Advice on slowly adding carbs back

#1

Hello!

I started keto on January 2. Four weeks today. I am 14 pounds down. I am eating usually around 20g or less of carbohydrates, occasionally 22-23. My weight loss has slowed this last week to about a pound in the last week but I am not super worried yet (although I miss the gratification of the pound and a half (or more) drop I admit. )

I am traveling to North Carolina February 28th for one week, to meet my boyfriend’s family. I will have to eat a little bit more of a normal diet on this trip as I don’t want to offend anyone in his family

My plan was to start gradually re-introducing some more carbohydrates starting February 10, starting with more vegetable carbohydrates and slowly adding a tiny bit of maybe rice, and then a small amount of other grains so that by the time the 28th came around I could absorb a few more carbohydrates without ballooning

Right now I have been lifting weights three times a week, but I have discontinued my running. I planned on starting running next week and upping my vegetable carbohydrates. I also planned on potentially lowering my fat content and watching my calories still.

For the record, I am a 48-year-old female, 5’5, currently weighing 138 pounds. For most of my life I have weighed around 122 to 128. I have run for 30 years and I have lifted weights for the last 11.

Two years ago I started a long drawn-out divorce and my daughter was deep in heroin addiction. She will celebrate a year clean on February 14 and my ex-husband and I finally finished our divorce and are very good friends. During that time I gained 25 pounds, due to surgery (resulting in no running or lifting) and comfort food choices, which I am now trying to lose. I have never had that happen before but I feel like I am approaching my former self and I feel really good about it. I don’t want to mess anything up and I am tired of weighing what I do. My plan is when I come back from North Carolina to go back to ketosis until I get back down to my more “normal for me” weight in the 120’s.

Does this sound like a feasible plan?

Thanks for reading!

(Wendy) #2

Hi Rocketdog,
My first thoughts are you are just starting and this is not a really good time to change your carbs and diet. And there is no real worry about having some major reaction to adding a few more carbs in the near future. You are not fat adapted yet nor will you be, in my opinion by the end of February.
So life happens, we have vacations and stuff and some of us can go off the ideal healthy keto plan and gain a bit and resume better choices afterwards.
Others find any deviation a major problem either with food cravings or weight stalls or any number of issues.
For me when I travel or have celebrations I usually try to make the healthiest choices I can and try to keep my high carb foods to as little as I can. I choose not to drink my calories. I avoid grains almost totally because they affect me the most. I might eat a few sweet things.
So hopefully you will have some meat and veggies available and can skirt around the starchy stuff. If not or you really feel uncomfortable eating a little different than everyone else, I still think you should continue to eat low carbs and healthy fats until you are there. That way you are maximizing the good diet days and then as soon as you are back, choose good healthy low carb options.
That’s just my two cents. Also I dont think that planning on eating this way just until you lose the weight will be an affective long term success. You may increase a few healthy real food carbs but you will most likely gain it all back if you return to the way you were eating before. Also as you get older you may find like many others that your body cannot deal with the high carbohydrate diet like it did before.
All the best to you and welcome to the forum!

(John) #3

Regarding adding more carbs back in - I found after a while that I feel better overall with a bit more carbs than the 20g recommended. It was easy enough - I just add in some berries, full fat yogurt, and some nuts. Or eat more veggies at meals.

The trick is to do it with increased quantity of otherwise keto-friendly veggies / berries so as not to generate insulin spikes. No need to eat rice or bread to do it.

#4

Thanks for the replies!

I should clarify a tiny bit: I generally run about 40 miles a week. I also backpack every month of the year, I put anywhere from 800 to 900 miles in on backpacking. Including winter backpacking. I also ski and backcountry ski. So carbohydrates generally don’t affect me too badly. I also have ankylosing spondylitis and so I do limit my wheat to only a few servings a week.

I recently (June) started taking armour thyroid medication (in addition to my AS meds) so I was having trouble losing weight, and my rheumatologist suggested this diet. I usually eat about 8 servings a day of vegetables, and limit my grains and consume my carbs in legumes and starchy vegetables. I was grain free for three years, 2011-14, but my cholesterol and other numbers worsened so my rheumatologist made me change my diet.

So adding back some carbs slowly has always been the plan. Frankly my athletic performance is always better with carbs. However I do not plan on returning it to the way I ate the last year/20 months. That was mostly born out of stress.

(Carl Keller) #5

Hello Rocketdog.

I admit it’s difficult to choose between offending others vs offending our health. Nobody wants to be labeled a pain in the [spoiler]ass[/spoiler]. So if your BF understands your way of eating, maybe it’s possible to talk to him about your trip and how his family might respond? You might even find that his family is willing to accomodate, in part or in whole, your dietary choice?

But if worse comes to worse, try to avoid the processed sugars and grains and load up on any protein and fat that is available.

#6

A planned carb cheat is definitely better than an unplanned one, and you definitely seemed to have it planned out pretty well. As long as you know you can get back into keto when it’s done and not fall into an increased carb downward spiral, it should be fine.

It will probably be a good reminder to you about how your body feels back on higher carbs and you’ll be looking forward to getting back on keto, or you might find that you can tolerate a few more carbs without it being too detrimental to your ketosis.

Whatever the case, sometimes life requires you to throw away whatever ‘rules’ you impose on yourself and just live without having to justify or apologise. Happy to hear you’re on the other side of a two year hardship with positive results and congratulations on your daughter’s upcoming anniversary.

#7

ChrisW, thank you! I learned more than I ever wanted to know about addiction but I am a better person for it. She is doing amazingly well.

I have never met my boyfriend‘s family before. They are a wealthy southern sociaite family and we have an entire week planned out of events. It will be rather difficult to avoid saying no to his mother and his aunts and 95-year-old grandmother :wink:

I’m very disciplined and will be able to control myself and do not anticipate issues when I come home. Thank you for your thoughts, both of you.

(John) #8

I am familiar with this milieu, having grown up in and around it. The wealthy southern socialites are quite familiar with people wanting to eat healthy and watch their waistlines, so if you decline desserts or leave food on the plate, they won’t think anything of it. In fact, they may greatly enjoy and politely listen to discussions about a different way of eating.

It’s the good-old down-home southern families that pile the plates high and expect you to eat it all.

#9

Might be a mixture of both :joy:
His uncle is catering a barbecue for us ha ha