Oh baby, have I been waiting to make this post about nutrition myths for awhile now. I don’t know if you know this, but there’s a lot of well, questionable dieting and nutrition advice out there. And I get it: you have a lot of differing opinions, and people with different backgrounds giving this advice.
And while I whole-heartedly believe that there should be nuance when it comes to nutrition advice (after all there is no “one size fits all”), I think a lot of the advice out there stems from diet culture, fat phobia and just outdated science.
So, with that said, let’s talk about the nutrition myths you need to ditch (part 1, because there’s a lot to cover).
1. You Should Only Eat 1500 Calories A Day If You’re Trying To Lose Weight.
I’ve talked about this before, but if you’re looking to lose weight, drastically reducing your calories is not the way to go. Long-term calories deficits actually slow down your metabolism, meaning your body learns to run on less calories to do the same jobs.
Research shows that not only does reducing your calories only offer benefits in the short term (with 95% of diets failing and leading to a regain in weight), but chronic dieters end up requiring less calories than people at the same weight who have never dieted (source, source). This means that the low-calorie diet that you go on to lose weight is not only not sustainable (as in, eventually your body will demand you eat more) but the second that you do eat more, you will gain weight.
If you want to know what you should be doing instead, check out this post Eat More To Weigh Less.
2. Saturated Fat Is Bad For You.
If you were of the dieting age in the 90s, then you probably learned to avoid fat like the plague. Thankfully, there’s no need to run from saturated fat. The link between saturated fat and heart disease is pretty much non-existent, and we now have the research to back it up (I’ll link some studies here, here and here).
In fact, because foods don’t exist as singular macronutrients, when you choose high-quality foods like avocados, salmon and coconut oil, you also reap the rewards of other beneficial nutrients. Even grass-fed beef isn’t just saturated fat: it also contains omega-3s and CLA, a type of polyunsaturated fat shown linked to lower rates of heart disease type 2 diabetes. Grass-fed beef offers 300%-500% more CLA than grain-fed beef. (source)
That being said, I caution against the keto craze of excess bacon and cheese. While saturated fat isn’t bad for you, it doesn’t offer a lot in terms of benefits, so it should still be consumed in moderation. A diet high in saturated fat and low in fibre (ahem, keto) correlates with gut dysbiosis and obesity. (source)
3. You Need To Avoid Dietary Cholesterol.
Similar to the war on saturated fats, the war against dietary cholesterol is unfounded. In fact, in the medical community at large is pretty much in agreement here. So much so, that even the US government updated their nutrition guidelines in 2015 saying that dietary cholesterol is no longer a “nutrient of concern”. (source)
This is because dietary cholesterol has very little influence on your total cholesterol levels. (source) Your body actually produces 75%-85% of its own cholesterol, and this is so tightly regulated, that if you lower how much dietary cholesterol you eat, your body will work harder to make up the difference. (source)
If you’re looking to reduce your LDL and total cholesterol, instead focus on limiting processed sugar, eating healthy fats and fibre, and moving your body.
Want to work with me?
Get on the waitlist to my Nourished Body Reset Program. This program is where I will teach you how to trust your body, eat intuitively, ditch the diet and cut the cravings. We’re talking about hunger regulation, what causes hunger and how to rebalance your body and metabolism and eat in a way that’s sustainable for you.
With love,
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