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

(Failed) #81

Thank you for posting that, it clarifies many of the questions I’ve had about the contradictory advice I keep seeing.

The most confusing to me is:
Fasting is good, but if you even eat food on any given day, you must eat X number of calories or macros or you’ll go into starvation mode, and then people say listen to what your body is telling you: it knows what it wants.

I am listening to my body. I’m eating little food at each meal (compared to what I see others post), but I am eating until I’m full, then eating again if I get hungry later. I’m eating carnivore-fatty meat, a few pickles or some celery for variety in texture.

I’m at a stable weight right now, but my belly and midriff fat deposits are shrinking, as is the extra hanging skin left over from a large weight loss years ago. I lost an inch around my midriff this week, and the extra belly skin hangs down 1/4" less. The pee sticks are dark purple.

I’m eating as much as I want at least once a day, sometimes twice, but it’s only a fraction of what I see posted on the “What Did You Keto Today” thread. For example, on the plates I posted on there, I only ate half, saving the rest for another meal.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #82

@DeeCS Autophagy is great, I am getting it with fasting 18-19 hours everyday. A month and a half ago I had a bit of turkey neck and loose belly flab but it’s all shrunk significantly in the last month. I haven’t gone a day without eating only IF.

(Doug) #83

Scott, true - my own experience is having “wasted” a LOT of energy by making extra heat or stuff going through me without getting digested. Not a bad thing in this modern world.

Totally agree that calorie restriction, per se, works horribly for most of us, if we want weight loss.

If we want to lose weight (and I mean lose fat) then we do need to be getting energy from our stored fat, rather than from somewhere else, though. This is not to say that the simplistic advice to “eat less” will be good - it’s almost always going to be wrong or at least woefully incomplete.

What about eggs? :smile: (#4xNewmanFTW)

That’s just fine with CICO - if the calories out goes up enough to offset that big intake, why would he gain weight? Likewise, if cutting the “In” means the “Out” declines, then the vicious cycle is apparent, but that’s really no indictment of CICO - CICO is just noting what’s going on.

I agree, it’s much different and “opposite” to where many of us come from. I never count calories unless it’s just curiosity; usually on days of eating very little just by circumstance. “Caloric deficit is not necessary” - this always bugs me, because how, really, can that be? I’m not saying that eating a given amount more or less than our starting amount will necessarily predict what happens as far as weight and body composition, but there’s no magic at work, if we want to lose fat then (other than having it surgically removed) we have to metabolize it, and whether we say calories or ounces or grams or even break it down into individual atoms, then it’s a case of those atoms going one place and not another.

#84

" * If I only eat a pound of cauliflower a day, I’ll lose weight. If I eat 200 pounds of them a day, I’ll gain weight."

Without arguing, I will suggest that it is impossible to eat enough cauliflower to gain significant weight.

(Failed) #85

Congratulations, that’s great!

(Erin Macfarland ) #86

@David_Stilley a couple of things I noticed are missing in this discussion…there is no real discussion of the role of physical activity- not necessarily as something that “burns calories” but as something that has a profound effect on hormones and on building lean body mass. As a personal trainer I have to battle the commonly accepted misconception that exercise makes us lose weight because it means we’re “burning calories.” And yes we do use additional energy when we are physically active- however, exercise does produce changes in significant physiological processes that lead to lowered basal insulin levels and better clearance of glucose. (This is a generalization for simplicity’s sake!) And endurance/cardiovascular exercise can have different effects than more glycolytic/power exercise. But both are beneficial in regards to making favorable hormonal changes. Exercise also tends to improve stress levels, sleep…which also lead to reductions in hunger levels. So, it can be a great tool in recalibrating how our body utilizes fuel

(Full Metal KETO AF) #87

Maybe this is more accurate…Since we accept that a calorie isn’t just a calorie (they aren’t calories they are food), different foods elicit difference hormonal response. So eating carbs causes the most insulin. It also increases hunger so you eat more with less satisfaction. If we’re eatin more protein and fat satiety signals work properly. This means you fill up on less carbohydrates so end up eating less “calories” that don’t give you sustained energy like fat. When the fat you eat runs out you burn body fat. People might eat more “calories” eating keto but it doesn’t store as fat nearly as easy. And it catches up the next day if you eat a lot so you aren’t as hungry. This never happens eating carbohydrates. We will be just as hungry or even hungrier the day after. So over time you will limit your food by what your body wants more naturally and eating at an intentional deficit is you interfering with your natural signals. Of course when our brilliant brains get into thinking sometimes that doesn’t work out as well as the finely designed biological machines we are.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #88

