Comments on: Your comments and questions are welcome.

By: Kylie Batt

Kylie Batt — Mon, 03 May 2010 22:42:37 +0000

? ???? ???-?? ????. ?????? ? ????? ?????, ??????? ??????? ?? ??????????.... ???????? ?? ?????? ????????? Please feel free to ask questions or post comments about the documentary film, “My Big Fat Diet”, or anything you see on this site or its links.....

By: Kylie BattName

Kylie BattName — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 06:37:12 +0000

?????????!!! ??? ??? ???????????!!!))))... ???????? ?? ?????? ???????????? Please feel free to ask questions or post comments about the documentary film, “My Big Fat Diet”, or anything you see on this site or its links.....

By: ed the grocer

ed the grocer — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 07:36:33 +0000

I am a grocer and the only book I sell/give away is the Taubes book. I also send as many as I can to your site. Enough praise. I also push Vit D – a given. Vit C – if glucose supplants vit C and vit C is needed for healthy connective tissue, then, there would be a less trouble with VLDL and LDL. Iodine, ( a suprise ) our food comes from the same old fields, the dairy no longer uses it for cleaning and the Dr. tells us not to use salt (iodized). The solution for a sluggish thyroid is to supercharge the gland even when there is no iodine to work with. Magnesium, selenium, chromium. And last, Q10/ALA , if q10 declines with age and the heavy demand gets all the q10, then what happens (no one says ) to the less muscular demanding parts of our system? colin, skin, eyes…

By: shar

shar — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:41:28 +0000

Dr Jay I just wanted to thank you for the referral to atkins. I read about your big fat diet and tried to find as much info as possible, your science made sense to me. When I couldn’t find enough info to follow the diet I read your advice to others to try atkins. Lost 9lbs in 4 days! Gotta say thank you so much for the advice!

Dr Jay’s Reply:

Thanks for sharing your story. I hope you have continued success.

By: PHolloway

PHolloway — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 02:59:45 +0000

Thanks for your input, Helen. However, my daughter’s father (not my husband anymore, for reasons that may become clear in this diatribe) has diabetes in his family and his health is a nightmare. My kids report that for him, breakfast is a handful of m&ms. He has always believed in low-fat, low-carb in spite of the terrible consequences on his family and, himself. He has always had memory and concentration issues very much like my son, and borders on paranoia, obsessive/compulsive disorder, etc. He has had major health problems that I won’t go into here, but they almost defy belief. His weight yo-yo’.s When I first started dating him, he weighed 230 pounds and he gained even more when he was in medical school and stopped competing in college sports. When he feels like he is overweight, he goes on a starvation diet. He has horrible emotional mood swings and some real cognitive impairment. (I am amazied that he continues to practice medicine, although he mostly works as medical expert on worker’s comp cases rather than seeing patients) So, no, I don’t think low-fat, high-carb is appropriate for him!

By: Helen

Helen — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 17:51:23 +0000

Hi PHolloway:

Thank you for your response to my previous post. I am now posting in the other string as I think Dr. Jay wanted to divert comments there.
From I read, yes extra fat cells are created as we become obese. Those who lose the weight retain the original fat cells, which sits there like empty sacs and thus the excess skin and subcutaneous tissue. After my childhood as a obese person, then two babies, I am fairly lean but retain those belly rolls of extra skin.
It sounds like your husband has perfect insulin sensitivity, and does not produce so much of it when exposed to carbs, so that eating carbs does not get away on him. For people like that, it seems a low-fat, high-carb eating style works fine.
Helen

By: PHolloway

PHolloway — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 16:28:36 +0000

Oops – I said her insurance WOULD pay – when it should read that the insurance WOULD NOT pay.

