This is what I’ll be examining over the next few posts. \u00a0In this first post, I will talk about why flexible dieting works, and how you’re able to eat everything from vegetables to ice cream, and still achieve whatever body composition goals you want.<\/p>\n
![\"Think](\"http:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/images.jpg\")
<\/a>Think of this as energy and nothing more.<\/p><\/div>\n
So why would someone want to do flexible dieting?<\/strong><\/p>\n The biggest reason I advise flexible dieting is the flexibility it gives you– \u00a0You don’t have to restrict yourself from foods unnecessarily. \u00a0If you make room in your daily nutrition for something, you can have it! \u00a0An example I give my clients is how much I love chocolate: \u00a0I eat chocolate daily. \u00a0Pancakes are one of my all time favorite foods: \u00a0I eat them regularly. \u00a0I eat animal crackers, strawberry preserves, chicken nuggets, etc. \u00a0I don’t have to have a “cheat day,” because every day, I eat foods I enjoy based on whether they fit into my goals; not based on some arbitrary distinction between “good” and “bad.”<\/p>\n It’s also very easy to develop a binge eating disorder by unnecessarily restricting yourself– \u00a0By being flexible, however, you can avoid that (or work to fix it if you’re experiencing it) by promoting a healthy relationship with food, which is very important! \u00a0Now, you can have a serving of ice cream (that fits within your macros) rather than destroying\u00a0a whole gallon of ice cream because you don’t know when you’ll allow yourself to eat it again.<\/p>\n You can’t be serious. \u00a0You can’t lose weight with ice cream!<\/strong><\/p>\n The basic principle behind weight loss, and weight gain, is “Energy Balance.”<\/p>\n If you want to lose weight, eat less Calories than you burn; if you want to gain weight, eat more Calories than you burn. \u00a0It’s that simple. (Source<\/a>\u00a0| More reading about energy balance<\/a>) \u00a0There are some that believe that they’re made differently; that they’re somehow special and live outside the laws of our universe. \u00a0If you think that about yourself, I’m sorry to break it to you, but you are not exempt from the First Law of Thermodynamics<\/a>. \u00a0If you are, please submit your body to science, as you’re the first being that has managed such a feat.<\/p>\n But I’ve heard certain foods make you fat and others make you skinny!<\/strong><\/p>\n If someone tells you that certain foods, by default, make you fat, they don’t know much about nutritional science. \u00a0Likewise, if they say a food will make you skinny, they’re terribly misinformed, and are likely trying to sell you an agenda. \u00a0To illustrate this point, let’s discuss the three main macronutrients (commonly referred to as “Macros”): \u00a0Fats, Carbohydrates, and Proteins. \u00a0As a blanket statement, we can say that all foods are comprised of a combination of these, as these are “energy yielding” nutrients– \u00a0That’s just a fancy way of saying they contain Calories. \u00a0In fact, a “Calorie” is really just a measure of how much energy is contained in the food from the combination of macros. \u00a0(Source<\/a>)<\/p>\n A common misconception about macronutrients is that your body can differentiate where it came from– \u00a0People claim there is a magic sensor inside your body that tells your body if the sugar molecule you consumed came from ice cream vs. a banana, and it should treat it differently.<\/p>\n Your body can’t.<\/p>\n This is why flexible dieting works. \u00a0In the body, all macronutrients are broken down into “substrates;” Carbohydrates, no matter where they came from, get broken down into one of 3 “Monosaccharides;” \u00a0Proteins, no matter where they came from, get broken down into individual amino acids; \u00a0Fats, no matter where they came from, get broken down into (or remain as) triglycerides. \u00a0(More reading on Macronutrients<\/a>)<\/p>\n Are you sure that’s right?<\/strong><\/p>\n Yes. \u00a0To illustrate, though, let’s look at two different foods, and what will happen when eaten. \u00a0Let’s take a twinkie.<\/p>\n A twinkie has 4.5g of Fat, 27g Carbohydrates, and 1g Protein. \u00a0Let’s compare that to a\u00a0100g of\u00a0avocado: 15g of Fat, 9g Carbohydrates, and 2g Protein. \u00a0In both cases, the Fats will be broken down into triglycerides; the Carbohydrates will all be broken down into one of three monosacharides (Glucose, Fructose, or Galactose); and the Proteins will all be broken down into individual amino acids.<\/p>\n I’m still not convinced.<\/strong><\/p>\n Let’s take an even simpler example: \u00a0Let’s say you have a can of cola sweetened with high fructose corn syrup, a bottle of cola sweetened with sugar, and a banana– \u00a03 examples that are all very high in carbs. \u00a0What will all of the carbs in these examples be broken down into? \u00a01 of 3 monosaccharides: \u00a0Glucose, Fructose, or Galactose; and they’re all the exact same molecule. \u00a0(Source<\/a>)<\/p>\n Truth.<\/p><\/div>\n I’m still not sure I believe you. \u00a0How can you lose weight eating “bad foods”?<\/strong><\/p>\n First off, I can’t think of anything that I’d call a\u00a0“bad food.” \u00a0There are foods that aren’t very nutritious, but it’s still not a “bad food.” \u00a0Thinking of foods in terms of “good” and “bad” is\u00a0a poor mentality to have. \u00a0Also, there’s a fantastic story about a nutrition scientist that wanted to demonstrate the principles of energy balance to his students by\u00a0following a 10 week “convenience store diet,” and he ended up losing 27 pounds. \u00a0(Read about it here<\/a>)<\/p>\n So I should go eat twinkies all day!?<\/strong><\/p>\n Not exactly. \u00a0While it’s true that a “Calorie is a Calorie” in terms of body composition \/ energy balance, there is something else to consider. \u00a0In my next post, I’m going to talk about nutrient density and variety, which addresses this. \u00a0Many people will make the claim that not all Calories are created equal; \u00a0from a healthful diet standpoint, they do have a point; in terms of fat loss, though, they’re way off!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m going to write a series of posts talking about “Flexible Dieting;” a.k.a. “IIFYM.” \u00a0IIFYM stands for “If it fits your macros,” which is the idea that you can eat whatever you want to achieve changes in body composition, as long as it all fits into your Calorie and macronutrient ranges for the day. I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Flexible Dieting (Part 1) - \"Substrates\"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7,10,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health","category-nutrition","category-nutrition-myth"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3DfsS-hz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1089"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1089\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1097,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1089\/revisions\/1097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>