Anyone tried glycogen recompensation (eating high carb for a short time)?

#1

Based on a suggestion from @240lbfatloss, I am considering trying. I have been doing a fat fast all week and lost a couple of lbs. I do not exercise so not a body builder and I have been keto for 6 months and am about halfway to my goal weight but most of my weight loss was in the spring and early summer. Very little recently and when I eat a normal amount of lazy keto I gain

Perhaps an answer would be to track both activity and calories, keeping the 60/35/5% macro during the week with a 500 calorie per day deficit. On the weekends I’d flip your macros and go for full glycogen recompensation, including at least a 1000 calorie excess. There’s absolutely no chance of your body actually becoming lipogenic over so short a time, but you will gain weight due to glycogen. It usually works, (almost always) and provides a nice break.

Even if you greatly overeat carb calories over a two day period, your body will not switch over to storing fat. It will however, pull you out of caloric conservation, in the metabolic sense. After your second day, don’t eat again (keto) until you actually feel hungry.

Here is a link to the thread with the suggestion

So I have several lunches and dinners this weekend and am considering it. The weird part is although intellectually I love the idea, and went shopping and bought some selective gluten free carbs, honestly I do not feel the urge.

For the record I do not exercise so would not really be burning except while dancing at a wedding I am going to tomorrow at lunch time. I am not a big dancer at all

My "Carb Up" Experience
#2

Hey @Saphire!

I think the whole idea of glycogen recompensation is that you re-fill glycogen stores that have been depleting by intense exercise, so it doesn’t sound like that’s a framework that fits for you right now.

Have you seen AltShift? It’s alternating periods of very high fat and low carb (and probably moderate protein, so basically keto) with a few days of very high carb and very low fat. I found it intriguing but too tedious, but the idea behind it is one that might be of use to you: that we need to keep our carb/glucose pathways working and efficient (or something along those lines; not sure exactly what the mechanisms would be). I’m not quite convinced, but when folks who are not exercisers get benefit from carb cycling I suspect that something like this is what’s going on.
I’m not recommending AltShift; I’m just mentioning the using of different pathways.

You’ve indicated before that sometimes carbs send you into a tailspin. Are you worried about this? and/or do you have a plan in place if cravings get triggered?

One more thought -sorry, these are random and unconnected - but you might do best to stick to whole foods (potato, sweet potato, carrots) rather than anything packaged. Maybe that’s what you mean by “selective gluten-free carbs” but I wasn’t sure… often even if they’re gluten-free, things that come in boxes have a bunch of other ingredients that just trigger different hunger/insulin/gut responses.

#3

I did 3 days of carbs, but for an entirely different reason. I was following one of Dave Feldman’s protocol’s for lowering LDL prior to testing. I am not worried about cholesterol, but my doctors ‘make noises,’ and I get tested every 4 months (hypothyroid), and I was tired of the ‘noises.’

Dave’s protocol involves at least 150g of carbs for 3 days prior to testing, and I did that with rice, veggies, and some gluten-free bread, and fruit. It worked because my great numbers for HDL and trigs stayed the same, but my LDL dropped 40 points, which impressed my doctor.

The carbs didn’t bother me at all, and I went back to my zero (carnivore) way of eating immediately afterwards. Mark Sisson talks about the value of ‘metabolic flexibility,’ so I see this ‘carb event’ every four months as a good thing.

#4

So I posted this as I was leaving to go to lunch was mixed but was excited about carbs again. Perhaps on some level this is an excuse but I really feel that come Monday I will be able to stop.

Here is what happened, I ate all sorts of crap including jelly beans! I have learned that even though I do not have the active desire when in keto, it is still there and is waiting.

I started out slow, had steak veggies, chicken in teriyaki and some steak fries (which were delicious) I could have stopped there but of course I did not. They had candy with the dessert and of course I ate it. Note the person who recommended this said it was fine to eat candy and if gluten is not issue for me (which it is) to eat cake.

