A Metabolic Diet: Finding Your Metabolism Type and Pros and Cons of Popular Diets

Diets come, and diets go. Yet many of us pack the weight back on or lose no weight whatsoever. It's enough to drive you nuts! One way to further your weight loss goals is to focus on a metabolic diet. This type of diet takes into account your metabolism and how fast it burns calories to determine your "metabolic type". This then helps you choose which kind of diet could work best for you - high protein, high carbohydrate, or mixed. Several famous diets fit these categories, so understanding their metabolic type could help you determine how well they will work for you.

A metabolic diet is a diet based on your metabolic type. It takes your metabolic rate into account and encourages a person to eat the foods that will speed up their metabolism. In other words, while one person may do well on a high-protein diet, another person will do well on a high-carbohydrate diet instead. The end goal of a metabolic diet is to speed up your body’s conversion of food into energy.

But how does this work, and which diets fall under this classification?

Types of Metabolic Diet

There are several types of metabolic diets. Choosing the right one for you may help you shed the unwanted pounds.

Not everyone burns food for energy at the same rate. Each of us has a unique metabolism largely determined by our genes.^2. Two inherited factors determine your body's metabolic rate. They are:

• the rate of cellular oxidation - Cellular oxidation is the process whereby oxygen and glucose combine in a cell to form energy. The quicker this process occurs, the more energy is created. The slower it occurs, the slower the energy creation. The latter may contribute to weight gain.
• the dominant autonomic nervous system - Your autonomic nervous system consists of two parts. The sympathetic nervous system that burns energy, and the parasympathetic nervous system that conserves energy. A dominant parasympathetic nervous system that conserves energy can contribute to weight gain.

The metabolic diet idea is that your dominant autonomic nervous system and cellular oxidation rate determine your metabolic type.

Ideally, you should follow a metabolic diet based on your metabolic type to lose weight. The three types are:

• protein type
• carbohydrate type
• mixed type

What's Your Metabolic Type?

A metabolic diet is a diet based on your metabolic type. To figure out your metabolic type, you would need to determine your baseline metabolic rate. In other words, the number of calories your body needs for your daily activities. Then, by eliminating certain foods or eating higher amounts of others, you could speed up your body’s metabolic rate, the rate at which it turns food into energy³. In so doing, it stores less food in the form of fat.

Many diets have emerged over the years to do just that. And while they work for some people, they do not work for everyone. This is because these diets work for people of certain metabolic types. So, you need to know your metabolic type for a metabolic diet to work for you.

In general, someone with:

• a fast metabolism is a protein type
• a slow metabolism usually indicates a carbohydrate-type
• someone with an average metabolism is usually a mixed-type

Many famous diets are based on a metabolic type.

Popular Diets Based on Metabolic Diet Types

We will look at several well-known diets and who benefits most from following them.

The Metabolic Typing Diet

This diet recognizes the different dietary needs of individuals based on their metabolic type. This diet also has no rigorously set meal patterns. The diet recommends you eat certain percentages of different food groups, but these percentages are not fixed. You can have 5-10% variations up or down at different meals. See the percentages as a good guideline to follow.

Protein Type

People with a fast metabolism should focus on foods that take long to digest like protein and healthy fats. They should, however, also incorporate other food groups. A good balance of different food groups for the protein type is as follows:

• Protein – 50%
• Carbohydrates – 30%
• Fat – 20%

Typical foods to consider for the protein type include poultry, fatty fish like herring, and organ meats. Your carbohydrates should come from eating whole grain cereals and vegetables, while cream, cheese, and eggs are good fat sources.

Carbohydrate Type

Due to a sluggish metabolism, this metabolic type should focus on foods that quickly and easily digest. And while this type should eat plenty of carbohydrates, it's still important to avoid refined and processed carbohydrates. A good food ratio for this type follows:

• Carbohydrates – 75%
• Protein – 15%
• Fat -10%

Great complex carbohydrate sources for this type include fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Good protein sources include poultry and fatty fish like haddock, while low-fat dairy products of all kinds could provide a good fat source.

