The World's Easiest Weight Loss/Control Diet
Dr. Huggie Bear's Psychology Diet   Frank Barnhill M.D.
 

Our bodies use chemical messengers called neurotransmitters to start and stop most of our essential functions.  Glands and nerve type structures throughout our bodies send chemicals via the bloodstream to the brain to let the brain know what’s going on.  Sometimes these chemicals are hormones such as insulin, thyroid or estrogens.  There are special areas in the brain that can sense when these hormones are at optimum levels.  When a hormone level is too low, the brain sends chemicals through the bloodstream back to the gland or nerve target and causes the gland to make more.  If levels are too high, different chemicals are dumped into the bloodstream to slow production of that hormone.  This is done thousands of times per day to allow a fine-tuning of our body systems.  These steps of self-regulation are referred to as feedback loops.  They are used to help control body temperature, repair of skin and other organs, energy levels, digestion, and ultimately our weight or expected mass.

The human brain strives hard 24 hours a day to control everything just like a thermostat controls your heat and air conditioning.  If you’re too hot, brain signals from body heat via the bloodstream are sent to the skin to cool you off.  If you’re too cold, then your brain sets off shivering and sends blood flowing mainly to internal organs save body heat.  Well, your brain controls your body weight in a similar manner.  When you over eat and gain weight, at first, your brain sends out signals telling you to stop eating or at least slow down.  Unfortunately, your body is the ultimate conservationist.  The human body is like a huge processing-manufacturing-storage plant.  Even though the brain tells you to slow down on that pizza, at the same time it’s processing part says “Hey, since we have all these calories handy, it would be a shame to waste then!” “Let’s convert them to fat and store them away for a rainy day.” “You never know when you’re gonna get to eat again.” As far as the brain is concerned, fat is the same thing as money in the bank.  It can be burned for energy later.  The problem is that burning it is not as easy as storing it.  You have to exercise twice as hard to burn these same calories as you would to burn the calories in pure sugar.

Oops, forgot to tell you about another problem that arises after this excess food is converted to fat.  That very efficient brain of yours will reset it’s “fat thermostat to a higher level if you keep that excess weight on board for more than a couple of weeks.  Then, your brain assumes this new weight to be the “ideal body weight” and if you lose even a pound, the brain panics.  Your brain will actually send out messages to make you eat more until the weight is regained.  Remember those bad hungry pains, growls and belly moans you get while dieting?  I bet you get the picture now.  These feed back loops can result in a constant weight loss or in our case a constant weight gain.

So, what should you do to help control or lose or even gain weight?  The answer is really simple.  We have to trick your brain into believing you are presently at your “ideal body weight”!  How do we do that you ask?  The answer is experimentation with various food combinations and losing or gaining weight to reach a plateau or steady state weight.  Let’s take an example of weight loss, since that seems to be the biggest concern today.  Pretend you’re 160 pounds in weight and wish to weigh 130 pounds.  If you have weighed 160 pounds for more than one month, your brain’s thermostat is set at 160 pounds.  Ooh that’s bad, isn’t it?  You have two choices, stay at 160 pounds or diet and exercise to lose down to 130 pounds.  The last option sounds very difficult, but it’s not.  We’ve all heard about friends who lost a lot of weight rapidly, and then once off their diet, they gained it right back.  So, we’re not going to do it that way.  We’re going to reset your brain’s “fat thermostat” slowly over the next year and then trick it into staying at that setting.  Let’s discuss the details now.

The human brain doesn’t get overly excited when our body weight goes up or down by only 1/2 to 1 pounds a week.  So, that’s our goal, a slow weekly weight loss of 1/2 to 1 pounds.  Ok, I know you’re in a hurry and want to lose it all over night, but remember; it’ll just come back.  Here’s the deal.  You will have to put up with a few hunger pains and you will have to increase your activity level so that you burn up excess calories.  First, we need to find out your “calorie equilibrium set point” or the number of calories you can eat per day and not lose or gain weight.  You will need to weigh in the buff every day at the same time and must count calories.  It’s not going to depend on what you eat or how much, the set point is all centered around calories.  You could eat a lot of low calorie food or a small amount of high calorie food.  It won’t matter after we determine your set point.  Now, it would indeed be smart to eat a balance diet and of course you have to time your exercise to see how many calories you actually burn up.  I also feel everyone should take a good multivitamin.  But alas, once you know the set point, all you have to do is eat less than that number of calories or burn up more than your daily usual, and there your weight goes.  If you wish to gain weight, you just do the opposite.  By weighing daily, you will soon see how low in calories or high in exercise you must go to lose 1/2 to 1 pounds per week.

Let’s finish the story.  So, you’ve slowly lost 30 pounds in 52 weeks.  That’s great!  Now what do you do?

First let’s review what has happened.  You have slowly reset your brain’s fat thermostat to believe you are supposed to weigh 159 pounds, then 157 ½ pounds, then 156 pounds and so on.  Now, if you can maintain your desired weight for one year, your brain will probably accept this weight as it’s very own.  What about after that year, you ask?

If you eat more and notice a weight gain of 3 pounds over a three week period, then you know your calorie set point won’t tolerate the extra calories.  At that point, either eat a little less or exercise more.  The opposite is true if you wish to gain weight.

Most normally active adults have a calorie set point around 1500 to 1700 calories with normal work activity.  So, these are good numbers to start.

The more you do, the harder it will be on you.  Remember, every calorie you intake above your set point is converted and stored as fat.

Ask the restaurant for a calorie comparison sheet for their foods or buy a calorie-counting book and carry it with you.  I just memorized my favorite foods calories.

Hey, they work on the same principles and sometimes they do work well for people who follow the instructions very closely.

Ok, this one is close to 1500 calories and will usually provide a 1 pound a week weight loss.

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