I did a modified (keeping such health foods as unlimited salad, wine and martinis) Atkins diet for about six weeks. I lost ten pounds. I thought the Atkins diet would be easy, if I allowed myself to continue drinking, but giving up bread and rice and potatoes was pretty tough. I think the way to do it without damage is to limit yourself to two weeks, but totally without carbs (except, perhaps, for a little salad). Then, you start phasing in good carbs. I have not had a french fry in two months. I have had a few, small baked and sweet potatoes, and a half dozen onion rings. I have had a few bagels and about six English muffins, and all the salad I want. I have not read the Zone Diet, but I think that it is something like what I am doing now. I also think that having gone to the trouble of losing some weight, a person becomes more attentive and stops eating by habit. I have kept the weight off and have no lack of fulfillment, except for my eternal, fruitless longing for my favorite brunette (see that post).
What happened when people started looking for low fat is that producers increased sugar (fructose) and salt to compensate for loss of flavor. This alternative turned out to be at least as bad as fat.
The Atkins approach
Moderator: Available
What Bill said.
Jim
An obsolete model IMO and others - about to be changed (perhaps turned upside down) due largely in part to Atkins' work. Sugar in the form of carbs may indeed be fuel, but too much of it seems to lead to problems not the least of which is obesity and diabetes. The data seems to indicate that people who are obese should cut way back on the sugar/carbs - or risk getting diabetes - which is what the Atkins approach is all about.The USDA Food Guide Pyramid illustrates that concept beautifully,
Jim
Last edited by Shaolin on Fri Jan 17, 2003 12:22 am, edited 1 time in total.
Moy Yat Ving Tsun Kung-Fu
Rest in peace dear teacher: Moy Yat Sifu
Rest in peace dear teacher: Moy Yat Sifu
"We need AT LEAST 50%-65% of our incoming calories to be carbohydrate. In Sept. of last year the Institute of Medicine issued a report stating that the MINIMUM amount of carbohydrate need JUST TO FUEL THE BRAIN is 130 grams per day."
There are two entities in your body that are dependent on glucose right now--your red cells and your brain. The brain can figure out how to use metabolites from fat if you give it time, but, the red cells never will. So if glucose intake drops, the liver releases it's stored glucose (was stored as glycogen) but that will run out. Then glucose is a must, and it comes from protein. Protein can be turned into glucose, but, fat cannot, and you can't turn either fat or glucose into the essential amino acids... the nonessential you can make from the essential ones. the thing is, the brain will elarn to run on fats after a few days, and the red cells, while they never learn to use anything but glucose, just turn it into lactate. The lactate can be regenerated in the liver into glucose for reuse. This is why we don't have to use up all our protein stores when we fast--otherwise it'd be gone in days.
"So, it becomes obvious that low-carb diets, such as Atkins are ridiculously inadequate. Since the human requirement for carbohydrate is so great, your body is equipped to do what it has to do in order to survive when dietary carbohydrates aren’t available. It will cannibalize your muscles and other lean tissue in order to convert that protein into carbohydrate for the fuel that it so desperately needs. That process produces large amounts of metabolic by-products that must be detoxified by the liver and kidneys and eliminated from the body."
The breakdown products of protein metabolism in single celled organisms = ammonia. Just floats away. In mammals, it's made into the less toxic urea (gives your pee it's odor) so we waste less water to excrete it. Reptiles and birds make uric acid paste to save even more water, and stain your windshields.
It's interesting what we get taught. I was told in 12th grade if you didn't eat fat you'd die, because your heart runs on it. Well, guess what folks--you can turn ANY calorie source into fat.
"Those people who have weight problems in my way of thinking should at least try to cut down on the amount of carbs in thier diet. We know that carbs are a very high energy source and we also know what the body does with those carbs if you don't instantly use that energy - it turns the energy into fat! Using the low carb approach helps the body begin to rely on burning fat for energy which is what we want to get rid of, while eating lots of protein prevents the loss of lean tissue."
Extra fat in diet --> fat on butt. Extra carbs in diet --> right to the rear. Extra protein in diet? You got it. Buttpadding.
The key point here is that weight loss is accomplished by reducing calories, first and foremost. Americans eat too damn many of them. Talk to a european who's eaten at one of our restaurants--they don't know what to do with all the food. You get twice as much as you need, because they can make you feel satisfied that way, and they can't lower prices, but more food is cheap for them. Hence, size of industry standard dinnerplate was raised, and for industry benefit, we're being fattened.
Take a doggie bag.
Reduce calories, ensure you lose fat and not muscle by making sure you get plenty of the right vits, minerals, and protein. The argument about which diet is best for the rmaximal metabolic balance is good, but most of us would just do better eating less.
At a BARE minimum you require: essential amino acids (you can make the rest from them). Essential fatty acids (arachidonic acid, needed for chemical messengers, not routine fat--you can make those from protein or carb). And you need enough carb to run your red cells and your acclimating brain--but you can make glucose from protein. Vitamins and minerals and you're done.
The BEST diet remains to be seen. But overall we could eat more veggies and lean protein with less fat and refined carbs and be fine, if we limit our calories.
NOTE: reducing calories is the easiest thing, but you can also expend more (exercise) or pee them out (uncontrolled diabetes with sugar in the urine--seen diabetics with eating disorders do this on purpose, lots of teen diabetics do it too--or atkins diet with some ketones (fat metabolites) in the pee). I recomend the tried and true diet and exercise.
There are two entities in your body that are dependent on glucose right now--your red cells and your brain. The brain can figure out how to use metabolites from fat if you give it time, but, the red cells never will. So if glucose intake drops, the liver releases it's stored glucose (was stored as glycogen) but that will run out. Then glucose is a must, and it comes from protein. Protein can be turned into glucose, but, fat cannot, and you can't turn either fat or glucose into the essential amino acids... the nonessential you can make from the essential ones. the thing is, the brain will elarn to run on fats after a few days, and the red cells, while they never learn to use anything but glucose, just turn it into lactate. The lactate can be regenerated in the liver into glucose for reuse. This is why we don't have to use up all our protein stores when we fast--otherwise it'd be gone in days.
"So, it becomes obvious that low-carb diets, such as Atkins are ridiculously inadequate. Since the human requirement for carbohydrate is so great, your body is equipped to do what it has to do in order to survive when dietary carbohydrates aren’t available. It will cannibalize your muscles and other lean tissue in order to convert that protein into carbohydrate for the fuel that it so desperately needs. That process produces large amounts of metabolic by-products that must be detoxified by the liver and kidneys and eliminated from the body."
