Diets Don’t Work—Top Doctors Explain Why (Part 1)

This is going to be a brilliant, brilliant episode because we're going to be covering the 3 reasons that diets fail.

We know from the meta-analyses that have been done that 95— 19 out of 20 diets fail within 12 to 18 months. If you come off the diet, if you come off the weight loss jabs without the information that you need, we know that all of the metabolic problems, all of the weight will come back on in that period between 12 and 18 months. Our 3— the first one is totally in synergy with you, because that is actually understanding the unconscious brain. The second thing is understanding the cell, the components of the cell and the physiology of the cell that actually causes us to trap fat. And thirdly, understanding our macros. All of this has created this entanglement in the unconscious brain, and what you do and what we do is to try and unravel that so that people see the truth.

And not just to see the truth, but then understand the effect that their diet, their lifestyle, their environment has on their health, on their metabolism.

So if you like, losing weight is not really the problem. The problem is keeping it off.

Hi there, I'm Sandra Roycroft-Davis, a Harley Street weight loss specialist, Sunday Times bestselling author, and award-winning creator of the Slimpod program, which works in the same way as weight loss medication but naturally and sustainably. I created Slimpod after overcoming my own struggles with food and self-esteem and am I'm now really proud to say that I've helped over 350,000 people change their habits and break free from dieting for good. In this podcast, you'll hear inspiring conversations with Slimpodders and experts to help you feel empowered, supported, and in control around food again. And if you enjoyed this, please give it a like, hit subscribe, or share it with somebody. Every action helps more people find the video, and it could really help somebody who needs to see it. Let's get into it. So welcome to this, uh, amazing podcast episode. Uh, I've got Paul and Monique with me today who are both senior doctors in the UK with decades of experience in metabolic health. And metabolic disorders. Paul is the author of the bestselling book The Diet Whisperer, and which has been acclaimed for its innovative approach to weight loss, wellness, and disease reversal. And I was sent your latest book, Paul, by, by our publisher, and it's Beyond Weight Loss Jabs. And I was, I was very intrigued because, yes, Carolyn, our wonderful publisher, Charlotte Roycroft-Davis, that she thought it would be right up my street. And, and she was absolutely right. I was gripped from the start, and it's— we're so aligned in what we do. So this is going to be a brilliant, brilliant episode because we're going to be covering the 3 reasons that diets fail, why cellular fat is the key to so many things, and, uh, and how your fat cells work. Because I'm a firm believer in information is power, and, uh, that's, that's what I based my book on, The Weight's Over— Take Back Control, uh, because once you have the information, it's your choice as to what you do with it. But, uh, anyway, over to you because I'm just very excited about all this.

We are too. Thanks very much for having us, Sandra, and we've just returned. We, uh, two days ago we were lecturing in, in Switzerland on a very, on very similar subject matter to a group of medics over there, so really looking forward to chatting today. We took something with us which you may well recognize and really enjoyed. And I think that the synergies that you were talking about are absolutely right.

Yeah, Sandra, it's been wonderful to see the success of your SlimPod program, and we thoroughly agree with you that altering belief systems is a critical part of a weight loss program and indeed importantly avoiding the dreaded weight regain. So we salute your work in SlimPod.

Totally.

Thank you so much. I mean, that was the, the belief system when I, when I saw that in, in your book. And I think, you know, that, that's what I'm always preaching about is, is obviously the mind-body connection, but the, the every, every cell is listening to our thoughts. And you again have brought that alive, alive for me, that whole idea. So, uh, let's go in, let's kick off and, uh, and go into why— the 3 reasons why diets fail.

Sure. I think this is something that we've been conscious of for many, many years, and that that if you actually look at the scientific data, the number of diets that someone does during a lifetime is over 100. And, and the highest number I've seen is 123, 123 diets on average per life. And we know from the meta-analyses that have been done that 95, 19 out of 20 diets fail within 12 to 18 months. And that includes the weight loss jabs. If you come off the diet, if you come off the weight loss jabs without the information that you need, we know that all of the metabolic problems, all of the weight will come back on in that period between 12 and 18 months. So if you like, losing weight is not really the problem. The problem is keeping it off.

