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Cyclic Ketogenic Update
Highlights
1. If I have 2 or more no carb days in a row, I get the negative symptoms I had during my ketogenic diet (mainly feeling stressed, strung out, and having insomnia).
2. If I have 1 day with no carbs at all I feel great with no negative symptoms as long as I had a nice carb load the day before.
3. If I have nice carb load every other day I have enough energy to go to the gym or walk around the city and enjoy it.
4. If I don’t have carbs at least every other day I get lethargic and feel like shit.
5. My body composition is improving but the weight around my waist is coming off very slowly. The rest of my body looks good except for the male pregnant look.
6. 2 Days in a row without carbs gives me insomnia which sucks.
7. Ketostix show significant leakage of ketones in my urine by the evening of a low carb day following a carb binge the night before. I don’t know what the significance of this is if there is any.
8. If I eat over a certain amount of protein my urine has a strong smell the next morning. For now I’m capping my protein intake at 1/2 pound of beef plus a couple of eggs per day. I’m not sure what I’m going to do long term. It depends on how I feel and where my dietary experiments lead me.My strategy has evolved to the following
1. Big carb evening at least every other day. I’ll start eating carbs (Oatmeal, pasta, pancakes) at around 5 PM and eat as much as my body desires. Once I am satisfied then I stop. If I get hungry before bed I’ll make a batch of pancakes.
2. Sometimes I’ll eat low fat chicken breast with my carbs and sometimes I won’t. I have not figured out which is better yet.
3. Up until noon I subsist of fat (ghee/mct oil) if I eat anything at all.
4. For lunch I eat a half pound of meat plus a couple of eggs. The meat is usually ground beef, bacon, liverwurst, or oxtail. I sometimes have bone broth or great lakes gelatin with the meal.
5. On high carb days (around 4 per week) I don’t set any limits on the amount of food I eat once the carb window begins.
6. On low carb days I just have my one protein meal and I drink fat to appetite (mct oil/ghee) in coffee or ginger tea.Important Note
I’m usually not hungry following my present eating patterns. I’m never hungry on my high carb nights because I’m stuffing myself with carbs. I’m usually not hungry on my low carb days but if I am I’ll scramble a few extra eggs in the evening.I’m planning on sticking to this pattern for a couple of months before I decide to tweak it or scrap it for something else.
I have a pet theory that Matt Stone’s ideas are right in principle. I believe where he got it wrong is mixing fat with carbs too much. I think if people did his diet recovery stuff with mostly carbs and ate their meat/fat at different times of the day than their carbs they would rehabilitate their metabolism without putting on lots of weight. Once I get rid of my belly fat I’m planning on putting this pet theory to the test.
I would like to know if those who succeeded in losing weight by refeeding did it with with low fat / high carb or mixed carb & fat.
I would also like to know the macro-nutrient ratios of those who kept the weight on after the refeed was over.
Food for thought:
Matt Stone’s High Calorie Refeed of 2012
Cheese Burgers
Ice Cream
etc…Billy Craig’s 6,000 Calorie Weight Loss
Bran Flakes
Skimmed Milk
Toast with Jam & Cheese Spreads
Bread
Bagels
Baked Beans
Cadbury Chocolate Desserts
OatmealMy Refeed of Early/Mid 2013
Lots of carbs & Fat
No processed foods except for white cane sugarIn this small sample size those had a lot of carbs + fat during refeed (Me, Matt) gained weight and kept it on. Those who had high carbs with low fat (Billy) lost weight.
My Interpretation:
My gut feeling says that Matt Stone is on the right track with needing to feed to fix the metabolism. I think where he went wrong (and I went wrong) is mixing the fats and carbs together.What if people modified their refeeds somewhat.
Possible Option #1
What if during a high calorie refeed period people had a high fat low carb breakfast. Then wait about 4 hours. Then eat as may carbs and their body can handle for the rest of the day/evening.Possible Option #2
What if people did their refeeds with high carb / low fat. Then when the refeed is over go back to eating normally with mixed fat/protein/carbs.@Real Amy
Yeah, I tried moderation before and it didn’t work out for me. The main problem is a debilitating appetite that interferes with the quality of my life.
