Avoiding too much protein, and contemplating "complex" carbs?

(Bansaw) #1

I’ve been on Keto for 6 months now and felt some benefits, but have some concerns in my mind.

One is my protein input. I only have one kidney (allegedly) and I have to take care of it.
So I am contemplating having less red meat. I am wondering is chicken (white meat) /eggs are better in terms of protein first of all.
Dr Perlmutter (who is pro-Keto) is quite clear on red meat and its dangers.

I also have heard some whisperings in the Keto community that “complex” carbs are becoming more acceptable. While simple carbs like bread etc are obviously out.

I’m going to check Dr Perlmutter out more, but just wanted to see if this Keto community here are micro-adjusting their thinking on carbs. It wasn’t long ago that people were thinking, all carbs are in the same category almost and shunned as much as possible. Ok, well not totally shunned but there is a daily limit, … I think you know what I’m trying to say.

(Ethan) #2

What whispering are you hearing? From whom? That makes no sense. If it kicks you out of ketosis, it’s not keto friendly. Complex carbs are better than simple—as simple carbs are bad on any way of eating. But complex carbs still turn to
glucose and require insulin!

(Charlotte) #3

I’m confused… You allegedly have one kidney? That implies you have been given no proof that you have one kidney. Would you be willing to elaborate?

(Banting & Yudkin & Atkins & Eadeses & Cordain & Taubes & Volek & Naiman & Bikman ) #4

Complex carbs are just slow, long glucose elevations, paired with long insulin releases, rather than high spikes.

The glycemic load is the same, so I wouldn’t go there.

I dunno that Dr. Perlmutter has the truth about kidneys and red meat. modern chicken is apparently more protein dense than modern beef.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #5

UI have just one kidney, it belonged to someone else 16 months ago. I was on dialysis for 10 years, eight on peritoneal and two on hemo at the end. I have very strong feelings that I might have never developed or would have been able to reverse my renal carcinoma if I had been eating keto 20 years ago. All I can tell you is in 5 months of eating this way I have turned around post transplant pre diabetes from taking prednisone every day now, I am no longer PTPD.

I have monthly extensive blood work monitoring my kidney function and I have not had elevated sodium, creatinine or BUN since I started. BUN if you’re not familiar with the term is defined as “Blood urea nitrogen is a medical test that measures the amount of urea nitrogen found in blood. The liver produces urea in the urea cycle as a waste product of the digestion of protein. Normal human adult blood should contain between 6 and 20 mg of urea nitrogen per 100 ml of blood.”

My doctor always was advising me against too much protein. They had me eating a LFHC diet. I had to be careful about phosphorus and potassium all the time. Many non keto foods like potatoes are out. And tomatoes, avocados and spinach are extremely hard on a person with renal failure. Your kidney has to remove BUN and this is up to you to limit the buildup by restricting protein. In my opinion a ketogenic diet is not unhealthy for a functional kidney, my transplant doctor, and my PCP are on board with the way I eat now and are very happy with the way it’s affecting my metabolism and health. :cowboy_hat_face:

(Charlotte) #6

I’m sorry to hear about your carcinoma. I’m glad you’re recovering! :heart: Thank you for sharing. It’s great your doctors are on board with keto. I wish I knew more about the renal system to offer any useful advice. So all I will say is Hugs’n’kisses!

(Bansaw) #7

I had an ultrasound many years ago and they didn’t find my left kidney in the place where it should have been. I had another ultrasound more recently suggesting that it may have developed in “a different place”.
So the jury’s still out on that one.

(Bansaw) #8

Thats one good thing for me too: blood sugar. I was pre-diabetes, now I am just above normal.
But I had a kindney function test a month or two ago to suggest that it was struggling in terms of creatinine. On the other hand, my BUN was just about normal.
I just dont want to take any chances, my grandfather passed away from kidney issues back in the day, so I dont know if I am weak DNA-wise.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #9

Lots of people used to die back in the day from renal failure. Dialysis is fairly recent and is improving all the time. It’s possible to live quite a long time on dialysis but you’re slowly dying as it takes it’s toll on your body. Bones deteriorate from elevated phosphorus and calcification of your organs is an eventuality. I have had atherosclerosis since I was in my mid 20’s. It eventually led to kidney cancer and renal failure. Keto is healing for atherosclerosis.

