Screw what the “experts” say. How do you feel when you eat carbs?

There is so much conflicting data out there about carbs. I’ve read so many books and absorbed so much information about paleo diets, nutrient timing, general nutrition, and my conclusion is that you really need to gauge your own body’s reaction to carbs.

Of course, that is the answer for everything: How does your body react?

Studies about human nutrition are based on generalities. Often they are not perfectly scientific, because it is just impossible to achieve a perfect environment where only one factor is changed when you are dealing with human nutrition.

Imagine trying to figure out if olive oil is good for humans or not. How can you do that?

So many of the studies are so general in nature, and so subjective, that we are fed a lot of misinformation.

The French drink five times as much wine as Americans and their levels of heart disease are five times lower than Americans’, so the wine must be the answer! This may be true, but there is no way to know if it’s the wine or not. Maybe the fact that they eat 50% more cheese than Americans is the answer.

The studies about carbs are about the same. Even if there were a way to show that carbs generally are great for the population at large, better than fat as an energy source, how would you know if it’s good specifically for you?

TRY IT!

I will use myself as an example.

I’ve gone without carbs for days, just to see what that did to me. I ended up with pretty good energy, but I felt like hell. My eyes burned, my mood was terrible.

On the other hand, I also know that when I eat a lot of simple carbs — say, around 75 to 100 grams at a sitting — I end up feeling sluggish and unable to keep my eyes open about 20 minutes later.

So I know pretty much my body’s reaction to carbs, and I consume them appropriately, based on what I know about my body, not based on what some expert or study has told me.

How about you? How do you feel when you consume carbs? Do you know?

So much health and fitness information. What should we believe?

Wow, there is so much health and fitness information out there. Can I really get fit and strong in only 30 minutes a week? Should I avoid carbs? Are fats bad for me? How about cholesterol? Aerobics — good or bad? And stretching?

The first thing you need to know about any information you receive is that the person presenting you with that information has an agenda separate from the obvious one. Usually that person is trying to make money.

Think about it.

Let’s say you have built a pretty good salary selling people on low-fat living. Then low-carb living comes into vogue, becomes the publicly acclaimed healthy way to go. Are you going to give up your salary, even in the face of scientific evidence that debunks the basis for it? (I am not saying this evidence exists for low-fat living — this just an example.) NO! You are going to continue to push the scientific evidence that shows low-fat is the way to go!

What if you are a pretty successful personal trainer, making $60 for a 45-minute session. You have a list of clients who keep a roof over your head, food on your table, and a 60-inch tv in your living room. Are you really going to tell them that they can get in shape in only 30 minutes a week?

How about if you are a government agency facing budget cuts if you don’t endorse the version of the food pyramid your primary supporters in Congress want pushed through for whatever political reasons they have?

I gave up on information I get from others long ago. This is not to say that I ignore it, but I filter it, picking and choosing what sounds right. Primarily what I do is try it out on my own body.

Exercise is supposed to make my arthritic knee feel better? Let’s try it out. Well, yoga definitely helps, but plyometrics does not.

Carbs are evil and making me fat? Let’s try it out. Maybe it looks like calories are more important than the actual types of nutrition that comprise them.

I know, I know. It takes a lot of energy to try  stuff out. It’s much easier to believe in the one thing, do it, then blame the thing when it doesn’t work, or praise it when it does. That situation — when the thing actually works — creates problems, too, because even if it works for you, it might not work for someone else.

I love Tony Horton’s P90X. LOVE IT! But it’s not for everyone. In fact, all the parts of it are not even for me. But I love the parts that do work, and I do them, and that’s my thing. I have to be careful, though, not to evangelize about it. I only really talk about Tony Horton’s P90X when asked.

So, back to the original point — how about this blog? Should you believe me?

You won’t see a lot of answers here. I raise questions, try things out, and let you know what works for me. My thought is that maybe some of the stuff that works for me will work for you. That’s all. This blog costs me nothing to keep. I do make a kickback on any links you click to buy stuff here, but that’s not how I make my living.

