People looking for magic for fat loss and people looking for magic in muscle weight gain are often suckers for magic diets and magic elixirs. Steroids work for the latter, but it's a bad idea.
I have had enough success with patients who want fat loss over the past 12 months with Contrave to feel that it is worth a mention. It's a magic elixir of Wellbutrin and Naltrexone. Both seem to have a measurable effect of reducing cravings of all sorts. No, it's not quite magic but it can reduce greed and take some of the burden from self-restraint.
I have posted in the past about how subjective hunger (aka "false hunger") is common in the overweight who have no caloric needs at all but who tend to desire more intake and to eat more avidly, more rapidly, than normal-weight people. It may have something to do with the loss of satiety signals, or ignoring them. Insulin sensitivity plays a role, for sure, and that is produced by poor or excessive eating habits. Psychological factors too. All we really know is that, if you are overweight and hungry, something is out of whack because you do not really need any food at all.
(As I have asserted in the past, exercise does nothing meaningful for fat loss. I'll make one exception to that: compulsive exercisers who work out for hours daily, but they usually are living on organic lettuce from Whole Foods too. One other factor: for most people, heavy-duty cardio and weights do tend to reduce appetite. People in rigorous daily fitness programs therefore need to follow nutritional programs to make sure their intake is sufficient to support their efforts or they can risk losing muscle while their bodies are undergoing renovation. This only applies to body renovation projects, not maintenance)
