If I recall correctly, one of Fung’s primary premises is that calories don’t matter. He completely negates the functionality of CICO. Rather, his focus is on controlling blood sugars. If you eat foods that have a low impact on blood sugar (proteins, fats), you won’t raise your blood sugar for extended period of time and your body will continue to metabolize your own body fats. If you eat a high amount of carbs and raise your blood sugars - such that it take a long time to metabolize those sugars before you return to ketosis, you will lose less fat.
This is a VERY simplistic break down - but it’s the essence of why he doesn’t advocate for CICO as a primary fat loss calculator. Rather, the emphasis is on achieving and maintaining ketosis (where your body is essentially living off fat stores). Fasting is the primary method and it is possible to achieve metabolic flexibility if you fast and minimize carbohydrates (not calories) when not fasting.
Edit: This is spelled out most clearly in his book Guide to Fasting. I’m not sure about The Obesity Code.
No.
While there is nothing wrong with counting things, the intent of CICO is to count with the intent to restrict how much you eat. It’s hard, probably impossible, to count without using that information to influence what and how much you eat.
Fasting shifts the focus to when you eat, not how much. Eating less often leads to eating fewer calories overall. Without a sense of restriction.
Focusing on calories doesn’t work for the vast majority. Fung spends some time talking about the biggest loser study that showed the contestants had a big reduction in their BMR due to the calorie restriction (considerably more than the weight loss would predict). Doing IF, and listening to your biology’s sense of fullness, your BMR doesn’t drop like that. It explains why the Biggest Losers regained their weight and IFers tend to do a lot better losing and maintaining their losses. Calorie counters do lose some, but falter and regain. That’s the normal pattern unfortunately. I know because that was me quite a few times!
Long term OMADer here. 4.5 years so far. After decades of obesity and even low end of morbid obesity, I’m free and easily maintaining. This literally saved my life. Lost 50 lbs and 20 years. I love living and eating in this schedule. It’s life enhancing!
Resist the urge to count calories (it’s a slippery slope). Trust in the fasting method. Pick healthy foods and stay away from the sugary / highly processed carbs.
This is a question I’ve worked on finding answers for quite some time.
The answer lies in understanding that though CiCo is important to the extent of remaining in a calorie deficit. CiCo in itself does not tackle metabolic syndrome, which is what fasting tackles.
As a result purely using CiCo will quite likely mean people will hit a plateau and / or once you stop CiCO your weight will bounce back.
On the same note, fasting without a calorie deficit may not give long term results. However it may still tackle the underlying metabolic syndrome (depending on the fasting protocol) even if the weighing scale doesn’t budge significantly.
Would highly recommend watching this talk by Dr Fung - https://youtu.be/tIuj-oMN-Fk
Calories are explicitly a measurement of heat energy, it is not appropriate or scientific to apply that to the human body. We are not a bomb calorimeter. We do not capture heat energy and use that for metabolic process or store heat as energy for later use. We use chemical reactions for energy. We do not eat calories, we eat mass in the form of fat, protein and carbohydrates. We also do not burn calories , calories are explicitly a measurement of heat energy, how do you burn heat?!?
When people think they are calorie counting and losing weight they are not counting calories , its impossible unless in a highly controlled lab with very special equipment. What they are doing is eating less mass which is why they lose weight, it’s not mass less waves, ie heat energy, aka calories. Labels on packets can be up to 20% out by law, so think you have counted 2000 calories? Think again, 20% out could be 1600 or 2400. Thats before we even go into the inaccuracy of fat being 9 calories per gram, protein being 4 and carbs being 4. Those are out too. Also how do you accurately track energy out? You putting your poo in a bomb calorimeter ?
Before anybody shouts laws of thermodynamics they also do not apply, as the first law specifically states in a closed system, humans are not closed, so that’s the end of that. Calorie supporters conveniently also forget the second law, which shows how a calorie is not a calorie, as energy will be used in making available energy and different masses ie protein requires more energy than fat to make that energy available.
Calorie counting also completely ignores hormones which is exactly how our bodies regulate our composition.
Until we let go of the wrong calorie dogma obesity will continue to be a problem.
If you have a decent understanding of how many calories are in the foods you eat, fasting can become a really useful tool for intuitive eating. At the end of the day, if you overeat but still fast, you won’t really lose any weight or the rate of weight loss might be a lot slower (or if you overeat too much, you will gain weight). Also, I’m not sure I fully understand your question but I hope that helps. Initially, it might be a good idea to count your calories and macros just to see how much you are eating. At the end of the day, you will still have to eat less (depending on how much excess fat you have) to lose weight.
The main misconception that Jason explains is on the surface level if you roughly calculate your BMR/TDEE to be 2000cal and you want to just immediately change to a 1400cal diet, your body will adapt relatively quickly to a much lower BMR and so your 1400cal diet (if you’re spreading it across 4-6 meals in a day) won’t actually help you lose weight in the medium to long term. The simplest answer I can give you for a beginning ‘guide’ to follow is pick a fasting time period e.g. 16:8, 20:4, OMAD, whatever you want) and then count your calories/macros initially so you are not overeating.
I think of it like this:
I eat low carb so that my body can easily burn fat for fuel.
I eat once per day to add fuel to my system for burning. This is where it is wise to be mindful of CICO. I try to feed my body the right amount of calories to last for 24 hours.
If I wish to burn fat I skip my meal. This invites my body to use the energy I have previously stored as fat and causes weight loss.
This works for me.
There are a lot of factors that affect weight gain/loss but you should still count calories even if it’s not as simple as calories in/out. It seems that exercise/movement is more important than previously thought as it is an appetite suppressant and is thought to increase sensitivity to satiety signals. Then there is NEAT, which we don’t control and affects how many calories we burn on a daily basis. We seem to move less unconsciously when we reduce calories so have to supplement with deliverate movment.
Just count the calories as one of many things ticked off that helps.
Two things.When you 1st start fasting it’s most important to control blood sugar.
After you have been practicing fasting for awhile then if you need to, modify CiCo and or track macros.
I track my macros periodically to have a reality check. Or when I plateaued.
Mostly when you fast you don’t need to track CiCo and its a useful tool if you hit a plateau
CiCo is not a useful tool when first fasting. IMO because you are already making changes to not eating for longer periods so restricting what you eat when you 1st start fasting is, well, too restrictive. 😀
You are changing the hunger Hormone balance when you fast and I have found, for the most part, I naturally eat less when fasting.
CiCo is a great tool when you need it. And let’s face it, No one keeps up with calorie counting for very long periods so why burden yourself unless you need the tool.
If you want to lose weight then it’s good to know what your calorie intake is and if your in a deficit or not.
I fast and count my calories when in my eating window. I’ve seen so many people gorge themselves on foods in their eating window and gain weight.