weight loss and its issues

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Sugar promotes cravings. The more sugar you eat, the more sugar you want. A high sugar meal raises the blood glucose level, which triggers the outpouring of insulin. This excess insulin lingers in the system, triggering a craving for more sugar, thus adding another hill to the roller coaster ride.

Sugar promotes heart disease. When bears are storing up body fat for their long winter hibernation, they consume lots and lots of carbohydrates. When you eat excess carbohydrates, your body turns these sugars into fat. The body stores excesses of most nutrients as a safeguard against starvation. If you eat more carbohydrates than you can burn off, the excess is stored as fats. People who eat too much sugar tend to have higher blood tryglycerides, and this increases the risk of cardiovascular disease.

Excess sugar depresses immunity. Studies have shown that downing 75 to 100 grams of a sugar solution (about 20 teaspoons of sugar, or the amount that is contained in two average 12-ounce sodas) can suppress the body's immune responses. Simple sugars, including glucose, table sugar, fructose, and honey caused a fifty- percent drop in the ability of white blood cells to engulf bacteria.

most foods are ok in moderation - as long as a person isn't overdoing it then it should be fine. anyway, it is not physically possible to avoid sugar completely. every time you eat a piece of fruit, you are ingesting the sweetest sugar of all: fructose.

It is possible to keep sugar levels to a minimum, I don't eat fruit or butter.

A handful of sugar is going to cause an insulin spike and an increase in fat far quicker than a bowl of oats.

http://fit-to-hit.org/2012/01/how-sugar ... t-storage/

It is possible to keep sugar levels to a minimum, I don't eat fruit or butter.

i don't think anyone should eat a handful of sugar, which is why i said "in moderation". your brain will not function if you don't get sucrose from somewhere, it's just a matter of choice as to where you obtain it.

fruit is an excellent source of fibre and essential vitamins, plus it is a great natural, portable snack.

No but some of my Toronto friends or former friends are from Edmonton.

Yeah but Wolf ... you're much closer to perfection than most people (don't take that as an offence, it's a compliment - you're an admirable fellow). Some of us have to expend our willpower on more immediate problems/flaws and don't have so much left over for perfecting our diet by eliminating common foods like fruit and butter.

Yeah but Wolf ... you're much closer to perfection than most people (don't take that as an offence, it's a compliment - you're an admirable fellow). Some of us have to expend our willpower on more immediate problems/flaws and don't have so much left over for perfecting our diet by eliminating common foods like fruit and butter.

Thank you, I understand that. It does require a certain amount of discipline to keep a healthy diet but it is in times when we feel most troubled or stressed that we end up eating unhealthily when we should really be eating healthy. For instance, someone that is having an anxious period shouldn't be eating tons of fruit, butter or chocolate, they should be eating calming foods such as pasta or brown rice.

not many people feel comforted from eating pasta or brown rice. it's a psychological thing for them. it's not fixed in stone, of course, but it is about as easy to change as sexual preferences can be (not gender preferences, but preferences like wanting a slim or blonde partner). if a food doesn't make a person feel good, they won't want to eat it in times of stress.

a lot of it is environmental. if a child is fed buttery cookies or fried potatoes for comfort from age 2, it is very hard to break that conditioning. if it was easy, people wouldn't be obese. have you ever been fat?

not many people feel comforted from eating pasta or brown rice.

No, I have never been fat. My point is people prefer a second of satisfaction instead of eating something that will be better for them in the long run, if you can look at it from that perspective and think about the positive benefits of the healthy food you are eating, it will make more sense. A person can re-frame their mind and that's why hypnotherapy and certain methods work for some people that need to lose weight, they also need a desire and willpower to make a change.

Discussion
We have shown that there is a lower dopamine D2 receptor availability in the striatum of obese individuals than in normal individuals. Moreover, in the obese individuals the D2 receptor measures were negatively correlated with their BMI. The results lead to an association between low D2 receptor amounts in obese individuals or a more-severe eating disorder and higher BMI. Low levels of dopamine D2 receptors have also been reported in individuals addicted to various types of drugs including cocaine,18 alcohol,19 and opiates.20

This would suggest that a reduction in D2 receptors is associated with addictive behaviour irrespective of whether it is due to food, as in this study, or to addictive drugs as seen in substance abusers. Eating is a highly reinforcing behaviour that not only provides nutrients needed for survival, but that also induce feelings of gratification and pleasure.21 Feeding increases extracellular dopamine concentration in the nucleus acumbens,22 which is an effect believed to
contribute to the reinforcing effect of euphoria as well as that of drugs of abuse.23 Thus, one could postulate that the decrements in dopamine D2 receptors in obese individuals represent a downregulation to compensate for dopamine increases caused by chronic overstimulation from feeding. However, an alternative explanation is that individuals with low numbers of D2 receptors may be more vulnerable to addictive behaviours including compulsive food intake.24

In this respect it is noteworthy that obese individuals with a binge-eating disorder are significantly more likely to have a family history of substance abuse than those in the general population.25 It has been postulated that compulsive disorders such as drug addiction, gambling, and obesity reflect a “reward deficiency syndrome”, that is thought to be due, in part, to a reduction in dopamine D2 receptors.26 This study provides direct evidence of a deficit in dopamine D2 receptors in obese individuals. We speculate that in obese individuals decrements in D2 receptors perpetuate pathological eating as a means to compensate
for the decreased activation of reward circuits, which are modulated by dopamine.27 This study cannot discriminate if the brain changes in obese individuals are a consequence or a cause of the obesity. Further studies that assess D2 receptors measures before and after successful weight reduction interventions might help determine if the low levels are due to changes secondary to the individual’s large BMI.

that's right. for obese people, overeating is like a hit of cocaine. one major problem in obesity treatment is that... you can quit cocaine but you can't quit eating. so telling these people to "eat healthy" is telling them to have a tiny fractional hit of cocaine every day instead of the massive dose they are craving. not so easy.

i think people who manage to lose weight and keep it off for their whole life should be understood as anomalies with superhuman willpower.