As anybody who reads this blog knows, I am not a fan of The Biggest Loser. It is what it is... entertainment. But it has absolutely nothing to do with the reality of living with excess weight, losing it, or keeping it off. So when three different people emailed me yesterday asking my opinion of the latest study that came out about the contestants of the 2009 season regaining much of the weight they lost, some gaining even more, I was far from shocked.
It's obvious that many of them would have regained the weight, but I think it's important to address some of the issues mentioned in the New York Times article about what happened to their metabolisms and what those changes mean for long term weight loss. The conclusions are not as dire as they might seem.
1. Massive, rapid weight loss is unrealistic and unsustainable. Dur. That has been common wisdom for a long time. Under the bizarre and extreme circumstances that they lost the weight, we should not be surprised that they gained it back.
2. Health-wise, weight loss of 5-10% of body weight is enormously beneficial for anyone who is overweight or obese. In other words, a 250 pound woman who loses 15 -25 pounds can expect to feel better and have better health outcomes. Period. It's about how we feel, not about how we think we look. Big can be beautiful, but if we don't feel so good, small increments of weight loss are worth the effort and much more easily maintained.
3. Changes in diet and physical activity should be sustainable. If you can't imagine doing it for the rest of your life, don't bother. Move and stand whenever and however you can. Become a hummingbird. Flutter about constantly and you will boost your metabolism. Physical activity is good for you regardless of weight loss.
4. Make muscle maintenance part of your fitness routine. Muscle burns more than fat and keeps your metabolism up. You only need a few minutes a day of strengthening exercises to make this happen. See my new series of 5-minute workout videos or sign up for the newsletter to get a new one in your mailbox every two weeks.
5. The article talks a lot about hunger. The hormone, leptin, does drop in people who have carried and lost a bunch of extra weight, but hunger can be remedied by eating a ton of high fiber, high water content foods... fruits and vegetables... and lean protein. You don't have to be hungry. You just have to find foods that you like, that fill you up and don't pack on the pounds, and eat a bunch of them before the hunger hits.
We should not be trying to glean any wisdom from The Biggest Loser, except that it doesn't work. Though this is an interesting scientific study of biology and extreme weight loss, what happened to most of them will never happen to any of us. Metabolism naturally drops when body weight drops, but with slow, steady weight loss, the calories we burn will remain in line with our body size. When you are smaller, you need to eat fewer calories. It's an unfortunate fact, but that's the reality. Not a problem if the changes have come naturally, sustainably aligned with the reality of our lives.
If we assault our bodies by starving them and beating them down with 8 hours of pounding exercise every day, we will mess them up. That's all. No big surprise.
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