Occasionally I am asked to test out a product so crazy weird that I simply can’t resist saying yes. Some bloggers get to try out cool stuff like hawt Danskin clothes (aside to Danskin: pick me, pick me!!) or powdered peanut butter. Me? I get pinhole glasses. The concept was bona fide nutsville – something about curing my terrible myopia by wearing sunglasses where you can only see out of little holes – and yet how awesome would I look in these bad boys?
Of course I told them yes. Can you imagine the post I could write with that kind of material? Strangely, I never heard from them again. I’m still waiting for my glasses.
And so it was with this fresh in my mind that I agreed to try out Sensa. At first blush it sounded as insane as the glasses and I had a brief rush of panic when the package actually arrived. After all, this was a 6-month comittment. But then I started reading their promo materials and became genuinely intrigued. At the very least it fell under the “can’t hurt to try it” category.
What Is It?
Sensa is marketed as a weight loss product. Except there is no diet and no exercise. It’s not even a pill. Usually that screams quackery. But the gist is this: our taste is influed greatly by our smell. Surely you all remember that “taste test” you did in 6th grade where you had to close your eyes, plug your nose and open your mouth to see if you could tell the difference between an apple and a pear? Okay so you were probably distracted wondering if your lab partner would follow the directions or put pencil shavings on your tongue but the point of that middle school mayhem was that you can’t really tell. Our sense of smell is our sense of taste.
Research has shown that our sense of smell helps our body determine satiation. And so the doctor behind Sensa came up with a way to influence, or rather enhance, our sense of smell by sprinkling what he calls “tastants” on your food. The idea being that enhanced taste and smell will bring on satiation quicker without feeling deprived or hungry.
Does it Work?
The Sensa people claim their product is based on 25 years of independent research. They even ran their own study on (the weirdly precise number) 1,436 men and women. The results, if they are true, are rather astonishing:
– The average weight loss of people using Sensa after 6 months was 30.5 pounds
– A control group of 100 people using a placebo lost 2 pounds
In Practice
You are supposed to sprinkle the “tastants” (they look like salt) on everything you eat. Since the tastants are calorie-free, sugar-free, salt-free, msg-free and everything else-free, I figured it couldn’t hurt to give it a try. Immediately I discovered one reason why it might be a useful weight loss tool: just the act of having to sprinkle it on every bite of PB&J, sneaked-from-my-cupboard chocolate and lick of pancake syrup really made me aware of what I was eating. But seeing as the placebo group didn’t experience significant weight loss, there has to be more to it than just that.
They say the tastants are virtually tasteless. You can taste them if you lick them right out of your hand but you aren’t supposed to be able to taste them on your food. I, however, can. There are two types: sweet and salty. For some reason I can taste the sweet tastants – and they are not unpleasant – but not the salty. I wonder what that says about me. Anyhow, aside from the fact I feel like kind of a nut hauling around my little box of sprinkles wherever I go, it really is quite easy to use.
So far, after using them for one week, no weight loss yet but in a stroke of marketing genius (or pure evil, I can’t decide) the company explains that while men often see steady weight loss right from the get-go, women often see nothing until month 3 and then lose rapidly after that point. So I’m on the hook at least through month 3. I’ll let you know what happens.
If you are interested in trying it out yourself, the Sensa people have offered my readers a 15% discount. Just go to www.trysensa.com and type in ROCKETXL as the coupon code. In the interest of full disclosure, I am not being paid to review this product nor do I recieve kickbacks from any sales generated. I get the product for free to try out and that is the sum total of my involvement.
Any of you heard of this? Tried it? Think I’m brainwashed? Think it’s a bad idea for a girl with as many food issues as I have to try a weight-loss product? Tell me how you really feel!
Reading your post made me laugh. Sometimes I feel like “gear whore,” prostituting myself for free crap all the time. But your “skinny powder” intrigues me. I’m new to your blog, have been over here one or two other times, but feel quite the kinship with you on some of this stuff. Do I think “thin” people are crazy for doing things that just might make them drop pounds to look “perfect?” Nah. I looked back to read a few of your posts and it sounds like you know what’s “right” (healthy), but maybe want a little of what is “wrong” (sick). I dunno. I think it’s okay to have thoughts, acting on them is another story. And the powder? I’m guessing deep down you know it’s not gonna work, so you do it for the excitement. Maybe I’m totally off, but that is how I might look at it… Now, off to read more of your posts. You have your own version of Cliff’s Notes??? 🙂 Have a good one!