@Emacfarland I absolutely agree on your point. However I wasn’t trying to make such a specialized comprehensive thread. This is for the guy on crutches or in a wheelchair as well as active people. The benefits of exercise are not in question at all here. Simply eating and hormonal responses and a reminder that looking at food as calories is erroneous, @April_Harkness made a beautiful example above how foods affected her more than calorie numbers. That’s the point I am trying to drive across and how calories in our diet don’t have much to do with anything. She stated she gained weight eating 1600 kcals with carbs and gained weight but eating 2500 kcals on carnivore made her loose weight. So what we eat is much more relevant than how hot a food burns in an oven because we aren’t just ovens “burning” food to release calories. :cowboy_hat_face:

(Erin Macfarland ) #89

@David_Stilley for sure! I wanted to parallel your discussion by dispelling similar myths around exercise…it’s not a matter of burning calories just like weight loss isn’t about reducing calories…but also wanted to include that variable of how, when you are active, and are also eating LCHF, you create a very effective environment for getting hormones to work in your favor. But it’s a great discussion, maybe one of the best I’ve seen on the forum in a while! So thank you!!

(Full Metal KETO AF) #90

@Emacfarland You are so right, lots of “no exercise necessary” posts concerning weight loss ignoring the other benefits of even lightly active living and moving your body. We have such incredibly designed skeletal/muscle structure. We can move in more articulate ways than any species on the planet yet it goes to such underuse and neglect in the modern world where we don’t have to chase game on foot and be physical or die, or run from lions and tigers and bears!

:cowboy_hat_face:

#91

I’ve just seen videos where he twisted things too far around for me. Enough that I don’t trust what he says. I give him as much credibility as those that made the What The Health documentary and the claims they make.

However, this one was a short video, so I did watch it. I agree with the spirit of what he said, but not to the extent of what he was claiming. Also, the Fung video had a couple of things misstated (e.g. mixing up BMR and TDEE, probably unintentionally), but I still knew what he meant.

I don’t often get insulted. I think this discussion has brought up a lot of good points, regardless of how it started. If nothing else, someone should come away with the impression that nutrition is complicated.

But I want to get back to the issue of measuring grams of the macros instead of calories – in the end, doesn’t that end up being somewhat equivalent?

That is, someone on keto will be consuming minimal carbs, so only a few calories come from there. More proteins are needed than carbs, but still typically a small part of daily calories (mine is higher than most, at about 40%). And isn’t the need relatively fixed?

Restricting carbs is necessary. Restricting proteins is usually not desired. Some have to prioritize proteins to make sure they meat meet their guesstimate of a macro.

But that leaves it to the fats. If fats are eaten to satiety, isn’t that in essence creating the “Calories In” portion of the CICO equation? Leaving it up to the body to worry about the “Calories Out” portion? For someone losing weight, the “deficit” would be coming from stored body fat. So when we talk about a caloric deficit (or surplus) on keto, we’re pretty much talking about how much fat is being consumed.

How different are fats in how much energy the body gets from them? Is stored body fat more or less efficient than consumed fat, gram by gram?

(Karen) #92

Pretty much what I was saying in the thread a little higher up in this discussion. It’s also what Richard, of the 2ketodudes said in an interview not that long ago, on keto woman.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #93