Absolutely, absolutely.

And the problem is is long-term metabolic health and metabolic flexibility. That's what we're aiming for. And so our 3, the first one is totally in synergy with you because that is actually understanding the unconscious brain. Yeah, that's the first thing. The second thing is understanding the cell, the components of the cell and the physiology of the cell. That actually cause us to trap fat whilst taking in more fat. And thirdly, understanding our macros. If we understand our macros, particularly carbohydrates and sugars, that goes a long way towards understanding how to keep that metabolic— how to keep your metabolism healthy long-term and keep those cells thin.

So that's really understanding what sort of food is on your plate and what effect it has on your body. Yeah, absolutely.

You know, our Diet Whisperer books, our Health Buddy courses, what we basically do is we tell stories, and, and, and, you know, we're storytellers. That's what, that's what we actually do. And we try and make the facts memorable, understandable, and when we do that, it creates long-term success and it creates long-term cellular health. So yeah, number one is totally concordant with you, and number two and three, we hope, actually will add something to your listeners, uh, in, in, in actually emboldening the message that you're already getting over.

Absolutely. That, I mean, you know, we, we, in my program, uh, we go into a lot of detail, but not that, not that detail way down below as to what happens in the fat cells and, and, and at that level. So this is Every page that I turned was, was, oh my goodness, I need to, I need to share this with my community just because I'm, I am very much into, you know, helping anybody to, or helping anybody who'll listen to, to, to change. And you mentioned You mentioned the fat jabs, and, uh, well, I should call them the weight loss jabs because we don't like fat jabs. I don't like it anyway. We've got a lot of people who will be listening to this who are doing SlimPod and the weight loss jabs together because, um, because obviously if you're, if you're just On the weight loss Jabs, the— your habits and your emotions around food, and, and probably most of the reason that you've been a yo-yo dieter in the first place, and potentially a yo-yo Jabber, because that's what's happening, um, is because you haven't sorted your head out and your relationship with food. And so we're finding that people who are doing both and actually paying attention, using, using the Jabs really as a kickstart to to doing, to doing their, um, to doing well, to losing weight in, in that moment, um, they are, that they are very much aware of their relationship with food, um, but it's the people who are not and who need more information about this. And that's why your book is so valuable, because it does go heavily into, uh, what you need to do in order to protect your muscles, because that's one of the biggest casualties, isn't it?

It is. And, um, this again, it comes back to, you know, we, we use, um, the, the, the, the Freudian term, we use Freud's, um, iceberg. Yeah, as, as an example. And, and the tiny bit of the iceberg that's above the water is our conscious brain, and the huge amount of the iceberg that's under the water is our unconscious brain. And we know that for the last 70 years, that Big Food that now provides in the US 90% of people's food, the Big Food manufacturers have huge budgets for marketing and advertising to get at your unconscious brain. And so You know, the reason that this is such an important thing to understand is because we've got to unravel some of that stuff. You know, that diets are about laziness, which they're not. Diets are about, you know, and a lot of doctors have used this term over the years, just move more, eat less. That's just— that's— these are all messages. And snacking is healthy. 3 meals a day is normal. You need breakfast cereals. Breakfast is called breakfast because it's a different meal. And all of this has been— all of this has created this entanglement in the unconscious brain. And what you do and what we do is to try and unravel that so that people see the truth.

And not just see the truth, but then understand the effect that their diet, their lifestyle, their environment has on their health, on their metabolism. And so by understanding the effect eating sugar has on you, on your body, you can change your belief system because it doesn't do anything good to you. So why would you want to eat something that's bad for you? So information about those three things— diet, lifestyle, and environment— are the key to a successful permanent weight change and disease reversal and a different health trajectory going forward.

Absolutely that. So, are you going to explain to me now about the macros?

Yeah, I mean, do you want to do the macros first or do you want to do the cell first? The introduction to which? It doesn't matter.

Whichever you want to do first, go ahead.