High creatinine can be an indication that you didn’t drink enough water to adequately flush it out of your system for a couple of days. I had an elevated level a while back and tested again the next week after diligent hydration and it was normal again.

The main cause for loss of kidney function loss is arterial blockage (read fats combined with carb and sugar inflammation causing plaque to built up in near microscopic arteries branching in the kidneys. We all head towards renal failure in life, it’s just a fact that if nothing else gets you your kidney function deteriorates over time because they wear out, usually by blockage starving small areas of your kidney and eventually you have few filters left and the kidney is inefficient at cleaning your blood. Me, I would rather take my chances with keto eating than rolling the dice about how my new kidney will last eating a carbohydrate based diet again. Don’t want new plaque forming in my new kidney. The shocking thing is after the transplant I had a day long class with a dietitian advising me to eat a low fat healthy grains and fruit and vegetable diet with modest protein which led in 6 months to a pre diabetic state, something I had never had an issue with. This is partially because of prednisone but they should have advised me to keep carbs and sugar minimal but they didn’t because of MEDICAL DOGMA. :cowboy_hat_face:

(Carl Keller) #10

Depending on which doctor you are listening to, the amount of protein we need or should consume varies greatly. It’s probably the most controversial subject among keto experts.

I was recently watching a Benjamin Bikman video where he discusses the relevance of protein. One part that stood out to me was when he was talking about the amino acid carnitine which shuttles fat into mitochondria for oxidation which then become ketones. So carnitine plays an important role in ketosis and guess where we get carnitine from?.. Red meat is the best source. Chicken, fish, beans and avocado are also good sources of carnitine.

He goes on further to say that moderate protein when beginning a ketogenic diet might be best and that later, a higher amount of protein might be beneficial. He recommends 1-2 grams per kg of body weight of protein.

I’m not saying that BB is the man whose advice you should adopt… just that the opinions of how much protein is the right amount are all over the place, even among PHDs.

#11

A resident of the retirement community I live in recently found out she has always only had one kidney. A doctor had done some scans for another reason and noticed it and asked her about it.

And she’s been seeing a kidney specialist for years because of low kidney function. That doctor had no idea she only had one kidney.

We told her to get a new kidney doctor.

(Simon Saunders) #12

I find I don’t need to count non complex carbs like broccoli or zucchini and add as much as I feel.

For complex carbs if I eat 10g worth every 5hrs I will maintain my morning standard blood ketone level of 1.4-1.8.

If I exceed that level say 20g I one meal the following day I’ll be at 0.2.

It’s never really discussed but load and timing over insulin load is an important factor if consuming more completed carbs.

(Banting & Yudkin & Atkins & Eadeses & Cordain & Taubes & Volek & Naiman & Bikman ) #13

One of the larger takeaways that you can expand on from Bikman’s talk and the Macklin Prof who for some reason, I can remember his twitter handle better than his name, is that your protein need may vary over time. Bikman’s point about adjusting macros is one thing, MacklinProf’s is that older people need more, because they don’t digest it as efficiently.

Come to think on it, the Eades also advise varying protein over time. They linked protein intake to LBM and activity level.

Context matters.

(Bunny) #14

Lost all my weight in the beginning using white bread toasted in my keto regimen, ham egg cheese breakfast samich, turkey, roast beef, spam, bacon, samiches basically!

That is a myth that you cannot eat bread on keto, I’ve experimented and done it, may not work for everyone, but it worked in my self-experiments.

Problem is, people eat too much bread all the time!

Bread will not knock you out of ketosis, it’s when you eat it everyday is where the problems begin?

I have my metabolism in just the right state (more active iron rich mitochondrial brown fat tissue) to burn up (oxidize) the sugar that bread is going to make.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #15

True but if there are renal decline issues excess protein is hard on your kidneys. A person could still do keto with stage 4 kidney disease but it would be very restrictive compared to a standard keto diet. I’m not saying @Bansaw does necessarily but he did say he only had one kidney so it’s important to get that sorted with his doctor. My regular nephrologist, transplant nephrologist and primary care doctor are all supportive. I saw my regular nephrologist a couple of days ago and he told me he wishes many of his patients would do the same thing. Change is in the wind. :cowboy_hat_face:

(Consensus is Politics) #16

Instead of dogma, call it consensus. Thats what it really is. When they dont know or understand something they come to a consensus. One must remember, CONSENSUS IS NOT SCIENCE!

