It’s January and the nation has noticed those jeans fitting a bit tighter, and the scale tipping away from where it should be sitting. It was the holidays that did it, and now it is time to seriously consider getting those “Thanksgiving” and “Christmas” holiday pounds off.
But which diet to choose – there are so many that are extremely popular, it can really be confusing trying to figure out what one is best. A diet that keeps you full, but allows you to eat out. It also doesn’t require a whole lot of measuring, and specialized foods.
So, narrowing it down to whether it is best to cut out carbs and sugar, or carbs and fat was the experiment of the month for twin doctors.
The 35 year old identical twins, Chris and Alexander van Tullekin, both physicians, took on the task of finding out just which promoted the best success.
Chris, a physician at University College Hospital in London tried the low-fat, high carb diet, while his brother Alexander, who is the director of the Institute of Humanitarian Affairs at Fordham University in New York, went on a high-fat, low-carb diet.
According to an article Alexander wrote for The Daily Mail both brothers lost weight. Alexander lost the most, at nine pounds in one month.
The brothers found that eliminating a single macronutrient like fat or sugar is not a solution to weight loss, nor is fad diets.
“It is about building an environment in your life where you could easily eat a cheap and healthy diet and get enough exercise. It is amazing that we are not all fat and I come away with a sense that I know enough about diet and nutrition and I should be reducing the calories and building an environment where I can do that rather than looking for one toxic ingredient,” Chris said.
After the experiment ended, the British twins also concluded that the real villains when it comes to weight gain are processed foods that contained a combination of high fat and high sugar.
Susan Jebb, professor of diet and population health at the University of Oxford, agreed with their conclusion.
“Processed foods pack calories in and are unbelievably attractive and delicious,” she told the Daily Express. “They are temptations for all of us and it is astonishing that any of us stay slim.”
The brothers concluded, any diet that eliminates fat or sugar will be unpalatable, hard to sustain and probably be bad for your health, too.
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