The breakdown products of protein metabolism in single celled organisms = ammonia. Just floats away. In mammals, it's made into the less toxic urea (gives your pee it's odor) so we waste less water to excrete it. Reptiles and birds make uric acid paste to save even more water, and stain your windshields.
It's interesting what we get taught. I was told in 12th grade if you didn't eat fat you'd die, because your heart runs on it. Well, guess what folks--you can turn ANY calorie source into fat.
"Those people who have weight problems in my way of thinking should at least try to cut down on the amount of carbs in thier diet. We know that carbs are a very high energy source and we also know what the body does with those carbs if you don't instantly use that energy - it turns the energy into fat! Using the low carb approach helps the body begin to rely on burning fat for energy which is what we want to get rid of, while eating lots of protein prevents the loss of lean tissue."
Extra fat in diet --> fat on butt. Extra carbs in diet --> right to the rear. Extra protein in diet? You got it. Buttpadding.
The key point here is that weight loss is accomplished by reducing calories, first and foremost. Americans eat too damn many of them. Talk to a european who's eaten at one of our restaurants--they don't know what to do with all the food. You get twice as much as you need, because they can make you feel satisfied that way, and they can't lower prices, but more food is cheap for them. Hence, size of industry standard dinnerplate was raised, and for industry benefit, we're being fattened.
Take a doggie bag.
Reduce calories, ensure you lose fat and not muscle by making sure you get plenty of the right vits, minerals, and protein. The argument about which diet is best for the rmaximal metabolic balance is good, but most of us would just do better eating less.
At a BARE minimum you require: essential amino acids (you can make the rest from them). Essential fatty acids (arachidonic acid, needed for chemical messengers, not routine fat--you can make those from protein or carb). And you need enough carb to run your red cells and your acclimating brain--but you can make glucose from protein. Vitamins and minerals and you're done.
The BEST diet remains to be seen. But overall we could eat more veggies and lean protein with less fat and refined carbs and be fine, if we limit our calories.
NOTE: reducing calories is the easiest thing, but you can also expend more (exercise) or pee them out (uncontrolled diabetes with sugar in the urine--seen diabetics with eating disorders do this on purpose, lots of teen diabetics do it too--or atkins diet with some ketones (fat metabolites) in the pee). I recomend the tried and true diet and exercise.
--Ian
-
Guest
Here's a reply article located at:
http://www.beachbody.com/jump.jsp?itemI ... NT&path=29
THE ATKINS DEBACLE
The high fat/low carb craze could be more dangerous than healthy
by Steve Edwards
There's always something on the market promising a simple solution to whatever ails you. When it comes to nutrition, theories are so prevalent that if you interview 10 different trainers or nutritionists, you just might get 10 different protocols for “the only diet plan that really works.”
Forefront on many people’s list these days is the Atkins Diet, written by Dr. Robert Atkins way back in 1972. But unlike most diet fads, this one has remained popular. Participants are said to be able to devour fatty foods and still hone their bodies into chiseled works of art. Heck, why wouldn’t it be popular? Pass the bacon!
A recent cover of New York Times Magazine showed a photo of a steak with a melting cube of butter on top, with a bold headline stating, “What if Fat Doesn’t Make You Fat?” The article that appeared in the magazine earned its author, freelance journalist Gary Taubes, a reported $700,000 advance for a book on the subject. It asked questions such as, “What if it’s all a big fat lie?” about whether or not the world’s nutritional experts have been bamboozling us over the years in stating that things like fatty meats, butter, cream, and cheese might be bad for our health.
But an article on the cover of Nutrition Action, sarcastically titled “Big Fat Lies,” shed some more compelling light on the subject suggesting that it may have been Taubes, and not the experts, who’s been doing the bamboozling.
Nutrition Action is a small circulation, science-based, non-glossy magazine that is somewhat of an insider’s trade publication. In general, its stories use studies to state the latest facts and trends in the nutrition industry. This article, however, took a slightly different slant, mainly because the author, Bonnie Liebman, interviewed each person quoted in Taubes’ article in order to “validate” his story. What she found was that virtually every claim made by Taubes was out of context from its original statement.
“He (Taubes) knows how to spin a yarn,” stated Barbara Rolls, an obesity expert at Penn State in Leibman’s piece. “What frightens me is that he picks and chooses his facts.”
Taubes’ major claims were all refuted in Liebman’s story. Not by her, but by the experts whom Taubes had used himself to support his article. Gerald Reavan of Stanford summed up his feelings on how Taubes misrepresented his quotes by saying, “I was horrified.”
Below are the main points of Taubes’ article (NYTM) and what Liebman (NA) found out about his claims on the Atkins Diet:
#1
NYTM: The experts recommend the Atkins Diet.
NA: But they didn’t. Reavan, Harvard’s Walter Willett and Stanford’s John Farquhar are all huge names in the field of nutrition. And while Taubes cited them and others as a “small but growing minority of establishment researchers who have come to take seriously what low-carb researchers have been saying all along,” this was far from the truth. When Willet was asked point blank, his answer on Atkins was, “I certainly don’t recommend it.”
#2
NYTM: Saturated fat doesn’t promote heart disease.
NA: Taubes stated that saturated fats will elevate both bad cholesterol (LDL) and good cholesterol (HDL) levels and cause “a virtual wash” in the body, which is absurd according to every expert Liebman could track down.
#3
NYTM: Health authorities recommended a low-fat diet as a key to weight loss.
NA: Taubes claimed that “everyone from the Surgeon General on down” has recommend low-fat diets to lose weight when, in reality, it’s only stated that eating too much fat is bad. “The Surgeon General’s report doesn’t say that fat causes obesity,” said Marion Nestle, chair of the nutrition and food studies department and New York University, who also was managing editor of the report. “Fat has twice the calories of either protein or carbohydrates. That’s why fat is fattening…”
#4
NYTM: We’re fat because we ate a low-fat diet.
NA: “It’s hard to believe this claim passed the laugh test at The Times,” wrote Liebman. Studies show that Americans eat roughly 500 calories per day more than we did in 1980, which is a pound a week alone, regardless of what type of food it is. This claim is “preposterous,” according to Samuel Klein, director of the Center of Nutrition at the Washington University School of Medicine. “There’s no real evidence that low-fat diets have caused the obesity epidemic.”
#5
NYTM: Carbs, not fats, cause obesity.
