Hi! I have been keto since April 2018 and my husband has been following and eating LCHF. I have battled with weight all my life and diabetes and heart disease are part of my heredity - thus my reasons for changing my lifestyle (and it is working!). My husband does not have a weight problem, cutting out carbs he instantly lost almost 30lbs (which is ok because it was mostly abdominal - but he could easily gain a few). My husband wants to do Keto and fasting with me because he has the terrible heredity of Alzheimer’s in his family AND he is being followed for tremors in his arm which could be a precursor of Parkinson’s. My question to you is: How can my husband do Keto and fasting for major health concerns and NOT lose more weight? We firmly believe in the benefits for his health but are not sure how to go about it at this point. Thanks for any studies or information you can point me to or experiences.
Balancing weight loss and gain on keto - Keto for health matters (Alzheimer's & Parkinson's)
Hrm…Is he considered clinically underweight? You said he didn’t have a weight problem before. If its because the weight loss has made him unsightly, maybe exercising would be the best way to gain healthy weight instead of fat weight. The body’s weight set point depends on many factors, stress is one of those. So physical stress might raise that set point.
Yes, I agree that exercise is needed now. He is not underweight now BUT cannot lose anymore. The doctor had recommended that he lose his belly fat (about 10lbs) and was thrilled with his loss! He has gone down 3" around the waist - nothing left.
At the risk of stating the obvious, he basically has to eat more to the point that he stops losing weight. Increase fat. If he can eat dairy, more dairy would probably help. And he might need to increase healthier carbs slightly.
Perhaps do a search on here for “weight maintenance.” There are many threads on that.
One idea might be more carbs. Out to maybe 55g/day or even 1g/kg lbm. That was the Protein Power recommendation for maintenance, an increase in carbs, but not a return to SAD levels . It was also the Atkins recommendation for maintenance, only Atkins had you go up 5g/week until you hit a level for maintenance. (IIRC: The Eades had you do this as well, only with an expectation that you might get to 1g/lbs of lbm or sth… I don’t recall).
Alternatively, just increase calories to the point of equilibrium. So many folks are stalled by nut consumption or dairy or whatever, so check out what people are stuck on with stalls and he can do that.
If the plan is to battle Alzheimer’s & Parkinson I would not be in favor of increasing carbs. I would attempt to increase calories with fat to limit weight loss. I think your body will find its set point on a ketogenic diet rather than just keep losing weight. All of this assumes the lack of hunger doesn’t also suppress the desire to eat significantly.
Great article! I am almost more confused for him now though! The benefits of ketosis in his case are important. I don’t know if he can IF more than he does now (he doesn’t eat breakfast, so basically is 18:6).
He is one of the lucky ones… or not, to never feel hunger - he never has had hunger issues, thus weight not a problem. He had trouble when we first met (30 years ago) understanding how I could always be hungry (I now understand perfectly - leptin was my culprit!) In the beginning of my venture(April) he only cut out orange juice and white bread and lost 10lbs in no time! I am hoping his body will find his set point - that’s exactly what I tell him as reassurance (and family members who are worried about his weight loss).
He is LC right now, not keto. Our goal is keto but he loses weight. So he is eating moderate carbs at around 50.
Have you checked his blood ketones? It’s possible that he could be in ketosis with 50g of carbs.
Good question! We will check. I have a blood ketone meter that I use.
You don’t have to do IF, or in your husband’s case, lose weight to get the benefits of ketosis. As long as his brain is getting a regular feeding of ketones, he is likely delaying cognitive decline. There is a lot of medical research interest and plenty of anecdotal evidence that ketones can reverse symptoms of brain degenerative diseases.
I’ve read articles and watched videos about people who were neck deep in Alzheimers and slowly came out of their foggy delusional state simply by adding coconut oil to their diet. So if ketones can reverse symptoms, then it seems logical to say that ketones will help prevent the symptoms from even occuring.
@Jocelyne_Slattery There are a number of issues mixed in this thread. Firstly, if your husband had visceral fat (i.e., not the jiggly love handles, but a real belly), that is a major symptom of metabolic syndrome, so he has gone keto just in time. Diabetes, heart disease, obesity, high blood pressure, and Alzheimer’s disease are all part of the metabolic syndrome, being basically effects of insulin resistance, to the point where several researchers into Alzheimer’s disease have been making a point recently of referring to it as Type III diabetes.
Weight is a touchy issue in our society. First of all, there are two kinds of weight: lean tissue, and adipose tissue (i.e., fat cells). When we talk about “losing weight” that is usually a euphemism for losing fat. If your husband were to have a DEXA scan, he might discover that his body fat percentage is still above the normal range for men, which is 10-12%. We have had people on these forums being told that they are “too thin,” and a lot of it is that our expectations have been readjusted. Take a look at pictures of shirtless soldiers and sailors from World War II or kids at the Woodstock festival, and compare them with pictures from today, and you will see that the normal human body is actually supposed to carry far less fat than we suppose these days.
In any case, if your husband likes his new weight and wants to maintain it, one of the things he should be eating more of is not fat, but protein. Protein is what muscle and bone is made of, and if he’s getting enough of it, his body may well decide to add some muscle and to increase his bone density. This will increase the reading of his scale without necessarily affecting his waist line, since muscle and bone are far denser than fat tissue.
Also, since your husband is concerned about contracting Alzheimer’s disease, he can increase his circulating ketone levels by adding some exogenous ketones to his diet. These supplements are not usually necessary, but can be helpful in the case of people like your husband. The additional β-hydroxybutyrate will help feed his brain and will help dissolve the amyloid plaque and neurofibrillary tangles that are the signs of the disease. As one brain specialist has pointed out, Alzheimer’s disease is partly a problem of glucose metabolism in the brain, caused by insulin resistance, and brain cells that can no longer metabolize glucose well can often still metabolize β-hydroxybutyrate quite easily.
We realize he needs a dexa scan. He is skin and bones right now - what we can see.