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Home » How to lose weight safely » Shun the snacks and eat hearty meals to lose weight, says bariatric surgeon – inews

LifestyleFood and DrinkDr Andrew Jenkinson urges people to rethink what and how they eat, to avoid them becoming his latest patients

Tuesday, 7th January 2020, 6:01 am

For the next month, publishers will inundate us with myriad books on how to lose weight and get fit, ever mindful that the nation needs increasing help. Almost 30 per cent of the UK population is now obese, while 35 per cent are overweight. Both statistics are growing as steadily as our collective waistband.

But there is one new title this month that asks us not to invest in those dieting books at all. Admittedly, its author, Dr Andrew Jenkinson, cheekily suggests we buy his book instead but this weight-loss surgeon is adamant that for too long weve been looking at dieting the wrong way. If we dont employ a more holistic approach, then obesity levels will rise further still.

In Why We Eat (Too Much), the doctor posits that our propensity for intermittent diets will always prove ultimately ineffective; the moment we come off them, the weight piles back on. He examines the newly emerging scientific understanding of metabolism and appetite and how this is controlled by powerful hormones which are tough for simple willpower to beat.

The hormonal triggers that drive our eating and resting behaviour seem to be mainly influenced by our changing environment, he writes.

Reset your weight

Jenkinson, who works at University College Hospital in London, has spent 20 years as a consultant surgeon performing gastric sleeve and bypass operations for those whose lives have been made miserable by the weight theyve failed to keep off. He believes that while losing weight permanently might be difficult, it isnt impossible.

Trust me, our hypothalamus doesnt want to be 19 or 20 stone, he tells i. It wants to be closer to 11 or 12 stone. What I try to stress in my book is that not everyone has to end up as one of my patients, and that surgery really is a last resort.

You can learn to reset your weight to a healthy level without having to starve yourself endlessly, or spend too much time in the gym.

Snacking addiction

The reason why so many people struggle, he believes, is down to nothing less than an erosion of food culture over the last few decades.

We used to have three meals a day, and build up a healthy appetite for each, but now its all about comfort food, food that we develop an attachment to because they stimulate the same pathways as Class A drugs, albeit at a lower dose. So we snack endlessly.

This comfort food comprises largely sugar, fat and salt, alongside colours, flavourings and preservatives to imitate the taste of unprocessed foods and to disguise, as Jenkinson says, their offensive qualities. The more pleasurable, he says, the more it will sell.

Jenkinson instead encourages a permanent avoidance of all processed food in favour of proper meals, cooked from fresh ingredients. In this way, our bodies will metabolise naturally so we wont need any more faddish diets. Dont expect to lose weight in a couple of months, he warns, but rather a couple of years.

Wider lifestyle choices

He writes that we should also overhaul much of the way we currently live our lives, recommending lower wattage bulbs at home in order to help us relax more, and also stresses the importance of sleep. And when we do opt for comfort food because who doesnt like to spoil themselves? then eat it mindfully, employing all the senses. The more we do this, the less we will need to consume.

This advice might sound solid and practical but unsurprising. The truth is, however, weve never been short of practical advice; we simply tend to turn a deaf ear to it. The trick, Jenkinson insists, is to at last start listening.

This obesity epidemic is a major health crisis, and its only going to get worse, so we really should start addressing it properly, he says. I want us to stop blaming people for eating too much, but instead encourage everyone to look more closely at the food they eat.

Each of us needs to eat better in order to live better, to understand more how our weight is controlled, and how futile the cycle of dieting can be. If we can do this, he promises, lives will improve.

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Shun the snacks and eat hearty meals to lose weight, says bariatric surgeon - inews

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Home » How to lose weight safely » Shun the snacks and eat hearty meals to lose weight, says bariatric surgeon – inews