Mixed Type

The mixed type has an average metabolism that burns calories at an average speed. A good diet to follow would typically include foods in the following ratios:

• Carbohydrates – 50%
• Protein – 40%
• Fat – 10%

This type can also eat any complex carbohydrates, proteins, and healthy fats.

Pros and Cons of This Metabolic Diet

This diet addresses the three metabolic diet types. It also limits your processed food intake and limits refined carbohydrates, sweet or fizzy drinks, and added sugars. The diet does, however, appear somewhat restrictive, especially for those who fall in the protein or carbohydrate type groups. Vastly limiting the intake of certain food sources could lead to nutrient deficiencies if you are not careful.

The Zone Diet

The zone diet gained much traction from the late 1990s onward. It also advocates for the consumption of different food types according to a specific ratio:

• Carbohydrates – 40%
• Proteins – 30%
• Fat – 30%

The diet is also specifically aimed at reducing inflammation.

The protein sources of this diet include lean meats like turkey, chicken, and pork, as well as fish, shellfish, and egg whites. It also supports the inclusion of low-glycemic carbohydrates. Foods low on the glycemic scale tend to take longer to digest. Some recommended fruits and vegetables here include apples, berries, oranges, broccoli, zucchini, tomatoes, lentils, cucumber, lentils, and beans. The monounsaturated fat sources in this diet include avocado oil, olive oil, and a variety of nuts.

Pros and Cons of The Zone Diet

One of the major benefits of this diet is that you can follow it even when going to a restaurant. The diet is easy to follow and does not limit the foods you eat. It only suggests that you remember your food ratios with every meal. Furthermore, the diet does not have a strict caloric limit to what you consume. It is extremely flexible and fits into most people’s lifestyles with ease.

However, some people may find this diet restricting in that it recommends reducing the consumption of foods such as pasta and bread.

The Atkins Diet

Although the Atkins diet gained widespread popularity during the 1970s, it is still a firm favorite among many people to this day. At one stage, however, the diet was discouraged due to its advocacy for the consumption of higher levels of fats in the diet. More recent research has, however, shown that consuming healthy fats is essential for a healthy diet⁴. You should, however, make sure your fat intake is from healthy fat sources like olive oil, for example.

The diet has four phases.

1. The first phase, although relatively constricting, lasts two weeks and jump-starts weight loss.
2. Phase two is about balancing. Here, you slowly reintroduce low-glycemic fruits and vegetables as well as nuts.
3. The third phase sees you fine-tuning your diet where you approach your goal weight while adding carbohydrates to your meals. Your weight loss journey should now start to slow down as well.
4. This is followed by the fourth or maintenance phase. Here, you eat a balanced diet full of low-glycemic carbohydrates and other nutrients that will help you maintain your current weight.

The Pros and Cons of The Atkins Diet

You should see this metabolic diet as a lifestyle diet. You are expected to continue with the fourth phase of this diet to maintain your weight for the rest of your life.

Because this diet has a higher protein and fat content than most diets, it helps you feel satiated for longer. In so doing, it may help curb food cravings. The low-glycemic carbohydrate food choices also help with this.

However, do not follow the first phases of this diet for longer than six months as it could lead to nutrient deficiencies. Unfortunately, many people are so impressed with their weight loss they become tempted to do so. This could have a long-term impact on your health.

Tree Nuts and A Metabolic Diet

According to research, tree nuts may help reduce a person’s metabolic syndrome risk. The term ‘metabolic syndrome’ refers to a variety of health issues that include high cholesterol levels, high blood sugar levels, high blood pressure, and visceral fat gain. In other words, the factors that increase your risk of heart attack or stroke⁵.

Of course, following a metabolic diet may help reduce these issues and help you lose weight as well. But going on your weight loss journey and consuming tree nuts during the process may help you reduce your risk even more.

One study suggests that eating tree nuts can help you lose weight and thus address one of the factors related to metabolic syndrome⁶. It may also have benefits for those with diabetes⁷, lower your cholesterol levels ⁸, and blood pressure levels⁹.

