Anyone else think this is a bad diet?

[KWKSLVR]

I need to vent. My dad is a diabetic (along with having had 2 heart attacks) and he is in a special nationwide study that I personally think will result in a lot of f*** up diabetics so anyone that could reassure me would be appreciated . A diet is one thing, but they are treating this stuff as a permanent lifestyle adjustment.

My problems with the diet:
1) The primary use of supplements over real food.
Breakfast is to be a Glucerna shake
Lunch is to be another shake or a Glucerna bar
Dinner (one of the few things I like) is to be "sensible¨.

The only restriction is fat which is to be around 80g's a day. At this point I'll interject my dad's stats. He's about 6'2¨ and was 290lbs when he started this. He is down a bit now.

2) Snacks: More glucerna or a freak'in SLIM FAST bar <--Bangs head on the wall.
Pop's says, "they're great! They taste like a butterfinger!¨ I say look at the nutritional information, it IS A BUTTERFINGER.

3) There are NO restrictions on carbohydrates or sugar, as long as fat grams aren't exceeded and neither or calories. This leads me to my BIGGEST Problem.

4) My father, 290lbs, is to consume only 1200 calories a day <--bangs head against the wall even harder.

What this basically means is that the foods that end up getting consumed half of the time consist of reduced and low fat processed crap whose transfat content is probably just as hard to break down as double the amount of fat that could be coming from healthy sources. I personally think that every last one of them is going to eat themselves into heart attacks.

These doctors piss me off. For months I've been saying, "You NEED to be eating more, period and if these doctors disagree they're morons. You NEED to be eating at least 2500 calories a day.¨ Of course he disagreed until about a month ago when he came home with the infamous formula for calculating calorie intake and what did it come out to? Oh...2750 calories <---banged head even harder than the 2nd time.

All of these reduced fat, low fat packaged foods have to be harder to break down than clean sources. I just don't get how they can expect people to consume nothing but glucerna and slim fast along with a "sensible¨ meal for the rest of their lives.

My god it pisses me off to no end. Am I being unreasonable in my ASSumptions on this? These people actually wonder why they feel so tired after having an active day. Hmmm, I wonder? NOT!

 

[KWKSLVR]

Man, I copy/pasted that from WORD to spell check it and it came out all kinds of screwed.

Edit I think I got it all unscrewed

 

[breathinbleedout]

Calling Mr. X to the rescue
I am sure there is another side to the story. Mainly being all the medication he might be taking for being a diabetic, and for his heart. Mabye the food he is consuming works well with the medication?

 

[variation]

man, that sounds like a pretty crappy diet

he'd probably be much better off just eating lean sources of protein, healthy oils and lots of dark green vegetables, and he could eat alot more meals that way too, appose to small concentrated high calorie chocolate bars.. hehe...

 

[Mr.X]

Calling Mr. X to the rescue
I am sure there is another side to the story. Mainly being all the medication he might be taking for being a diabetic, and for his heart. Mabye the food he is consuming works well with the medication?

Just from reading 1/2 of it, I can already see it's a commercial study. Here's some advice for you, get his off this ludicrous diet. He can suffer from it if they keep underfeeding him and not controlling his fat intake properly (i.e. he needs more fat). Seems like it's a single product study that's he's being used for.

I would think he needs a professional nutritionist to sit down w/ him one-one and workout a diet and training and lifestyle rouiten. After all, how can it be a life change if all he's eating are these corporate products, pure BS.

Mr.X

 

[KWKSLVR]

I've tried to get him off but he's pretty dead set on it. The problem is that he's in the pharmaceutical field (pharmD, and manages for a large pharmaceutical company) and his personal doctor (and good friend) approves of it. The worst part is that all of this stuff is free so he’s all about saving some money (heck, I would be too ).

We usually argue over stuff like this. When I did Atkins for a year and half all of them complained over it. Granted, my blood/lab work shut them all up for a couple of months but these guys got all of them started back up on "low carb diets will cause you to consume massive amounts of muscle" BS (like it causes you to chew up any more muscle than any other long term calorie deficient diet does).

He's eating more than he used to. I was home for most of the week so I snuck a peak at his log book every night and he's consistently up to over 2000 calories so I'm not quite sure where the hell they were trying to go with sticking him on a 1200 cal diet for so long. However, at the same time I can tell if eating more is what they want him to do or if he’s just “cheating”.

I'm just appalled at how people in the field can just blatantly ignore facts in favor of their own opinions .

 

[Mr.X]

You ever hear the saying: "the most knowledgeble can be the most stupid at times" same goes for all folks. Sometimes the thought of them knowing it all is what ruins them.

Mr.X