Episode 21: How much fat should be in my diet?

In this week’s episode, Jessica is discussing a listener’s question, “How much fat should be in my diet?”  Fad diets have long taught fat is bad, which is simply not true! Fat does so many things in our bodies such as regulate hormones, insulate our organs, metabolize certain vitamins, and so much more. 

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Intro 

Welcome to the art and science of eating. I’m Jessica Begg, registered dietician and clinical counsellor. I worked for fifteen years in programs for the treatment of eating disorders. I now help those that struggle with emotional eating and their relationship with their body. This podcast is where I answer questions to help people along this bumpy journey to creating peace with both food and their body.  

Podcast

Oh hi hi, and welcome back!

This week’s question is from a listener that wrote in. Her name is Karen. Karen asks ‘why have fad diets said to eat no fat in order to lose fat, as in to lose weight? I started eating good quality olive oil and I feel so much better. How much fat should I eat?’ 

Hi Karen, thanks for sending in your question. Yes, fad diets and more so the older ones told people to cut out fat to eat no fat and low fat foods. The thinking was mainly to decrease calories as fat has twice as many calories as the other two macronutrients that we need, protein and carbohydrates. So the three macronutrients that we need are protein, carbohydrates, and fat. So however, restrictive diets always have the aim to make bodies smaller and these silly weight loss programs like Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, Dr. Bernstein -- I know you guys are all shaking your head ‘yup, I’ve done those, I’ve done those.’ Ideal protein, cabbage soup diet, Do-Can diet. Those were just the ones I can think off the top of my head. I’m certain you’ve guys have done many more. I love to hear from them. About you; about what you’ve done. There’s always new names and new books out there about weight loss. All of them though, no matter what the name is or who’s doing it, they all have a 97%-ish like plus or minus a few percentage points but typically about 97% fail rate for their sustained weight loss. 

The other thing about these fad diets are and actually should quantify around the idea of fad diet. A lot of the language has changed around the use of fad diet. So the diet industry, if we use that word, they’ve co-oped a lot of the words that we use in the health world so I’ve noticed previously people would say it’s a lifestyle but it’s really same thing, very restrictive. Also, wellness as in I’m trying to get healthy and yet it’s all cutting out large portions of food, and these diets are just straight up not healthy. They should not be done for health nor should they be done for lifestyle because they’re not healthy. As cutting out large portions of total amounts of food, like as in calories but also food groups like fats or what is currently in vogue is all carbohydrate-rich foods, as people are doing now. So, you just remove a lot of nutrients, a lot of nutrition. So, like you said with the olive oil that you’ve added back in, you get a lot of healthy fats like Omega-3 is from that oil that decreases inflammation, for example. Fat is also a carrier for vitamins that we need, like vitamin A, vitamin D, E, and K. Oils make up also the outer cell wall of every cell in our body, let alone things like nerve conduction, hormones, the list goes on of everything that fat is used in our body. And like I said, the current fads cut out carbohydrates so things like the paleo diet, the keto diet. Those are just as inappropriate as the low fat diets, as carbohydrates are an important component of our diet, just like fat like I said. That there’s

those three macronutrients that we need and carbohydrates because it’s such a common topic, I’m gonna make a separate episode of that. I’m making a list of things that have been coming up, and I’ll do that in a couple of weeks cause also what came up in terms of meal planning or what to think of when planning meals like what are the components. So this is kind of a nice little segway. So look ahead; i’ll get those things together for you all. So, the preferred distribution for talking about macronutrients because this is the level that we’re talking about here. Not meal or food items is that distribution of macronutrients should be 50-60% carbohydrates. It’s a large proportion of what we eat, carbohydrates. 20-30% fat, so again, big components. And 20% protein. We don’t need as much protein as what current fad diets or what’s out there in the ethos. What the fat component of this distribution would look like in terms of foods, would be things like cooking oils with your meals. The fats in nuts and seeds, the fat that’s just naturally occurring in meat and dairy items if you eat those, and also having other or fun foods is what we call them. So fun foods would consist of things like chips, cookies, ice-cream, all of those things also have fat in them that we are also accounting for and using. That it is still an important part even though we’re quantifying them as fun foods and where these got confused is that the health promotion professionals, or health professionals never intended for people to cut out high fat foods entirely and some people would use “eat in moderation.” But what does that mean actually? What does moderation mean? This will mean different for every person and that’s why there’s no categorization, or lot of numbers of counting around that. For some, it’s just having fun foods sporadically. Maybe it’s not important to them like it is to me. So for others, like myself, it’s making sure I eat my balanced meals for the most part, making sure they’ve got these components of proteins, starch or grain, fruit or vegetables at most of the meals. But then I have fun foods as part of my meals and as a lot of my snacks and that is important for me. And it was meant for the using “in moderation” was to make sure fun foods weren’t interfering in people being able to get the nutrients and vitamins that they need. But assuming that you can get the nutrition that you need, it’s actually not too difficult to and I think I’ll talk about this more in this meal planning episode that we’re gonna think about it, is that you don’t actually need to eat too too much in order to get the nutrition that you need is that fun foods can still be a large proportion or not the majority of, but a significant component of your daily eating. And so, with that, fat fun foods is an important bit and to answer your question Karen of how much fats you should eat. I don’t want you to count them but I want you to understand that you should intentionally add fat into your diet like using the oils that you’re having. So, intentionally cooking with them and intentionally putting them on things and knowing that fat is a happy and healthy part of your diet. I hope that answers your question, Karen. Let me know if you have anymore. I would love to hear any followup questions and any more that you have. See you all next week!

Disclaimer

This podcast is for education and information purposes only. Please consult your own healthcare team to discuss what is right for you and your care.