Daily macros - need feedback

(Robert) #1

I am new here and new to Keto. I have been in ketosis for 3 weeks according to the test strips. I have been listening to the podcasts and have finally realized I needed to make some corrections to what I eat daily. I know macros are important so I ran all the numbers and got mine. Today was my first day to stick to those numbers. I made a spreadsheet that tracks what I eat and does the math for me, all I do is put in my foods.

What I need is to know if this looks like a normal daily keto diet. I want to preface this with I am not hungry. I feel great actually. I’m not starving at all. My first week here I struggled to get in all the fat and bacon I was under the impression that I needed but when I stick to my macros, there is no way to get it all in there. So, tell me what you think, is this an ok day?

Breakfast was 2 lettuce wrap BLT’s. Not hungry for lunch but had a bag of pork rinds and dinner is now. I work nights so my meals are backwards. My deficit is 20.

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(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #2

A well-formulated ketogenic diet consists of healthy whole foods in the following proportions: (1) less than 20 g of carbohydrate daily, to keep insulin secretion at a minimum; (2) “moderate” protein, i.e., somewhere in the neighborhood of a gram a day per kilogram of lean body mass; and (3) fat to satiety, in other words, until you are no longer hungry.

Fat is the only macro of the three that doesn’t stimulate the secretion of insulin (well, it does a little, but not like the other two), so it is a safe source of all the calories you are no longer getting because you are not eating carbohydrate. You should eat fat until you are satisfied, and can go several hours between meals (if you need to snack, snack on fatty foods, and eat more fat at your next meal).

If you eat the way described in the first paragraph, you won’t need to count macros, and you won’t need to count calories. Eating fat to satiety may involve eating quite a bit of food at first, but your body needs all that energy to start the healing process. In a very short time, however, it will start telling you to stop eating when you’ve eaten much less, and that will be a level at which it can burn both the fat you are eating and the extra fat stored in your body. If you keep on eating fat to satiety, gradually your food intake will rise as your fat store shrinks, until you are getting all your daily calories from your food—because you will no longer have any extra fat. And the beauty is that you won’t ever have to count a calorie, it will all happen automatically.

On the other hand, if you enjoy measuring stuff, have at it!

(Robert) #3

Thank you for that, Paul. I really appreciate it and you make perfect sense. I don’t enjoy measuring at all but I don’t have a problem feeling full. I don’t eat until I am full, I eat until I am no longer hungry and feel like eating. My previous diet that I transitioned from was very low calorie so I am already used to small portions. When I went Keto I had to have small meals and fatty snacks in between. But, now that I have been in Ketosis for about 2 weeks, I eat my meals until I am not hungry anymore. When I snack, it is only on fatty foods and only until I am no longer hungry. I do find myself not snacking as much though as I get used to Keto.

The problem I was having that lead me to measuring is everyone kept saying to eat fat, add bacon, cream, and butter. All of which I love. The problem is I added that even though I wasn’t hungry and ended up way over my macros. The measuring was my way of putting my food into perspective because I felt like I was constantly eating, even when full. As it turns out, I was. I was over 300 gr of fats, carbs were more than quadrupled, and protein was more than doubled. My issue was less about fats and more about not knowing how much other stuff I was eating. I took the eat fats advice and added fat even though I was not hungry but I didn’t cut back on the carbs or protein like I should have. I expect that after a few days of tracking I will be able to better judge my foods and so that I can stop tracking.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #4

Sorry people confused you. Even here on these forums, you will receive a lot of inconsistent advice. I think part of it is coming from people who haven’t absorbed the full message, which is why I repeat myself a lot, but also, people, including me, are sharing what worked for them, and it may or may not work for you. It’s a useful habit to add “YMMV” at the end of every post we read, lol!

So I hope you can simplify things to something that works for you. Just keep the carbs low, and don’t get too hungry, and a lot of the rest ought to sort itself out. Please continue update us on your progress. :bacon:

#5

Your numbers look dead on man! I’ll echo what @PaulL said about inconstant advise. It’s not that lots of people are wrong, but just like people that eat “normal” people eating keto have different goals, and different situations which dictate stuff like this. Diabetics will be much more strict with their carbs, people who are protein sensitive will stay pretty low, while people lifting weights and trying to actively put on muscle will have it a lot higher. Many are anti sweetener, Some people track religiously because they’re number nerds, or because their troubleshooting and some just let their body tell them what to do (which I did for years and it was awesome). Lot of trial and error to find out what both you and your body like and what they don’t.

#6

I’m having a hard time as well with a full day’s macros. Carbs are easy to track. Protein is fairly easy to track but my mental math could be off. Same with fat. I don’t know what to look for when I’m getting too little or too much fat. Am I really supposed to dump mayo, oil, butter and cream on everything? (exaggerating)

I was just reading about this and Heavy Cream says 0g carbs but it is actually somewhere around .4g carb per serving: 2 Tbsp. I guess they are allowed to put 0g carb if it less than .5g per serving.

Just something to consider. You may actually want to use butter, coconut oil, or drink it black if you’re putting it in coffee. Carbs add up quickly. I am just trying to figure this out myself.

(Ron) #7

Until you are fat adapted it is better to feed your body fat so it has plenty of dietary fat to draw from during the transition period. The body has to learn that it cannot use glucose for fuel and when it runs out of stored glucose you want fat available in the diet for it to be forced to use. Eventually it will adapt and you can reduce you fat intake should you choose then. Adaption can take from 4 weeks to 4 months depending on how much healing you body has to do from metabolic damages first.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #8

No, but you are supposed to get the calories you are no longer getting from carbohydrate from the fat you eat. Fat contains over twice as many calories per gram as carbohydrate, so it takes less to satisfy us, and it is the safest source of calories, because it stimulates insulin secretion hardly at all. If you cook in fat, and eat fatty meat, and put fatty dressing on your salad, and put heavy cream in your coffee, you will probably get enough fat to satisfy your hunger. If not, put more butter or gravy (made with heavy cream!) on your meat, and put cheese sauce on your broccoli. Once your hunger has been satisfied, you ought to be able to go hours until your next meal.

(Robert) #9

Thanks. And I agree completely. It has only been 2 days but I have already stopped tracking unless I get an unknown introduced that makes me question where I am in my macro count. I also find I am down to 2 meals a day because I am just not hungry. According to the podcasts this is normal. I still get my macros in though. Gotta keep that fat coming!

(Robert) #10

Yes, I had not taken into consideration that diabetics and people maintaining have different goals. I was well into the podcasts before that occurred to me. It looks like my understanding is clear, I just need to focus on doing what my situation requires and not what works for others. There is a curve, but i’m learning. lol

(Robert) #11

I think that is the stage I am trying to get to now. Some days like today I eat and cannot finish a meal and I am not hungry for several hours. Other times hunger comes on fast and strong. At those times, it gets the fat post haste and within minutes my hunger is sated and I can go back to what I was doing. It doesn’t help that my old habits included eating all day and I never really got hunger pains so they are more noticeable now.

(Robert) #12

I feel your pain. I tell you what I started doing since I started this topic. I only track my carbs and proteins, and sugars while I am trying to get keto adapted. Fats don’t matter so much until you are adapted. Until then, don’t worry about them. If you hit your limit on carbs and proteins but you are still hungry, eat something that doesn’t increase those but is high in fat.

By the time you are keto adapted the fats will fall inline and you can start cutting back on things like the cream and butter that are mostly fat if needed to achieve your end goal. That is what I got from the pod casts and the posts from others above.