STOP Counting Calories—Please!



STOP Counting Calories

 

Calories Are Deceiving

Did you know that one gram of dietary fat is 9 calories, and one gram of protein or carbohydrates are 4 calories each. So when you are given a certain amount of calories it is this calculation that you are getting. So 100 calories could be 11.11 grams of dietary fat and nothing else. Or it could be 25 grams of carbohydrates or 25 grams of protein. More than likely it will be some combination of the above. So if you were deciding what to eat would you pick something that was 100 calories without even knowing what the grams of dietary fat, protein, and carbs are? I hope not, but many people do. They hear—a calorie is a calorie—from so called experts. Not paying any attention to how they will feel if they are getting all of their calories from carbohydrates, how it will affect their organs if all of their calories come from protein, and how little amount of food you will get if all of the calories come from dietary fat.

Nutritionists Focusing on Calories

I was watching a morning talk show this last Wednesday and a well-known nutritionist with a PhD was telling viewers she would recommend eating two pancakes with syrup instead of two eggs with whole wheat toast and butter, since the pancakes and syrup only had 280 calories!!! What? Eat pancakes with syrup for breakfast instead of eggs and toast (are you kidding me?!) as the preferred choice of a credentialed doctor. This is a classic case of focusing only on the calories and not on the nutrition of the foods you are eating. Perhaps this is how eating foreign substances became a fad for weight loss, the perception that there is no calories associated with them. Which brings up another problem: calories equating to pounds.

Calories do NOT equal pounds

Yes, I am going to go out on a limb here and buck the status quo and pretty soon you will, too. Do you know how much ½ gallon of water weighs? It is about 4 pounds. How many calories does it have? ZERO. How much does a gallon of water weigh? Yep about 8 pounds, again how many calories? Still ZERO. How about 200 gallons of water? 1,600 pounds and yes you are right again, ZERO calories.  DO NOT drink water in excess it can be deadly.

 

Calories Burned Do NOT Matter

I am sure you are certain that you are exercising in an effort to burn calories, please do not think this way. It will keep you from working out for your overall health. Your body needs for you to move it—daily…yes daily, not 3 times a week or every other day. Every single day you need to do something that gets you moving, walking, lifting, just get going!! There is another benefit to exercising every day and that is that your appetite will be much more even. If you think you are working out to burn calories you are going to be sadly disappointed and more than likely you are going to say to yourself, that you will just skip a glass of wine, or latte or that dessert and along with it skip the workout!! No, no, no!!

Sherri Sue Fisher, author of TimerDiet

www.timerdiet.com/timer-diet-concepts