We do macros? Macros. This is what your plate looks like. On your plate, you've got a potential of 3 different macros. Protein is for growth and fats and carbs are for fuel. And these macros are completely different. So let's look particularly at the carb one because that's the one involved in obesity. So there are 3 different types of main carbs, and I think this is very important for your listeners to totally understand. And there are complex carbs, there are staples, and there are sugary carbs. So let's look at each one separately. And the reason that they differ is because they contain different amount of nutrients and they have massively different effects on your body. So some will not increase your sugar, your blood sugar and some will increase your blood sugar, and that's a very big difference. So let's look at the complex ones first. These are the really good guys. These are the ones you want to eat. You can actually, on a weight loss journey, eat most complex carbs. So complex carbs include your greens, broccoli, cabbage, kale, spinach, lettuce, artichokes, asparagus. So they're the things that when, if you were to eat them raw, which you can, they're quite chewy. And they're chewy because they've got fiber in them, lots of fiber. And fiber is really good stuff. And the reason fiber is good stuff is firstly for your gut health, because you need bulk to expel all the debris. And secondly, fiber is actually the food for all the gut organisms. We've called them gut bugs, and lots of people now use that term, which is great to see. So fiber is the food for your gut bugs. No fiber, only bad gut bugs will grow because they'll grow on sugar. So if you want good gut bugs, because there are good guys and bad guys, you want good gut bugs, you need to provide them with lots of fiber. And that's a very big reason to eat complex carbohydrates. And complex carbohydrates, because they're absorbed slowly, because they've got fiber, they don't by and large, put your blood sugar up. And they also contain lots of vitamins, lots of antioxidants, and polyphenols, which only the gut bugs can use, but they work on those polyphenols and make them into something very special for you, and then you get lots of serotonin, you're very happy, you get lots of energy, and you feel great. So eat fiber to feel great, and you won't increase. You won't get fat on the complex ones. Now there are beans and lentils in that category as well, and they need to— they've got too much associated glucose with the fiber and everything. So they need— they're brilliant foods, but only when your weight— when you've achieved your desired weight, because they've got too much glucose in them. So you need to just park them until you're at the end of your journey and then judiciously include them.

That's fascinating, Monique, just because we have so many people who decide to go on a kind of a plant diet. On a what diet? Plant diet. Yeah. And so you're saying that, you know, not all plant food is actually good for losing weight.

Oh, quite, quite absolutely, because as I say, beans are brilliant foods. How many varieties of beans are they? They've all got a different amount of vitamins, polyphenols, great stuff for you, and they have lots of fiber. They also have lots of protein, which is great, but they have a different glucose composition, and so they will prevent you losing weight because actually fats don't make us fat, glucose makes us fat, because glucose activates insulin, which pulls we might— we'll look at later. And once you've got insulin circulating, it's the fat controller. All the carbs go off to be fat in your fat stores and it won't let anything out. So yes, not all complex carbs are the same, but when you are your proper weight, these are very good foods to eat because of the range of antioxidants and polyphenols that they've got.

Amazing.

It's all—

it's no wonder people get confused because it is just—

yeah, it is. Yeah, just think anything green, anything that is chewy. Like, a bean isn't chewy, you have to cook it and then it's mush, isn't it? Uh, so, uh, all of the green sort of leafy things are great, and little hard things that you have to boil and cook to make them softer they're not going to work.

Fascinating. Great. Yeah, carry on.

Okay, so now we're at staples. And by the name, you're gathering that most people use this as the mainstay of their diet. And this is probably the biggest cause—

well, one of—

it's a big cause of weight gain. And they're really pasta, bread, potatoes, rice, and cereal. And they are very simply— most of them don't have a lot of fiber. Some of them have a little bit, in significant amounts, but they're basically strings of glucose molecules. So glucose, glucose, glucose, glucose, glucose.

That's a good one, that, Jeanette.

Ah, yes, yes. Strings of glucose molecules. And when— the thing is, is they don't have anything like the amount of antioxidants, polyphenols, they don't have polyphenols that the complex carbs have. So they're not giving you the nutrients that you need. And the glucose, glucose, glucose is being released very quickly, which makes your blood sugar go up. Which makes your insulin go up, and we've already said insulin will prevent fat burning. So if you're on a weight loss journey, you need to abandon the staples. When you've finished your weight loss journey, if this is something that pleases you and you want to eat the staples, you can eat them. We have a really good way of working out how many staples you can eat. We call it the glucose waterfall, which we discuss in the course, in the Health Buddy course and in the book, and you can work out exactly depending on how much you fasted and how much you've moved whether you have any room in your carb stores to store the glucose from the staples. So staples, we all love our staples, but you just won't really lose much weight.

