Ángela Quintas: «To lose weight, what matters the least is weight»

Ángela Quintas: «To lose weight, what matters the least is weight»

Nutrition

After the success of “Slim down forever” and “The recipes to lose weight forever”, the chemist expert in clinical nutrition Angela Quintas explains in “The secret of good digestion” how to take care of the digestive system to live longer and better

We eat at least three times a day, we choose our food consciously, we introduce it into the oral cavity, we grind it in our mouth, we impregnate it with saliva and we turn it into a bolus… And from there, what? Chemist Ángela Quintas, an expert in clinical nutrition, invites in her book «The secret of good digestion» to understand in a simple way everything that is behind a process so vital and at the same time so unknown that, incidentally, it influences , and a lot, when it comes to losing weight.

In fact, in weight loss, according to the expert, not only do the foods we choose, the way we cook them and when we eat them influence them, but issues such as the time we dedicate to eating are also relevant. chew or to go to the bathroom.

Ángela Quintas, who has run her own nutrition practice for more than 20 years, has been a nutritional advisor in films by Daniel Sánchez Arévalo, Pedro Almodóvar, Alejandro Amenábar or Alejandro Rodríguez, among others. And with her we talk about digestion, of course, but also about the ubiquitous topic in the first months of the year: losing weight.

What are the main mistakes we usually make when trying to lose weight?

The worst thing is that people want to lose weight very fast. That “urges me” or “I want it now” is very common. That about the fact that in the first consultation they ask you “How long will it take to lose weight?” is very habitual.

Another mistake is the fact that they come with a “fixed weight on their heads. I always tell them that the weight does not matter, that the important thing is to know the amount of fat you have in your body. What is the use of reaching a specific weight if what you have lost is water or muscle mass and then you are going to have a rebound effect? Sometimes they tell you that “I want to weigh fifty-odd kilos because it’s my usual weight.” So I ask them: “But how long have you not weighed that? If you weighed that twenty-odd years ago, what you ask now doesn’t make any sense »…

Therefore, the urgency when trying to lose weight and have a “preconceived” weight that we want to reach yes or yes are usually the most common mistakes. And for me the worst.

But then when do you have to put the brakes on weight loss?

Sometimes I advise a patient to stop losing weight because he is already in the correct fat percentage or because his analytics indicate a healthy state and he tells me that he wants to lose even more. But it is not correct and sometimes this type of request occurs because they consult the famous “tables” that mark a certain weight based on height or because they calculate its Body Mass Index. It is true that it is an index that we used for a long time but now it does not make sense because if you have a lot of muscle mass, it is likely that you weigh a lot, but that does not mean that you have to lose weight necessarily.

This is best understood with an example. If we weigh an elite athlete, it is likely that their body mass index is high, but that does not mean that they have to lose weight, but that their muscle mass weighs a lot and that makes the index high. But the truth is that if you see him and if he does an analysis his appearance is good, his fat percentage is low and his data is correct.

So what is used now to measure whether or not you need to lose weight?

Those are indices that were easy to calculate but what we now use a lot are bioimpedance machines. What they do is that they send a signal and what they record is how much muscle mass you have and how much fat you have and in which area they are placed. Much more advanced methods have also come out. Now we have new methods with which we can know exactly what your silhouette is like and we can also see how your back is positioned, your point of balance. And this type of machine is very good for making comparisons, that is, I can do this scan when you weigh 80 kilos and repeat it again when you weigh 60 kilos, for example, and then make an overlay. That is very good to visualize because sometimes many people say that they do not notice the weight loss and that they do not look thinner. Thus, this helps them to really see the changes that have occurred in their body.

What happens when we lose weight on our own or ride our diet using information from here or there?

There are two ways to thin. On the one hand, there is that of the person who loses weight and when they meet someone they ask: “What happened to you?” (in that case it is most likely that what you have lost is muscle mass and water). And on the other, there are those people who lose weight and who receive comments such as: «How good are you! What have you done to get it? That is the difference.

When you lose weight, the first thing you should consider is that you improve your health and your analytics, that decrease your visceral fat And lower your cholesterol if it is high … That is the most important thing because if what you are going to do is lose weight at the cost of your analytics getting worse and you lose muscle mass or water, that is not going to compensate you or to your body because you are not going to be well and also you are going to make a sick face.

In addition to physical appearance, what signs indicate that we need to lose weight?

Analytics are important. For example, a glycosylated hemoglobin is telling me how likely I am to be diabetic or lipidic profile (cholesterol, triglycerides …) is also indicative. Or, for example, transaminases, which may be indicating that I have a fatty liver or that it is not working properly. But there is an indication that is fundamental, which is the visceral fat index, which provides data on the fat that is placed between our viscera. This fat is related to type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome and if we have a very high waist circumference and we see that it is a hard gut and it gives the sensation that the fat is inside the abdomen, there we have to remedy.

It is also another sign when some people have pain in the joints (in the knees, especially) because that makes you not go for a walk or exercise because your knee hurts and. Since you don’t exercise, you can’t feel better and that makes you go into a loop somehow.

Is it possible to do a selective weight loss? Sometimes we want to remove a little from one part, but not from another….

The truth is, you can’t choose where you want to lose weight from. But it is true that if I have very localized fat I will have to use exercise to lose that area. There are even those who go further through cosmetic surgery, which also plays its role.

Women also have another handicap, which is the influence of hormonal changes… Can you lose weight during menopause?

When a woman is young, the fat is placed more on the hips and buttocks, but when she gets older and approaches menopause what happens is that the female hormones begin to decrease and the fat begins to be placed on another way, in a way closer to the way it is placed in the case of men: we begin to lose our waist and we gain abdomen.

But you can lose weight when menopause comes. It is true that this person is at a time when this process becomes somewhat more complicated, since it is necessary to attend to food in a more exhaustive way. And also, when the years go by, the ability to build muscles diminishes due to a pathology called sarcopenia. This reduces the basal metabolism, which is what is spent as a base and which depends directly on muscle mass. And the result is that at the end of the day the caloric expenditure is lower and the desire to move is less. These are factors that must be taken into account, but of course you can.

Decalogue for a happy intestine

• Avoid abusing anti-inflammatory drugs (ibuprofen), cortisone, acetylsalicylic acid, and omeprazole.
• Do not take antibiotics without a prescription and if you do, accompany them with a probiotic to protect the microbiota.
• Do not forget the fiber in your diet: it is the food of your bacteria
• Make potty time a habit
• Cut down on sugar and ultra-processed foods
• Eat a varied diet rich in fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole wheat flour, low-fat protein, olive oil …
• Don’t be obsessed with excess hygiene
• Do not abuse fats
• Do not smoke
• Keep your weight at bay