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BlogHer caught up with William D. Lassek, M.D., and Steven J.C. Gaulin, Ph.D., co-authors of BlogHer Book Club's pick, Why Women Need Fat for more information on what women eat and how it affects them, especially as they age.
BlogHer: Your book focused a lot on consuming more naturally-sourced foods, including animal and dairy products. Do you have any suggestions for people who do not consume animal products, such as vegans?
William Lassek & Steven Gaulin: In general, most studies show that vegetarians are less likely to gain excess weight than those who eat meat. However, when we compare American women who say they are vegetarians with those who eat meat, their weights do not differ very much. This may be because of the large amount of vegetable oil high in omega-6 fat in the American diet.
One reason that vegetarians may benefit from not eating meat is that they get less of the active form of omega-6, arachidonic acid, which is a strong promoter of weight gain. However, because American women are also more likely to have more vegetable oils, which are high in a form of omega-6 which can turn into arachidonic, it is especially desirable for them to choose oils like canola, walnut, olive, and flaxseed and to avoid foods which “may contain” oils other than canola or olive oil. Flaxseeds and flaxseed oil are high in the basic form of omega-3 and canola and walnut oils are moderately high.
Vegetarians are more likely to have low omega-3 levels in their blood, especially the most active form, DHA, which is most abundant in fish or seafood. For those vegetarians who eat eggs, choosing high omega-3 eggs is very desirable. If they do not eat fish, DHA supplements made from algae are available and are very desirable. A web search for “DHA from algae” will provide many choices. If possible, they should aim for 750 mg to 1000 mg a day of DHA with similar amounts of the next most active form of omega-3, EPA. Taking supplementary DHA is especially important for women who may have children in the future and for those who are pregnant and nursing. Supplements for their infant children after weaning may also be desirable.
BlogHer: Your bibliography is impressive (something I appreciate in a book) and definitely helped back up your surprising claims. How long did it take to research and write this book?
William Lassek & Steven Gaulin: We have been working together on the research that ultimately led to this book for eight years, analyzing detailed data from more than 20 different national and international data sets. Since there is are so many different and opposing ideas and opinions about weight and dieting, many of which have surprisingly little evidence supporting them, we felt it was very important to make sure that all of our ideas were supported by hard evidence from our own research and the research of others. That doesn’t mean that we are correct about everything, because all scientific ideas are subject to relentless and constant criticism and so inevitably undergo change, refinement, and improvement. But it’s still the best method we have for trying to get at the truth. What we say in our book is as up-to-date as we could make it.
BlogHer: Some of our reviewers have commented on the fact that they are struggling to reconcile the idea that animal fats and full-fat foods, in moderation, are not bad for us. As one person put it, they'd been programmed to believe that animals fats are bad for us and that low-fat is good. Do you have any advice for the people who are really struggling with the concept that full fat foods aren't as bad as we were raised to believe?
William Lassek & Steven Gaulin: We can certainly sympathize with this struggle, because we have keenly felt it as well. For the past fifty years Americans have been indoctrinated with the idea that animal fat is bad for us, so it is not easy to suddenly confront the possibility that this may not be true. But up until forty or fifty years ago, animals were the major source of fat in the human diet. Since the Stone Age, our richest source of fat has been animal fat, and getting that fat was one of the main reasons that our ancestors scavenged and hunted for meat. Millions of years ago our ancestors where breaking open the bones and
