Why We Struggle to Maintain Weight Loss

Tara Parker-Pope of The New York Times has written an excellent summary of research on set point theory, that is, the body's tendency to defend a higher weight after weight loss. And some of us may just have to work harder to maintain weight loss because of other genetic factors.

This research can be used as an excuse for weight regain - "What's the use?" or "My genes made me do it" - or as information that can help us forgive ourselves for sometimes falling short of our goals. Of course, I recommend it as a source of compassion, not an excuse for poor eating habits.

Tara Parker-Pope's article

The research also supports the idea that gastric bypass surgery resets the set point that the body will defend going forward. Surgery is not a simple engineering change. Rather, it starts a complex biochemical process that supports weight loss until the new set point is reached.

Welcome, Part 2

Welcome to GourMind!

On this, the day of my "official" launch, I feel I have enough momentum to trust I will keep writing and thus warrant your continued attention. In this post, I want to acknowledge two people who make this blog possible, give you some tips for enjoying blogs (in the event that you are new to them), and recommend some of my favorite blogs.

First tip: this is the newest entry in the blog. To read the rest in chronological order, scroll down or use the directory on the right to get to the first entry.

Soapbox moment: I love the idea of introducing high school and beginning college students to science through blogs. Many bloggers excel at translating complex research into easily understandable prose. So please bring your youngsters to some of the science sites named below and encourage them to find others that are interesting to them.

Acknowledgments . . .

Steven Roach is my wonderful research assistant. He is a Harvard undergrad who has been a tremendous help in navigating the research literature. Happy summer vacation, Steven, and thanks for all your hard work.

Lisa Schreider is my personal assistant (and lots of other people's too) who makes it possible for me to have the time to work on special projects like this blog. Lisa is a tremendous resource and I feel fortunate to have her in my life. Check out her business at:

http://www.lisashandsoftimeconcierge.com/

Now, for those of you who are new to the world of blogs . . . let me introduce you to a few helpful services:

(1) Google Reader is a central site that lets you track new entries on your favorite blogs:

http://www.google.com/reader

You can add the addresses of all the blogs you are following on Google Reader. Then you simply check that page to see if there are new entries, called posts, on your set of blogs. There are other such sites as well.

(2) Research Blogging is a directory of blogs that describe and critique peer-reviewed scientific research. GourMind is a member. You can search Research Blogging for blogs about topics you are interested in. For example, if you search for GHRELIN, some of my posts will pop up. It also allows direct links to the research articles published online. (You or your institution still have to have a subscription most of the time.) When you see this symbol in a blog:








it means that it is indexed in Research Blogging. Here's the link:

http://researchblogging.org/

(3) Another outstanding collection of blogs is Science Blogs, an elite group of writers who have been invited to participate. You'll also see some of these writers in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Nature, and Wired. Find lots of fascinating science here:

http://scienceblogs.com/

Finally, some of my favorite blogs:

Neurotopia                 http://scienceblogs.com/neurotopia/

The Frontal Cortex      http://scienceblogs.com/cortex/

We're Only Human      http://onlyhumanaps.blogspot.com/

Obesity Panacea         http://scienceblogs.com/obesitypanacea/

Dan Ariely                  http://danariely.com/
(Author of the great Predictably Irrational)

So . . . enjoy GourMind and any other sites that enrich your mind and your life. Write comments, ask questions, and connect with other readers and writers.  

Thanks for your attention and your participation!

Introduction

Welcome to my blog. The name GourMind is meant to suggest the intimate relationship between our emotional love of food, our biological need for food, and our attempts to negotiate between the two. GourMind allows me to report on what I read and keep it organized, while also inviting comments from readers.

I spent my first few years of graduate school observing, railing against, hearing criticism for, worrying about, and finally accepting my writing process. It’s primarily a thinking process. I read and think and read some more and fit things together and read and read and read and think and fit and read. Then some internal equivalent of an oven timer goes off – usually shortly before a due date – and I write and write and write and write.

So, without the constraint of a deadline, you may correctly conclude that I have been thinking about writing this blog for quite some time. Here’s what I have been thinking about:

Why is it so difficult to eat well and maintain a proper weight in a prosperous nation?

Why does “I should” so often lose the battle against “I want”?

What can we learn from those who do lose weight and keep it off?

Are we battling our own bodies and brains (because that is certainly what it feels like sometimes)?

What is a craving?

How can we understand the so-called French Paradox? And why are French women starting to get fat? Mon Dieu !

How can we take advantage of the concept of taste satiety to eat a more varied and more healthful diet without overeating?

What can we apply to eating problems from the research on addiction to alcohol and drugs?

What can we learn from those who have had bariatric surgery, especially from the 12- to 24-month “honeymoon period” after gastric bypass?

I’ll approach these questions with the curiosity of a journalist and the tools of a Ph.D. in psychology. I’ll include anecdotes and describe trends from my clinical practice. And I’ll contact researchers for their input as well. Some of the rock stars in my psycho-neuro-cuisine iPod are Nora Volkow, Kelly Brownell, Wolf Singer, Antonio Damasio, Julia Child, Thomas Keller and Ana Sortun.

Using a multidisciplinary approach, I intend to use the GourMind blog:

to summarize and clarify the state of the art research in the neuroscience of appetite, the experience of taste satiety, the portability of the French Paradox, the workings of the diffuse enteric nervous system, and the neuropsychological effects of bariatric surgery

to raise questions for research that will fill the gaps in our current knowledge

to translate these findings into useful tools for the daily life of the omnivore in a toxic environment

I anticipate an interesting and delicious journey.