Can we please stop repeating the “You have to eat at a deficit to lose weight on KETO” lie?

(Annette ) #61

I raised my calories and am back to losing after a stall. Works for me.

(PSackmann) #62

Chiming in here as another foodie…are you hungry between breakfast and dinner, or just “nibbly”? That’s been the biggest lesson for me, is learning when I’m actually hungry, or when it’s just because my mouth wants something to do. I don’t think that’s restricting, it’s simply not over-eating, if that makes sense.

(Scott) #63

No! This can’t be. The laws of thermodynamics and CICO prohibit this. Worlds will collide and civilization will end as we know it, all because of keto ahhhhh.
Uhm, or you will break a stall and lose weight. Take your pick. :laughing:

(Dirty Lazy Keto'er, Sucralose freak ;)) #64

Hungry. No question about it. I get a little bit of that “I have to eat something” crashy feeling. NOT like I used to when I ate carbs, but still, its definitely NOT an eating out of boredom thing either. Lucky for me, my GF usually has some fat bombs in the freezer, so I will eat two of those (and not even feel the need for 6 more) and bam ! I’m good for how ever many more hours until dinner. I think a couple of these are about 100-150 cals.

Once in while, if Im up long enough after dinner, I will eat another fat bomb or two, and that is usually about half hungry, and half, just because those fat bombs are really tasty :slight_smile: And so I have a little mini-fail :slight_smile: lol

(Full Metal KETO AF) #65

@goohsmom I am a big time foodie. I love cooking and eating good food. I made my living cooking delicious foods. But my definition of “good food” has changed drastically.

@FishChris You are still a newbie with keto and as you said a previous food hog. So you are still in the process of change. Eating hyper palatable food with lots of artificial sweeteners might fit your keto macros but it will never help you achieve normal satiety signals. You want that stuff simply because it tastes good to your sugar addicted taste buds. That stimulates eating keto deserts and treats even though you probably ate enough meat. If you quit focusing on the deliciousness of food rather than listening to your body’s satiety signals to regulate appetite you will never sort that out and will probably eat more than you really need. I think you’re doing well now but it may eventually backfire as far as progressing toward having healthy regulation with your hormones dictating how much you put in your mouth rather than your taste bud indulgence for pleasure. :cowboy_hat_face:

(Dirty Lazy Keto'er, Sucralose freak ;)) #66

David, fair enough. And I’m not going to jinx myself, by telling you your wrong. But as long as this is working for me, I’m not planning any major changes either.

(Susan) #67

Exactly this! That was what broke my 2 month stall as well Annette =).

(Susan) #68

You are also a nursing mommy with 3 little children running around demanding mommy’s attention, so this is really great for you to know, not to cut calories, so you have lots of milk and don’t get all run down yourself =)). If you keep those carbs at 20 grams or less and no sugar, fill your body full or proteins and healthy fats and you will do great =).

(CharleyD) #69

@David_Stilley Thank you for that. It takes courage to post a correction!

(PSackmann) #70

I’ve learned, over half the time that “crashy” feeling is either thirst or a desire for salt for me. I prefer to stretch out as long as possible between eating, to leverage low insulin levels as long as possible, so I started trying just a bit of salt washed down with water. After a few minutes, if that didn’t work, it would be a pat of butter with a bit of salt, hoping for a minimal if any insulin response. Most times, that will work and the “crashy” feeling goes away. True hunger, for me, is when I start to think about eating and just know I’m going to be ravenous…until I’m not. It is a sudden thing, that switch to not. I could over-ride it if I wanted to, but why should I? It’s my body telling me a signal, each time I respond correctly, the signals become clearer.

(Dirty Lazy Keto'er, Sucralose freak ;)) #71

A lot of times, I will drink something with zero carbs (a drink with artificial sweetener, or water, it makes no difference) when I feel hungry… but once I’m really hungry, it really doesn’t go away until I have a little snack… But the good thing is, it can truly be a “little snack”… and then I’m good for several more hours…

(April Harkness) #72

WHat @David_Stilley said about hyper palatable foods with artifical sweeteners. I had to cut out ALL artificial sweeteners, and even the keto fat bombs on standard keto were causing me to gain weight again. So I stopped. For me…Never is easier than “sometimes”. (yes, I stole that from a book called “Never Binge again.” ) Do cals count on keto? Hell yes. Especially when you eat a dozen “keto” fat bombs.