Laurie
Baby, I say sprinkle away. I don’t think there is any chance of addiction and if they want to call it unhealthy to sprinkle your chops.. well.. whatever. =)
I love trying free stuff, yes I do feel a bit like a gimmick prostitute, but I’m high class. You know what I mean… right? lol
I’m so eager to hear how this one goes. I’ve read about the tests on this, and it sure intrigued me. I’m not ready to go out and try it yet, but want to see if it really works at all.
I would never remember to sprinkle it on everything. And I do wonder how much of it is just an increased awareness of what you are eating.
I’m naturally skeptical, and it doesn’t help that the site doesn’t even link the actual clinical study paper, which I’d assume has many more juicy details and statistics. Does losing 30 pounds of weight automatically improve other indicators of health such as blood pressure, insulin and glucose tolerance, regardless of how bad the diet is? How about people who drink lots of soda and/or liquid calories… sensa doesn’t work on those, so do those people naturally drink less due to the satiety mechanism, or is this proof that soda has no effect on weight?
It’s really interesting that men lost weight steadily and women didn’t lose much until month 3. Since the study only lasted 6 months, who knows what’d happen after 6 months? What happens after you keep taking it longterm? What happens if you stop taking it?
Maybe I’m just being overly paranoid, but these new things always seem to generate more questions than answers for me 😛
Think it’s a bad idea for a girl with as many food issues as I have to try a weight-loss product? Yes. Jealous, much? Alas, yes.
I am a total sceptic when it comes to this stuff, but am also convinced if I had to think twice and sprinkle before I stuck my paw in the jam jar I might lose weight. But I love to stick my paw in the jam jar.
I’m in admiration though, how on earth will you not get sick of doing this after three weeks, let alone three months? Commitment!
TA x
If it’s msg, salt, sugar free etc etc, then the hell is in this stuff?
I also love free stuff, but in this instance I would definitely stay away – sounds a bit too creepy and non-natural to me!
This makes me a bit concerned, mainly because what if it does exactly as promised? You don’t have thirty pounds to spare, and would frankly be in health trouble.
Also my general rule of thumb for pharmaceutical products designed to induce severe weight loss in healthy people is that if it works, it’s dangerous (fen-phen, ephedra, etc.) and if it’s harmless it generally doesn’t work. This because chemically induced weight loss is fundamentally based on keeping your body from working properly when it comes to the digestive, endocrine or whatever systems that particular pill is trying to affect.
I wish you the best of luck though(and I hope you won’t need it!)
They “ran their own study” – reason enough to be suspicious right there. I’m calling placebo effect on this one. It might work, because you are more aware of how many times you eat during the day; but I’m wondering what is actually in the product.
See mom sweat – Glad you found me! Thanks for understanding the crazy in me, lol!
rozemary – No, it’s not addictive.
Judy – that was my thought as well.
dislyxec – as always, you make some excellent points! I don’t think you are overly paranoid – I probably ought to me *more* paranoid! And your “conclusion” about soda pop made me giggle. Touche!
TA – yeah, the sane part of me kinda thinks this is a bad plan, even if just for the mentality alone.
WundaLucy – they have an ingredients list and it’s all pretty harmless stuff. Everything in it is on the FDA’s “regarded as safe” list. But yeah, I had that thought too, esp. because it doesn’t taste like much.
Anon – Good point about the 30 lbs! I don’t think that’s a magic number though. And really I’m guessing this will lean more towards the ineffective side than the overly effective side.
