You say calories, I say hypocrisy.

Food hysterics like to point out how high fructose corn syrup, enriched flour, and fried meats make us so obese as a nation. Nobody debates them on this. We don't blame people that overeat on these products or the simple fact that they overeat on anything. Instead, we nod and accept as fact that something else controls our lives. Then many of us go home and pray for an all powerful wizard in the sky to control our lives and 'give us the strength' to lose the weight.

A small rant to follow this large admission.

I'm pretty fat. That is accurate and yet it isn't what people really mean when they say fat. When people say fat, they really mean heavy. We don't gain fat and lose weight, we gain weight and lose weight. Fat is independent of weight. I'm lazy, stubborn, and lack willpower. I know what the fix is, but I never put the plan in motion. I regret that because I know a lot about food and nutrition so I look like a hypocrite when I distill advice. Just know that my heaviness is noted and it doesn't mean I don't know what I'm talking about. Now on to the rant...

Companies absolutely want you to buy their products. These products can spend years in R&D and companies try hard to come up with things that people will like. I think we can all agree on that, but what we can't agree on is this notion that the companies want to hurt you or make you fat. McDonald's wants you to try their Angus Third Pounder, they may even want you to eat them regularly, but they don't want you to eat them every day or eat every meal at McDonald's. They'd much rather have more patrons that came in at different times than have the same people come in at the same time every day. Their goal is to be busy from open to close. By having regulars that eat every day, they get into a rhythm. That means they get really busy a few times a day and they're slow the rest of the day. They'd much rather be steady to busy the entire day. Pepsico want me to drink Mountain Dew, but they don't want me getting half me calories from it.

What I'm talking about is personal responsibility and moderation. Food hysterics need a villain, and since they're trying to convert you into food hysterics, they won't risk insulting you by telling you to ease up. You don't have to become a vegan or go on some crazy diet to lose weight, it's all a matter of calories.

One of my professors at OSU lost a lot of weight from one year to the next. He taught a nutrition class and used himself as an example. Did he spend hours in the gym? No. Did he only eat raw organic foods? No. He simply took in less calories than his body needed and he got more active by walking more.

??

No crazy diets, no crazy workouts, just less calories and more activity. It's like this: 3,500 calories = 1 pound. Therefore, losing 1 pound/week would require someone to reduce calorie intake by 500 calories a day. If you aren't that big, then 500 calories is too many to shave. In that case, you can work out to tone and build lean muscle and raise your metabolism/ burn calories.

Enter Tyler...

Tyler is a guy that lost 100 pounds in a year. He went from a size 48 pant to a size 38. He went from 4xlt shirts to just xl. He worked out, he limited his caloric intake, and he even did it without denying himself. He ate bacon cheeseburgers every week. While he didn't eat that every day, he treated calories like cash. He had so many calories to spend in a day/week. Some days he would be frugal with his calories, other day he would splurge, you know, live a little.

Tyler had sleep apnea, back pain, and high blood pressure that all disappeared when the excess weight came of and it didn't have anything to do with the amount of HFCS or enriched flour he ate...it was the calories.