My goal is just to let you know — honestly — my experiences in my quest for fitness. My hope is that you’ll find it interesting enough to read from time to time.

My agenda? To help you get healthier and more fit.

Believe it.

An illogical way to manage your health

The other day my friend was sick with the flu. She asked me which medicine I’d recommend. I didn’t have a recommendation, because I have not had the flu in quite a few years, so I queried my friends and family and came up with a consensus best medication.

I passed this along to my friend. She looked the medication up on the internet, and said, “I don’t want to use that one, because I’ve heard it can cause strokes.”

Now, I have no problem with that. I try to be pretty careful with what I put into my body, and, in fact, the kinds of risks she was citing are the very ones that keep me from taking any kind of unnecessary pharmaceutical products.

However, the irony of this situation is that my friend, the one who made this statement of concern about ingesting a drug that “can cause strokes”, is quite a bit overweight and has a hard time finishing any meal without a sugary dessert.

Excess body fat is definitely a factor in heart disease, cancer, liver problems — you name it. Refined sugar is well-documented to be a major culprit in the accumulation of that excess body fat.

My friend knows all these things — we’ve had discussions about them — yet she chooses to continue to risk her life with her poor dietary habits.

Her life. What she wants to do is fine by me.

And you, too. You are free to choose to destroy yourself with your poor dietary decisions.

But don’t, then, try to sell me that you do not want to take a medication, because it might cause a stroke, or liver damage (as many painkillers do), or whatever.

That kind of reasoning, that illogical approach to life, is just too annoying.

What’s your motivation for working out and eating right?

My brother posted on one of those social networks today something about how he needs to get into shape for a reunion this summer. I have a friend who started a diet in January, because she’s getting married in the fall.

That’s great. I mean, whatever motivates you to get into better shape is good, right?

Sort of, but let’s examine the phenomenon of getting into shape for a specific event. What happens after the event? Well, you can either find another event right away to force you to continue your good health habits, you can feel so good from your new lifestyle that you continue your healthy ways, or you can go back to your old habits once the event has passed. Guess which route most people take?

This is why your fitness motivation must come from within yourself. You need to want to be fit more than you want to eat that cake. You need to want to be fit more than you want to sit in your easy chair pounding beers. You need to want to be fit more than you want to smoke that cigarette.

How do you get to that point where you want fitness that much?

I have to admit: I dunno.

I remember when I quit smoking for the last time. I had quit previously, once even for about 18 months, but I always went back. The last time I quit, I never had any doubt that I would not go back — I knew it was over between me and cigarettes. They were not only killing me, but they also made my clothes smell really bad, and with more and more buildings going smokeless, it had become an inconvenient habit. I had the cravings, the nicotine withdrawal, but I was never tempted to smoke, because I was done with it.

General fitness is tougher, I think, because I’d tried many times to lose weight. I needed results to stay motivated.

When I weighed 235 and was on two blood pressure meds and had pains in my gut, I was motivated to lose weight, but the only thing I knew worked was calorie restriction, and that is really hard to stick to. But once I started and saw the pounds dropping off, I stayed motivated to continue. When my weight went under 200 for the first time in years, I was elated, but I didn’t quit. I ended up losing 50 pounds.

But then I plateaued. And I lost my motivation. I gained back 10 pounds.

Then I found Tony Horton’s P90X, and I realized that losing fat is not all there is to fitness. I needed to put on muscle as well.

I have since plateaued a few times, but have stayed motivated throughout, because I feel like I’ve found a good solution to my fitness problem. Plus, Tony keeps it mixed up with his One-On-One series, so that helps.

How about you? What’s your motivation? Hopefully it is a general quest for fitness, because that will last a lifetime. But if you really feel that you need to get your body looking good for some event, that’s cool. Any port in a storm and you might, you just might, get motivated enough by your results that you internalize the motivation and stick with it for the rest of your life.