Why are we lighter on the same cals from LFRV vs SAD?

Hi guys,

I haven't had time to post here much the last year or so.. I've been very busy with work and other life stuff... but I still check in from time to time.

I've been pondering something lately that I hope you all can help me with. As some of you who have been around longer might remember.. I'm always struggling to eat enough to maintain a healthy weight. It's difficult for me to eat even 2000 calories from fruit per day.. I just can't seem to get the volumme down.. even after years of being LFRV... so I've been skinny all the while and just try to deal with it...

In case anyone is wondering I can't go back to cooked vegan foods for more calories because even something as "innocent" as boiled or steamed potatoes or yams really makes me ill..any cooked food brings back my fibromyalgia pain with a vengeance and give me throat and sinus "infections" and makes me grumpy and irritable.

In my attempts to find a solution I've been reading alot about calories and it occurred to me that it seems to take way more low fat raw calories to sustain a certain weight than low fat cooked calories would take.. In a recent poll here of how many calories people eat per day I was very surprised to find out that several women my size (height and weight) eat 3000plus calories per day to maintain their (low by SAD standards) weights while mainstream calorie charts will say that only 1800-2200 calories are need to maintain that weight.

Does anyone have any theories as to why it takes more low fat raw calories to maintain a certain weight than would it would be if the same person was eating low fat cooked calories? It seems counter-intuitive to the notion that raw calories are more efficient and better assimilated by the body. If that is the case, why the heck do we need some much more of them eating raw?

Thanks so much!

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Permalink Reply by Xenia on May 4, 2011 at 8:12pm

I think you would most likely WOULD be able to gain muscle a with gaining muscle and the work needed to do so, you would perhaps automatically be able to eat more calories!! Perhaps that is the reason you haven't be "able" to eat more all this time?

I do know that Dr.G says in his book that exercise( and therefore mucle gain ) is important because this allows us to eat more calories which we need in order to satisfy and give our bodies all the nutrients it needs etc... Or words to this effect...

Do you get what i mean?

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Permalink Reply by Josh Fossgreen on May 8, 2011 at 12:16pm

In my experience, you'll lose the motivation to exercise before you actually hit that wall.

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Permalink Reply by jaime on May 4, 2011 at 9:04am

I know that when I ate low fat vegan (with cooked rice and sweet potatoes) without spices and salt I could pack down the carbs. just as with raw. So it seems to be about what I am eating with the carbs not just if they are raw or not. Because generally cooked foods come with spices, salt, and fats and I think the way the body metabolizes and synthesizes all of these things results in retaining fat and water. I think when we eat cooked food and less calories, it does not mean that our bodies need for carbohydrates is satisfied. The ability to maintain a higher weight on cooked food/less calories is just an illusion of fat and water retention guising as less nutrition for more weight. Also, I blend 1 pound of dates with 1.5 litres of water which makes three jars of datorade that I drink throughout the day and this helps me keep up the calories. It is way sweet at first but after a few days it is just grand.

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Permalink Reply by ednshell on May 4, 2011 at 2:08pm

Victor this makes so much sense. I was thinking along these lines, that the caloric count of raw was a bit off for some reason. I didn't know how they figured out caloric values. Actually I still don't, lol. :)

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Permalink Reply by ednshell on May 4, 2011 at 4:12pm

Thanks for the effort Victor, lol.

I have some questions if you are so inclined to answer, if not, no big deal.

Is the food in an enclosed water tight dish in a pool of water? Is the water in an air tight container so the water doesn't all evaporate? Does everything really turn to ash, even oil and watermelon? How do they know at what exact point all the food is ash, is the container glass or can they tell some other way?

This prompted me to send a request to Robert Krampf, the happy scientist to do a live video to demonstrate. I'll let you know if he does it. Can you imagine a way to set up a home experiment?

Thanks! :)

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Permalink Reply by ednshell on May 4, 2011 at 4:45pm

Oh how cool! I wonder if companies pay big money to skew the results ever. Interesting stuff, I'll have to do this with the kids, they'll love using the fire and water too.

Thanks Victor! :)

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Permalink Reply by RawDad on May 4, 2011 at 10:57am

It's either a flaw in the caloric unit measure - or an absorption issue. Such high volume food likely requires a very thorough chewing to be close to fully utilized.... I would venture blending may improve efficiency.

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Permalink Reply by DURIANRIDER on May 4, 2011 at 2:00pm

Ever heard of sodium retention? ;) Take in 5g of sodium per day and thats around 500g of fluid retention. Do this daily and you blow up on the same cals. Same if someone is fasting, put salt in their water and they will 'gain weight' whilst fasting. Easy.

Its more about maintaining QUALITY OF LIFE vs maintaining xyz weight IMHO. Ive not many anyone that is eating like a mouse that I would like to live like. Im into high glycogen, drug free lifestyles.

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Permalink Reply by ilan on May 4, 2011 at 2:32pm

Do you remember where you got that number (5000mg = little over a lb of fluid retention) from? Been looking for that stat.

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Permalink Reply by DURIANRIDER on May 4, 2011 at 6:39pm

Its just a 'known fact' in the health and fitness industry. Have a google and a read Ilan.

Do an experiment yourself. Its pretty fun!

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Permalink Reply by DURIANRIDER on May 4, 2011 at 6:41pm

Carbs get stored as glycogen and fat gets stored as fat. We are burning glycogen all the time and the brain uses around 20% of our glycogen stores. Some people say that we burn as much fuel sleeping as we do when under high brain stress. I just dont agree!

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Permalink Reply by Jacob on May 4, 2011 at 8:00pm

Well, they could have some % of correctness. If we learn new things, we need more calories because of the new structures we are being built in the brain.

If we do things that we already master and done before many times, we will not burn much more than 20%.

High brain stress could also be high body stress at the same time that requires an automated higher calorie need. But it's probably not the brain that screams for more fuel, depending of the stress.