Tree nuts have strong antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. This could help reduce not only the ravages of inflammation but also have a beneficial effect on all cardiometabolic health issues¹⁰.

Besides consuming tree nuts, you could also make use of nut oils when cooking. Examples include hazelnut oil and almond oil. Do remember, though, that these oils are best used for seasoning and lose their beneficial compounds when heated.

Is Your Metabolism Unbalanced?

The gastrointestinal tract is the first thing people think about when hearing the term ‘metabolism’. We think in terms of food going in, going through various processes that extract the nutrients our bodies need to function properly, and then the elimination of the waste products.

However, metabolism refers to a wide range of chemical processes continuously going on inside your body. These chemical processes help your body function normally or in a state of homeostasis. In other words, in a stable state of equilibrium or balance. This happens at a cellular level.

How Stress Leads to Weight Gain

Imbalances in your metabolism are often caused by stressors. Stress induces your NeuroEndoMetabolic (NEM) stress response. This response affects all body organs and systems, including releasing hormones and activating your immune system. With an immune response comes inflammation. This is normal and lets you know your body is fighting to protect and heal itself.

But when stress continues, the NEM stress response also continues, as does inflammation and its effect on metabolism. So, your metabolic processes may, eventually, become unbalanced. This could result in a variety of issues include:

• Food sensitivities
• Constipation
• Diarrhea
• Leaky gut (also known as irritable bowel syndrome, i.e., IBS)
• Neurological disorders like Parkinson’s disease or multiple sclerosis
• Cognitive issues like Alzheimer’s disease
• Psychiatric disorders, e.g., depression
• Various chronic infections
• Hormonal conditions due to hormonal imbalance
• Weight gain

Weight Gain, Inflammation, and Leptin

Inflammation can increase your chances of gaining unwanted pounds. This happens because inflammation (and weight gain) impairs the production of leptin. Leptin is a hormone found in the brain. It plays a key role as a chemical messenger in the regulation of metabolism as well as appetite control. The lower your leptin levels are, the slower your metabolism. Furthermore, inflammation may also impair your body’s insulin processing ability. This could result in higher glucose levels and more accumulation of fat in the liver. The latter could further affect your body’s ability to properly process insulin¹.

So, in the end, these hormonal imbalances resulting from inflammation slow down your metabolism and result in weight gain.

What's worse, weight gain adds further stress on your body which, in turn, contributes to the weight gain cycle.

But this does not mean you cannot lose weight. Following a metabolic diet that is right for your body type could help.

Safety Factors to Consider on a Metabolic Diet

While a metabolic diet may help you lose pounds, you do need to take care. Many people may find the restrictions of these or other diets unsustainable. And many pack on the pounds after the dieting period is over.

Dieting is not the best choice for everyone. People with diabetes, for example, need to take special care about the foods they consume. Food can have a major impact on their blood sugar levels and have an impact on their insulin dosages.

As a rule, anyone with pre-existing health conditions should first talk to their healthcare provider before following a diet. These professionals are best suited to determine whether a diet will work for you and can fill you in on possible repercussions.

Diet Plan for Adrenal Fatigue

The best diet to follow is one that allows for lasting changes that ultimately become part of your lifestyle. Talking about a diet that considers your lifestyle while addressing many metabolic conditions related to adrenal fatigue, why not take a look at Dr. Lam's Nutritional Adrenal Fatigue Recovery Program? The program has a healthy, 30-day meal plan specifically designed for those with adrenal fatigue.

In Closing

A metabolic diet geared towards your individual metabolism is one of the safest dieting options out there. Whether you need a diet higher in protein, carbs, or a mix, considering your individual body's needs can make a big difference in weight loss success. Do remember, though, that you need to remain consistent and not fall back on your old eating habits afterward.

Rather, incorporate the lessons these diets teach you into your permanent eating patterns and lifestyle. And in all of these diets, you still need to avoid processed foods, fizzy drinks, and sugary foods. They cause inflammation, one of the causes of weight gain and other metabolic health issues.