Quote:
Originally Posted by chassis
This reminds me of the Steve Martin movie, The Jerk. Remember that one?
"It's the cans! He hates these cans!"
Substitute cans for cholesterol, salt, sugar, bread, starch or any of the enemies of modern dietary thinking.
For example, Patient A is given a complete physical and blood labs are taken. High blood pressure, sodium, sugar and cholesterol are noted. Presciptions are written. All good, right?
What doesn't come out in the discussion is that Patient A is 150 lbs overweight, does not exercise, and eats a large bag of Lay's potato chips and drinks a 2 liter of full-sugar carbonated beverage every day.
What would happen if Patient A was at a mid-healthy range BMI eating a balanced diet from all food groups in existence 2,000 years ago, and had a VO2max in the 40-50 range, but still registered high on cholesterol, salt and sugar in blood labs?
Is it the cans, or is it the cans?
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It's a combination of factors, but in a nutshell, we eat too many calories. The reason many people do this is habit, food availability, and nutritional deficiency. When someone craves a food, that's the body's way of saying it wants it. It often does this because it needs it. What is your favorite food? Look up the molecular components of that food and see if it's something you are getting enough of. Seafood is a great example. Do the people that love it have enough iodine or 3-PUFA's? That is often case more than it's not.
We Americans typically don't eat enough diversity. We eat the same things over and over which leads to greater nutritional deficiencies. We eat more calories to get more nutrients. I often tell patients to eat more colors. That increases the diversity of what they eat.