NA: This is the--now almost standard--claim that carbohydrates cause an insulin spike that raises hunger so that you will eat more, but it’s hardly fact. “It’s not proven at all,” says Rolls. “We have no firm data that glycemic index affects body weight or how full people feel after eating.” Says Columbia’s F. Xavier Pi-Sunyer, director of Obesity Research Center at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York, “Insulin crosses the blood brain barrier and turns off food intake… If anything, insulin should lower food intake.”
Taubes did use a study that showed weight loss from eating lower glycemic indexed foods but according to Rolls, “It’s hard to tell what led to the weight loss in that study because calorie density, fiber, and glycemic index all go hand in hand,” meaning that it was more likely due to type of foods eaten then just their glycemic index.
#6, 7, 8
NYTM: The Atkins Diet is the best way to lose weight, The Atkins Diet works because it cuts carbohydrates, Low-fat diets don’t help people lose weight.
NA: “It’s silly to say that carbohydrates cause obesity,” said George Blackburn of Harvard. “We’re overweight because we overeat calories.”
“Low-fat weight loss diets have proved in clinical trials and real life to be dismal failures,” claimed Taubes. But his piece did not cite any studies and, across the board, studies that have shown weight loss have one thing in common: a reduction in the number of calories consumed. A diet that helps you cut calories will help you lose weight, no matter what those calories are.
#9
NYTM: The Atkins Diet is safe.
NA: Even the Atkins web site claims that the diet isn’t nutritionally sound without supplementation, which is suspicious for a diet touted as “perfectly safe.” Studies have linked excessive red meat consumption to certain cancers, and there is no disputing that excess protein leads to acidic urine.
“…acid urine leaches calcium out of the bones,” stated Blackburn. “You can buffer the diet by taking a couple of Tums a day, but now we’re into medical supervision of people on the diet.”
Also, studies on the Atkins Diet showed that LDL levels didn’t go up, which seems good until you consider that they should be dropping when weight is being shed. “The harm caused by saturated fats could be overcome by weight loss,” says Samuel Klein of Washington University’s School of Medicine. “But what happens once people stop losing weight and start trying to maintain the loss? Will their LDL climb? We don’t know.”
#10
NYTM: Taubes examined the evidence objectively.
NA: This claim is not even close. Taubes seemed to ignore anything that didn’t fit within the realm of what he wanted to say, such as Willet’s claim that red meat is associated with higher risk of colon and possibly prostate cancer. “The New York Times isn’t the National Inquirer,” wrote Liebman. “Readers expect The Times to run articles that are honestly reported and written. Yet in August, The Washington Post revealed that Taubes simply ignored research that didn’t agree with his conclusions. For example, he didn’t use anything from Pi-Sunyer because “he just didn’t strike me as a scientist.” And if Taubes is willing to ignore the words of someone who’s served as president of both the American Society of Clinical Nutrition and the American Diabetes Association, we’d probably do just as well to ignore him also.
Conclusion: My own research and trial and error methodology shows that using the Atkins Diet can be effective to lower the body’s overall fat percentage. However, having done it myself (for short periods) and interviewed and worked with hundreds of people who’ve tried it, I cannot recommend eating this way in order to even lose weight effectively and definitely not for a healthy lifestyle. Massive protein consumption has a diuretic effect on the body, so in the initial stages you tend to lose a lot of water weight. You also flush your electrolytes making chronic dehydration, a dangerous condition, highly likely without careful replenishment.
A review of the Atkins site and articles like the one analyzed above do nothing to change my opinion. On their own web site, wording is carefully constructed so that an educated reader feels there is something that they aren’t being told. Such as where it’s stated that you can get all of your vitamins on 60 grams of carbohydrates per day. This is qualified by showing an example of an exact ratio of foods you need to eat in order to do so, which is a highly unlikely scenario, since anyone that fastidious about their diet is unlikely to even have a weight problem to begin with. My experience at their site was that it had the feel of someone peddling snake oil.
Bottom line is that there are just too many health professionals saying that the diet isn’t safe to justify its use. Supporters cry conspiracy, but I find this scenario highly unfathomable. Atkins has its supporters, but every single professional that I’ve found was somehow connected to making money off of it. I haven’t found even one exception over the years, which is reason enough to remain very skeptical and stick to a more sensible eating plan.
http://www.beachbody.com/jump.jsp?itemI ... NT&path=29
THE ATKINS DEBACLE
The high fat/low carb craze could be more dangerous than healthy
by Steve Edwards
There's always something on the market promising a simple solution to whatever ails you. When it comes to nutrition, theories are so prevalent that if you interview 10 different trainers or nutritionists, you just might get 10 different protocols for “the only diet plan that really works.”
Forefront on many people’s list these days is the Atkins Diet, written by Dr. Robert Atkins way back in 1972. But unlike most diet fads, this one has remained popular. Participants are said to be able to devour fatty foods and still hone their bodies into chiseled works of art. Heck, why wouldn’t it be popular? Pass the bacon!
A recent cover of New York Times Magazine showed a photo of a steak with a melting cube of butter on top, with a bold headline stating, “What if Fat Doesn’t Make You Fat?” The article that appeared in the magazine earned its author, freelance journalist Gary Taubes, a reported $700,000 advance for a book on the subject. It asked questions such as, “What if it’s all a big fat lie?” about whether or not the world’s nutritional experts have been bamboozling us over the years in stating that things like fatty meats, butter, cream, and cheese might be bad for our health.
But an article on the cover of Nutrition Action, sarcastically titled “Big Fat Lies,” shed some more compelling light on the subject suggesting that it may have been Taubes, and not the experts, who’s been doing the bamboozling.
Nutrition Action is a small circulation, science-based, non-glossy magazine that is somewhat of an insider’s trade publication. In general, its stories use studies to state the latest facts and trends in the nutrition industry. This article, however, took a slightly different slant, mainly because the author, Bonnie Liebman, interviewed each person quoted in Taubes’ article in order to “validate” his story. What she found was that virtually every claim made by Taubes was out of context from its original statement.
“He (Taubes) knows how to spin a yarn,” stated Barbara Rolls, an obesity expert at Penn State in Leibman’s piece. “What frightens me is that he picks and chooses his facts.”
Taubes’ major claims were all refuted in Liebman’s story. Not by her, but by the experts whom Taubes had used himself to support his article. Gerald Reavan of Stanford summed up his feelings on how Taubes misrepresented his quotes by saying, “I was horrified.”