Then we had an evening party and I ate more but was able to stop. My daughter made gluten free chocolate chip cookies and I ate some of those. I had two bananas (craved bananas at the beginning of keto.) I am feeling like the very hungry caterpillar and Monday I am going back in my cocoon

#5

Thanks for keeping us posted!

@Saphire I think we can lose the taste for something like jelly beans, but on some level wanting a big hit of sugar is really natural for us. I think I read somewhere that Bushmen in the Kalahari will down about a quart of honey when they find a hive (AHHHHH! a quart of honey! it seems like it would instantly send someone into a diabetic coma) but of course that happens rarely, and in the context of a very active, outdoor, whole food, connected-to-circadian rhythm life - whereas we’re surrounded by the equivalent of a quart of honey in half of the bags and boxes on supermarket shelves available to us all the time.

Enjoy your Sunday and then going back into the cocoon tomorrow. How are you feeling today?

(Ken) #6

Sapphire,

Weigh yourself Sunday night, to see how much you’ve recompensated. You should be feeling fairly thirsty, as water is used to make glycogen.

You should be able to stop when necessary, as keto has reduced your leptin resistance. You now should feel fairly sated when you occasionally eat carbs. However, don’t stop until you hit your 1000 Cal per day excess.

#7

@Madeleine, @240lbfatloss

Thank you for the responses. I do feel like crap! Which all I have been eating this weekend. I did finally have some sushi this morning at the wedding which made me very happy, interestingly I did eat a lot then suddenly realized I could not eat any more. I After the sushi I was able to eat the appetizer but the rib eye on my plate was soon packed up to go home, I could not even touch it. I did have desert but none of it was that great because the party was dairy free so the deserts were not dairy. There was a nice apple pie type item that was tasty but the rest was not great.

Some observations, the less hungry I got the less I was able to eat protein but I was still able to eat carbs. During dinner I discovered some rolls that were delicious, I was able to have 2 even though I was not hungry for anything else.

Fruit definitely does not taste as sweet when compared to chocolate chip cookies.

Having anything with gluten in it was a mistake. By this morning my stomach was completely bad.

I enjoyed the first meal, after that it did not taste as good except for the sushi this morning which was so tasty. It was also the first item I ate today other than coffee so I was hungry when I started eating it.

Note I was not any hungrier than usual this morning.

Whenever I did the hunger check, I never wanted eggs but some carb that I was craving would still sound good.

While I am not T2, I do check my sugar periodically and it was on the high end of normal yesterday an hour after the jelly beans. I feel like I am not any more insulin sensitive than I was 6 months ago. I have a family history of T2 so was hoping to solve that with keto

#8

If your goal is to be in ketosis, carbing up can drive you out of it. Especially if you’re metabolicly deranged. Even consuming too many calories can knock you out of ketosis.

For those of us who are insulin resistant, the best strategy for repairing our body is to get in ketosis and stay there (for a time period measured in years not months).

#9

Thanks @4dml I think the original suggestion was to prevent a metabolic stall. I have not had any major weight loss in over a month. I would like to maintain metabolic flexibility

In general I seem to go in and out of ketosis. The only time I have measureable ketones is during a fast or if I have skipped dinner and have not yet eaten the next day, otherwise I find even nuts knock me out. I measure using a cheap breathlyzer I got for $10. My goal is to lose weight and not have cravings for carbs, I do not see ketosis as an end goal but rather a means

#10

@Saphire
I hope you’re on your way to feeling better!

Re your post immediately above: it’s my understanding that as our bodies get more accustomed to making and using ketones, we’ll show much lower readings (basically we get more efficient, so there aren’t higher levels of ketones floating around).

#11

Thank you @Madeleine . I have never had the patience to read through the entire cheap breathalyzer thread. I aware of the efficiency idea. I have no idea if it is that or if it is not that sensitive (never read the long thread on it beyond a coupla posts) or if I simply get knocked out of ketosis from nuts and berries and cheese or tomato sauce on food but I rarely eat out and the sauces I make are very low carb. The only time I know I am in ketosis is when I am fasting or when I did not have dinner. Does not bother me at all. My goal is not ketosis.

