Is it About Calories: Why is There an Argument?
Like you, I scroll through the Internet, and it’s confusing. You’ve got people screaming, “It’s only about calories! It’s all about calories!” Then you’ve got the other side saying, “No, it’s nothing about calories. It’s all about hormones.” And then you’ve got other people screaming, “No, it’s all about [fill in the blank].” I’m going to talk about my stance on this crazy, confusing, polarized take on health and weight loss. Trust me, I’ve heard it all, and I’ve fallen prey to some of it until I had a better understanding of the body and how it actually works. That’s when I started to get a whole lot clearer.
Counting Calories: The Basics
So, let’s jump into calories first. For weight loss, notice I didn’t say fat loss. I said weight loss. You need to be in an energy deficit. You cannot eat more than you expend and expect to lose weight. Now, I want you to start thinking beyond weight loss to fat loss, muscle building, and muscle retention. I know that you want that scale to move. I know you want it to show a certain number. But remember, it is just your relationship to gravity at the moment you step onto that scale. So it’s not the end-all-be-all metric.
In regards to the calories-only matter camp, my answer is yes. Calories do matter. But they are not the only thing that matters. A healthy weight means being at a weight that your body can sustain without yo-yo dieting. You cannot maintain that weight if you are not metabolically healthy. What’s happening on the inside matters a lot more than that number on the scale, and that’s where the calorie-counting group never elaborates.
Just as an example, if I stuck to between 800-1200 calories a day and only ate Snicker bars and peanut butter sandwiches, I should end up losing a ton of weight and being healthy, right? If it’s only about calories, we all know that’s not what happens. Eventually, the weight loss falls out, and my health will take a downturn because it’s not getting the nutrients. That never really worked for me. I did try eating lots of grapefruit once. That didn’t work either. So, it’s probably a little bit more than just calories.
Hormones: The Other Side of the Story
I’ve also listened to the calories-don’t-matter camp. Don’t count calories. They don’t matter. It’s all about controlling your insulin, which is a hormone that regulates all the other hormones. It’s considered a master hormone in your body. It also regulates your leptin and your ghrelin, which are your two hunger hormones. But they never really go into detail about that. It’s all about hormones being healthy and balanced.
Okay, there’s a piece they don’t tell you as well. Their methods for controlling insulin actually lead to an energy deficit in two ways: by eating less energy (not necessarily less food) or increasing your expenditure through moving or body recompositioning. When we have more lean muscle mass, our energy expenditure goes up. There is also some research that states making ketones increases expenditure because your body making ketones will increase your metabolism. So now you might be wondering about the statement I made about eating less but not fewer foods.
Nourishment: Quality Over Quantity
The underlying message of the calories-don’t-matter camp is to change what you’re eating to whole foods and remove things that spike your insulin, like starches and sugars. So, you’re not just switching over to fiber-filled vegetables; you’re also removing things that spike your insulin, which are all low in calories when you start adding them up. This means you’re probably taking in less energy but also taking in nutrients that help heal the processes in your body to increase expenditure. It also helps your body get better at signaling when you’re actually hungry or full because it has the nourishment.
So, when we look at the camp that says don’t count calories or calories don’t matter, they’re just approaching it from a different angle. It’s not that they don’t believe in energy expenditure; they just feel that there’s a better use of your brainpower to manage what you’re eating to get to a healthy weight and a healthy inside.
There’s one big issue I see here from the don’t count calories side: for some people, their bodies aren’t working correctly. Without tracking their food, they can still overeat healthy foods. Some people don’t feel full, and it could take them years to get those signals working properly. So, for this group, tracking is a must for weight loss and even for maintaining until they get those signaling hormones working properly.
The Bigger Picture: Overfed and Undernourished
Okay, with that said, this is where I combine everything back together, and hopefully, it will make some sense to you. I’ve said it before and it bears repeating. Most people who struggle with weight loss are overfed and undernourished. This is actually causing their body to feel hungrier more often to get the basic building blocks it needs for health. The food we eat plays the biggest role in our health.
Once you’re in this overfed and undernourished state and all you simply do is try to count calories and move more without actually giving your body the nutrients it needs, it will seem like a never-ending cycle of losing and gaining weight. Diets in the terms of “follow this plan exactly” will work until it stops working because it is not addressing your body in the health it is in today. It’s not giving it what it needs today to get healthier. That’s what breaks the cycle, focusing on what your unique needs are today, not doing what you did two years ago. You need to figure out what your body needs supported today.
What Your Body Is Telling You
Let’s address some symptoms that you might not even know could be supported nutritionally before they actually become a full-blown disease state. Having excess weight around the middle, being tired all the time, crashing every afternoon, skin issues, digestive issues, bowel movement issues, trouble sleeping, mood swings, and brain fog. Let’s not forget the minor blood pressure issues, blood sugar issues, and thyroid issues.
Many will actually say these are just signs of aging. I don’t agree. I’ve seen too many people improve with adjustments to their nutritional intake and give extra support through food and lifestyle changes first. Then sometimes they add in some supplements when they are temporarily needed. I actually encourage most people to remove all supplements except those that are prescribed by their doctor. Too many people are taking things they don’t need and are wasting money trying to out-supplement a poor diet. Or they’re trying to micromanage symptoms with supplements while still eating things that are encouraging the symptoms.
The Path to True Health
So, to wrap it all up, yes, calories matter. But what those calories are made of and what they do in your unique body is more important. Your underlying health matters, and what those calories do to your health matters. Finally, the Don’t Count Calories camp is relying on your body to heal