Below are the main points of Taubes’ article (NYTM) and what Liebman (NA) found out about his claims on the Atkins Diet:
#1
NYTM: The experts recommend the Atkins Diet.
NA: But they didn’t. Reavan, Harvard’s Walter Willett and Stanford’s John Farquhar are all huge names in the field of nutrition. And while Taubes cited them and others as a “small but growing minority of establishment researchers who have come to take seriously what low-carb researchers have been saying all along,” this was far from the truth. When Willet was asked point blank, his answer on Atkins was, “I certainly don’t recommend it.”
#2
NYTM: Saturated fat doesn’t promote heart disease.
NA: Taubes stated that saturated fats will elevate both bad cholesterol (LDL) and good cholesterol (HDL) levels and cause “a virtual wash” in the body, which is absurd according to every expert Liebman could track down.
#3
NYTM: Health authorities recommended a low-fat diet as a key to weight loss.
NA: Taubes claimed that “everyone from the Surgeon General on down” has recommend low-fat diets to lose weight when, in reality, it’s only stated that eating too much fat is bad. “The Surgeon General’s report doesn’t say that fat causes obesity,” said Marion Nestle, chair of the nutrition and food studies department and New York University, who also was managing editor of the report. “Fat has twice the calories of either protein or carbohydrates. That’s why fat is fattening…”
#4
NYTM: We’re fat because we ate a low-fat diet.
NA: “It’s hard to believe this claim passed the laugh test at The Times,” wrote Liebman. Studies show that Americans eat roughly 500 calories per day more than we did in 1980, which is a pound a week alone, regardless of what type of food it is. This claim is “preposterous,” according to Samuel Klein, director of the Center of Nutrition at the Washington University School of Medicine. “There’s no real evidence that low-fat diets have caused the obesity epidemic.”
#5
NYTM: Carbs, not fats, cause obesity.
NA: This is the--now almost standard--claim that carbohydrates cause an insulin spike that raises hunger so that you will eat more, but it’s hardly fact. “It’s not proven at all,” says Rolls. “We have no firm data that glycemic index affects body weight or how full people feel after eating.” Says Columbia’s F. Xavier Pi-Sunyer, director of Obesity Research Center at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York, “Insulin crosses the blood brain barrier and turns off food intake… If anything, insulin should lower food intake.”
Taubes did use a study that showed weight loss from eating lower glycemic indexed foods but according to Rolls, “It’s hard to tell what led to the weight loss in that study because calorie density, fiber, and glycemic index all go hand in hand,” meaning that it was more likely due to type of foods eaten then just their glycemic index.
#6, 7, 8
NYTM: The Atkins Diet is the best way to lose weight, The Atkins Diet works because it cuts carbohydrates, Low-fat diets don’t help people lose weight.
NA: “It’s silly to say that carbohydrates cause obesity,” said George Blackburn of Harvard. “We’re overweight because we overeat calories.”
“Low-fat weight loss diets have proved in clinical trials and real life to be dismal failures,” claimed Taubes. But his piece did not cite any studies and, across the board, studies that have shown weight loss have one thing in common: a reduction in the number of calories consumed. A diet that helps you cut calories will help you lose weight, no matter what those calories are.
#9
NYTM: The Atkins Diet is safe.
NA: Even the Atkins web site claims that the diet isn’t nutritionally sound without supplementation, which is suspicious for a diet touted as “perfectly safe.” Studies have linked excessive red meat consumption to certain cancers, and there is no disputing that excess protein leads to acidic urine.
“…acid urine leaches calcium out of the bones,” stated Blackburn. “You can buffer the diet by taking a couple of Tums a day, but now we’re into medical supervision of people on the diet.”
Also, studies on the Atkins Diet showed that LDL levels didn’t go up, which seems good until you consider that they should be dropping when weight is being shed. “The harm caused by saturated fats could be overcome by weight loss,” says Samuel Klein of Washington University’s School of Medicine. “But what happens once people stop losing weight and start trying to maintain the loss? Will their LDL climb? We don’t know.”
#10
NYTM: Taubes examined the evidence objectively.
NA: This claim is not even close. Taubes seemed to ignore anything that didn’t fit within the realm of what he wanted to say, such as Willet’s claim that red meat is associated with higher risk of colon and possibly prostate cancer. “The New York Times isn’t the National Inquirer,” wrote Liebman. “Readers expect The Times to run articles that are honestly reported and written. Yet in August, The Washington Post revealed that Taubes simply ignored research that didn’t agree with his conclusions. For example, he didn’t use anything from Pi-Sunyer because “he just didn’t strike me as a scientist.” And if Taubes is willing to ignore the words of someone who’s served as president of both the American Society of Clinical Nutrition and the American Diabetes Association, we’d probably do just as well to ignore him also.
Conclusion: My own research and trial and error methodology shows that using the Atkins Diet can be effective to lower the body’s overall fat percentage. However, having done it myself (for short periods) and interviewed and worked with hundreds of people who’ve tried it, I cannot recommend eating this way in order to even lose weight effectively and definitely not for a healthy lifestyle. Massive protein consumption has a diuretic effect on the body, so in the initial stages you tend to lose a lot of water weight. You also flush your electrolytes making chronic dehydration, a dangerous condition, highly likely without careful replenishment.
A review of the Atkins site and articles like the one analyzed above do nothing to change my opinion. On their own web site, wording is carefully constructed so that an educated reader feels there is something that they aren’t being told. Such as where it’s stated that you can get all of your vitamins on 60 grams of carbohydrates per day. This is qualified by showing an example of an exact ratio of foods you need to eat in order to do so, which is a highly unlikely scenario, since anyone that fastidious about their diet is unlikely to even have a weight problem to begin with. My experience at their site was that it had the feel of someone peddling snake oil.
Bottom line is that there are just too many health professionals saying that the diet isn’t safe to justify its use. Supporters cry conspiracy, but I find this scenario highly unfathomable. Atkins has its supporters, but every single professional that I’ve found was somehow connected to making money off of it. I haven’t found even one exception over the years, which is reason enough to remain very skeptical and stick to a more sensible eating plan.
Just Wanted To Say, HI!, to Susie.
Susie, nice to see you in words, if not in person! 
david
david
-
Susie Harrison
- Posts: 10
- Joined: Sun Jan 17, 1999 6:01 am
- Location: Indialantic, FL, USA
- Contact:
Re: Just Wanted To Say, HI!, to Susie.
Hi David,david wrote:Susie, nice to see you in words, if not in person!
david
Thanks for the friendly greeting! Good to hear from you. I hope you make it down here for another visit this year.