Some updates @240lbfatloss, thank you for your suggestions. Last night I had gained 13.4lbs over Friday morning’s weight. This morning I only weighed 8.4 over Friday morning and about what I had weighed when I started the semi successful fat fast 10 days ago. My plan is to go back to keto today and try to keep my calories around 1400 but to focus on eating keto rather than strictly restricting. My blood sugar when I measured last night was ok. Interestingly I had planned to have some ice cream last night but wanted to measure blood sugar first (did not want to stay up the extra hour). By then I had eaten more than enough and simply was not hungry my head still wanted it but my stomach did not and I did not bother.

I did not drink any alcohol the entire weekend, in two cases because I never like to drink early in the day, in the other because I was driving. I still woke up Sunday morning feeling fuzzy and hung over. This morning I felt quite a bit better.

I get some stiffness in my back from certain foods (I think, not sure which exactly but possibly gluten). This morning I woke up with it, not as bad as it can get. Interesting to see if it goes away by tomorrow, wondering why I did not wake up with it earlier

#12

It sounds like you are having huge water shifts according to how you eat. It would probably be benefical for you to have food sensitivity testing done.

If the goal is weight loss, extended fasting is probably the most reliable, fastest, simplest, metabolism preserving method. For severe cases, Dr Fong suggests a 7-14 day fast followed by 42 hour IF protocol.

#13

Thank you. I love Fung, have read his entire blog going back to 2013! Have done up to 5.5 Days. Do not want to go beyond that because I do not have medical supervision and I am afraid of refeeding issues.

I am sure I have food sensitivities but have learned to live with them. Since I normally do not eat gluten or sugar, at this point I would probably test negative. I think for gluten you have to eat it for 6 weeks before the antibody test is accurate

(Ken) #14

Saphire,

Good job. Depending on your body size, it looks like you were successful at recompensation. Of course you had a large water weight gain, due to glycogen, it was totally normal. It should go away rapidly, depending on salt intake. See what your weight is Friday, although it may take a couple of weeks to take effect.

#15

Thank you. At this point can do the 5 days of keto and reducing calories by 500 per day and then going back to regular keto and IF by the weekend? I cannot believe I am saying this and maybe it is in my head but I really do not want to spend another weekend wacked out on carbs! I cannot afford the bathroom or nap time

I am on the East coast and am still not hungry although I have had a couple of cups of coffee with HWC (cannot drink it without some type of milk and get headaches if I do not have it) not sure how much I will be eating anytime.

As for how much, while I do not like to post my weight, I am average/slightly above average female height, medium frame and still have about 50 lbs to lose on average

(Ken) #16

Be flexible. Go by results. If you’ve dropped a pound by Friday, it’s a pretty good indication your metabolism needed a boost. If so, you’ve plenty of options. One would be just to flip your macros on the weekend, without going for full recompensation. The important thing to understand that periodic Carb intake for metabolic reasons are beneficial. If your weight doesn’t change by Friday, I’d go another round. Watch your salt intake starting Wed, so you get a true weight Friday.

#17

Thank you.

I barely ate yesterday, some coffee and HWC, eggs with butter, a little bit of chicken. Barely ate today, went out for someone’s birthday and had a small salad and a hamburger with mushrooms. Earlier coffee and HWC and a taste of some blue cheese dressing and salad and chopped chicken liver. I am so much happier without the carbs I am honestly surprised. Especially as to how much easier it was to go back to low carb eating. I was mildly tempted by the fries on my sister in law’s plate and the cookies my daughter made but not too much

(Ethan) #18

@Mare, I thought the protocol was to eat a ton of keto calories for three days, not carbs

#19

If you check his site, Dave has three different protocols he’s experimented with. I chose the carb one because I tend to do a ‘carb day’ every few months. That’s what’s worked for me for the past decade.

#20

I know this won’t work for everyone. But I realized that if I could develop the ability to stop at a spoonful, there’s almost nothing I couldn’t have. The taste squashes the temptation and I savor every bit of the morsel.