Stress and Weight Loss

For many people, yesterday was one of the most stressful days of the year. Tax time can be very difficult. For that reason, I thought I'd address the effect of stress on weight loss.

Let's face it. We live in a stressful world. We have jobs, conflict, deadlines, and many other stressors that affect us directly. As if that wasn't enough, we can also worry about wars, terrorists, earthquakes, radiation, and a variety of other natural and man made disasters.

Of course, cavemen had their stressors too, but their stress came from a different type of danger, one that our bodies are more capable of processing. Most of the stress for cavemen came from one of two sources: lack of food or direct physical peril. In response, our bodies produce two distinct stress hormones:

Epinepherine (Adrenaline): comes from the adrenal gland, and is the one which predominates in situations involving physical peril. When the bear is chasing you, it is epinepherine that helps you escape. It raises your heart rate and blood pressure, dilates the pupils, reduces fatigue, and primes the muscles for action. In short, it amps you up to deal with the physical danger, whether that means fighting it or running away from it.

Cortisol: is a steroid (cholesterol based) hormone, which predominates in times of famine. Your body releases cortisol when it feels like it is not getting enough nourishment, as well as in times of physical danger. Cortisol is the conservation hormone. It tells the body to save and store. The body stops breaking down fat stores, and begins converting as much of the ingested food it can into fat stores, to prepare for the famine ahead. It also stimulates the appetite, prompting you to eat as much as you can, to maximize the storage.

That is all well and good, if you live in a world where you can be attacked by saber tooth tigers, and food is very hard to come by. Fast forward to today, when the stress comes from traffic on the interstate, your jerky boss, or the low balance on your bank account.

Fighting or running can do little to reduce these dangers, so the epinepherine just leads to feelings of anxiety, and high blood pressure. Since we are practically drowning in calories, when the cortisol is released due to the stress, you follow your biologic imperative, and eat. Your body then stores, thinking that you are being chased by a predator, and about to run out of food. The result: you are overweight, and chronically anxious and stressed out. Know anyone like that?

The good news: There is a solution! Your body has a natural way to dissipate the stress and block the effects of cortisol. That way is exercise. Look at our caveman. When the tiger pounced at him, what did he do: fight or run. Either way, he exerted himself. The exertion releases endorphins, which relax you, as well as a cascade of other hormones and chemicals which increase the metabolism and promote fat breakdown to liberate energy for activity. It is no coincidence that people who have a high level of activity also have lower stress levels. They are merely following their inner caveman. Follow yours, and the middle of April might go a bit easier next year.

Caveman Children and Pregnant Women

I get asked many questions about being a vegan. Hands down, the most frequent is "where do you get your protein?" Due to many repeated inquiries, I have a response for that question. If you want to read about it, click here.

Other than the protein question, the next most frequent question is about children and pregnant women. It usually goes something like this: "I want my family to become vegetarian, but I am afraid it will hurt my children [or fetus]. Is it safe for them?"

In a word, yes. All of the nutrients required for growth and development of body tissues can be obtained from plant matter. It is true that there is not one single plant source of all eight essential amino acids required for life (an essential amino acid is one that our bodies cannot manufacture from raw materials). This would be a big problem if you intended to feed your children only one type of food day in and day out. Fortunately, if you follow caveman rule #2:

Eat a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, and very little if any meat, eggs, or dairy

then you will not have a problem. The variety will ensure that you get enough amino acids, as well as a full compliment of antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals. If you also follow caveman rule #1:

Eat foods like they grow in nature

your kids will not be exposed to the processed crap that fills most vending machines, school cafeterias, and restaurants. On the whole, they will be much better off than the rest of the population, eating genetically modified, hormone and antibiotic laden meat. Not only will they develop just fine, they will probably avoid early onset puberty, and the behavioral problems associated with a diet high in meat and processed foods.

Really the only nutrient you need to worry about is vitamin B12. Since we clean our food thoroughly, and B12 comes from the bacteria in the dirt, there is no good vegetable source of B12, except for nutritional yeast. Fortunately, you don't need very much B12. Adding nutritional yeast to one of your meals a couple of times a week, or a weekly B12 supplement will provide more than enough of this vital nutrient.

You may be wondering if I walk my talk. What do I do with my kids. They are not vegan, nor are they completely vegetarian, but we do follow caveman rules 1 and 2. They eat about 90% vegetable matter, and very little processed food. Most importantly, they are learning lessons about good nutrition and healthy eating that they will hopefully carry for the rest of their lives.

M. Jacob Ott, MD

Multitask the Burn

OK. So cavemen did not mow lawns. They didn't even have lawns. If they did, they would probably try to mow it with something like this:

In the modern era, most of us do have lawns, however. Mowing the lawn is a task that large numbers of people have to deal with weekly during the spring, summer, and fall. Since that is the case, why not get the most out of it you can?