@David
My goal is to try to find a sustainable lifestyle that works for my biochemistry.Update
Diet that I followed:
I did no carb approximately, 90% Fat and 10% protein. I averaged about 60 to 70 grams of protein a day and the rest of my diet was the fat in beef/eggs/cheese along with butter, coconut oil, olive oil, and Ghee. I dropped the Red Palm Oil because I hated the taste and didn’t enjoy my food with it. I also used green powder to supply vegetables. (I absolutely hate eating vegetables and I know that stuffing food down my throat that I hate is not sustainable.) I also ate a few Brazil Nuts every day for Selenium. I plugged most my food into fitday and took supplements to fill in the nutritional gaps in my diet.The Good
1. Food tasted good. I would have no problem eating this way for life if the diet had worked out for me.
2. Lost an inch around my waist
3. I could go several hours between meals without getting dizzy.
4. Didn’t Crash unless I ate too much protein in one meal
5. Sleep was very goodThe Bad
1. Mental focus started out really good but deteriorated over time
2. My eyes seem to be a little more bloodshot than usual.
3. Asthma may have worsened a little bit (mild wheezing)
4. I looked older in the mirror
5. General SluggishnessInteresting Points
1. This time around I went into ketosis in less than a day.
2. No low carb induction this time, seemed like my body was already adapted to low carb.
3. I don’t know if the bad results I got were the result of not going high enough in calories or being too low in carbs. I researched this thoroughly and the “experts” seem to be divided on this issue.What I will Try Next
1. Slowly get my body used to carbs by eating some starch every couple of days and building up the amount.
2. I will try a cyclic ketogenic diet where I take myself out of ketosis once every few days with a high carb evening. (Got this idea from Dave Asprey)Thoughts
1. I really want to find a way to make low carb living sustainable because I really enjoy this way of eating. It is in complete alignment with my taste buds.
2. I am going to make the assumption for now that my bad results on the diet were the result of a glucose deficiency. This assumption is based on looking at the results through the lens of Paul Jaminet’s work.Fructose is an isomer of glucose meaning that it has the same molecular formula as glucose. The atoms are just in a different configuration.
There are also two separate isomers of fructose – D-Fructose and L-Fructose. Some people claim that most of the fructose in fruit is D-Fructose and most of the fructose in HFCS is L-Fructose. Some people also claim that the liver processes both isomers of fructose differently. I was never able to figure out if is true or not.
I don’t know if the fructose part of sucrose is D-Fructose or L-Fructose. If anyone knows for sure, please chime in.
Glucose comes in two isomers as well. Dextrose is another name for D-Glucose which is the type of glucose found in nature.
Personally through experimentation I have found that fructose leads to belly fat so I stopped using sugar all together. But if I was going to buy sugar I would definitely buy dextrose which is only 1/3 as sweet as sucrose.
There has also been a study that implies that HFCS makes rats fatter than sucrose does. I don’t know what to make of this since I have not read the study in detail.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20219526Have you restricted calories in the past?
If so, have you eaten enough calories in the last 8 months to reverse the adaptations your body made when you restricted in the past?
David,
I have the same issue as you do – my weight goes in the stomach area.
Synopsis Of Research – Belly Fat:
From my non-180 degree health research this could mean either liver issues, insulin resistance, or too much cortisol. If the fat is visceral fat in the stomach area its probably not a leptin issue since visceral fat doesn’t produce as much leptin as subcutaneous fat. People with leptin issues are fat all over. But the visceral fat produces other hormones that suck. (paraphrasing)
Disclaimer – Don’t know if any of this is true – but other people believe that this is true.Personal Experience – Calorie Restriction or Exercise
I’ve lost weight in my stomach area multiple times in the last decade either through caloric restriction or exercise and I always end up feeling like shit and gaining it all back in the stomach area. When I did both calorie restriction and exercise together it really fucked me up badly physically and mentally.In my dietary experiments over the last few years I have noticed that sugar (sucrose, honey) makes my belly blow up incredibly fast with visceral fat. Sugar is good for many people but there are some people out there who it is not good for so consider that a possible contributor to your belly fat. If your body uses the sugar to build tissue and replenish liver glycogen then sugar is great. If your body decides to store it as fat then it sucks because it will be visceral fat around your liver.
Looks like you are going to follow a 500 to 1000 calorie deficit from your second to last post. Can you report back at some point and let us know what your hunger levels, physical energy, and mental energy are like a few months into your deficit?
If Matt’s beliefs are correct the calorie deficit will backfire in some way or another. But there are many others who believe in calorie deficits are healthy so Matt could be wrong.
Sometimes anxiety is not caused by imagined negative results. Sometimes it is caused by imbalances in the body. A suppressed metabolism could be the cause of anxiety.
For me personally I discovered that allowing myself to remain hungry for too long triggers anxiety. The anxiety has nothing to do with thinking about food. It has to do with the particular hormones my body releases when my body detects insufficient food intake. Having a huge meal makes this anxiety go away quickly.
If you are eating insufficient calories for a long period of time you may end up with elevated cortisol levels. Elevated cortisol levels can make you feel anxious and make your mind race. In this case it is your body giving your mind negative thoughts not your mind causing anxiety.
You must figure out the root cause of anxiety before you can fix it. It is a chicken/egg problem for sure.
Meditation will only fix anxiety caused by the mind. It will not fix anxiety caused by the body.