Susie
-
Susie Harrison
- Posts: 10
- Joined: Sun Jan 17, 1999 6:01 am
- Location: Indialantic, FL, USA
- Contact:
Panther,
Thanks for posting the article by Steve Edwards - very well-written. He is referencing all the right people - well-known researchers and scientists in the nutrition field (such as Bonnie Liebman, George Blackburn, Xavier Pi-Sunyer, Walter Willett, Barbara Rolls, and Gerald Reavan). It is really interesting and ironic that when all the "diet gurus" such as Atkins and Barry Sears, try to back up their claims using researched published by Reavan and others, that it comes back around to bite them in the rear. Gerald Reavan, for example, has appeared on talk shows, etc., saying he wishes those guys would stop using his name, because they are misinterpreting his research and coming to all the wrong conclusions.As you may know, Reavan finally wrote his own book to set the record straight on his position.
Thanks again - I really enjoyed the article.
Susie
Thanks for posting the article by Steve Edwards - very well-written. He is referencing all the right people - well-known researchers and scientists in the nutrition field (such as Bonnie Liebman, George Blackburn, Xavier Pi-Sunyer, Walter Willett, Barbara Rolls, and Gerald Reavan). It is really interesting and ironic that when all the "diet gurus" such as Atkins and Barry Sears, try to back up their claims using researched published by Reavan and others, that it comes back around to bite them in the rear. Gerald Reavan, for example, has appeared on talk shows, etc., saying he wishes those guys would stop using his name, because they are misinterpreting his research and coming to all the wrong conclusions.As you may know, Reavan finally wrote his own book to set the record straight on his position.
Thanks again - I really enjoyed the article.
Susie
-
Bill Glasheen
- Posts: 17299
- Joined: Thu Mar 11, 1999 6:01 am
- Location: Richmond, VA --- Louisville, KY
Thanks for all the inputs, everyone.
I have a few comments on the Steven Edwards article, which Panther so graciously posted.
* Nobody who knows what they are talking about claims that carbohydrates per se cause obesity.
* Nobody who knows anything about feedback control systems would have written a paragraph such as the one above about insulin, blood sugar, and hunger.
* Anybody that knows anything about diabetes and diabetes research would be shocked at his vilification of the glycemic index.
This is something that's difficult to explain if you've never taken differential equations and linear control systems. But these fields along with training in compartmental models were part of my graduate biomedical engineering training. But I can probably use some analogies to get the point across.
The best way to describe carbohydrates and the glycemic index is to use an analogy. Let's say you're trying to heat your house with a fireplace. What would you use? Well first you have to consider the goal. The goal is to keep your house at a comfortable level. How easily can you do that by burning newspaper? Not very... Every time you throw some on the fire, it burns very quickly, only to be consumed and leaving the house cold. You get a spike in the heat, and then it's gone. The best thing to do is to put something in the fireplace that'll take a very long time to break down. That way the heat will be released slowly, and it'll be easy to figure out exactly how big you want the fire to keep it at the temperature you want.
The body is very much like that with blood glucose vs. what you want to eat, except that you have insulin and your brain to take the place of the person figuring out what to put on the fire. You also have a rather complex storage system to save what you can't use right away.
Are you so hungry that you are "bonking?" This is a sign that your blood glucose level is so low that you can't think straight. A jelly donut or a sugary soda will get your blood glucose level up pretty quickly. That's a good thing, right? Not exactly. Our body systems are "tuned" to anticipate what's coming through the GI system based on fluctuations in blood glucose level. If you kick blood glucose levels up really high, the body responds with a BIG bolus of insulin. That causes the body to quickly store the excess glucose as fat, and it tells your brain to stop eating. After all if the blood glucose level went up that quickly, then you must have eaten a massive meal with lots of wonderful stuff, right? Oops!!! Not exactly. The excess insulin over-stores calories and shuts the appetite down. You are satiated for a bit and you pack away the extra calories. Except....you pack away TOO much and now you are bonking in an hour. So your body tells you to Eat already!!!
Sugar, refined flour, Twinkies, french fries, white rice, white pasta, overcooked vegetables, coffee cake, "snack foods," etc. were NOT part of our diet when nature was selecting for the ideal blood sugar regulation system. We evolved eating fish and/or free-ranging animals, vegetables (probably not overcooked), fruit, and nuts. The fish would have been a supply of beneficial (eicosapentanoic acid, docosahexanoic acid) fatty acids and protein. The free-ranging animals would have been relatively lean, and research has recently shown that animals that eat grass have a better fat profile (from our standpoint) than those that are grain fed.
But from the carbohydrate and glycemic index point of view, the raw vegetables and fruit would have been a source of slow-releasing sugar. By not spiking blood sugar, you don't spike insulin. The sugar consumed is more likely to be stored as readily-available glycogen. Any athlete that eats well and (not surprisingly) performs well appreciates this. Furthermore, these sources of carbohydrate are more likely to contain vitamins, minerals, and essential phytonutrients (some of which we are just beginning to appreciate). By eating in this fashion, our brain and our bodies experience relatively constant blood sugar levels. We are less likely to store fat. We are less likely to get giddy. We are less likely to bonk. We are less likely to do all the bad things to our body that diabetics know all too well by the end of their lives...
Write down everything you eat in a week. If you really sat down and looked at it (and bothered to read the labels on food you eat), you'd be shocked at the amount of carbohydrate-dense food you eat. You'd be shocked at the amount of simple sugars that are snuck in your processed food to make it taste better. (This pi$$es the s*chit out of me!!!). If you never looked at a snack machine and never stopped at a fast food place and never ate processed anything for the rest of your life, you'd probably live a half dozen years longer.
One of the reasons we have lost the ability to eat the right amount of food is because we keep fooling our appetite system. As long as you eat things that nature never intended you to eat (after tens of thousands of years of evolution), you will probably not be at your ideal weight. Anybody that would take the time to write the mathematical models for sugar regulation in the body could understand this from a first principles point of view. You can research until the cows come home (hopefully with lowfat dairy products...
), but you'll probably do what most idiots out there do, which is try to prove some flawed theory with a simplistic model. Start first by understanding the complexity of blood sugar regulation, calorie storage, calorie release, and appetite control. When you do that, you're halfway there. But most people can understand it from a qualitative point of view by understanding how to keep your house at a comfortable temperature.