By: PHolloway

PHolloway — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 16:27:12 +0000

Another comment:
As I read more of this blog, I am more and more interested in the postings here and feel compelled to respond. I just read the question about bariatric surgery, and, as always, really appreciate Dr. Jay’s reply. My daughter, who weighed 320 pounds at her “peak’ at age 16, lost about 150 over several years with diet (modified low-carb – she prefers to be vegetarian but eventually became resigned to the fact that her heredity would make that difficult) and intense exercise. What a marvelous accomplishment for a young woman! However, by the time she graduated from college, she had massive amounts of loose skin everywhere. That is a side-effect of major weight gain/loss that few people mention. I have an acquaintance that suffered the same fate after bariatric surgery. My daughter commented once that “I worked so hard to lose weight and I’m still a freak.” It was so tragic, especially since she is a talented actress in a society that demands physical beauty for performers of her age group. She visited a plastic surgeon and arranged for surgery, only to discover that her insurance would pay for it. My acquaintance, on the other hand, had the same procedures and her insurance covered it because it was the result of the bariatric procedure. (Dr. Jay, being from Canada, might be interested in that little detail, especially as we debate public health care in the US) Fortunately, between my mother and me, we came up with the $15,000 plus for the operations and my brave daughter endured the pain and rehabilitation of two stints of operations (abdomen and under-arms performed in two separate “bouts”). She is much more comfortable now and has a slim midriff and torso, but is left literally and emotionally “scarred for life.” She is convinced that she will never have the career she wants because of the visible scars. She still has some extra skin on her thighs that leaves them looking heavy, but really can’t afford the cost and trauma of more surgery.
As her mother, I am laden with guilt that her life was so severely impacted by my mistaken belief in feeding my family a low-fat, high-carb diet. I have no doubt she suffered malnutrition and near starvation that lead her to have disordered eating as a child. She still is prone to bulimia when under stress. I write this so that anyone considering massive weight loss be warned that there are some side effects – especially if the weight is gained or lost quickly. Also, for parents with metabolic syndrome and insulin-resistance in the family, to feed your children a low-grain, low-sugar, low-processed food diet from the beginning and not to listen to the medical establishment. The saddest part of this is that her father is an MD in internal medicine and sports medicine and still believes in low-fat, low calorie diets. His health is a disaster!

By: PHolloway

PHolloway — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 02:43:43 +0000

In response to Helen:
I have no trunkal obesity – I carry my weight in my hips and thighs. (I have never actually been overweight, to tell the truth – just a bit “chubby”). However, my sister is a classic apple shape. She is official “Type II” while my very slim brother and I have never hit the “magic number” to be diagnosed, but have severe reactive hypoglycemia and other severe reactions to eating carbohydrates. My son is very thin, but has “ADHD” responses to carbs. My daughter weighed 320 at age 16, lost half the weight, but is still a bit heavy in her thighs. (She had to have massive amounts of skin removed from her abdomen and under-arms – which may have also removed some fat cells? would like someone’s take on that.) So, in my family, we are all insulin-resistant. In my generation and the next, the men tend to be quite thin but subject to emotional swings from carbs, and most of the women have trunkal obesity, except for me. I have a very tiny slim waist and no fat on my ribcage. If I get into “carb creep” I know immediately by small “love handles” just above my waist towards the back. So I guess I’m the odd one.

By: PHolloway

PHolloway — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 02:37:29 +0000

Dr. Jay:
My community is a test market for a new KFC “sandwich,” and a local reporter did a story in which he had his blood lipids tested, ate the sandwich, then was retested. His numbers were: HDL 50 down to 39; LDL 145 up to 155; triglycerides 135 up to 215. He used this data as “proof” that the fat (no transfat,mostly saturated) had caused these horrible changes.
The product was two breaded. fried chicken patties as the outer “holder,” (no bun) sandwiching cheese and the “Colonel’s special sauce. 590 calories, 280 from fat. No mention of carb count or what was in the sauce, or whether the chicken was processed or what kind of cheese.
I am wondering about the accuracy of blood tests immediately following a meal. I am wondering why his blood lipids appear to have reacted in a manner that is the opposite of what has been seen in longer term studies of low-fat vs low-carb. Of course, without knowing the carb count (and I expect that it was high due to the breading and suspect the sauce is full of HFCS), this is not a low-carb food and it is possible the ill-effects were due to the carbs.
I have emailed my questions to the reporter and will report back if I get the answer concerning the sauce, carbs, etc.
In the meantime, I interested in your reaction to this.
The newspaper story cited this statistic: Every point your HDL drops, your heart disease risk goes up 10%. And implied fully that dietary fat is the culprit.
Peggy in Omaha