<human>: Condense the text into a few key points

So the reason this came up, is I visited my grandparents and the subject of dieting came up between my 24 year old male cousin and my grandmom. My grandmom has struggled with food and eating for as long as I've been alive. She has always tried all kinds of fad diets and exercise routines and has never been successful. She had surgery (gastric bypass I think) and is still very overweight. Her favorite diet is Atkins but it never works for her because she severely restricts herself for several weeks then binge eats trays of brownies and bags of candy. It's not a sustainable lifestyle change for her. 

So anyway, she starts telling my cousin and his boyfriend all these foods that they can't eat (carrots, apples, onions, etc) and I merely suggest that there shouldn't be anything wrong with those foods as long as you are watching your calories and she (my grandmom) practically bit my head off. I tried telling my cousin about the whole TDEE thing and balancing proteins, carbs, and fats in a way that leaves you filling satisfied and energized but I wanted to give him something he could look at on his own later. 

I googled calorie counting hoping to find a reputable source describing what I've been doing successfully and I instead got pages and pages of anti calorie counting websites. It seems many of them assume that people who count calories won't think to eat enough fat and protein and will instead focus on mass marketed "low calorie" diet foods that taste bad or use all their calories on high calorie junk food and be hungry the rest of the day and ultimately fail.
<bot>: Why all the general distaste on the Internet for counting calories when so many here have been successful, and does anyone know a good reputable resource I can send my cousin to read about?