(PSackmann) #73

For me, the pat of butter is enough for a “little snack”, anything more and I go ahead and eat a full meal’s worth of food. There are days that I do eat 3, sometimes 4 meals, if that’s what my body really wants. Point being, it’s what my body wants, not what my brain thinks it wants.

(Scott) #74

I used to hit a bag of macadamia nuts that I keep in my office daily at 9:30. When I added an extra breakfast meat and added butter to the grease in the pan without draining to my eggs my snacking stopped. The bag of nuts is still there but it is my wife that is coming in to snack now.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #75

@Rclause Ha! I remember your early posts about trying to control macadamia nuts and noticed when you stopped mentioning them. Congrats on breaking the pattern!

#76

That would mean we’d have a solution to the world’s food crisis. If everyone could maintain themselves on half a chicken thigh, would that be a bad thing?

As I asked, what would an optimal BMR look like, it that were our goal?

Before keto, I was ravenously hungry all the time. Even now, I could eat an enormous amount of food in one sitting without ever feeling full. But I no longer eat nearly as compulsively as I used to. Carbs and insulin are evil. :slight_smile:

If we looked at food solely as a fuel, what would “diet” look like? How would we determine how much fuel is necessary? Wouldn’t we want to minimize the need for fuel?

That’s flawed as well.

Carbs are carbs? We have sugars, starches, fiber (soluble and non-soluble), sugar alcohols, allulose, and whatever. We’ve come up with the concept of “net carbs” to fix some of those complications.

Fats? Saturated or unsaturated? How many types of cooking oils are there?

Proteins? What about all the different amino acids? If I had a portion of liver and a portion of sirloin with equal amount of carbs, fats, and proteins, are they nutritionally identical?

What about the individual micro-nutrient content?

And, of course, there are those studies that claim we have insulin produced just by thinking about food. Or by consuming beverages and foods with no nutritional content.

No matter what you choose, it has complications. At some point, you have to reduce the situation to a simplistic model, introducing limitations and flaws in that reduction.

I guess we need to add diet to the list of prohibited topics of politics and religion? After all, that’s the first rule of keto – don’t talk about keto. :frowning:

(Full Metal KETO AF) #77

Carbs aren’t a significant part of my diet. I went into a whole carbs are carbs argument on another thread so don’t jump to conclusions they are insignificant on a keto diet when you restrict that below 20grams. Actual micro nutrients aren’t part of this thread so comparing different proteins and fats for ideal balance is another subject all together. This is about eating at a deficit. Let’s stay focused on that. Curious why you have a problem with Ken Berry MD?

(Full Metal KETO AF) #78

Talking about diet is what this forum is for @OgreZed, I don’t get what your wrap up statement implies, I never meant to insult you, although I might have worded the title better substituting misinformation for lie, I only was talking about the spreading of what I perceive as a lie, not accusing anyone of being a liar. I think it’s absolutely a critical topic for discussion and something people starting out should be exposed to ASAP to start the thinking process right.

(Scott) #79

I only eat nuts for desert after dinner or lunch now. I did find a new type at Lidl that is just as addictive, Coco dusted almonds!

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #80

Yes, you are not restricting your intake. :grin: This is because you are listening to your body and letting it decide how much to eat. If you need 2500 calories/day, and your body knows where it can find an extra 1000 calories that it doesn’t need, it will stop you from eating when you’ve reached around 1500, by suddenly causing you to lose interest in eating more (what we call “satiety”). Note that this is not caloric restriction, because you are still meeting your need for 2500 calories, merely from two separate sources.

Now if you decided that your caloric need was 2000 calories (as many people like to believe), and on top of that you decided to eat an 800-calorie deficit, you’d be taking in 1200 calories and stopping before you got satiated. Your body would then recognize that there was a famine going on, and would reduce its energy expenditure to 1200 calories in order to compensate. It will also retain any fat you may happen to have lying around in your fat tissue, regardless of whether you are eating low-carb or not, so as to still have something of a reserve for when the famine gets really desperate.

I hope I’ve made it clear that the first situation is the result of working with the body’s natural processes, the only mental effort required being that of avoiding carbohydrate, so as to free said natural processes to work properly. The second situation is the result of a conscious decision to interfere with those processes, and it is what we are referring to when we advise against restricting calories.