Conference rocks::weight_control

    I just picked up a book called the T-factor diet, which is a low-fat
    diet.  There are two possible sequences described in it, for a 
    'crash' program, and a more gradual program.
    
    The book is available in paperback also, and the writer is a
    professional from Vanderbilt University.  He has some points about
    metabolic function in converting proteing, carbohydrates, fats, etc.,
    which seem to make a lot of sense.
    
    For 4.95 plus tax, it'll give you some direction for at least 2 or 3
    weeks on either program -- 4 to 6 if you combine both (I suppose then
    you could 'resequence'!
    
    CJ
    

    Rather than enter my diet, I highly recommend the series (3) of books
    by Covert Bailey - Fit or Fat, Fit or Fat Target Diet, Fit or Fat for
    Women.  His plan is low fat, low protein, high carbs and exercise.  I
    have been following his plan for 5 months (yesterday) and am down 73lbs
    and more importantly 5 clothing sizes!!!!
    
    Good luck,
    
    ...dale 

    
    First of all, let me say that this is my first time in this conference
    so if I say something that's already been said elsewhere, please
    forgive me, and if it's a bit long (and it is) it's only because I 
    want to show you that I've been where you are and perhaps in some small
    way I can help. Here goes... 
                                 
    Anyway, I'd like to share some advice that I received about a year ago
    when I was told by my physician that I was on the verge of moving into
    the "high risk" heart disease catergory because I was overweight and
    my blood pressure/cholesterol was skyrocketing. After scaring the hell 
    out of me with this statement, he then advised that I see the dietician 
    who was affiliated with his practice. I agree and made an appointment but 
    because he was booked solid I had to wait several weeks to see him. 
    Meanwhile, over that 2 week period I put myself on a diet. It was my own 
    version of all the "fad diet" books I had read, advice I had been
    given, etc. Well when I finally walked into the dietician's his office 
    I was pretty cocky. I had, in my opinion, been eating all the "right" 
    foods in fact I had kept a written log of my daily intake. Boy, will I 
    show this guy I thought. After sharing with him what I had eaten over the 
    past two weeks he proceeded to knock me for a loop when in cool fashion
    he tore "my" diet apart. In his opinion, it wasn't so much that I was 
    eating the right foods, the problem was the way I was going about it. 
    
    Well enough for background info, let me get to the advice part. He 
    told me that the key to me controlling my weight and at the same time 
    get my cholesterol down to an acceptable level as well was to 
    follow this regimen .....
    
    ...limit your fat intake to 25mg per day. Eat as much as your body
    wants but stick to this rule!! Now, one pat of butter = 5mg, one 6 oz 
    piece of chicken, fish or beef = 5mg, so whenever you sit down for a meal 
    make sure that the ratio of vegetables to poultry, fish or beef is
    6::1, that is six parts veggies to one part other. In addition, eat as 
    much fiber as possible, lots of fruits etc., and he gave me a chart
    that listed the fiber content of a broad range of foods so I could
    monitor my progress towards this goal. 
    
    Over the first month I stuck to this advice, but belive me I ate, and
    ate, and ate, to the point where I thought I'd bust. Whenever I felt
    the urge to eat, I ate but I kept that one RULE in mind while I ate,
    "25mg of fat/day". After the first two weeks I noticed that I began to 
    lose. A pound here and a pound there at first but as I progressed into 
    week three and then four, things began looking like a melt-down. I was 
    astounded. It seemed the more I ate, the more I lost! After the first
    month I had dropped a cool 17 pounds. I began to gain some momentum,
    encouraged by these incredible results. I continued to eat, although
    I was gorging myself as I had the first month. Nonetheless I ate and
    ate and the the weight continued to vanish. In retrospect, it was
    a little difficult to change the mix of what I was eating but as time
    wore on it got easier and easier. Two, three then four months passed.
    I tallied the results, I had lost 39 pounds in a little less than four 
    months and there were no signs that it would stop. It did stop
    eventually but I've been able to maintain everything I lost by just
    sticking to that one rule of ---> 25mg of fat/day <--- in closing let
    me give you all the encouragement I can and say that it can be done.
    God knows, it's not easy but maybe this little bit of advice will help 
    you along the way. 
    
    
    

    re .3
    
    Does this apply to both males and females or do you know if it's
    different?  Thanks.
    
    Virginia

    If you read the T-factor diet, you will see that the elimination of
    a large part of fat is what does it -- and from everything else I've
    been reading, it makes sense.  I've been talking to some dietitians
    bout it, and their cut at it is 'fat -> stored fat at about 97%
    efficiency, whereas proteins and carbohydrates are anywhere from
    50% on down, depending on what you are doing, etc.
    
    Take a look at it -- I think the 25mg sounds good.
    
    cj

       The information in .3 and .5 is totally incompetent, to the point
       of being potentially dangerous.  I assume that it's because
       the people who wrote these notes don't understand the difference
       between a milligram (1/1000th of a gram) and a gram.
       
       25mg of fat would not take long to consume.  A single ounce of
       cooked turkey (white meat, no skin) has 210mg of fat; an ear of
       cooked corn (no butter) has 1000mg of fat.
       
       Sorry for the flame, and I'll assume that the 25mg suggestion was
       an unintentional error, but people might do themselves significant
       harm if they were to take your information at face value.
       
       --Mr Topaz 

    I think it was meant to be 25 gram of fat.
    
