Are Calories All That Count?

Welcome to the top 10 questions about fitness, nutrition and lifestyle. My name is Ben from BenGreenfieldFitness.com and in this video series, I'm going to answer the top questions that I get about exercise, human performance, and diet. And the first question I'm going to answer in video 1 of this series is a question from Tina, who says, my doctor told me that the problem with my weight is that I eat too many calories. But I have been eating just 1200 calories per day for the past 10 months, and I've actually gained 5 pounds. How can this be? Well, Tina, the idea is that you can't just think about calories in terms of simple caloric balance, meaning that a lot of people would have you believe, even nutritionists, registered dietitians, or physicians will say calories in, equal calories out. Meaning that if you eat 1200 calories and you go out and you burn 1700 calories, then you'll burn 500 calories a day and you'll lose a pound of fat a week. But in reality, if you were to go out and eat, for example, like 12 of those 100 packs of Oreo cookies, and then you were to go out on a different day and you were to eat 1200 calories of salad, fruits, vegetables, whole whole grains, nuts, and a little bit of lean protein, your body is going to respond a lot differently from a hormonal perspective to the 1200 calories of real food versus the 1200 calories of pure sugar. There's many reasons for this, but one of the primary things that you need to think about is the fact that your body produces a certain amount of hormones in response to a high sugar diet. And that high sugar diet creates what's called inflammation in your bloodstream. And inflammation in your bloodstream or your gut can lead to. It's basically almost like a cascade of fat gain. It can trigger your body's ability to actually hold onto fat or decrease your body's ability to lose fat or even increase your body's ability to turn sugars into fat. And so what this boils down to is that no matter how many calories you're eating, it's going to go a lot deeper than just calories. Start to look into some things like the glycemic index of the foods that you're eating. If you don't know what the glycemic index is, then Google it. Look into the potential for food allergies to certain foods that you might be consuming. Gluten, dairy, soy, and eggs are four examples of triggers for food allergies. And then just look into basically how your body feels after you eat, what type of make you feel sluggish, what type of foods maybe don't give you quite as much energy. And those are the type of foods that may be not so healthy for your unique metabolism. So it comes down to a lot more than just counting calories. Start to pay attention to more details about the foods that you're eating, and you'll see better results. This is Ben from BenGreenfieldFitness.com and that was the answer to question one from our top 10 fitness, diet, and lifestyle questions about everything from fat loss to human performance to nutrition. Thanks, Tina.