Weight Loss

There was an interesting study which showed that the participants eating ultra processed food gained body fat even when they weren't in a calorie surplus! Processed foods are literally designed to be so super delicious that you almost can't help over eating them - and so not over eating is really hard to do! So, it's especially interesting to see that even if you are able to avoid over eating the ultra processed food calories, it still might not protect you from gaining body fat. This was a study done with healthy young men eating an ultra processed food diet both in a calorie deficit and with calorie maintenance and then repeated with a healthy diet. There was a three month gap between diets to allow bodies to return to normal between. They saw a 1kg fat gain on the processed food diet regardless of whether the calories were in surplus or maintenance. Heart markers deteriorated. There was an increase in phthalates, which disrupt hormones. There was a decrease in testosterone too. Now, this doesn't mean you need to panic and eliminate every piece of ultra processed food from your diet. What is important is what you do OFTEN - not what you do occasionally. Don't worry about the odd bit of ultra processed foods. BUT if you lean on them frequently (more than a few times a week), then it's worth making some changes because even if you don't reduce your caloric intake, it's likely you'll see some body fat loss just with this. This is backed up by my experience too. Often, the initial diet suggestions I'll make to a client is changing their diet to a more "real food" based diet, without changing anything else, and the results are almost always more significant than the kilo shown in…