Fat Loss Tips.

High protein diets have become popular in recent years as a way of reducing weight. There are two reasons why they work.

First, they make you reduce or eliminate refined carbohydrates, such as white bread and pasta, white rice, breakfast cereals, cookies, pies, ice cream, chips, etc. It is well known that refined carbohydrates are largely responsible for promoting weight gain. As a result, if you avoid them, you are going to lose weight.

Second, foods high in protein (and fat) produce a quicker feeling of fullness and reduce the total amount of food that you eat. The less food you eat, the fewer calories you cosume, which leads to weight loss. 

Your appetite (and the amount of food you eat) is regulated by several hormone-like substances produced by stomach and intestine. For example, your stomach makes a hormone called ghrelin, which increases your appetite. The higher the level of ghrelin, the hungrier you feel and the more food you are likely to eat. But as you begin eating and more food enters the stomach, the level goes down and becomes very low by the end of the meal.

Another hormone called peptide YY or PYY has the opposite effect. It tells your brain that your are not hungry and reduces your desire to eat. It is made by the cells of the intestine during a meal. As food enters the intestine, more and more of PYY is produced. Studies (both human and animal) showed that PYY can reduce food consumption by as much as 30 percent. Obese people seem to have a problem producing adequate amounts of PYY.

There are dozens of chemical regulators of appetite that are produced by various parts of the digestive system. Many of them are being studied as possible solution for the growing epidemic of obesity in the United States and other countries.

So it appears that Atkins was right after all. High protein foods help you lose weight because you eat less food. Other diets that are based on the same idea – low carbohydrate high protein – are generally quite successful when followed as prescribed.

Recent research shows that proteins and fats stimulate the production of PYY more than carbohydrates. This means that if you eat food containing protein and fats, you will feel full sooner and will end up eating less.

Some people doubt whether high protein diets are healthy, but so far there is no evidence that they are harmful and the result (weight loss) is clearly beneficial. I address the safely of high protein diets in another article: High Protein Diets – Are They Safe?