I used up my inspiration and energy in writing this long e-mail answer, so I'm sharing it here in this article. 

 Someone asked me the following question:

"Can you tell me how many carbs you limited yourself to
when you were on low carb?
Did it work well for you?
I seem to have more luck counting carbs."
 

Here's my answer. 

I think that low-carb is an excellent diet plan, and if it is a workable plan for you, go for it. Personally, whether I'm doing low-carb or not, I've found that it is necessary for me to track my food, and count calories.

All of my own research and experimentation and observation leads me to believe that Calories Count, even when doing low-carb, and IF there is a "calorie edge" to eating low carb, it is a very small one, probably not more than 100 calories a day.

I've seen that people who choose to eat more calories than they burn ...over time... while doing low-carb will still gain weight. Low-carb -- when it's VERY low carb -- tends to be more satiating, and more and more I suspect that --- over time --- it works primarily because people ingest less food.

My experiments with low-carb have been during maintenance at normal weight, so it can't be fairly compared with someone in the weight-loss phase.

I am intrigued by Gary Taubes' position about carbs, (see the BOOK TALK Section at DietHobby.com) and did a lot of experimenting with it in 2011.

I have experimented with what is known as ZERO carb -- which actually turned out to be around 5-10 carbs a day, because I choose not to give up my very small amount of plain, Greek yogurt.

However, during most of my low-carb experimentation, I worked to keep my carbs around 20 or less.

When I'm doing my "normal" - "balanced" food plan, my carbs are usually around 50-80 or less. For me, a normal, really high-carb day would only be about 100 carbs. It just turns out that way, because I don't have a large enough calorie allowance for more.

My own experience .. so far .. because I expect to be doing further future experimentation with low-carb
is that ... either because of the lack of variety in the food, or because carbs cause more cravings (& at this point for me I can't honestly say which)

My appetite tends to be satisfied at around 1100-1200 calories a day, which is just a tiny bit ABOVE my calorie allowance to maintain my current weight, and over a long period of time, would still involve a weight-gain, but I didn't lose any actual fat weight at that calorie level on 20 carbs or on zero carbs.

What happened for my body, was that my weight dropped between 3 to 5 lbs DURING THE TIME I was low-carb, but I feel very certain that this drop was only due to water-weight, because within a week or two of returning to a very-low-calorie, "balanced" diet of around averaging only 800 calories, and my weight quickly adjusted to the previous number.

This happened to me 4 different times, each time after more than a month of successful low-carb eating so I never experienced even a real fat loss of even 1 or 2 lbs,after weeks and weeks of low-carb eating.

That's the personal data I have so far, but it isn't conclusive, and I will be doing more experimentation.

My preference is to receive diet questions in the comment section of DietHobby.com rather than in e-mails, so that the comment and my answer will benefit all of the readers there.

Due to my time limitations, When I spend time writing a long e-mail answer, there's a good chance it will wind up as a future article, anyway.

Like it just did. 

 

I read a lot about various Diet Plans, and I've spent a lot of time experimenting with them. I am not a fan of the Intutitive Eating Diet (and it is a Diet, although proponents like to label it a "non-diet"). 

My research and personal experience with it  has proven to me that "Intutive Eating" is an absolute disaster as a weight-loss plan for almost every person who struggles with obesity.  In my opinion, even "Faith Healing" has a better track record.

People who embrace the Intuitive Eating concepts sometimes develop Peace of Mind about their eating...but that usually lasts only until they realize that, not only are they NOT losing weight... they are Actually becoming fatter.

However, adding some simple guidelines to that concept can help stop the Intuitive Eating runaway train to Fat City.

I think that embracing the No S Diet plan is a useful strategy that can be helpful for people who have bought into, and found themselves trapped inside, the Intuitive Eating fantasy mindset.

Here's a very insightful quote by a long-time member of the "No S" forum:

When a thin person says she eats as much as she wants, it is a different "as much" as the typical overweight person.

Most thin people have a different definition of what full or stuffed is. Most of them hate the feeling of being stuffed. And most of them will routinely wait a long time to have a meal, if necessary. If they have to wait longer for dinner one day, they just get hungrier and wait. They will leave even food they love on their plate when they are full.

If eating as much as you want routinely means eating when you are hungry and beyond full or slightly less than full, you will not lose weight.

In the meantime, when you are intermittently reinforcing the habit of overeating, eating just because you have an urge that has nothing to do with hunger, responding to environmental cues, etc., you are making that habit stronger and stretching out the time it takes to help establish and solidify the habit of allowing yourself to get hungry several times a day by eating moderate amounts and then waiting an appropriate amount of time.

