Table Of ContentDedication
To my best friend, partner, and wife, Angela. Just the thought of you brings me
more joy, more satisfaction, and more life than anything else I have ever
experienced. You are my beloved, without reservation or qualification, as we
dance into eternity.
To my heroes and parents, Mary Rose and Robert. All that I am is thanks to your
love, example, and support. From the day I was born, and every day after, you
have always found a way to help and love me. I live, hoping to return the favor.
Contents
Dedication
Foreword by William Davis, MD
Preface by JoAnn E. Manson, MD
Introduction: The Smarter Science of Slim
PART I: THE CALORIE MYTHS
1. The Myth of Calorie Math
2. Your Set-Point Weight
3. How Your Set-Point Rises and How to Lower It
4. Eating More Doesn’t Make You Fat
5. Exercising More Doesn’t Make You Thin
6. The Myth That All Calories Are Created Equal
7. Calorie-Quality Factor 1: Satiety
8. Calorie-Quality Factor 2: Aggression
9. Calorie-Quality Factor 3: Nutrition
10. Calorie-Quality Factor 4: Efficiency
11. The Myth of Moderation
12. Where the Calorie Myths Came From
13. Low-Fat, Low-Cholesterol Confusion
14. Why Good Health Is Bad Business
15. How Humanity Can Achieve SANEity
PART II: THE SOLUTIONS
16. Go SANE with Your Diet
17. SANE Carbohydrates
18. SANE Proteins
19. SANE Fats and Sweets
20. The Ten Principles of SANE Eating
21. Get Smart with Your Exercise
22. The Six Principles of Smarter Exercise
PART III: THE SANE AND SMART ACTION PLAN
23. Smarter Subconscious
24. Five Weeks to Complete SANEity
25. Simple SANE Cooking
26. Your Smarter Exercise Program
Conclusion: Fight Fat with Facts
Afterword: Spread the Word (and Get Bonus Content!)
Acknowledgments
Appendix A: To Do before Exercising Smarter
Appendix B: Products That Make Going SANE More Convenient
Appendix C: The Top Four Most Frequently Asked Questions
Appendix D: Further Reading
Notes
Index
About the Author
Praise for The Calorie Myth
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
Foreword
Had “official” agencies and other sources of conventional dietary advice gotten
the nutrition and health message right to begin with, there would be no need to
have so many books on the topic. But they got it wrong—colossally wrong.
Ever since the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services issued the first U.S. Dietary Guidelines for
Americans in 1980, the dietary and health-care communities all synchronized
their message for nutrition and health: cut total and saturated fat, eat more
“healthy whole grains,” watch calories, and increase physical activity.
They advised us that the human body is a vessel that behaves according to
the physical laws of thermodynamics: the human body transacts energy currency
just like any other energy-consuming vessel—no differently, say, from an
automobile or furnace. We are thereby subject to physical laws such as “Calories
in, calories out,” regardless of whether those calories are in the form of
carbohydrate, fat, or protein. According to this line of thinking, it does not
matter what hormonal or metabolic environment a calorie enters; the end result
is the same.
We were also told that weight gain was a simple matter of consuming more
calories than we burned. We were advised that weight loss would occur,
predictably and mathematically, when we cut calories in or burned more calories
out, the basis for the “Eat less, exercise more” mantra for maintaining healthy
weight. By this line of logic, cutting back, for instance, on the 238 calories in 2
tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil in your salad while maintaining an
unchanged level of physical activity should predictably yield weight loss of 1
pound every two weeks, or 25 pounds over a year. Alternatively, performing
housework, such as vacuuming and sweeping the house 30 minutes per day,
without altering calorie intake should burn in the neighborhood of 110 calories,
yielding just under 12 pounds lost over one year. Easy, eh?
As the nationwide experience has demonstrated, this doesn’t work. While
there are surely people who are indeed gluttonous and lazy and could be
illustrative examples of the “calories in, calories out” concept, there are plenty of
people who have followed conventional advice to reduce fat, consume more
whole grains, etc., yet now hold an extra 30, 50, 150 pounds on their frame. If
there has been a miscalculation, it has been a miscalculation of epic proportions.
Could the one in three Americans now obese and another one in three
overweight all be gluttonous and lazy? Or is there something fundamentally
wrong with the concept of calories in, calories out?
The year 1980 marks this astounding turn of events for the American public:
the start of an unprecedented and dramatic increase in calorie intake, weight
gain, and overweight and obesity. We now have the worst epidemic of obesity
and all the diseases that accompany it, such as hypertension, diabetes, “high
cholesterol,” degenerating joints, and other conditions, in human history. There
surely have been periods in our history when widespread illness plagued us, but
those periods were due to mass starvation, war, and disease. In contrast, we have
our modern epidemic during a period of virtually limitless abundance.
It doesn’t take an astute student of modern culture to see that conventional
wisdom is not just inaccurate, but devastatingly wrong. Of course, the human
body follows the laws of physics and energy, but not by the simplistic rules
offered by conventional dietary thinking.
Anyone who has had some false starts and stops in weight loss learns some
tough lessons acquired through the school of hard knocks. For one, cutting
calories makes you hungry and miserable, while—though you are not conscious
of this—reducing your level of physical activity. Conversely, increasing physical
activity creates hunger and increases calorie intake. The combination of the two
—decreasing calorie intake while purposefully increasing physical activity—is
an especially unpleasant experience and an effort that requires monumental
willpower to follow, as it generates ravenous, intense hunger. This last painful
strategy, by the way, typically results in dramatic reductions in metabolic rate
and loss of muscle mass, both of which further booby-trap any genuine effort at
fat loss.