As soon as I read this I immediately remembered reading the book, The Shangri-La Diet by Seth Roberts (who has some relationship with the authors of Freakonomics). Crazy diet (drinking olive oil ewww) but the theory behind it was interesting. It had to do with how either unfamiliar flavors or “tasteless” flavors can reduce appetite. It seems like this product relates to the authors experiments.
http://www.blog.sethroberts.net/2008/06/16/crazy-spicing-works/
I’ve always been extremely wary about any sort of diet supplement. Our good friends at the FDA don’t test this stuff nearly as long as they should before allowing it to be sold to the public. A big part of losing weight is learning self control. This kind of thing is the easy way out and is only effective long-term if you intend to use it for the rest of your life. As Charlotte has said before, it’s about lifestyle change.
Charlotte-I hope the stuff doesn’t work on you. If you lost 30 pounds you might just have those 20/20 guys knocking on your door for photos again.
yeah that seems like a lot of work. it would definately deter me from eating anything extra.
and if it makes you feel any better i cant wear any of my danskin stuff until i get all the website info cause i dont want to mess it up before i have to review it. its all in my closet mocking me.
Kelly Turner
http://www.groundedfitness.com
oh my gosh, I’ve got a box of these that have been sitting in my pantry – I know the doctor who invented them (he truly is an extremely intelligent, kind man and a huge expert in the field) but I haven’t had the courage to whip them out at meals. I guess I’ll wait until your three-month check-in!
Initially, this does sound intriguing to me. But like other posters, I’m concerned about what’s in it. Because I try to limit the amount of chemicals I put in my body, I’m a little leery of this powder stuff.
And can you imagine how weird it would be to go out to a restaurant (with friends, or on a date) and sprinkle all the food with powder? They’d put me in a loony bin, or think I had serious issues, and I’d have to explain it over and over.
But I’m intrigued as to whether it will work, so keep us posted!
well, i think i have such a unique anecdote to add here…!
My husband can’t smell. He lost his sense of smell around age 5 when he had his tonsils taken out. Somehow the operation messed up his adenoids. Result? My husband is enviably slim. We both think this has something to do with his “handicap”. Although we are both mid-twenties and this could change….he is clearly not affected when we walk in to a house smelling of fresh baked brownies and he doesn’t take bites to “test” the food while cooking.
Interestingly enough, we had a conversation last weekend about this with some friends. We were wondering…with all the other great lengths people go to be slim, when will people permanently “remove” their ability to smell? In an era of stomach stapling, lipo, speed disguised as a weight loss aides….I do wonder.
As for the sprinkles…I’m a little skeptical here since you don’t even need to lose weight! You already look great and are so very very fit!
Hehehe oh that sounds like a fun little experiment.
I think that as long as you don’t take it too seriously, there’s not any harm to it.
Although I just checked out their website and I don’t know that I like their ingredients all that much… I’m not too keen on yellow 5 and artificial flavours and I don’t even know what some of the other things are in there. So that would scare me off.
I’m interested to see how this works for you! I’m a skeptical when it comes to these things. But I still find them so intriguing.
And you are so lucky to get such crazy/random freebies!
“Think it’s a bad idea for a girl with as many food issues as I have to try a weight-loss product?”
Yes, but I’m not judging. I just know from my own experience that I cannot try any of the weight loss products and be okay within my own headspace. I even have issues with protein powders.
I’m not sure you need to lose any weight. I mean, it seems like you’re in awesome shape as it is.
And I’m not sure it’ll be good for the food issues either.
Don’t have much opinion on this. I wouldn’t use it. Always enjoy your writing, however!
Whoa! Neat stuff. Olfaction is, well, one of my pet interests, albeit my interests are in body odor, still I like this field, cuz I like to eat too. I really like the idea behind this, but have a few questions…
First: I could not find out from the website what Sensa actually was. The FAQ for What is Sensa? does not give its ingredients… Not cool if you ask me, but proprietary, I would bet. That scares me, however. I do like to know what I am putting in my body, esp if it’s artificial.
Second: Free stuff rules! How can I get free stuff too…?
Third: Science? Hah! A few things, if I may, about the science here. An initial thought is that any company that performs its own research, well be weary of that research – can you say “Conflict of Interest?” and the damn study had over 1000 experimental participants compared to 100 control participants – come on Doc! That’s just not cool. That being said, there is good scientific evidence (and Doc Hirsch is at the forefront) showing that this can and does work. One study asked overweight folks to use a scented inhaler to deliver the smells (again undefined smells), 3 times/day and similar, albeit, not as robust (30+ lbs of weight loss), were discovered.
