In weight lifting you have this concept of "hard gainers," who are generally men who want to gain muscle mass / weight, but can't seem to, "no matter how much they eat." A common refrain from them is something like "I ate a whole pizza on my own, and still nothing!"
Well, the moment they start actually counting their calories, it's the same story you just told. Sure, they ate a whole pizza on Saturday, but also nothing much else that day, and they ended up short of their caloric needs, and then every other day that week was even less, minus the occasional splurge that also didn't bring their average up high enough.
This goes for people who "can't" lose weight too -- when they start counting calories they are surprised to find that they eat a shitload of calories they didn't know about, most of which are empty of nutrition.
One way to reframe the question of calories is to start considering calories per week, instead of per day. You start to get the picture either way--whether you're trying to gain or lose--when you're thousands off your goal by day 3 and realize what a big adjustment you'll have to make during the next 4 days to make your count right.
I have seen this so many times anecotally too. It’s not even “metabolism” so much as it is how hungry people naturally get. It varies so much from person to person. I could easily eat 4000kcal a day and feel hungry if I have anything less than 2200 or so whereas I know “hard gainers” who struggle to eat more than 1000kcal in a single sitting.
However I don’t think it’s purely genetic/intrinsic. At least personally I have seen that after a period of dieting my natural hunger reduced to about as much as I had been eating.
Anyway, I agree that these restrictive diets work in general by making it easier/necessary to count calories and eliminate some junk food. Really, eliminating dense addictive foods and counting calories is probably all the vast majority of people need to do to lose weight
I am pretty sure it has mostly to do with your blood glucose level. Keto and Fasting are all about getting your blood glucose levels low enough and when you reach it your hunger usually goes away. I suspect people who eat a lot of processed foods also snack a lot. Every meal raises your blood sugar and makes you more hungry.
I thought this was me. I started tracking calories, sure enough I just plain old wasn't eating enough. Actually eating the calories planned made all the difference, although I felt stuffed pretty much all the time.
In weight lifting you have this concept of "hard gainers," who are generally men who want to gain muscle mass / weight, but can't seem to, "no matter how much they eat." A common refrain from them is something like "I ate a whole pizza on my own, and still nothing!"
Well, the moment they start actually counting their calories, it's the same story you just told. Sure, they ate a whole pizza on Saturday, but also nothing much else that day, and they ended up short of their caloric needs, and then every other day that week was even less, minus the occasional splurge that also didn't bring their average up high enough.
This goes for people who "can't" lose weight too -- when they start counting calories they are surprised to find that they eat a shitload of calories they didn't know about, most of which are empty of nutrition.
One way to reframe the question of calories is to start considering calories per week, instead of per day. You start to get the picture either way--whether you're trying to gain or lose--when you're thousands off your goal by day 3 and realize what a big adjustment you'll have to make during the next 4 days to make your count right.