In The Calorie Myth, Jonathan Bailor presents the wealth of science we
already have that (1) should cause us to reject the miserably incorrect “calories
in, calories out” misconception; and (2) shows us how to use the very same
science to understand the real ways the body responds to calories and physical
activity. He educates readers on why the human body protects its set-point as a
fail-safe survival mechanism, explaining that the only effective, long-term
weight-maintenance strategy is to manage your set-point—not to eat less and
exercise more.
What is magical about The Calorie Myth is the easy-to-grasp, step-by-step
way he tells the story, taking the reader by the hand and showing us why this one
nutritional insight was misinterpreted and led to catastrophically misguided
dietary advice, and how new insights can be keys to unlocking hidden wisdom.
He creates a new language and framework that allow readers to put their arms
around these concepts without getting bogged down in science, detail, or dogma.
Knowledge is power, and in this instance, the proper understanding of just how
the human body transacts energy empowers the reader to regain control over
metabolism, health, and weight, even after a lifetime of being led astray.
But there is much more here than an unemotional recounting of the
nutritional science that makes the case against the myth that “a calorie is a
calorie is a calorie.” Jonathan captures the essence of effective nutritional
arguments in his own clear, succinct, and uniquely clever way. The same no-
holds-barred, incisive thinking goes into Jonathan’s analysis of exercise,
educating the reader on why “less is more” once the principles of hormonal
correction and high-intensity bursts of exercise are understood using the
revolutionary insight of eccentric exercise.
This book is appropriately titled: it does indeed bash the myths underlying
how the human body manages energy. There is no hypothesizing or empty
prediction here; there is detailed analysis of the science underlying these
principles—principles that, when properly and consistently applied, achieve
heights of functioning, result in weight loss, and provide relief from the myriad
health conditions of modern life.
—William Davis, MD, author of the number one New York Times bestseller Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat,
Lose the Weight, and Find Your Path Back to Health and The Wheat Belly Cookbook
Preface
The dual epidemics of obesity and type 2 diabetes are the looming public health
crises of the twenty-first century. All around us today, in all walks of life, are
people who struggle with weight control. The growing prevalence of obesity in
the United States and around the world, especially among children and
adolescents, portends an enormous global burden of chronic disease in the
future. The crystal ball shows not only more people with diabetes, but also
enormous numbers of people with hypertension, heart disease, stroke, and even
cancer. Although medical research has made strides in treating and controlling
some of the health consequences of obesity, the prevention and management of
obesity truly hold the key to improved health. Of particular importance, we now
know that people suffering from overweight or obesity can take charge of their
health—if they are willing to make even modest changes in their lifestyle.
Throughout my career in preventive medicine and epidemiology, I, together
with my colleagues, have valued the importance of empowering the public
through information and shared decision making. Our research has focused on
prevention of cardiovascular disease and diabetes, including assessing the role of
lifestyle factors in reducing risks. We have examined the “power of prevention”
in several large-scale clinical studies, including the Harvard Nurses’ Health
Study, the Women’s Health Initiative, the Women’s Health Study, the VITamin D
and OmegA-3 TriaL (VITAL), and other research projects. One of the major
findings from our large population-based studies is that type 2 diabetes and heart
disease are largely preventable through lifestyle modifications, which are
powerful determinants of our risk of chronic disease. For example, we’ve
published papers from the Nurses’ Health Study indicating that at least 90
percent of cases of type 2 diabetes and at least 80 percent of heart attacks can be
prevented by lifestyle changes, including being physically active, maintaining a
healthy weight, and following a diet that is high in fruits, vegetables, and whole
grains and low in saturated and trans fats and refined carbohydrates.
We’ve made efforts to inform the public of these findings, as well as of the
work of other researchers around the world, often writing columns in magazines
and working closely with print and electronic media over the years. Yet the
scientific findings of so many researchers and other dedicated individuals in
academia remain largely unknown by the general public. Part of the problem is
the pervasive and overpowering impact of mass marketing by the food industry.
Another problem is the often confusing and contradictory messages about
nutrition and health on the Internet and various mass media outlets. Even the
dietary guidelines from the federal government may seem confusing and at odds
with some of the research studies that have attracted attention. How is the
general public supposed to know which scientific studies to believe?
That’s why Jonathan Bailor has performed an invaluable service with his
book The Calorie Myth. Jonathan has studied thousands and thousands of pages
of academic research on health and weight loss and he has put the results into
terms that the ordinary person can understand. We have made great strides over
the years in understanding how the body responds to different types of food. Yet
all too often a popular author cites the scientific evidence selectively,
emphasizing only those aspects of the wide-ranging research that support the
diet plan he or she is promoting. Jonathan’s work is far from “just another diet
book.”
The Calorie Myth dismantles the myths that have contributed enormously to
the health and weight problems that many people have and replaces them with
easy-to-understand facts that will change the way you think about eating and
exercise. On the eating side, he shows why changes in a person’s metabolism
affect weight gain and how to get your metabolism burning rather than storing
body fat. He provides a sensible formula for eating the right kinds of food that
produce satiety—that fill you up so much that you won’t have room for the types
of foods that are fueling the obesity and diabetes epidemics. He shows how
balance is the key to long-term health and weight loss. He also clarifies what the
scientific literature suggests are the best ways to exercise. Short bursts of
vigorous and forceful activity can provide all the stimulation needed to get your
metabolism back on track. But moderate exercise also has a role.
The scientific community now knows a great deal about how the human
body works. In culling the literature and gathering the results of so many clinical
studies, Jonathan Bailor presents a weight-loss program that is based on rigorous
science. We can make the right choices that will help us to avoid becoming
overweight or obese. As a treasure trove of reliable information and sound facts,
The Calorie Myth can help you take charge of your destiny and turn the tide on
weight gain.