Most people mow their lawns with fancy riding mowers, or self-propelled push mowers. These devices make quick work of the grass, but they do nothing to help us mow down our own fat tissue. This is my lawnmower:

Since you have to mow the lawn anyway, why not get in a bit of a workout while doing it? Foregoing convenience devices can help you build additional effort and calorie burning into daily activities. I have to work much harder to mow the lawn with my dinosaur of a mower, but that is the point. I also don't use any gasoline, or have to maintain any sort of engine. I AM the engine.

You can use this principle in many areas of daily living. Take the stairs, rather than the elevator. Park as far away from the store as you can, rather than following people around the lot to find the closest spot. Use one of the carry baskets at the grocery store, rather than a cart. Carry the grocery bags out to the car yourself, rather than having the bag clerk do it. Walk the half-mile to the office, rather than driving or taking a taxi. By multitasking your burn, and building additional effort intentionally into daily activities, you will see more success with weight loss more quickly, and perhaps save some money and the environment as well.

M. Jacob Ott

Exercise Should be Fun!

I don't know about you, but when I was a kid, I used to exercise all the time. I exercised before school, after school, before bedtime, and nearly every day all summer and winter break. I just didn't call it exercise.

I called it playing, and it was fun. I played tag, hide and seek, football, baseball, basketball (basically anything that was played with a ball), and rode my bike. The bike was my main and only form of transportation, so I rode it everywhere.

Of course, it wasn't just fun, it was hard too. I remember sprinting until my lungs were on fire and felt like they were going to explode. Then I remember catching my breath, laughing, and doing it all over again. As kids, that is what most of us did.

Fast forward to adulthood, and it is a different story. At the gym, I watch a stream of adults trudge in, heads down, body language saying that they would like to be anywhere else. I know what they are thinking, because I am telepathic. Well, maybe not, but because I have thought the same thing at times: "I have to get in my 20 minutes on the treadmill so that I won't gain weight." They then make a halfhearted attempt at exercise, barely breaking a sweat, and trudge out of the gym, headed to the next thing that they don't want to do.

How did we get from being a kid who likes to play exercise, to an adult, who finds it to be a chore? Does this change in attitude affect the results we get? You bet it does! Like with most things in life, it is not just what we do, but how and why we do it that is important. Exercising with a poor attitude will steal most of the benefit away, for two reasons:

First, you will not put in the effort you would if you were having fun. Second, the high cortisol (stress hormone) levels that come with doing something you dread actually increase the storage of fat, and promote muscle breakdown.

The cure? Do something that you like to do! Whether that is walking, running, swimming, climbing, weights, or a sport, it is very important that you enjoy it and look forward to doing it. Gradually, as you get into the habit of exerting yourself again, you will look forward to the feeling of pushing your body. Then you will be ready to take on the kind of harder training that you would not have liked or wanted to do before.

Caveman Exercise 103

In the last post, we discussed the general attributes of exercise. In short:

1. It should be hard
2. It should be consistent
3. It should be varied

Now you might be asking "So, Jacob, how do I translate this into actual exercise?" I'm glad you asked. Here are my 4 principles for Devolving your exercise:

1. Make Time Every Day- Cavemen did not get days off. It is that simple. It's not like your stone age ancestor could say "I don't think I'll try and get food today. I'd rather just lounge on the beach and read my granite tablet." Getting food was an all-day, daily activity. There were no rest days. Now, this is the modern world, and we do have the luxury of being able to rest occasionally, so I am not saying that you can NEVER take a rest day, but they should be the exception, not the rule.

2. Push Yourself- Just like with the vacation days, Thag, your stone age ancestor, was not really able to say "I don't feel like running after that rabbit. I'll just walk instead. I'm sure it will wait." Survival was often hard, and required their full capacity. If you want to be fit like them, you'll use yours as well.

3. Do Things a caveman Would Have Done- Cavemen did not have stability, but they certainly had variety. They never knew what they might have to do in the struggle to survive. They might have to run, jump, climb, crawl, or swim. Unlike us, they did not perform the exact same routine day in and day out. This is why they were not overtrained, even though they "exercised" all day, nearly every day. If you want your body to be able to take anything, then you will do a wide and varied spectrum of exercise.

4. Be Patient, Don't Give Up!- We in the modern world like a nice linear progression. We expect to invest a little every day, and see a return in nice regular intervals. At work, we get paid by the hour, and get regular deposits to our bank account every two weeks. The natural world does not function like our social structure. You may work hard for months, and see no gains, then all of a sudden make vast improvements in a week. That is just the way of a natural system. The bottom line is be patient. You didn't become fat and sedentary in a day, and you will not retain fitness in a day. If you aren't making visible progress, just trust the process You will see results eventually, if you stick with it.