A consensus can be arrived at in several ways.

— Rumors have it that alligators live in a nearby pond. The general consensus is, we better put up a warning sign sign

— a bunch of politicians are getting paid by lobbyists to promote agriculture, so they do that in any fashion they can, including the making of a “Food Pyramid” with healthy grains as its base, and evil fats in the tiniest portion

A scientific conclussiin is reached by examination of the evidence, testing, observing. Its not proved unless everyone else doing the same tests comes to the same conclusions. Repeatedly.

— Some people notice what looks like a log moving around in a pond. They notice it sink, surface again and sink. A big splash and a large bird dissapears under the water never to come up again. A nest of alligator eggs are discovered nearby. Footprints in the mud lead to and from the pond. Others come and verify the findings. Conclusions, we think an alligator lives here. Better post a “No Swimming Sign”.

Science is NEVER settled. Anyone who says “The science is settled” is selling something. And you should assume something is wrong, and demand proof. The more dire the circumstances, the more proof from different sources needed.

(Mark) #17

Yes - the Protein recommendations by many of the experts, varies greatly, making it basically a crap-shoot for most of us. :wink:

(Carl Keller) #18

I believe that if we remove the things that distress our metabolism, our hunger hormones will naturally tell us when we have had the right amount. This has worked for humans for a million or so years so there’s no reason why it can’t continue to work unless some genetic or medical condition discombobulates the balance.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #19

Okay Carl I believe this to a certain degree, but I can’t honestly say that while eating a delicious freshly grilled ribeye steak :cut_of_meat::yum: and 3/4 of the way through it saying “I think this is becoming uninteresting because I have reached satiety” has ever happened. It just doesn’t happen for me.

I still enjoy the heck out of eating delicious meat, I always did love it more than carbs when I was eating a SAD. That hasn’t really changed since I started eating keto style. Maybe it’s something that will take more time for me and maybe it will never happen.

That’s the reason there’s so much variation on protein amounts. Some try to stick to what mathematics say you should have and lots of keto people are saying “Screw that, I am just going to focus on keeping carbs under 20g” or whatever they set as a limit.

Whatever people are comfortable with doing and is getting them the results they want in a sustainable way seems to be the real macros. :cowboy_hat_face:

(Karim Wassef) #20

Protein’s insulin response and use is different that carbs. The problem is in combining proteins and carbs where the effect is massively magnified causing a larger and more sustained insulin response. This causes more hunger and clearly keeps you out of ketosis.

If a fat adapted body has access to dietary and endogenous fat for fuel, it really doesn’t need to break down amino acids except in cases where it urgently needs glucose or to replenish muscle glycogen. To do this, it has to deaminate (remove the nitrogen compound) and break down the rest to use in glucose making. This is not a preferential use of amino acids but it is what the body does if glucose is low and it needs a sudden burst of it.

If the demand rate is slower and controlled, it will be fine taking the glycerol backbone off the fats to make a little glucose and converting the 3 fatty acids into energy or ketones.

There’s also a constant cycle of breaking down and rebuilding tissue that needs a flux of fresh amino acids. As long as you’re getting enough of the 9 essential amino acids, you’re in balance.

So when you eat protein on Keto, you get a narrow and low insulin spike that signals the body to use these new amino acids for the building part of the cycle.

Dr Bikman’s results show that if your glucose is low (Keto or fasting), the dietary amino acids will not spike insulin because doing so could likely cause hypoglycemia… fainting, death… instead, it releases glucagon to provide the energy needed to assimilate the fresh amino acids. It takes energy, even to make energy. If you’re in Keto, the response is mild… in fasting, it’s strong because it needs to incorporate the amino acids into the rebuilding cycle vs. having to catabolize its own tissue.

If you consume too much protein though, and your use is low (not exercising or weightlifting to build more muscle), it decides to store the excess anyway. I’ve personally gained both fat and lean mass while not eating any carbs… two ribeyes a day will do that. :slight_smile:

That’s been my understanding and experience anyway.