A recent column about my husband and I trying to save some holiday weight received the following responses:
“I read your article about counting calories after a trip to Texas. I totally agree. I started using an Excel spreadsheet in 2016 to record every single calorie. My weight ranged from 275 lbs to 231 lbs. Red, from York, Nebraska, said.
“Four years ago, during the pandemic, I decided to get serious. When I graduated from Air Cadet and returned from Vietnam in 1970, I weighed 170. “I set it as a goal for next year’s birthday. I made it one day before (my birthday),” he continued.
“I still track all my calories and keep them between 170 and 180, so I’d say your system is great. Just stick to it,” he said.
Jerry from Tucson had a different view. “I read your column about calories. That’s true to the extent, but I’m not sure it was all that helpful for people in the weight loss game.”
“To lose weight, at any age, you need to burn more calories than you take in. But the problem is in the realm of metabolism, and there’s no easy way to measure it. It’s complicated, and hormones are the main driver of what our bodies do with food, but to solve the problem, we need to study hormones, not count calories. The ‘count calories’ game is a losing one, it doesn’t work,” he explained.
“I don’t take it personally, but being a registered dietitian is not the secret to success in this field. It’s not your fault, but what you’ve been taught doesn’t work. If it did, , we would not have had an obesity epidemic in this country,” he added.
No offense, Jerry. It is certainly true that to lose weight you need to burn more calories than you burn. And not only hormones but also metabolism (how our bodies burn calories) play a role. The same goes for exercise, as it boosts your metabolism. What and when we eat also affects how our bodies burn calories.
According to a 2021 review on the topic published in the Journal of Obesity & Metabolic Syndrome, there are multiple ways to lose weight that are backed by good research. And there is no single best strategy for losing weight. However, these researchers state that “reducing daily calorie intake is the most important factor for weight loss.”
So, no matter what strategy you use, the goal is to burn stored calories (aka fat).
When I asked reader Red if I could use his name in this piece, he replied: I was just amazed that other people were using basically the same system that I was using. The most important thing for me is that it gives me discipline in my eating. ”
Us too. My husband has now lost 13 pounds. And I’m still fighting the last four. Thank you for commenting.
Barbara Intermill is a registered dietitian nutritionist and syndicated columnist. She is the author of Quinn-Essential Nutrition: The Uncomplicated Science of Eating. Email barbara@quinnessentialnutrition.com.
