When I was at weigh-in the other day my LAWL counsellor told me that if I eat the same foods every day that my body will "get used" to it and my metabolism will slow down. I think that is complete rubbish. I mean, my body doesn't see an apple or a slice of whole grain bread it merely sees the nutritional components of those foods, doesn't it? I pressed her about this and she had no real answer other than telling me it was a scientific fact and that that should be all the convincing I would need. Well I remain unconvinced and when I asked her to name the studies and/or institutions that had published these results so I could confirm them she got a little snooty with me.

Maybe I'm just a skeptic but I'd really like to see some published studies from a reputable source on this. Anyone know of any? Thanks.

KJ

Bravo for you for asking for the research! Nutrition is nutrition & studies consistently show that if you eat healthy, even if it is repetetive, you will benefit. The only real information that's consistently backed by studies is that a pound is 3500 calories & that a deficit is necessary to create weight loss, without causing your system to go into a metabolism freeze up due to too few calories (again, easily backed by science)

You're right & I'm thrilled you asked for the studies! Keep on keeping on! It's your life and you're being very smart about it!

Have a great weekend!
Marylynn

Research has actually shown that a diet consisting of less variety leads to less weight gain, more weight lose, and better maintained loses. The advantage to a fairly limit diet is two fold 1) you know what you will be eating so there is no thinking about it. 2) you will feel satiated with less food. when faced with a less oft eaten food you will want more becasue you do not know when you may get that food again. "I never get ---- so I will have an extra serving"
The counselor is off base on the food types. They may be thinking that you need to not consume the same number of calories each day, but really I doubt that is a big problem. It is more likely that as we get complacent in our weight loss we tend to increase serving size, have single bites of something we have no way of counting or we are not really recording our total consumption.

Thanks for the comments. They are appreciated.

I know my persistence kind of ticked her off but I really wasn't trying to be a pain I genuinely wanted to know. I realize that they are not dieticians or nutritionists but if you don't know something then just say so don't just tell me anything in an attempt to dispense with me.

I remember asking them at my centre once before why, when it comes to vegetables, if you eat them raw you consume 1 cup as opposed to 1/2 cup if they're cooked. They tried to tell me that vegetables shrink when they're cooked and that's the reasoning behind the different portion sizes. I asked her to show me an instance where 1 cup of broccoli had shrunk to a 1/2 cup after cooking. She then got all hand-wavy and mumbly and changed the subject. I never did get what I would consider an acceptable answer to that question so if any of you know please pass it on. Thanks.

I don't eat the exact same things everyday. Breakfast is always changed up as is dinner. Lunch and my two snacks are usually the same thing because a) I don't have to think about them and b) it makes them easier to assemble every morning before heading out the door to work. And oh yeah, because I like them.

KJ

Killjoy,

I thought the veggies just took up less space in the cup once they were cooked, so you're really getting the same amount. I've tried it, and it's not exact, but seems to be somewhat accurate. Maybe?

Yep, the "shrinking" is true. That's the problem with talking out your butt, even the truth sounds like a bunch of crap.

I'm on an exchange based diet, and have not only read "the shrinking" theory, I've tested it numerous times by measuring veggies before and after cooking. Some cooked down by a lot more than half (like spinache and other greens), but then again, I didn't pack the greens into the cup as tightly as I could have, so that might have made a more accurate experiment. Most I tried did actually cook down to about a half cup of cooked from a cup of raw, give or take.

Yeah, I can see it being true for spinach and stuff like that but what about turnip, cabbage, carrots, etc? I've only seen a lot of shrinkage on those sorts of vegetables if you boil them for an excessive amount of time.

I don't know. I'll have to experiment this weekend to see. Thanks for the info!

KJ

OK, we are sitting her arguing about vegetable volume. Veggies are the lowest calorie highest nutrition foods we consume. I mean really if you are eating them with out added fat or other calories it really is all the same. Yeah you loose some volume with cooking but you still have a calorie poor nutrient rich food. Not to mention the fiber.
The real goal of this plan is to re-train our minds on how we eat to live. A cup of sautéed mustard greens is not going to ruin my diet, the corn bread and butter is!
I have been really trying to relearn that the basis of my meals should be vegetable based. In the past a meal consisted in starches and proteins.

Oh I agree with you fully about the vegetables and that eating a little extra will hardly be considered failure to stick to the plan. Some of the counsellors at my centre have implied that from time to time I may have been eating "too many" vegetables which I thought was somewhat of a non-issue. If I have one extra vegetable serving the odd day will it derail my plan? I think it absolutely will not. My point is that I feel it is in my best interest to ask questions may I have regarding the plan. I get a little perturbed when the people I am paying to help me through this thing feel they can tell me any old thing and that I should be satisfied with that.

I found one counsellor who seems to be really good and now I go to her exclusively. She's actually told me that there are some things she doesn't know (surprise, surprise!) but says she will look into them and find out for me. At least she seems willing to work with me unlike some of the other ones there.

So I'm not trying to be argumentative here I'm just looking for answers and other people's experiences. That's all. Sorry if I came across as looking for a fight.

KJ

You both make good points. I know for me personally, I did not gain weight from eating an extra serving of veggies!!

KJ, The first thing they give you on stabilization is unlimited veggies. The first thing they suggest you eat more of if you are feeling hungry is to over do the veggies. One counselor told me to not worry about it if I go over on the veggies. She said many of the most successful people on plan regularly overdo the veggies. What a great habit to have. Eating lots of veggie.
I also am skeptical about the claims that carrots are holding back your weight loss to any great deal. Another counselor recommendation that I'm not sure holds a whole lot of water is that it is the coffee that I'm drinking... although if I'm not getting in the water in favor of the coffee, well that will show up on the scale the next day.

You have to take what they tell you, sift through it and apply it to your life. I've heard other people on this forum say that they just ate as many veggies as they felt like having and they also were fairly successful. Of course every body is different. Perhaps some people react badly to increased vegetables or really feel the sugar in the carrots or really do react to coffee in a negative way. I just never felt that these three things were truly the source of any failure to lose weight at any point in time... but then again, it did take me a long time to lose my weight.

I work for one of the franchise centers and prior to that I was a PT and the one thing that I always reccomended CONSISTENCY! My advice, if it's not broken don't fix it. Your body is smart, but it's not that smart. I do reccomend variety with your fruits and veggies because different ones provide different essential nutrients. As far as your starches go, as long as they are whole grain and high fiberous then I see no reason why you can't use the same ones on a regular basis. Try to choose lean proteins and as far as they go you can pretty much stay with the same ones.