I spent years looking at why I ate. It wasn't until the No S Diet that I realized that it didn't matter. The best way to cut the cord between multiple reasons to eat and eating was to surrender to the one-plate 3-meal structure.  I won't ever be able to remove all the reasons I would like to eat.  On N (normal) days, most N days, they are irrelevant.  The problems don't go away.  The random eating has.

I eat my meals, some light, some heavier.  I get hungry, I satisfy the hunger.

It is ten times easier (but not easy at the start) than anything else I've done and that includes several years wasted trying to just read my body's signals. It is too easy to lie to yourself or to just not be sensitive enough. Besides, on that system, I was routinely getting hungry even fewer times per day because I would overeat the wrong foods all the time. Do you think you can get used to that?

Then again all the experimentation did finally make me see the futility of the other methods for me.
 

I am not a Jillian Michaels fan,  but I feel the podcast below is worth hearing
because it is an interesting demonstation of the shift that is taking place 
in the thinking and beliefs of some of the the "mainline" diet gurus.

I plan to make reviewing various diets a normal part of DietHobby.
However, my typing abiliities are limited at present due to my broken wrist.

My personal position is that EVERY diet works for someone, and just because it might not fit into my lifestyle, or be right for me personally, doesn't mean it won't work for others.

I recently watched these video reviews and found them interesting and entertaining.Although they express a viewpoint FAR MORE NEGATIVE than my own,  I decided to include them here at DietHobby.

Click this link for an interesting video review of The Biggest Loser.

Click this link for an interesting video review about issues with Jillian Michaels' Diet Plan. 

The Fantasy of  Intuitive Eating  is alluring.

"Eat when you're hungry."
"Eat what you like."
"Stop when you're full".

However, for most people, these instructions are totally ineffective.
These concepts of Intuitive Eating involve letting one's BODY tell one how much to eat.

While a "slightly" obese person can have a similiar MENTAL state to a morbidly obese person, the BODY of a person who has spent a few years a bit over the BMI Obesity Border, is far, far different from the BODY of a person who has spent much of their lifetime far over that border.

New HABITS can be learned, and one can gain a new MINDSET, however, the PRIMARY PROBLEM with INTUITIVE EATING ... for those who've spent lots of time  far into the weight range of Obesity or are now "Reduced Obese"
...is the difference in their BODY's Physical Responses due to their condition, or former condition.

The body responds and changes as a result of Increased weight, and many of those inner changes are not eliminated by weight-loss, or evidently....(based on the experience of myself and others)... by maintaining that weight-loss for 5 to 10 years.

One Example of this is that Fat cells are not simple storage deposits, but each one actively relates to the body continually.

Anyone who has ever been morbidly Obese, has far, far more fat cells than someone who has never been less than 50 lbs overweight, and with weight loss, fat cells shrink, but NEVER disappear.

Body changes were addressed in the research of Dr. Rudolph Leibel, M.D. who assessed the reasons for the frequent regaining of weight by reduced-obese patients. Results of that research were:

"The mean individual energy requirement of reduced-obese subjects was less than that for the control (normal-weight) subjects, despite the fact that they still weighed 60% more than the controls.

In order to maintain a reduced weight, some reduced-obese or even partially reduced patients must restrict their food intake to approximately 25% less than that anticipated on the basis of metabolic body size."

Intuitive Eating is a MENTAL process of teaching oneself to rely on the BODY's NATURAL hunger and appetites.

However, the NATURAL BODY RESPONSE of a reduced obese person provides hunger and appetite cues that are intended to return that person to their former weight.
 My position is that ....perhaps... Intuitive Eating principles MIGHT work for those who have spent a brief period of their life in the BMI "overweight" category, or even slightly over the BMI "obesity" category, but as a weight-loss, or maintenance of weight-loss tool, Intuitive Eating principles are totally ineffective for those who have spent long periods of time well into the BMI category of "Obesity".

How do I explain the Examples used by Intuitive Eating Guru Authors? My personal opinion based on my personal research is that most of those Examples are a result of wishful thinking, wild exaggeration and outright untruthfulness.

 I like to think about the different aspects of Diets and Dieting,and the benefits this brings to my life.

I've experienced a great deal of weight-loss through dieting, but dieting has been beneficial to me in other ways as well.

As part of my DietHobby, I engage in various activities which includes: reading many diet books; experimenting with many diet plans; participating in various online forums; reviewing the blogs of others; and reading various diet and health nutrition articles. Many of these activities provide me with interesting facts, and some of them provide me with intense amusement.

In my Blog here on DietHobby, I will discuss, in no particular order, various articles, books, and diet concepts as thoughts about those subjects occur to me.

 I like hearing about the experiences of others, and I look forward to receiving ideas and comments from you. I’d like to hear your slant on things. I want to hear your opinions, whether you agree with me or not.  I’m hoping this site will help establish and nurture an online friendship  between you and me, and also friendships between those of you who make comments.