To understand these whole concepts further, it's interesting to consider weight regulation of certain tribes in southwest United States. These folks pack weight like there's no tomorrow (literally). Why??? Well, their evolution was a bit different than ours. It seems that they experienced cycles of feast and famine on a regular basis. So who lived? Those whose sugar regulation and energy storage/consumption systems were "tuned" to pack it away when food was there, because food would be scarce later. Makes sense, no? Food for thought...
Look, I don't live by Atkins. I do something like a modified Zone diet, and it seems like my choices have been 4 or 5 years ahead of the USDA (which by the way is HEAVILY influenced by lobby groups such as the cattle and dairy industries...). However it ticks me off when people do stuff like this.
First... You can have a "maintenance" Atkins diet that is perfectly healthy. Recent research has shown that fats from fish, nuts, certain vegetables, and olive oil have tremendously beneficial effects on the body. How come Eskimos don't have heart disease? They don't eat carbs, and they eat lots of fatty... FISH! How come folks that eat lots of nuts (reference a Harvard nurse's study) live longer? Again, it's the fatty acid profile of certain nuts and legumes (peanuts are technically legumes). I could go on and on...
The trick is to be selective about the types of fats you consume. Shun burgers and steaks for fish and nuts and avocados.
Now...who's going to argue with those food choices?
Second... The types of carbohydrates you eat matter. Stop eating simple sugars, unless they are part of fruit. Stop the refined flour intake. "Old fashion" bread has vitamin E and fiber in it. Vegetables have vitamins and minerals in them. Say goodbye to sugar and refined grains. Say hello to fresh fruits and vegetables that are barely cooked.
Now... Who's going to argue with those food choices? And guess what - you can make these food choices and follow both Atkins and Sears diets!
Third... I don't care WHAT weight loss diet you choose, you'd better see a doctor regularly. The best thing to do is eat right all the time. "Dieting" should be a way if life. "Dieting" should never be something you do to yourself after you eat way too much and now you look like crap in a bathing suit and it's May already... Once again, it's not nice to fool nature. Your sugar regulation system has an extra long-term component that adjusts your basal metabolic rate (BMR). This dictates how much energy you burn at rest. If you starve yourself - no matter by what method - you will lower your BMR. You can't fight tens of thousands of years of evolution. When you lose weight quickly - by any method - you will do bad things to your body. Among other things, you'll lose a few IQ points if you keep the yo-yo dieting up. You'll throw your whole blood chemistry into disarray when you go into a weight loss program.
The question isn't whether losing weight on an Atkins diet is safe, the real question is whether first getting fat and then losing weight - by any method - is safe. Stop picking on Atkins and instead stop feeding your face...
Many of the things your mother told you are true! Stop eating the snack food. Stop eating the processed food. Eat fresh food. Eat your fruits and vegetables.
- Bill
I have a few comments on the Steven Edwards article, which Panther so graciously posted.
This paragraph is grossly oversimplified and misleading.NYTM: Carbs, not fats, cause obesity.
NA: This is the--now almost standard--claim that carbohydrates cause an insulin spike that raises hunger so that you will eat more, but it’s hardly fact. “It’s not proven at all,” says Rolls. “We have no firm data that glycemic index affects body weight or how full people feel after eating.” Says Columbia’s F. Xavier Pi-Sunyer, director of Obesity Research Center at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York, “Insulin crosses the blood brain barrier and turns off food intake… If anything, insulin should lower food intake.
* Nobody who knows what they are talking about claims that carbohydrates per se cause obesity.
* Nobody who knows anything about feedback control systems would have written a paragraph such as the one above about insulin, blood sugar, and hunger.
* Anybody that knows anything about diabetes and diabetes research would be shocked at his vilification of the glycemic index.
This is something that's difficult to explain if you've never taken differential equations and linear control systems. But these fields along with training in compartmental models were part of my graduate biomedical engineering training. But I can probably use some analogies to get the point across.
The best way to describe carbohydrates and the glycemic index is to use an analogy. Let's say you're trying to heat your house with a fireplace. What would you use? Well first you have to consider the goal. The goal is to keep your house at a comfortable level. How easily can you do that by burning newspaper? Not very... Every time you throw some on the fire, it burns very quickly, only to be consumed and leaving the house cold. You get a spike in the heat, and then it's gone. The best thing to do is to put something in the fireplace that'll take a very long time to break down. That way the heat will be released slowly, and it'll be easy to figure out exactly how big you want the fire to keep it at the temperature you want.
The body is very much like that with blood glucose vs. what you want to eat, except that you have insulin and your brain to take the place of the person figuring out what to put on the fire. You also have a rather complex storage system to save what you can't use right away.
Are you so hungry that you are "bonking?" This is a sign that your blood glucose level is so low that you can't think straight. A jelly donut or a sugary soda will get your blood glucose level up pretty quickly. That's a good thing, right? Not exactly. Our body systems are "tuned" to anticipate what's coming through the GI system based on fluctuations in blood glucose level. If you kick blood glucose levels up really high, the body responds with a BIG bolus of insulin. That causes the body to quickly store the excess glucose as fat, and it tells your brain to stop eating. After all if the blood glucose level went up that quickly, then you must have eaten a massive meal with lots of wonderful stuff, right? Oops!!! Not exactly. The excess insulin over-stores calories and shuts the appetite down. You are satiated for a bit and you pack away the extra calories. Except....you pack away TOO much and now you are bonking in an hour. So your body tells you to Eat already!!!
Sugar, refined flour, Twinkies, french fries, white rice, white pasta, overcooked vegetables, coffee cake, "snack foods," etc. were NOT part of our diet when nature was selecting for the ideal blood sugar regulation system. We evolved eating fish and/or free-ranging animals, vegetables (probably not overcooked), fruit, and nuts. The fish would have been a supply of beneficial (eicosapentanoic acid, docosahexanoic acid) fatty acids and protein. The free-ranging animals would have been relatively lean, and research has recently shown that animals that eat grass have a better fat profile (from our standpoint) than those that are grain fed.
But from the carbohydrate and glycemic index point of view, the raw vegetables and fruit would have been a source of slow-releasing sugar. By not spiking blood sugar, you don't spike insulin. The sugar consumed is more likely to be stored as readily-available glycogen. Any athlete that eats well and (not surprisingly) performs well appreciates this. Furthermore, these sources of carbohydrate are more likely to contain vitamins, minerals, and essential phytonutrients (some of which we are just beginning to appreciate). By eating in this fashion, our brain and our bodies experience relatively constant blood sugar levels. We are less likely to store fat. We are less likely to get giddy. We are less likely to bonk. We are less likely to do all the bad things to our body that diabetics know all too well by the end of their lives...
