counting fat grams
 

Does anyone here just count fat grams that you eat per day? And not count total calories. Isnt fat what makes a person fat anyway?

I mean still keep an eye on calorie per say, but pay more attention to fat grams.

Excess calories are what make someone fat, not eating fat, unless you eat too much of it. And there are plenty of calories in many fat free foods, esp. processed "diet" foods, which are often fat free but have lots of sugar since they have to get the flavor from something, right? lol!

Your body also needs a certain amount of fat for healthy functioning, although it's best to get that fat from foods that have other nutritional benefits, such as nuts, olive oil, salmon, eggs, and avocado to name a few. You don't want to go crazy, but somewhere between 20-30% of your calories should come from these healthy fat sources. the number of grams is dependent on how many calories a day you eat - at 1500 per day, you'd want to have no more than 50 gr of fat.

When I first started dieting, it was all about the fat grams. Everyone was obsessed with fats, and there were hoardes of foods that were "fat free" or "low fat" that were chock full of sugar and calories. People thought they were eating right because they avoided the fats, but they gained weight because they were eating way too many calories. Dieticians even had a name for this phenomenon--the "Snackwell Syndrome." Now, I think people are focusing a little too much on calories and eat too much fat, but the 20-30% is a good rule of thumb. Personally, I try a holisitic approach by easting less than 30g of fat per day, combined with 1500 calories, high levels of protein and medium carbs. This has been successful for me in the past (I lost 40 pounds this way), and though I gained it back by eating poorly again, I expect this to work for me. Just my two cents :)

Before I wisened up I used to think that eating fat-free or low-fat things were the way to go.

Now, though, I know better. Most of the fat-free crap has aspartame, which to me is not only not healthy, but I can taste the difference. If I'm going to eat something bad for me [meaning sugar in this case] it's going to at least taste good! Plus, the difference in fat-free or normal products calorie-wise isn't usually much of a difference. A lot of the weightloss programs like Sparkpeople tell you how many fat grams you need a day, as well as carbs count, and it's definitely the way to go. Especially if you're new to calorie counting, it has saved me!

Ultimately, I am a calorie counter....however, in the beginning I was very conscious of how many fat grams and saturated fat grams I was eating every day. I have had cholesterol issues - so I kept those in a healthy range, too. I've been doing it for a while, so I 'know' what's what and now just count the calories with a watchful eye on the all the fats.