities to learn and grow from these, ahem, special challenges.
Anyway, that’s all a tangent to say, in an uncommon turn of events, my world’s collided today. This morning I filmed this video for FHM about The Top 5 Fats to Eat for Fat Loss. WHILE I was filming, two clients alerted me to a really informative new longitudinal study that supports the role of healthy fats in fat loss. Clearly, today was meant to be my day to talk about fat.
A little about the study:
“The new research, by five nutrition and public health experts at Harvard University, is by far the most detailed long-term analysis of the factors that influence weight gain, involving 120,877 well-educated men and women who were healthy and not obese at the start of the study. In addition to diet, it has important things to say about exercise, sleep, television watching, smoking and alcohol intake.”
You can read the full findings of the study here. For now I will just recap the highlights:
“‘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.'”
This is so true. This is exactly why I created my 6 Week Pregnancy Weight Loss Nutrition Program the way I did. The calories from McDonalds burger & fries are COMPLETELY different than the calories from your own homemade burger & fries. COMPLETELY.
Additionally, as I have said a million times, YOU CANNOT OUT WORK A CRAPPY DIET.
“‘Both physical activity and diet are important to weight control, but if you are fairly active and ignore diet, you can still gain weight,'” said Dr. Walter Willett, chairman of the nutrition department at the Harvard School of Public Health and a co-author of the study.”
I have seen this over and over in my years as a trainer. People who come in and work their rears off, only to go home and eat anything they want and find their rear is no smaller after months and months of training. What a waste of sweat!
FOR WOMEN TO BURN FAT AND TONE MUSCLE, YOU MUST CONSUME FOOD AS FUEL.
This means you eat well before your workouts so you can be strong and energized. Then you eat well after your workouts so you can recover and replenish. It’s all part of the female fat loss cycle.
No surprise that the study found certain foods to increase the likelihood of weight gain over the course of the 20 year study:
“The foods that contributed to the greatest weight gain were not surprising. French fries led the list: Increased consumption of this food alone was linked to an average weight gain of 3.4 pounds in each four-year period. Other important contributors were potato chips (1.7 pounds), sugar-sweetened drinks (1 pound), red meats and processed meats (0.95 and 0.93 pound, respectively), other forms of potatoes (0.57 pound), sweets and desserts (0.41 pound), refined grains (0.39 pound), other fried foods (0.32 pound), 100-percent fruit juice (0.31 pound) and butter (0.3 pound).”
And now the words that were music to my ears:
“And despite conventional advice to eat less fat, weight loss was greatest among people who ate more yogurt and nuts, including peanut butter, over each four-year period.”
This is exactly what I talk about in the video above. Additionally, because of my admittedly unhealthy relationship with fat that lasted most of my 20’s, I have really had to retrain my brain to believe, acknowledge and embrace this science. You may need to do the same. This was a long road for me, but I eat a million times healthier now than when I was having my fat free love affair. I eat less volume, because I’m full and satisfied more quickly during a meal. I eat fewer calories because I’m content and more quickly satiated during meals. I have more muscle mass because many forms of my fat are also great sources of protein which helps me build muscle mass (in addition to keeping me full and satisfied for hours on end.)
Eating fat assists in weight loss for all these reasons. Of course, whether or not fat helps you gain or lose weight is completely dependent on what kinds of fat you consume. Do you consume the right fats? This is a powerful diet lesson for moms looking to lose weight, especially if you’re looking to lose post partum weight. Fueling your body well, with good fats, will really help you manage the rest of your diet as you’re on the go from day to day, hour to hour, minute to minute. Having the right kinds of fats in your diet will lead you to make better food choices and curb your cravings for unhealthy snacks & treats.
You want to be sure you’re getting a touch of fat with all your meals and snacks, just as you do with protein. Your sources of fat should come almost completely from nuts (and nut butters), healthy oils (olive oil, coconut oil), wild fish (salmon, sardines, anchovies), avocado, and dairy (provided you can tolerate it.)
Be sure to watch the video above to see learn more about Eating Fat for Fat Loss.
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