Write down everything you eat in a week. If you really sat down and looked at it (and bothered to read the labels on food you eat), you'd be shocked at the amount of carbohydrate-dense food you eat. You'd be shocked at the amount of simple sugars that are snuck in your processed food to make it taste better. (This pi$$es the s*chit out of me!!!). If you never looked at a snack machine and never stopped at a fast food place and never ate processed anything for the rest of your life, you'd probably live a half dozen years longer.
One of the reasons we have lost the ability to eat the right amount of food is because we keep fooling our appetite system. As long as you eat things that nature never intended you to eat (after tens of thousands of years of evolution), you will probably not be at your ideal weight. Anybody that would take the time to write the mathematical models for sugar regulation in the body could understand this from a first principles point of view. You can research until the cows come home (hopefully with lowfat dairy products...
), but you'll probably do what most idiots out there do, which is try to prove some flawed theory with a simplistic model. Start first by understanding the complexity of blood sugar regulation, calorie storage, calorie release, and appetite control. When you do that, you're halfway there. But most people can understand it from a qualitative point of view by understanding how to keep your house at a comfortable temperature.To understand these whole concepts further, it's interesting to consider weight regulation of certain tribes in southwest United States. These folks pack weight like there's no tomorrow (literally). Why??? Well, their evolution was a bit different than ours. It seems that they experienced cycles of feast and famine on a regular basis. So who lived? Those whose sugar regulation and energy storage/consumption systems were "tuned" to pack it away when food was there, because food would be scarce later. Makes sense, no? Food for thought...
OK... For the third time... This is the classic strawman tactic.“The harm caused by saturated fats could be overcome by weight loss,” says Samuel Klein of Washington University’s School of Medicine. “But what happens once people stop losing weight and start trying to maintain the loss? Will their LDL climb? We don’t know.”
Look, I don't live by Atkins. I do something like a modified Zone diet, and it seems like my choices have been 4 or 5 years ahead of the USDA (which by the way is HEAVILY influenced by lobby groups such as the cattle and dairy industries...). However it ticks me off when people do stuff like this.
First... You can have a "maintenance" Atkins diet that is perfectly healthy. Recent research has shown that fats from fish, nuts, certain vegetables, and olive oil have tremendously beneficial effects on the body. How come Eskimos don't have heart disease? They don't eat carbs, and they eat lots of fatty... FISH! How come folks that eat lots of nuts (reference a Harvard nurse's study) live longer? Again, it's the fatty acid profile of certain nuts and legumes (peanuts are technically legumes). I could go on and on...
The trick is to be selective about the types of fats you consume. Shun burgers and steaks for fish and nuts and avocados.
Now...who's going to argue with those food choices?
Second... The types of carbohydrates you eat matter. Stop eating simple sugars, unless they are part of fruit. Stop the refined flour intake. "Old fashion" bread has vitamin E and fiber in it. Vegetables have vitamins and minerals in them. Say goodbye to sugar and refined grains. Say hello to fresh fruits and vegetables that are barely cooked.
Now... Who's going to argue with those food choices? And guess what - you can make these food choices and follow both Atkins and Sears diets!
Third... I don't care WHAT weight loss diet you choose, you'd better see a doctor regularly. The best thing to do is eat right all the time. "Dieting" should be a way if life. "Dieting" should never be something you do to yourself after you eat way too much and now you look like crap in a bathing suit and it's May already... Once again, it's not nice to fool nature. Your sugar regulation system has an extra long-term component that adjusts your basal metabolic rate (BMR). This dictates how much energy you burn at rest. If you starve yourself - no matter by what method - you will lower your BMR. You can't fight tens of thousands of years of evolution. When you lose weight quickly - by any method - you will do bad things to your body. Among other things, you'll lose a few IQ points if you keep the yo-yo dieting up. You'll throw your whole blood chemistry into disarray when you go into a weight loss program.
The question isn't whether losing weight on an Atkins diet is safe, the real question is whether first getting fat and then losing weight - by any method - is safe. Stop picking on Atkins and instead stop feeding your face...
Many of the things your mother told you are true! Stop eating the snack food. Stop eating the processed food. Eat fresh food. Eat your fruits and vegetables.
- Bill
-
Bill Glasheen
- Posts: 17299
- Joined: Thu Mar 11, 1999 6:01 am
- Location: Richmond, VA --- Louisville, KY
More about fats...
Fats are made of fatty acids and glycerol. Certain fatty acids (mostly in the Omega 3, 6, and 9 family) are quite beneficial to our longterm health. Others are neutral. And still others (like arachidonic acid mentioned above by Ian) are pro-inflammatory and contribute to atherosclerosis. Most fats - to some extent - contribute to our risk of cancer when consumed in excess amounts, but this is a field with many questions still unanswered.
One classification scheme worth mentioning is saturated vs. polyunsaturated vs. monounsaturated vs. hydrogenated. Most folks agree that saturated fats are something you want to keep to a minimum. They are bad for your heart and they tend to promote inflammation which can have far-reaching effects (from joint problems to atherosclerosis to even Alzheimer's disease). Animal fats are the primary source of this. Thus if you must eat meat, eat very lean cuts. Remove the skin from your chicken and turkey. Choose white meat over dark meat. Eat nonfat dairy products.
Monounsaturated fatty acids (found in olives and nuts) and polyunsaturated fatty acids (found in vegetables) generally have more positive effects on your blood lipid profile. And I believe fish oil falls in the monounsaturated family.
The problem with fats and food chemistry is the temperature at which a fat is a solid. You cannot make a decent cookie with a polyunsaturated or monounsaturated fat. You cannot make a flaky pie crust with a polunsaturated or monounsaturated fat. You can't even make one of those "heathy" bars with a polyunsaturated or monounsaturated fat. To make the fat the right texture and end up with a product you can hold in your hand or put on the end of the fork, you have to do one of two things: either choose the saturated fat (water molecule on the double bond) or hydrogenate it (two hydrogens on the double bond). Food chemists have done the latter. Hence we have margerine instead of butter. We have food products made of "partially hydrogenated XXX oil" instead of "lard" or "beef tallow" or other fats with artery-clogging names. Problem is...research has shown that the hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated fats are just as bad as the saturated ones. Might as well pass the butter and the Crisco, put a beefsteak on the grill, and savor that dark chocolate.