Someone correct me if I am wrong but here are some general principles that I learned reading Matt’s Books and Blog.
1. You will gain weight eating to appetite until you reach your body’s setpoint.
2. Once you reach your setpoint, your weight will be stable if you eat to appetite no matter how much food your appetite calls for.
3. You cannot be fully healthy if you are below your setpoint while eating below your appetite because your body will make adaptations to conserve energy. Some of these adaptations reduce energy to systems in your body that are necessary for good physical, mental, and sexual health.
4. Some people who reach their setpoint and continue eating to appetite for a long period of time will eventually start to spontaneously lose weight because their setpoint spontaneously lowers.
5. Other people who reach their setpoint and continue eating to appetite for a long period of time will not lose weight and will forever be at that weight. But it is healthier to be at your setpoint and live with the extra weight than it is to suffer through your body’s adaptations to conserve energy while dieting the rest of your life.
6. The only healthy way to lose weight is to lower your setpoint. Unfortunately no one on earth knows a way to lower the setpoint for a large number of people. The human body is complicated and science still has a lot to learn about how setpoint works.The real question that this thread addresses is what do people who have an excessively high setpoint do?
This is interesting. I’ve been having having pale stools for days at a time on and off since I stopped my ketogenic diet and went to a normal diet. Pale stools could be a sign of gallbladder issues. I also had elevated liver enzymes that are still somewhat high that are baffling my doctor.
I did a ketogenic diet end of 2011 and early 2012. For the 2nd half of 2012 and 2013 I’ve been eating plenty of carbs.
Interestingly I had the opposite result. From refeeding I now have warm hands after having cold hands my entire life. I can walk outside with a short sleeve shirt when its 60 degrees out and maintain warm hands which is a miracle for me. But my basal temps are still shit.
Possibly relevant info:
1. 40 Year Old Male
2. Nice Body overall except bloated potbelly that makes me look like a pregnant male (Early Stage).
3. Non Alcoholic Fatty Liver
4. Went Ketogenic End of 2011, 2012 – felt great at first but ended up feeling like shit but had flat stomach while feeling like shit.
5. Tried refeeds a couple of times previously but failed because my stomach was blowing up really fast. I panicked and started restricting calories to get rid of the stomach.
6. When I restrict calories my face looses fat and I look older. When I eat a lot of food my face fills out and I look younger.
7. Figured out that sugar makes my stomach blow up fast – I believe that this is related to my fatty liver
8. In present refeed I’m getting the majority of my carbs from starches and not sugar. My stomach is not shrinking during this refeed but its not blowing up really fast like in previous attempts that included sugar.
9. Quit Ketogetnic Diet mid 2012 because I felt mentally and physically unhealthyGoal with refeed:
I believe that I damaged my body by going ketogenic and restricting calories to get rid of my belly although I was not fat anywhere else in my body before I went ketogenic. I also now have elevated liver enzymes that seemed to start elevating during my ketogenic diet. I believe that by eating all the food my body wants with good amounts of fat/protein/carbs my body will heal the damage that I have done.I am also hoping that eventually my bloated potbelly will go away and the weight will evenly redistribute around my whole body. I don’t care if I carry excess weight as long as it is evenly distributed and not concentrated in my stomach area.
This step-wise increase in hunger is vexing me. I increased my calories and I was fine for about a week. Now I got another sudden increase in hunger again.
I had the following today so far and it is only a little past 8 PM.
1. Oatmeal with walnuts and butter (Made with 1 cup of dried oats)
2. Cup of Nile Lentil Soup
3. Handful of pistachios
4. Macaroni & Cheese (1 cup of dried rice elbows, chevre cheese, butter)
5. Square of Dark Chocolate
6. Four Eggs scrambled in coconut oil mixed with butter and chevre cheese
7. Packet of almonds, 4 Brazil notes, handful of pumpkin seeds with melted butter
8. Small glass of Heavy Cream (around 750 calories worth)
9. Two bowls of Whole Foods Rice Krispies with Whole Milk
10. Half Glass of whole milk (To finish up the milk)Now I feel satisfied but now full. I still kind of feel a lingering weak hunger in my belly but it is not too bad. I feel good, relaxed, and content right now but annoyed that I have to eat so much food to satisfy my appetite. I don’t even like eating that much, I feel like its a waste of time and I get annoyed when I get hungry.
Thanks for the suggestions. I think I’m going to make some sort of bar.
I’m considering the spanish omlette too. I think as an experiment I’m going to make one, leave it at room temperature for 24 hours and see if it still tastes fresh. I’m going to try to eat it with my fingers to see how messy it is.
I thought about PB&J but in my experience it can be messy if you put too much Peanut Butter on it. But if you don’t put enough on it doesn’t taste that good.
