Eat Lesser & Live Longer (comment by Dr JB Lim)

The blogger’s note: In response to a question on the secret of living longer by eating lesser, Dr JB Lim has the following to say:

Friday, 13 July, 2012 9:58 PM

From: lim juboo

By how much the restriction is a good question?

The question we ask is not by how much restriction, but to what extent we have been over eating over and above our physical, biological and physiological needs. This is more important an issue to address than by how much do we need to restrict.

For instance if a person is 300 kg when he ought to be just 60 kg for his height, restricting his food intake by say, as much as 50 % to bring his weight down to say, 200 kg, still has not solved his problem even though there was a caloric restriction as much as by half.

It still does not answer the question ‘by how much’ – 10 % 20 % 30 % etc?

For instance, if you decide to drastically cut down your intake of roti canai by 75 %, say from 10 plates X 4 pieces of roti canai every morning (example), to just 10 plate x 1 piece roti canai, you are actually eating just 25 % (4 times less) of the normal consumption.

But with 10 pieces of roti camai a day, you are still 200 kg. It is still not a success. This is not just termed as ‘overweight’, but we call it ‘pathological obesity’ even though you have reduced your caloric intake (roti canai) by as much as 75 %.

Your problem is still there! It has not been solved, because you only considered caloric restriction by asking how much to cut, but you have not considered your initial weight, your physiological state, your physical condition, your biological needs, your height and lean body mass, your physical activities, the nature and composition of the foods you take, the frequency you take them, your sex (gender), your biochemical and physiological needs, the bioavailability of the foods consumed…etc, etc…down the long list.

You have only considered ‘how much food and caloric restriction’. You have still not answered your problem.

To illustrate another example, an overweight individual weighing say 70 kg eating, say (example) 3 pieces of roti canai a day, but decides to cut it down to just 2 pieces a day (only a 33 % reduction in caloric intake) may see a body weight reduction to 55 kg after 3 months when his desirable ‘normal’ weight-for-height ought to be 50 kg.

That is excellent result without counting calories or how much % restriction.

Nutritional science is not so simple as that. It take 4 years in an accredited university to get just a basic bachelor’s degree in Nutrition (Medicine takes just 1 more year), not to say a Master’s and Doctorate degree, fellowships, post-doctoral fellowships, research, post doctoral research into nutritional sciences.

Nutrition and weight management is not just like taking apples and weighing them on a weighing scale, and deciding how much to pay for them.

There are many reasons why caloric restriction and the lesser you eat, the longer your life span, shown again, and again, and again in so many animal models, microorganisms, and even in human studies since the rat experiment by Mc Cay and Crowell at Cornel University in 1934.

But I think one of the reasons is, the more you eat, the more you produce toxic metabolic wastes, most of them from the metabolic breakdown of foods, producing large quantities of highly damaging free radicals. These free singlet oxygen radicals damage, tear away and age all the DNA’s, the cells, tissues, organs, and systems in the body sending them all down a very steep hill of degeneration and early death.

Besides, the liver and the kidneys have to deal with all these toxic metabolites giving no rest and chance for these organs to recover.

All these – cardiovascular, renal, metabolic syndrome (diabetes, endocrinal, etc), cancers, stroke, gout, arthritis, retinopathy, hypertension and early death is just due to one thing – overeating over and above our physiological, physical and biological needs.

Just eat less and maintain a desirable body weight for your height. In fact it is even better to be about 15 % below this ‘desirable’ cut-off.

The best way to determine, is to let your body signal for you. Don’t let those ‘experts’ called nutritionists, doctors, and worse still those ‘health freaks’ and con men, bogus ‘health experts’ organic food salesmen, vitamin supplement ‘experts’ decide for you.

Don’t even let me decide your biological and nutritional needs. Let your own body signal and decide for you. You own body is the best nutritionist and doctor. No one is more biologically, psychologically and physiologically, and socially more qualified than your own body. Take this piece of message seriously.

Let your own individual body decide and signal to you when to eat, how much, and when to stop.

To me, the best body signal is to feel a little bit hungry all the time, and leave it there for hours. Hunger does not kill. It is just a body signal (symptom) of low sugar levels. That way I know my sugar levels are low, and my reserves are being used to maintain basal blood sugar levels for hours and hours as the fats and energy reserves are also slowly being utilized.

After many hours of ‘hunger’ (it will disappear after 1-2 hours), top it up again just a little bit by eating as little as possible. Limit it on the plate. Then stop. Wash your mouth to remove further stimulus of food in the mouth and go far away from the sight and smell of food.

Just for your info, I eat only once a day, but I take care of my fluid, and electrolyte, the micro-nutrients and trace nutrients every day.

I can give a one week course on how to maintain body weight scientifically, and keep that way (the desirable weight) very successfully for years and years.

Regards,

Research Nutritionist Dr Lim Ju Boo

Bask (Physiology) Post-Grad Dip Nutr MSc MD PhD (Med) FRSPH FRSM

Special Medical and Science Adviser

Head of Technical Advisory Board

The Dynapharm Pharmaceutical International Group