No matter what diet you choose, stay away from the animal fats and stay away from foods (virtually ALL processed foods) that say "hydrogenated" or "partially hydrogenated" on them. If you do that AND follow the evil Atkins diet, you won't find many detractors. You'll just have to put up with the strawman tactics to dis you for doing something you are not.
The biggest problem with all this business is that you can't simplify it.
- Bill
Fats are made of fatty acids and glycerol. Certain fatty acids (mostly in the Omega 3, 6, and 9 family) are quite beneficial to our longterm health. Others are neutral. And still others (like arachidonic acid mentioned above by Ian) are pro-inflammatory and contribute to atherosclerosis. Most fats - to some extent - contribute to our risk of cancer when consumed in excess amounts, but this is a field with many questions still unanswered.
One classification scheme worth mentioning is saturated vs. polyunsaturated vs. monounsaturated vs. hydrogenated. Most folks agree that saturated fats are something you want to keep to a minimum. They are bad for your heart and they tend to promote inflammation which can have far-reaching effects (from joint problems to atherosclerosis to even Alzheimer's disease). Animal fats are the primary source of this. Thus if you must eat meat, eat very lean cuts. Remove the skin from your chicken and turkey. Choose white meat over dark meat. Eat nonfat dairy products.
Monounsaturated fatty acids (found in olives and nuts) and polyunsaturated fatty acids (found in vegetables) generally have more positive effects on your blood lipid profile. And I believe fish oil falls in the monounsaturated family.
The problem with fats and food chemistry is the temperature at which a fat is a solid. You cannot make a decent cookie with a polyunsaturated or monounsaturated fat. You cannot make a flaky pie crust with a polunsaturated or monounsaturated fat. You can't even make one of those "heathy" bars with a polyunsaturated or monounsaturated fat. To make the fat the right texture and end up with a product you can hold in your hand or put on the end of the fork, you have to do one of two things: either choose the saturated fat (water molecule on the double bond) or hydrogenate it (two hydrogens on the double bond). Food chemists have done the latter. Hence we have margerine instead of butter. We have food products made of "partially hydrogenated XXX oil" instead of "lard" or "beef tallow" or other fats with artery-clogging names. Problem is...research has shown that the hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated fats are just as bad as the saturated ones. Might as well pass the butter and the Crisco, put a beefsteak on the grill, and savor that dark chocolate.
No matter what diet you choose, stay away from the animal fats and stay away from foods (virtually ALL processed foods) that say "hydrogenated" or "partially hydrogenated" on them. If you do that AND follow the evil Atkins diet, you won't find many detractors. You'll just have to put up with the strawman tactics to dis you for doing something you are not.
The biggest problem with all this business is that you can't simplify it.
- Bill
You should never force yourself to drink a specific high amount of water ever day, unless you have a specific medical condition requiring you to do so. Most of us don't need that much water. The main thing is to listen to your body. Note that we are talking about plain water here.suede wrote:how necessary is it to drink 8-10 glasses a day
as i get bloated and have to go toilet on hourlybasis
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/08/ ... 8276.shtml
http://www.pihealth.com/water.htm
http://www.cnn.com/2002/HEALTH/diet.fit ... ater.otsc/
http://www.inq7.net/lif/2002/dec/03/lif_21-3.htm
Keep in mind that people have died from drinking way too much water (water intoxication, or hyponatremia). The most recent one I've heard of was a boy who died in the fall from drinking too much water during some sort of bonding therapy session. Some health problems, particularly kidney problems, can make you more susceptable to hyponatremia, and young infants are particularly susceptable, but anyone can drink too much water. Here are examples, which also describe what drinking too much water can do to your body:
http://www.mercola.com/2002/jul/20/water.htm
http://www.restonrunners.org/special/hy ... _death.htm
http://www.gpush.com/hyponatremia.html
http://www.ravesafe.org/otherinfo/leah_betts.htm
http://www.country-spice.com/webpages/h ... hwater.htm
http://www.hhp.ufl.edu/keepingfit/ARTIC ... hwater.htm
While hyponatremia is rare, although more common than once thought, these examples serve to illustrate that you should use common sense and not overdo it on anything.
And don't believe the hoax e-mail about X% (I think it usually says something like 75%) of the population is dehydrated, that is an urban myth.
Glenn
-
Bill Glasheen
- Posts: 17299
- Joined: Thu Mar 11, 1999 6:01 am
- Location: Richmond, VA --- Louisville, KY
Glenn
Most health experts say we should ideally drink 8 glasses (8 ounce glass) of fluid a day. Two quarts of fluid a day isn't that much. There are many ways to get that.
Most people don't drink that much and they don't die or anything. However your kidneys, you skin, your cardiovascular system (efficiency of the heart) and your joints will be happier if you do. Plus, you won't eat as much.
Six to Eight Glasses of Water a Day
Eight glasses of water a day is still a good idea for most people
- Bill
Most health experts say we should ideally drink 8 glasses (8 ounce glass) of fluid a day. Two quarts of fluid a day isn't that much. There are many ways to get that.
Most people don't drink that much and they don't die or anything. However your kidneys, you skin, your cardiovascular system (efficiency of the heart) and your joints will be happier if you do. Plus, you won't eat as much.
Six to Eight Glasses of Water a Day
Eight glasses of water a day is still a good idea for most people
- Bill
Fluids yes, but we get our fluids from many different sources. The main concern seems to be forcing yourself to drink too much plain water, which can dilute the blood and pull sodium out of your cells.Bill Glasheen wrote:Glenn
Most health experts say we should ideally drink 8 glasses (8 ounce glass) of fluid a day. Two quarts of fluid a day isn't that much. There are many ways to get that.
Most people don't drink that much and they don't die or anything. However your kidneys, you skin, your cardiovascular system (efficiency of the heart) and your joints will be happier if you do. Plus, you won't eat as much.
- Bill
Keep in mind that everything you drink and a lot of what you eat contributes to your fluid intake during a day. Some people try to drink eight ounces of water on top of all the other fluids they may drink: Coffee, tea soda, sports drinks, all of which are mostly water themselves. Or they drink a high quantity of plain water over a short period of time under stressful conditions (i.e. high physical exertion).
Admittedly the deaths have mostly happened in extreme situations, but some readers of this forum participate in such activities.
I think the main thing is to be aware of your activities, the weather, and how much you perspire. One source mentioned that on mostly sedentary days when it is not too hot or humid, you only need about 4 glasses of fluids to keep you hydrated.
Glenn
