Weight Loss Without Calorie Counting

High protein diets cause weight loss. But are high protein diets really just low carbohydrate diets by another name?

Many believe that weight loss is caused only by cutting calories (‘dieting’) or by through aerobic exercise. This leads many up the garden path, and long term they make no progress. The assumption that to lose weight you must ‘diet’ and ‘exercise’ is so ingrained in the psyche of most people that to questions it results in derision. However, like a moth against the bulb, dieters come back for more. Hoping that this time it’s different, this time they’ll succeed.

The Dieting And Aerobic Exercise Fallacy

Doth dieting and aerobic exercise do cause short-term weight loss. This is well documented scientifically and most have experienced weight loss on such a regimen. However, what is clear is that the weight loss caused by dieting and aerobic exercise is largely skeletal muscle. Muscle loss lowers the resting metabolic rate and as a result less fat is burnt. Over time as appetite rises and resting metabolic rate falls further, even small intakes of food cause rapid body fat gains.

Fat Loss Without Cutting Calories

Is fat loss possible without cutting calories? Yes, absolutely it is. Studies feeding people low carbohydrate diets show that they lose weight and yet they do not forcibly restrict calories. Such diets cause weight loss without the need to restrict energy intake because they remove the source of weight gain and belly fat. Sugar and refined carbohydrates cause the accumulation of fat because they damage the liver and increase the processing of food into body fat.

Are High Protein Diets Really Low Carbohydrate Diets?

High protein diets (here) also cause weight loss without the need for energy restriction. This may result from their beneficial appetite suppressing effects or because of the low conversion rate of protein to body fat. However, high protein diets are also low carbohydrate diets. As high protein diets are also devoid of the sugar and refined carbohydrates that cause weight gain, this may be the real reason they cause weight loss, without the need to count calories.

Traditional Diets Also Cause Fat Loss

Traditional diets have fat burning effect without the need to cut calories (here). This is because traditional diets are also devoid of the sugar and refined carbohydrates that are the source of the metabolic dysfunction that causes weight gain. Studies show that free access to foods in the Mediterranean diet, with no restriction, results in fat loss. In addition studies show that such fat loss is achievable with no increase in energy expenditure from exercise.

Are You STILL Counting Calories?

If you are still trying to lose weight though counting calories you will not succeed in your fat loss journey. Calorie counting, aerobic exercise and weight loss gimmicks don't work and they never have. Many diets are able to cause weight loss without the need for calorie restriction because they are all low in refined carbohydrates and sugar. Removing these items from the diet is the first step in the journey to leanness. If you can't remove sugar from your diet, you must accept your fate.

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