Overall, pretty common sense, yet most of us tend not to follow these principles when it comes to our exercise, and fitness suffers for it.

Caveman Exercise 102

In the last post, I talked a lot about what exercise isn't. Now it's time to address what it is. As I said last time, most people have differing ideas when it comes to exercise, but almost all can agree that by and large, we don't do enough of it. Given our country's obesity epidemic and the fact that the average American watches four hours of TV a day, that conclusion is obvious.

In order to understand what exercise should be, we should spend some time thinking about what exercise does. Simply put, the human body requires physical activity, the way a car requires gasoline. Unlike your car, however, the more you use your body, the stronger it becomes. When we take people and force them to sit or lay in bed without exercise, many bad changes occur. They lose energy and get depression. They get blood clots, pneumonia, and other bad diseases. Even their cholesterol levels change, whether or not their diet changes.

From this we can see that the first purpose of exercise is to maintain, strengthen, and refresh the body. Exercise also helps to strengthen and maintain the cardiovascular system, improving fitness and treating such diseases as coronary artery disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes. Finally, exercise helps stabilize mood and promote mental well being. Exercise is a far more powerful antidepressant than any pill made today.

To reap these benefits, there are certain things that exercise must be:
1. It must be hard- It is not a coincidence that the word "exercise" and the word "exert" have the same root. In order for exercise to mean something, it must be difficult. That being said, what is difficult for me might not be for a pro football player. No matter what level you are at, exercise must challenge your limits. If a certain routine gets to the point where it is easy, then it is time to step the level up.

2. It must be consistent- Cavemen did not get days off, or rest days. They had to fight for survival and look for food every day. If you want exercise to give you maximal benefits, then you need to do it nearly every day. I'm not saying that you can never take a day off, but that should be the exception, not the rule

3. It should be varied- We say that variety is the spice of life. For cavemen, it WAS life. They never knew what they would have to do in their search for food and struggle to survive. Running, jumping, climbing, crawling, carrying, pushing, pulling. Nothing was impossible. This is why they never got "overtrained." Overtraining is really just doing the exact same routine too many times, until the repetition injures the body. To avoid this, you need to vary your routine, so that the body can't adapt.

In the end, just remember the guiding principle when it comes to exercise: some is good. More is better. You can never really get too much.

More about exercise in the next post.

Caveman Exercise 101

When I say exercise what do you think of?

Almost everyone I talk with has a different answer to this. They range from the ludicrous (100 steps on the treadmill = cardio workout) to more than adequate  (100+ miles running per week). Most people probably have the picture in their minds of people on machines at a health club. All of these (except the first one, that's just crazy) can qualify as exercise. So, when we say "exercise," what should we mean?

I like to think about it in terms of the desired outcome. In the end, what are we trying to get out of exercising? The answer is fitness. The purpose of exercise is to keep the body fit and healthy, and able to perform whatever actions we require of it. Aside from that, exercise has many beneficial side effects: it is a potent antidepressant and mood stabilizer, it treats many diseases, such as high blood pressure, type II diabetes, heart disease, chronic pain, and high cholesterol (even if you don't change your diet too much). That being said, for exercise to do this, it needs to be done right.

Cavemen did not exercise per se. Their exercise was a part of daily life. They had to run down food, forage for food, and evade predators. To do this, they had to run, jump, climb, crawl, and possibly swim. Since probably 80-90% of their waking hours were spent in the search for food, They didn't really have to worry about exercising in addition to daily activities. Their daily activities WERE what kept them fit and healthy.

Fast forward to today. In the information age, most of us have desk jobs. That means that we wake up, get into our cars, drive to work, walk into the office, sit at a desk for eight hours, walk back to the car, drive home, and walk into the house. That's about it for walking. Depending how close to your job and house you park, that could be as few as 500 steps or so. Given our modern lifestyle, there is no doubt that we need additional activity in order to maintain the health of our bodies.

The government and health organizations try to address this by putting a time on it. They say things like "exercise for 30 minutes daily." In order not to scare people off, however, they lower the bar so much on what activities they recommend that that thirty minutes is mostly wasted time. Walking at a moderate pace, which the federal government considers adequate, barely qualifies as activity, let alone exercise. It can be a good starter when you are sedentary (that is how I started when I was 350 lbs), but unless you increase the intensity, you are doing yourself little good as far as the benefits of exercise are concerned.

More on what exercise should be like in Caveman Nutrition 102