Fourth: what happens when you stop “using sensa on everything you eat” as recommended. The olfactory system, both at the level of the sensory receptors and in the brain has a tendency to adapt, or habituate to smells. Think about when you go home for thanksgiving dinner – initially the smell of the gravy, turkey, etc is overwhelming, but after about 3-5 minutes it’s gone. The smells have mysteriously vanished. Well not exactly. Your biology has just tagged that smell as no longer being important and stopped responding. If someone farts all of a sudden you smell some stuff again.. right?
So Charlotte, I bet you will find an effect if you follow the guidelines carefully (i.e. lose a few), but I will be more interested in the effects of the three months following your ceasing to use the product (assuming that you eventually will rejoin us otherwise sensory deprived individuals who are not cool enough to receive free samples, note my jealous anger here). I wonder if you will over compensate – that is eat more because your sense of smell is expecting more odors. Respond like, “What! This shit has no odor! Eat damnit, Charlotte EAT !!!!!! MORE!!!!!!” . Or if all systems will simply return to normal, and quickly. The latter is of course what we all hope ;-), but the former would be evidence of an olfactory sensory aftereffect, something we know happens in vision, hearing, touch, etc. This one is going to be interesting… Will they feature you on the homepage…
rozemary: um, getting stuff for free and being “high class”, well they just dont go hand in hand, do they? 🙂
i also must agree with the rest of your readers – losing 30 lbs – for shit’s sake – you would be so weak you couldn’t write… how would we go on? Please use sparingly…
Lastly, and I apologize for this long ass comment, I am bored at work and it’s raining outside so I have no escape, except to work (not!) – I wonder if I could surreptitiously use this on my fat friends. Yeah, I’ve got a couple, we all do don’t we. Kind of keep them around because they make us feel better about ourselves, oops, I mean because they are so important to us… yeah … important. But I wonder, for real, say could a wife start sprinkling her husbands food to help him lose that beer gut and get all ripped. More importantly, could a husband use it on his wife, should she say gain a little junk. Hmm. Thank goodness my old lady dont need it, but I got some friends I might turn on to this neato futuristic marriage (read sexlife) saving chemical compound. Or if I make my favorite dish, could I use it on all of my company so that they do not eat all my food and the leftovers stay with me? The possibilities are endless. I personally think the Sensa corporation should hire me as their marketing executive and pay me a lot of $$$$$$
Really rad post! I can’t wait to hear the results of this one….!
I thought you were experimenting with your exercise routine right now. Less volume….correct? As a science major here, you should only test one variable at a time. I would love to know after a month or two how this change in your exercise routine has worked for you. If you take this stuff, then you have too many changes to really find out what caused the result.
I was really happy to see a lot of concerned comments. I am surprised with your history that you would consider putting that stuff on your food. Please don’t. I think there are other worthwhile experiments out there that are natural. It seems your current readers enjoy the results of experiments that involve eating normal food while tweaking it a bit (not to the extent that sent you back to some of your old habits) and using different workout routines.
Your readers have your best interest at heart. They want to see you healthy and they want to see you do it naturally with diet and exercise. The magic powder is the wrong path to take.
hi there!
i just randomly came across your blog. i am a successful sensa user (down 23lbs) and am on my 3rd month. there's a couple of misconceptions i'd like to clear up.
1) ingredients:
they are listed both on the site and on the packaging and are essentially things i eat every day in other products anyway. nothing scary there unless you are vegan and opposed to carmine, in which case you better not be using any makeup products produced in china.
What exactly is in Sensa?
Sensa contains Maltodextrin (Derived from Corn from the USA), Tricalcium Phosphate, Silica, Natural and Artificial Flavors, FD&C Yellow 5, and Carmine. Sensa also contains Soy and Milk ingredients. Sensa is sodium-free, sugar-free, calorie free, gluten-free, and there are no stimulants, drugs or MSG.