It might just add to that that one of the things that happens with staples is your body doesn't know whether it's come from your spaghetti or whether it's come from your tagliatelle or whether it's come from your bread. All it sees is the beads are broken down into glucose. And the first thing that happens to that glucose is it refills your liver. The second thing it does is it refills your muscles. And any excess that you have beyond, beyond that goes— is converted into fat and goes into your fat stores. So that's why it's really important to understand Yes, if you haven't eaten anything since last night and you're having lunch and you want some spaghetti, that will be fine once you've reached your, once you've reached your, your target weight. But if you eat spaghetti or bread or pasta or rice in excess or too frequently, the excess after the, after the, the liver, then the muscles will be deposited in the fat stores as the body does something really clever called de novo lipogenesis. Where it takes excess staples, converts them into fat. Yes, excess carbs, converts them into fat and pushes them into the fat stores.

And then the circulating insulin says, you're not coming out. And that's why you can't access your fat stores, can't lose weight.

Exactly. Fascinating.

So in fact, carbs make you fat.

Yeah. You said something that really interested me. You said that once you got to your target weight, then you can eat the pasta, wouldn't you put them— put weight back on again if you're doing that? Isn't that not the problem or not?

We have this way of calculating how many grams of carbs you can eat and not put on weight, and that is the glucose waterfall, which is actually— Paul invented the glucose waterfall, so I might have supported him, but I'll take no credit for it, so I'll let him explain it.

Yeah, you're absolutely right that when you're losing weight, you want to keep your insulin as low as possible. And I'll talk about the cellular processes in a moment. But once you've reached your target weight, if you're— for example, if you fasted for 24 hours, your liver, your liver is perfectly capable of supporting your blood. Your blood always needs a certain level of sugar in it, of glucose in it. Very lazy thing to say sugar, but your But once you actually reach your target weight, you can then reintroduce what we call treat meals. So once or twice a week, we'll have a meal where we have some rice with some curry or something like that, or, or some bread or some pasta, or whichever of the 5 staples it is. You can introduce them, but respectfully, because you want to have enough to refill your liver glucose, then imagine it going down to the muscles. So if you've gone and if you've done a big CrossFit session, um, and one of the things that we know is intermittent athletes don't need to feed on glucose. The body, the body can actually do all that itself. But if, for example, you're doing 3 sessions of training every day like a footballer, then you will need to top up those glucose levels. Otherwise you'll just, you'll actually run down. You start, um, in cycling terms it's called bonking. It's actually where you're just hitting the wall, where you just, you're struggling to actually get the muscles working. Um, we used to think that you had to keep feeding when you were, when you were exercising. We now know you don't.

So, so with, without Glucose Waterfall, you can photograph, uh, in time, not today. Photograph your plate, find out, find out how many carbs are on your plate, and then you put in how much exercise you've done, how long you fasted, and then that gives you a figure for the space in your carb stores before all the carbs, glucose, trickles down your waterfall and goes into the fat stores. So it's a way of eating staples without the excess going to fat because you're not going to eat that excess. You can eat what you have released from your carb stores. So that's the glucose waterfall. Okay. So we now come to the Voldemort of carbs, which is sugar. And in our history, we didn't eat sugar. And then with the spices, the spice trade, white gold appeared, and this was sugar. And since then, the history of sugar has just got worse and worse. It has no nutrients. It has no known deficiency in humans from not eating sugar. And by sugar, I mean a single molecule which is formed of glucose and fructose. It's a specific molecule. Glucose isn't actually sweet, fructose is the sweet part. And that is table sugar, and that's what we're talking about here with sugary carbs. So we've got a substance that has got no nutrients. We've got a substance that is terrible for our health. And the reason it's terrible for our health and makes us fat is because when you eat it, it's absorbed very quickly because these bonds break very easily and you get a big spike in blood sugar. And when you get a big spike in blood sugar, as I mentioned earlier, you get a big spike in insulin and then you can't burn fat. And you become carb-dependent. So that's the 3 important carbs. Complex carbs, greens, all that sort of thing you want to eat.