Fats to satiety is repeated a lot around here. But the actual biggest source of satiety is protein. When we eat protein Peptide YY is released in the small intestine and that is the primary satiety signal, fat is less and carbs is the lowest. So usually “moderate protein” is what’s recommended and that might not trigger full satiety but it goes a long way, then the advice is to shut things down the rest of the way adding fat, but who eats their macros separately? We eat a combination of foods so that fat to satiety never made sense to me. I think it’s best to just try to eat close to 65-70% fat and 25-30% protein. I have taken vegetable consumption really low in the last 6 weeks because of dental work that keeps me from chewing food. So I am eating lots of ground meats, eggs and cheese and tomatoes from my garden. Sometimes I do some cauliflower mash or broccoli cheese bakes or stewed zucchini and tomatoes. But many days it’s just 100-150g. Of tomatoes to add variety to meat and eggs. When I can chew again I am going to give carnivore a go for a while to see if I can reduce some inflammation that hasn’t gone away just with keto so I’ll be shooting for a 30/70 protein fat diet. I have a funny way of tracking. I weigh 151 right now and set a 150g. protein limit. I rarely hit that much. I set the fat macro to zero. I try to end up with more grams of fat than protein but that often requires adding an ounce of cream cheese or something to my second and final meal. I’m experimenting but the way I have been eating has gotten the scale moving again. Cronometer says 1800 kcals is what I use for maintenance. Usually I end up just above or below that with my appetite. So eating at what Cronometer said was a maximal weight loss deficit was like 1500 kcals. I tried to stay with that and fairly quickly went into a two month stall. Since going to maintenance levels of kcals I have lost about 11 lbs in the last 5 weeks. So eat more and loose more. It’s counterintuitive but that’s what resulted. I average 1000+ kcals from fat. Part of the problem with a calculator like Cronometer is that calorie amount really doesn’t tell you where to cut to stay with your deficit and the easiest way to shave calories off is to cut a bit of fat. But keeping fat grams higher than protein is an important aspect of KETO. So the ratios are more important than kcals I think because eating enough fat ramps BMR up because it’s our primary energy source and with ramped up BMR we burn more fuel and unless you keep eating more and more a natural balance comes into motion between how much we eat and we end up in a natural deficit. We either burn more body fat or if we don’t have a lot left we get hungrier for more food. It has little to do with how much I love a food anymore because I love all my cooking, I have hit a balance point where what I eat is enough to satisfy hunger and I don’t eat past about 3pm most days so I burn body fat for metabolic needs while I sleep after using what I ate as fat was used up. Then I eat about 10am after about 19 hours of fasting. I sleep a lot better with a fully empty stomach. If my stomach has food in it I get GERD because of a hiatal hernia.

(Dirty Lazy Keto'er, Sucralose freak ;)) #94

Okay. Thank you Paul :slightly_smiling_face:

(Dirty Lazy Keto'er, Sucralose freak ;)) #95

For the record, I think Dr. Ken Berry is great. And I’m not trying to nit pick every claim he makes in each of his vids. I think he probably knows more about the Keto diet and health than I do.

(bulkbiker) #96

Not sure I can agree 100% as exercise psychologically gives you the “I exercised so I can eat more (crap)” feeling… which is very counterproductive. I personally haven’t increased my exercise one iota in my weight loss journey apart from a few crazy months spent at the gym where I got an ingual (sp?) hernia for my troubles…
Still down over 120 pounds and maintaining…

(Doug) #97

David, I do agree with the effect of protein and fat. :slightly_smiling_face: It’s profound and amazing how satisfying and how long are the effects. If we want to lose fat, then as long as we’re doing what we need to, to be burning up our stored stuff, then it’s a good deal; no calorie counting required.

#98

=

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #99

Not to mention improved mitochondrial health, which does have an effect on the metabolism over time.

Although as Prof. Bikman jokes, increased efficiency in the muscles is a mixed blessing, if we have fat we want to burn off, lol!

The key word is “necessary.” Exercise is certainly a beneficial activity for those who feel motivated to do it. Some of us, however, have factors that interfere, and I like your image of the person in a wheelchair, who can certainly benefit from ketogenic eating, even without exercise.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #100

I wouldn’t expect any difference per se; since the energy content of a fatty acid depends primarily on the number of carbons it contains. If the fat in your adipose was converted from carbohydrate, it will mostly be one particular fatty acid, the name of which I am forgetting at the moment. If it came from other sources, there will be more variation.

My understanding is that the main difference among the various fatty acids is how long their carbon chains are. The enzyme that cleaves the bonds removes two carbons at a time. On a per-cycle basis, I don’t believe there is a different energy cost to metabolising different fatty acids. Cleaving a carbon bond is cleaving a carbon bond, after all. So the energy cost of the reactions involved and the ATP yield would be affected only by how many carbon atoms the fatty acid starts out with, because that would determine the number of cycles.

Of course, this is all guesswork based on my knowledge of chemistry, and could be proved wrong by experiment.