    They are right, it does work.  But, I keep my fat intake down under
    18 gram a day.  With my calorie intake of 1400 or there abouts, my fat
    intake is about 12-13%.  It does drop to 11% during the week, but at the
    weekends I sometimes use a 50% less fat cheese with my meal, so it ups a
    bit.  
    
    ...dale

    Yeah, I misread 'mg'.  Assumed it meant grams.  I guess that's an
    example of a scotoma -- or seeing what you want to see.
    
    The American Heart Association and the US government have both recently
    lowered the recommended level of percentage of calories in your diet
    from 30% to less than 30%.  If your body size and activity level were
    such that you required 1600 calories a day to maintain you weight, then
    the fat content of such a diet would be 480 calories from fat, which at
    approximately 9 calories per gram would be approx 43 to 44 grams of
    fat.  Clearly a diet of 25 grams of fat for such a person would be a
    level of only 14% total calories from fat.
    
    Since fat is converted to body fat at an efficiency of some 97%, vs an
    efficiency of conversion of between 40% and 60% for carbohydrates and
    proteins, it's easy to see why such a diet is:
    	
    	1.  Beneficial to the heart (by lowering lipid levels
    
    	2.  A diet that might result in either weightloss or easier
    	    weight maintenance.
    
    In case I sound rather pedantic about this, it's because I am.  I had
    a heart attack some 5 years ago, a triple bypass, and have become a
    student of proper diet since (not that I have always had the sense or
    discipline to follow the proper precepts at all times!).
    
    Strangely enough, to digress, although I always had _low_ total
    cholesterol readings (generally from 165 to 175 mg/dl; it was not until
    I suffered the heart attack that they did a cardiogram, and discovered
    the plaque deposits that necessitated the bypass.
    
    I was informed (slightly after the fact), that although my cholesterol
    levels were exemplary, my LDL/HDL ratios (low-density lipoproteins/
    high-density lipoproteins or simply "bad-guy"/"good guys" ratio,
    generally it should be 4.0 or less, mine was 7+) was NOT exemplary.  
    The _ONLY_ way to correct this, according to my surgeon, the cardiologist, 
    my family physician, and the dietitian that supervised my recovery, was to 
    do three things:
    
    	1.  Exercise a lot -- not weight-lifting, but aerobic exercise
    	    (that makes HDL's increase so your ratio gets smaller)
    
        2.  Consume a lot of fats with EPA (a type of fish oil - say cod
    	    liver oil), at least 1 to 2 oz per day (which now adds 270
    	    to 540 calories of fat to your diet IN ADDITION to whatever
    	    the 'hidden' fat content of your food is), the net result
    	    being a diet with perhaps 40% of it's calories from fat.
    
        3.  Embrace the 'low-fat regimen' of fish, skinned poultry, and
    	    vegetables, with as little fat as possible.
    
    From my reading of the T-factor diet, although the writers approach it
    in a different way, their 'diet' is a low-fat diet.  And, virtually
    every other reputable diet book I have read, upon inspection, turns out
    to be a 'low-fat' diet.
    
    The only other thing to watch out for is sodium, and that's a story for
    another day.
    
    CJ
    	

    
    I recently bought the "T-Factor Fat Gram Counter", which is a small
    booklet that contains a listing of foods & their fat contents.  I'm
    trying to log my daily fat intake and keep it within the 20-40 gram
    target (for men it's 30-60 grams).  I'm amazed how much fat is in
    food & how quickly you can reach 20+ grams.  I gave up fast foods
    a while back - good thing, a Burger King double beef Whopper with
    cheese has 60 grams of fat in it!!!  I guess that's not too surprising,
    however, there are a number of foods listed that I didn't know had
    that much fat, for instance: 
    		
    			1 medium avocado      30 g.
    			1/2 c. tofu           11 g.
                        2 oz link sausage     20 g.
                        2 T. sunflower seeds   9 g.
                        3.5 oz duck w/skin    28 g.
                        3 egg omelet w/cheese 40 g.
                                                                   
    The booklet also contains the fiber grams and calorie contents.
    Cost $1.95
    
    Audrey

    
    
    Audrey,
                   
            Where did you buy it??
            

    
    I bought it at Waldenbooks in the Auburn (MA) mall.
    
    Audrey
    

    Guess this is as good a string to reply to for my questiona as any...
    
    I just bought a bag of pre-cut carrots to snack on.  The nutrition
    chart on the back says that a serving of 2.8 oz there is 1 gram of fat.
    
    FAT IN CARROTS?????  That's a new one on me.

.12> I just bought a bag of pre-cut carrots to snack on.  The nutrition
.12> chart on the back says that a serving of 2.8 oz there is 1 gram of fat.
    
    The standard carrot, 100gm, has 0.2 gm fat, according to the Nutrition
    Almanac, c1975, p214.
    
    To convert grams to ounces, remember there are 454 grams per pound, and
    16 ounces per pound ...
    
                 1 ounce     16 ounces
    100 grams  * --------- * --------- =  3.52 ounces
                 454 grams   1 pound
    
    
    Are there any other ingredients listed?
    
    Does the label say 1gm or less than 1gm?

    Carrots are excellent as they have beta carotene in them and are a good
    source of vitamins.  
    
    Someone told me that they roast a lot of vegetables (i.e., carrots, 
    turnip, etc.) and they are very good.  Brings out a sweet taste in them.  
    They just spray the pan (they use a turkey pan) and cook at 350 degrees for
    whatever length of time is needed.