2) the study was NOT performed by the company that distributes sensa today. It was a completely independent and clinical trial. Dr. Hirsch has performed countless studies over the past few decades that relate to smell as that is his area of expertise. after the success of his weight loss study the product came to market.
3) i lost weight in my first month even though i am a woman.
4) you may not be the best candidate for this product because you surely don't seem like someone who needs to lose 30 plus pounds. as i said i am having success but thats because i was 40lbs overweight and had major issues with portion control. sensa helped me identify that fact and now i am slowly and sensibly losing weight. for me, it's working. if its the placebo effect then so be it! 🙂 also there's always the risk that you will gain weight back after any diet so i dont think sensa should be blamed for that. its up to me to keep up the good work after all. and in this case, the "good work" is simply not eating like a pig!
anyway, i am really interested to see how your experience is on sensa.
jen
determinedtobefit – I read that book! And the study behind it. If I remember correctly, it was part of some kind of joke though. The author later disavowed it?
Anonymous – way to throw my own words back at me:) You are right, of course. And I know it.
Weighting Game – what are you waiting for girl?? I could use some company on the Crazy Train;)
Lethological – The ingredients didn’t seem that scary to me. But maybe I just don’t know what I’m reading?
Bird Brains – I have heard other anecdotal stories of a similar nature. My friend temporarily lost her sense of smell due to a medication and dropped like 10 pounds. When all was said and done though she was glad to have her sense of smell back.
SeaBreeze – delicately put:)
Tricia – I know, I know. The thing is that I gained 10 lbs back in June and it’s been driving me nuts ever since.
Dr. J – I think that was the nicest way I’ve ever heard anyone say “You idiot” 😉
Prof – You make some excellent points! Should have had you guest post on the subject;) You are right in that the theory behind it is sound, which is one reason I find the product compelling. But on the other hand, the study… yeah. But according to their site, it has been published. And your point about what happens when I stop? I sure hope it doesn’t screw my metabolism up!!
Darcy – Oh, I was SO waiting for somebody to call me on the confounding variables:) Yep, busted. The only thing I can say though is that my Experiments are always scientifically unsound. As I showed with the KB experiment, it’s impossible to keep all factors in my life consistent from one exercise program to the next, thereby impacting the results. But yeah, I’m having guilt over that. And yes, you all have really made me rethink my cavalier attitude about all of this! I guess I figured it couldn’t hurt to try. But maybe it could?
Jen – thank you for taking the time to comment! I appreciate you posting the ingredients. I kept meaning to do that and never got around to it. I’m so glad that you are experiencing success with this. Please keep me posted on how it goes for you!
Fun! I love trying new things so I’d go for (since there is nothing naughty, just artificial in the ingredient list). However, I admit this would probably be too high maintenance/low reward for me. I’d forget to sprinkle on half of what I ate and no results for 3 months?! By week two I’d have forgotten the little sprinkles box at some restaurant and not realize it for days. Definitely interested in your experience though!
This was actually one of the topics a classmate picked to do a mini presentation on at the beginning of this semester (clinical nutrition program). Unfortunately I can’t remember the conclusions but there are a few red flags: the study was done by the company itself and there is not enough research. On the positive side as you already deduced there is probably not a danger in trying it. I say you are getting it for free, try away and report back to us! I’d love to know how you fare with it.
Oh yeah! It just came back to me, I remember the presenter talking about how silica was one of the ingredients which is basically sand right? We all thought that was interesting.
I thik you posted this in october, what have your results been up to now?
Anonymous – I have posted several updates since then about it. (Use my search bar and type in “Sensa”) but the gist of it is that I have not seen any weight loss yet from it but I’m only going on month 3 and they say that sometimes it takes 3-4 months for women to see a change.
It's been over 6 months… what was your final Sensa verdict?
Anon – I did post a follow-up to this but the short answer is I didn't see any weight loss from Sensa. But it might help some people, I don't know.
I have been using sensa for a month now, I did not think that it would work. I am still in the trail stages and I have lost 11 pounds in 24 days, i will continue to use this product.
Corlisa—- Jacksonville Fl.