Good Calories, Bad Calories, by Gary Taubes

As an anecdote,I was 40+ pounds overweight and had triglyceride levels over 800, LDL cholesterol over 300. My doctor said it would be physically impossible for me to reduce these numbers into safe levels with lifestyle changes alone. I decided to try anyway.I tried the low-fat route and not only was it rediculously difficult to keep up with I actually gained weight.I stopped doing that and I said I would eat whatever fatty foods I wanted, excluding fast food, and instead cut out sugar and refined grains after reading similar stuff. Not only was this a lot easier to do, it has immediate benefits. I dropped my triglycerides to 300 and LDL to 190 both within striking range of the effect of exercise able to reduce them to normal. I also lost 25 pounds over the course of a year that I have kept off for more than a year.I started slowly, I stopped with the 2 biggest offenders. Soda and alcohol. Luckly I can have a good time without having a beer and soda was easily replaced with tea.Then I did a few other easy things, whole grain breads and pasta replace the refined versions. If you make a good sandwich/sauce you will barely notice. Replace candy with nuts for snacks. GO with whole grain/oat based cereal, if you want better flavor use fresh fruit.The harder steps were in locating the hidden sugar in the food you buy. Ketchup, lunchmeat, peanut butter, etc. They aren't obvious but you just have to read that pesky ingredient tag. Don't buy anything whatsoever that has high frutcose corn syrup and watch out for hippy sounding alternatives like "dried cane syrup". Don't try to kid yourself that "Earth Power" cookies are any better for you than Oreos.One that I recently discovered which I never expected was popcorn. It is better to eat a whole bowl of icecream than to go for that favorite movie snack. The only popcorn that is moderately good for you is the kind that doesn't taste good.Other than that I buy everything else full fat. Milk, yogurt, eggs, meat, etc. It tastes better and seems to satisfy more.Now if I could only get my ass to the gym on a regular basis...Not necessarily for the weight issue but exercise DOES in fact improve your lipid profile.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

RE: Meat snacksYea meat snacks are going to make you gain weight because of their high sodium content. It is not going to be that big of an issue if you do the occasional beef jerky or pastrami sandwich but if you eat processed meat every day then you will probably notice it on the scale although it shouldn't affect your overal lipid profile more than regular meat. It also may affect your situation if you have high blood pressure which for me isn't an issue (knock on wood). If you need a snack, sub the jerky for unsalted or lightly salted nuts. Its overall less sodium if you need the salty fix.RE: Diet sodaI can't find the original place where I read it but I have memory of reading something about how diet soda actually increases appetite. It was a long time ago that I swore off soda so its hard to remember. By doc though does say that going with diet versions is just as bad as regular although I cannot recall the logic.RE: HungerThe trick I think is not to try to fight hunger. That is just a recipe for disaster. Even if you willpower away from the cookie you will actually eat more at your next meal to compensate. Eat until you are satasfied and just make sure you are filling yourself up with things that will fill you up faster, keep you full longer, and that you actually enjoy. The biggest thing for me was to not feel frustrated and like I was on a "diet" or that I was depriving myself. Portions do matter but if you eat the right things, you will naturally adjust how much you eat.What you eat when also seems to make a big difference. I noticed that I was pigging out at lunch and dinner because my breakfast was usually just a piece of fruit. I realized later that my breakfast choice was actually not much better than eating nothing because all it did was get my appetite going and I gave my body nothing for hours. I switched to oatmeal with walnuts mixed in to give me the 1-2 punch of soluble fiber and protien to start they day. Immediatly I was less hungry at lunch and leaving half my plate at dinner.My biggest challenge then was to make sure not to skip lunch either which I started doing which switched back on my big dinner appetite. I generally try to do all my carbs in the day and try to make dinner heavy on protien. So if I eat pasta I try to make sure its for lunch. I taught myself how to do lots of neat things with beans for dinners to avoid just eating steak or chicken every night (which was also getting expensive).

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

I think the effect of the Balanced Diet recommendations are to stave off problems at the population level. Yea for any given individual you will be making little difference but for the college kid who eats nothing but Doritos and and Pepsi the effect may be to shift away from a poor diet to a better one.Do you need to hit every food group? No. Does the impression in the public that you do help reduce nutrition related disease population wide? Maybe?I would look into the thing about carbs. There is nothing wrong with carbs and in fact some of the things I personally eat are very high in carbs. They just also happen to be very high in fiber which is a net bonus. They give me energy, fill me up, keep me regular, and are hopefully staving off lipid diseases later in life.I have in fact heard about what you mentioned regarding fat and resistance to certain diseases. I think I read somewhere that low cholesterol is actually associated with higher mortality for things like infection, cancer, etc. But it is true that obesity aggrivates almost all of those things so it is a double edge sword considering that it is rare to have low cholesterol paired with obesity. You shouldn't let that deter you from achieving a normal weight.The other issue is that one of the most common lipid diseases is having high triglycerides like I do. This is in fact a problem as it puts you at a much higher risk of diabetes which therfore puts you at risk for things ranging from heart disease to cancer to infection.The best thing to stave off high tryglycerides is low sugar and high fiber. Not to stay away from carbs all together.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)