Fat shaming

In the video below, James Corden touched a cord (pon intended) when he eloquently spoke in his monologue. He told us about how he felt when Bill Maher said that Fat Shaming was due for a comeback. I was not fat-shamed when I was young because I only got obese well passed my 30s. However, I was bullied frequently enough when I was in high school. This makes me think that anyone in high school is bullied or shamed for one reason or another. This is just the way teenagers are. This is not to justify it, but rather to point out that the very nature of bullying is unreasonable. We should not take it seriously or think less of ourselves because we are bullied, teased or shamed.

Is not your fault

People, especially the young, that are obese or simply overweight are particularly vulnerable. As James said, they might tend to use food as a security blanket when they are depressed, thus setting the vicious cycle. Here I want to make it clear that in most cases, obesity is NOT the fault of the individual, it is a disease and as such, it has a cure. Shaming someone for being overweight is not only wrong, but it is also stupid. The solution, as James wisely says, is in educating the patient on how to deal with obesity. Unfortunately, there is much misinformation and the field of nutrition is at the very least confusing and full of false claims. I for one spent decades expecting a low-fat diet and a daily 45-minute walk to cure my obesity. Year after year it only got worse.

Missing the proper information

Then, when I decided to make a dramatic change in my life, the how was simply NOT there. I was not fat-shamed, but I was doing plenty of that to myself. My doctor too trie to fat shame me without offering one iota of advice on what to do. I never consulted a nutritionist because I knew what the advice was going to be and I was already doing it: low-fat diet and exercise. Let me be clear about this because I do plenty of exercises: It is NOT the cure for obesity. Incidentally, neither is a low-fat diet. The chance you need to take is far less traumatic than you think. It is not about working out for 8 hours a day for 6 months like in the Biggest Loser TV show because as we know, that failed miserably and most contestants regain the weight back.

Exercise is hard, on SAD

Exercise is a great thing, but it will not put you in a way to weight loss because you simply have no motivation to exercise. In the Standard American Diet (SAD), you eat at least 3 times a day and eating a low-fat diet. You are under the influence of insulin all day long and your energy is derived from glucose. The storage of glucose as glycogen is quite limited, and thanks to insulin, the excess is stored as fat. So you see, if glucose and glycogen are depleted you will feel weak and hungry. Exercise is hard after eating, even for me who feels fit and energetic before eating.

Making the Switch

To get more glucose, you go eat more and insulin maintains your drive to eat more. This continues until you make the switch, form a carbohydrate-based metabolism to a lipid-based metabolism. To achieve this all you need to do it progressively increase the time between meals until you adapt to OMAD. One Meal A Day (OMAD) transforms your metabolism because your insulin secretion is reduced to only one time a day. As insulin is out of the picture, your body secretes glucagon, the fat mobilization hormone. This is when your body will slowly adapt to fat metabolism. Your body fat is a better source of energy because the energy thus produced is more efficiently used. But let’s face it when you are overweight, exercise is also difficult. I know because if I had to load up 60lbs, my performance in my daily routine would be terrible.

Now is up to you

So you see, up until now, obesity was not your fault. And I do mean “until now”. Because if you do not take action and begin taking steps toward OMAD, you are failing to control your insulin. Now you also need to control Grehlin, the appetite hormone. Fortunately, Grehlin spikes within 30 mins before your meal and then slowly decreases. Resisting eating for 30 min. more is not as hard as it sounds. The truth is that Grehlin’s effects are not incremental, they are transitory. After spiking, Grehlin slowly goes away until the next meal. Today, after years in OMAD, I can categorically say that I do not feel hungry but once a day. My workout performance is far more impressive before my meal than after it. Here is a suggestion on what to do to test your ability to enter the OMAD regimen and leave hunger in the past.