We all have heard the saying that calories are just a matter of calories. So it doesn’t matter what foods you eat; it matters what you do with your body. The truth is that the calorie theory is very flawed. It is one of the most misunderstood concepts in nutrition and fitness.
As a matter of fact, it’s clear that you’re serious about getting healthy. You’re reading articles, you’re grocery shopping, you’re cooking up a storm. Nice job! You’re on the right track. And now that you’re burning through all that information, it’s time to start putting it into action. Popping your vitamins, hitting the gym (or hitting yourself, if you don’t like gyms), tracking your food intake. It’s tricky, though, because everyone has different information out there about how to do things best.
How much should you work out? What type of workout should you do? How many calories should you eat? Fullness or emptiness? It’s like comparing apples to oranges to apples to oranges again, and then again. And then an article pops up that tells you that calories don’t matter at all. That counting them even makes it harder to eat healthily! That you should completely cut them out of your life! Calories are nothing but energy.
The focus on calories in a diet has been a plague for our society. It did bring a ‘lightbulb moment’ to many people, but unfortunately, also generated a lot of misconceptions. Here are some examples:
- People do know what counts as a calorie: In the public eye, a calorie is something that is very clear and easy to define. In truth, a calorie is a unit of energy and can come in many forms. For example:
Food Calories: This is the one we all think about when we think about calories, and rightfully so. If we eat more than we burn in a day, we will gain weight. If we eat less than we burn in a day, we will lose weight. - A calorie is just another word for food: This is not true. A calorie is not just another word for food. The definition of food includes carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, fiber and water.
The thing is, our bodies are not fuel-burning machines. They don’t just use calories for energy. They also use proteins, fats, and carbs for other important functions besides fueling your body. The body converts everything ingested into glucose, amino acids, and fatty acids before being used. Therefore the only reason to count calories is if you’re trying to lose weight, and that’s an entirely different challenge. To lose weight, you need to reduce your caloric intake below your basal metabolic rate.
Metabolic rates vary widely among people. And that is why one size does not fit all when it comes to weight loss. The trick is to find the right balance of diet and exercise that works for an individual’s unique metabolic rate, eating habits and level of motivation, all of which play a role in how many calories a person needs each day. Robust research on metabolic rates (the amount of energy your body burns while doing nothing) shows that they vary widely between people, with some people burning up to twice as many calories as others while doing nothing. Some of this variation is a result of genetics; some is due to lifestyle.
The problem with calories and the confusion they create in the general public is that they don’t consider how we uniquely respond to eating and exercise. This is why calories don’t matter when it comes to losing weight. Calories do give us a way to estimate how full we might feel when consuming a meal. But when it comes to weight loss, you need something better than calories because people don’t all respond to eating in the same way.
The concept “calories in, calories out” is very simple. It is an outdated concept that was created in the 1900s by a man named Wilbur Atwater. In order to determine the number of calories contained in a food, Atwater burned every possible food to ashes then measured what was left. That is to say, he used a bomb calorimeter which incinerates food to ashes. In order for this process to occur Atwater needed to know the exact amount of water that was present in the food that he wanted to analyze. This is crucial because one gram of fat contains more energy than a gram of carbohydrate or a gram of protein.
The flaw in this calculation is that food does not contain 100 percent water. In reality, it contains about 78 percent water. Also, the burning process causes the loss of other nutrients such as proteins, fiber, and minerals which are not taken into consideration during the calculation. Although based on science, Atwater’s system of counting calories did not consider the human body’s physiological responses to foods. Because of this, Atwater’s system assumes that 100 calories from steak are exactly equivalent to 100 calories from carrots.
Under those circumstances, here is some expert advice:
-calories are no longer a good metric for weight loss because it doesn’t take into account nutrient density and macronutrient ratios
-focus on overall net energy balance instead of overall caloric intake
As a matter of fact, people living with diabetes can eat carbohydrates at any time without fear of weight gain because carbohydrate has an insulin production and balance. Indeed there’s a discovery that making diet complicated by focusing on a small number is not necessary when insulin production can be managed by being aware of how many carbohydrates are consumed for the day.
In essence the problem with obsessing over calories is that it’s impossible to gauge how dense a food is. For example, an apple contains around 95 kcal while one tablespoon of Nutella has 105 kcal. Dense foods may not be healthy for you or provide much nutrition, but they can go unnoticed in calorie counting because they just need 1 tablespoon to feel full whereas low-density foods like watermelon require 3 cups and 45 minutes on the treadmill.
With this in mind, one of the reasons this theory works, and is popular in weight loss circles, is that we’re told to eat less and/or move more. These two pieces of advice are easier for our brains to understand than abstract math equations about carbs, fat, etc. which calorie counting requires people to use to make calculations during every meal or snack (which can be very time consuming). Calories don’t matter as long as those who maintain a balance between their caloric intake and output does so with low-calorie foods. Hence, instead of worrying about calories, focus on your energy balance by increasing or decreasing the amount of macros you eat.
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