As much as possible.

Staples you can use judiciously when you've achieved your target weight, not for eating on a weight loss journey. And sugar, no reason in the world for you to ever eat sugar again. I'm really sorry about that. When you come to see it, when you look at a sugary thing and you think of that glucose spike and you think of that insulin release, Why would you eat it? Now, occasionally, occasionally, occasionally we might. It's, it's, it's almost never for us now.

I know. And this is, this is part of the problem that you were talking about earlier about, you know, manufacturers and big, big food. They've addicted everybody, not everybody, but they've addicted a lot of people, millions of people to, to sugar for that, that reason. Fructose is in everything now. Obviously. Um, and so, uh, so that, so that they spike dopamine, um, and, uh, and we just want more and more of it. Um, so yeah, sugar has got no nutrients whatsoever.

There is no mammalian cell on the planet that actually requires, uh, sugar. You know, there's— it's something that is not required by the body. And it's really important, I think, just to always remember that when you're talking about your staples— rice, pasta, potatoes, bread, and cereals— you're talking about glucose, glucose, glucose, glucose, glucose, glucose in the chains. So they're all chained tiny little sugars, but they're all glucose. When you get table sugar or high fructose corn syrup or honey, anything that's sweet, there is a 50/50 usually relationship in nature of glucose and fructose. They never— fructose never appears on its own. It always appears with glucose. And, and when we were talking earlier about the glucose waterfall, how you can carefully enjoy some carbohydrates after periods of exercise or fasting, if you add fructose into the equation— because remember, they're all glucose— if you add fructose in with sugar What it does is— when we talked about the glucose waterfall, glucose goes to the liver first, and then the liver says, 'Thank you very much, I'm now full,' and on the cells, the gates come down. When you add fructose into the equation— so if you've got flour and fructose, which is a biscuit or a cake, um, once you've got fructose in the equation, it stops that natural barrier in the liver coming down. So the fructose and the glucose then overfill the cells in the liver. That clever process that we talked about, de novo lipogenesis, then converts those into fats, and that's how you get non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

Wow.

And I think that what may be of interest to your listeners is that if you go back to 1970, we were eating around about 3.5 teaspoons of sugar a day added to our drinks and food. In 2000— it's come down a little bit since 2000 because people are becoming aware of it— but around 2000 when it peaked, we were looking at somewhere between 45 and 50 teaspoons of sugar a day on average, on average, that was added to our food and drinks. And that in itself is one of the major culprits If you, if you, if you think in terms of foodstuffs, if you— 3 foodstuffs— you overeat your staples, not a good idea, they're going to spill down into the fat, the glucose will. If you eat excess sugar above 3.5 teaspoons a day, we try to eat zero, there's no reason for it. If you add that and then you add the seed oils that have massively increased in— so graph goes that way— massively increased over the last 50 years, and they're pro-inflammatory. They also contribute to insulin resistance and mitochondrial dysfunction. And mitochondrial dysfunction and insulin resistance drive each other, and they also drive obesity.

Wow.

So those three things, you can— those are three things really important to remember, you know. Not— it's not only— it's not only the food, it's what has the food been cooked in. So if you eat a packet of crisps, for example, If you've been exercising and you've been fasting and you haven't been snacking and you eat a packet of crisps, that would be fine if they were cooked in extra virgin olive oil. But they're cooked in seed oils, so what they convert into is not a snack but a way of actually transferring pro-inflammatory oils into your body, which none of us should be doing.

Thanks so much for watching. I hope this episode has given you a spark of hope or a new way to think about your journey with your weight. If it did, please give it a like, hit subscribe, and share it with somebody who needs to hear this. And if you're ready to lose weight for good, try the SlimPod Programme. It's helped thousands of people change their lives, and it can help you too. You'll find all the links below. And I'd love to support you on your journey.