“Nice Clickbait headline…”
I wish it were. I wish I were sensationalizing, and that you weren’t “lied to”, simply misinformed.
But the reality is that since the 1950s, you have been DELIBERATELY misled about nutrition, for a variety of reasons. Some innocent, and some quite nefarious.
We’ll get more into the nitty-gritty of that tangled web in the future. Right now, let’s focus on carbs, and why not only do you NOT need them, but they’re actually BAD for you.
First, I feel obligated to say that the word ‘carbs’ is short for carbohydrates. Now let’s pretend I didn’t say something so painfully obvious and move on…
In nutrition, there are 3 categories of foods, generally referred to as ‘macronutrients’, or ‘macros’ for short. These 3 categories are:
- Fats
- Proteins
- Carbohydrates
Everything you eat is made up of various ratios of these 3 macros. In the future, you’ll actually be one of those people that LOOK at food labels. But don’t worry, I’m going to make it easy for you. No math, no counting calories. Eventually you’ll know the 2-3 things to look for and you can do it in 5 seconds.
The downside is that you’ll be APPALLED at how much GARBAGE is in the food you’re being sold. But more on that another time…
My purpose today is to introduce you to the concept of carbs as the enemy, and give you some food for thought (pun intended😎).
Exercise and the Institute of Medicine makes the follow recommendations for dietary macronutrient distribution:
Carbs – 45-65%
Protein – 10-35%
Fat – 20-35%
These match the numbers from the National Academy of Sciences (according to Weight Watchers, but their link was broken. You can Google around and find this stuff 😉)
Let’s skim over the nonsense of those “distributions” and summarize that they recommend about 50% or more of your diet to be carbs.
For now, let me jump straight into MY personal recommendations for macro distribution:
Fat – 85%
Protein – 15%
Carbs – <1%
“Sure, random dude from the internet. I’m going to take YOUR advice over the National Academy of Sciences and Exercise and the Institute of Medicine! 🤨“
I know, they have big official sounding names, people with degrees that they paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for, and the official stamp of approval of the Federal Government of the United States of America.
But I’m on the internet! So what I’m saying must be true!
In case you missed my previous post about why Fat Doesn’t Make You Fat, go take a peek, and pay special attention to the part where I talk about what EVERY CELL in your body is made of.
Super short version if you didn’t go read that post (I still love you):
Your body is made out of Fat, Protein, and Cholesterol.
Carbs aren’t in that list. So what does your body need carbs for?
“I know this one! Energy! Carbs are how you get energy!”
While it’s TRUE that your body uses carbs for energy, it doesn’t NEED to use carbs for energy.
Carbs are simply the easiest thing for your body to convert into USABLE energy. Let me explain.
The human body uses glucose for energy. Glucose is sugar. ANYTHING your body uses for energy must first be converted into glucose before your body can use it.
(I’m simplifying, but we’re at pretty much 80% of what you need to know, so stick with me.)
When you eat, your body turns excess Glucose in your blood into Glycogen. Glycogen is one of two ways your body “stores energy” (the other being triglycerides). Primarily, Insulin is responsible for this process of creating and storing Glycogen. (Seriously, did you read Fat Doesn’t Make You Fat? You should…)
Ok, so why does this nerdy stuff matter?
The bottom line is that your body is REALLY good at turning carbs into sugar. So when it has carbs available, that’s exactly what it does. When it has pure sugar, even better.
Most of us understand that sugar is bad for us, right?
Well carbs are just sugar as far as your body is concerned. And humans spent a LONG TIME evolving biological systems to ensure our survival.
One of the most important was the ability to SURVIVE WINTER. Why does this matter?
Human evolution in 3 sentences:
Humans need to survive winter when food is scarce, and fruit ripens right before winter. Fruits turn bright colors when they’re ripe, to signal to animals that they’re ready to be eaten (because they want to spread the seeds in the fruit). Humans, and other animals that evolved COLOR VISION, did so largely to find fruit because the sugar in fruit makes you fat and helps you survive winter, when there’s less food.
Literally, your body craves sugar and carbohydrates as a survival mechanism, BECAUSE they make you fat and allow you an opportunity to live long enough to find GOOD food.
But when that’s your diet ALL THE TIME, your body freaks out.
It pumps out tons of Insulin to constantly push the excess sugar into your liver, muscle, and fat cells. THIS IS NOT GOOD.
“Ok, so if sugar and carbs are the ONLY way my body gets energy, how the hell can I NOT need carbs?!?”
Ok, remember the 80% explanation? Here’s the rest of it:
When your body has NO sugars or carbs available to use for energy, what happens? You just collapse into a sleepy, lifeless slug and die, right?
WRONG.
Your body enters a state called Ketosis, which activates the Ketogenic Process. This process breaks your body’s fat cells down into Ketones, that your body uses for energy, as an ALTERNATIVE to glucose.
And if we remember what our body is MADE out of (fat, protein, cholesterol), do you think your body will react better to being fueled by FAT, or by SUGAR?
And deeper down the rabbit hole we go…
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