Disappointed after 13 months

#32

Really?
It’s borderline impossible anyway and very much unnecessary for most of us and I don’t even talk about the people who feels way better with a bit more carbs.
I ate any amount of carbs between 3 and 19g of carbs on my carnivore days (I don’t consider my exceptional milky day properly carnivore, that was very sugary). It’s safer and better if I mostly stay below 10 but I need some allowance to have some of my favorite items. I am sure I am not the only one.
Well, we all should figure out our own sweet spot. Mine is way below my ketosis carb limit for sure but zero is out of question.

#33

Hi Wendy and @PaulL,

Paul, I understand that we get our energy from other sources. But from fat, too. Even folks who eat, say 100 g carbs a day.

How could you (Wendy) not be in ketosis eating 60g of carbs? 60 x 4 = 240 Kcal. Your body didn’t work only with this energy. You’ve got at least about 900 kcal from something else than the carbs you’ve eaten. Some part of it, from fat, therefore, ketosis. Probably, over 50% from ketosis, no? Otherwise, you’d have shrunk (if you had lost only bone and muscle - no fat - equivalent to those 900 Kcal/day).

I get confused with this.

Fat adaptation: isn’t the idea that we shouldn’t be eating carbs because we evolved eating protein and fat? But a few centuries eating carbs and our bodies don’t know how to burn fat anymore? And it learns again how to burn fat and use it for fuel by eating keto for months, but then our body forgets again if you eat 60 g of carbs instead of 20?

Am I the only one who finds it weird?

I’m not asking because I want to eat carbs. I don’t! I’m happy plenty with less than 20g most days and never go over 30.

I just find the thing of “out of ketosis” because a 20-60g of carbs difficult to understand.

If eating 30g I’m not in ketosis, I should be shrinking. I’m not. I don’t lose weight, I don’t put weight on. Mind you, I don’t care, because I’m happy with my weight.

I’m ok with just saying “I feel so and so and I don’t know why”. What I don’t get is all the certitude of knowing it’s the 40 extra carb g that made me go out of ketosis, I’m not fat adapted, etc, that’s the reason I felt/feel like this. Do you understand my confusion?

There aren’t answers to all of our questions. And it’s ok.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #34

The issue here is insulin level, not the quantity of carbohydrate consumed. The production of ketone bodies is stimulated by glucagon and inhibited by insulin. They work in tandem. A low ratio of insulin to glucagon is ketogenic, a high ratio of insulin to glucagon is not.

Glucagon secretion is stimulated by a low-carbohydrate diet; whereas insulin secretion is stimulate by a high-carbohydrate diet. The threshold at which carb intake becomes too much depends on how insulin-resistant a person is. Too much carbohydrate for too many years leads to a situation in which cells are overwhelmed by the insulin generated to bring blood sugar down (remember that a carbohydrate consists of glucose molecules arranged in various ways), and so they down-regulate their insulin receptors in self-defense. This means that it takes more and more insulin to clear the blood of a given amount of glucose. This in turn means that the insulin/glucagon ratio in someone who is insulin-resistant is going to be higher than the ratio in someone who is insulin-sensitive, when they eat identical amounts of carbohydrate. An insulin-resistant person has to really restrict carbohydrate, in order to get insulin down to the same level as a more insulin-sensitive person.

Because too much glucose in the blood is toxic, the body reacts by metabolising some of the excess and by storing the rest in the form of fat. A rise in insulin is the signal to do this. As you can imagine, when there is an emergency load of glucose, the body doesn’t want cells using ketones instead (because there is all that glucose to get rid of), so it shuts off ketone production as soon as insulin rises above a certain level. The liver stops producing ketones and starts turning excess glucose into fatty acids, and insulin tells our fat cells to take in those fatty acids and not let them out again until the emergency is over. This is why a high-carbohydrate diet is so deadly to so many people. Their muscles and other cells are being damaged by all the glucose they are being forced to metabolise, and their fat cells are getting stuffed with fatty acids they can’t let go of, because insulin is too high. And on top of it all, the excessively high insulin is also causing damage.

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #35

I think you’re confusing a couple things here. Burning fat can and does occur without ketosis. People on CICO diets do lose fat. They have a problem keeping it off because by restricting calories they also slow their metabolism.

Ketosis is a byproduct of burning fat. So ketosis can only occur when fat is burned. As pointed out by @PaulL above, glucose/insulin prevent ketosis. They also interfere with fat burn because even when you’re burning fat because you’re eating too little carbs to supply all the energy you need, at the same time insulin is locking fat inside adipose cells for storage. That’s why even though you can burn fat when not in ketosis, it’s inefficient.

The inefficiency of burning fat while insulin is stuffing it into adipose cells is why there is no ‘fat adaptation’ occurring. Fat adaptation can only occur when insulin is low enough that it’s not trying to store fat and prevent burning it.

It’s very important to understand this.

#36

Thank you, Paul!

However, we aren’t talking about someone eating in excess of what this person needs just to survive. Even people who are insulin resistant lose weight if they restrict calories. It’s tough, but it happens. It means high insulin doesn’t mean that person doesn’t need energy to survive. Energy that can’t be explained only by those 240 Kcal (60g carbs) that person has eaten. Breathing, digesting, blinking will deplete those 240 Kcal and it’s not going to be enough. The rest of the energy is going to come from burning other stuff, including fat.

Also, many people aren’t insulin resistant.

#37

I’m googling some of the things you say to try to understand. For instance: “ketosis is a byproduct of burning fat”.

I’m back with this from Diet Doctor:
" Ketosis is a metabolic state in which your body uses fat and ketones rather than glucose (sugar) as its main fuel source.

Glucose is stored in your liver and released as needed for energy. However, after carb intake has been extremely low for one to two days, these glucose stores become depleted.

Your liver can make some glucose from amino acids in the protein you eat via a process known as gluconeogenesis , but not nearly enough to meet all the needs of your brain, which requires a constant fuel supply."

So, I still don’t understand why, when one would eat 60g of carbs per day, the main fuel source wouldn’t be fat.

(I’m so sorry we’re hijacking this thread! It wasn’t my intention! If someone wants to move this discussion elsewhere…)

Ketosis and Fat Adaptation - A Discussion and Analysis
(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #38

However, there is a difference between losing weight and losing fat. It is very difficult to shed excess stored fat when insulin is high, because insulin signals fat cells not to allow the fatty acids to escape (the mechanism is more complicated than that, but that’s the gist).

(Edith) #39

This is soooooo me! Just add berries, dark chocolate, black and green tea to the list.

#40

Though I personally agree with you, for some individuals, cutting carbs works, too. I personally find it a miserable way to live, but it works for some folks, too.

https://www.cell.com/cell-metabolism/fulltext/S1550-4131(15)00350-2

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #41

You know what, that’s a good point:

Attention: @PaulL @OldDog @VirginiaEdie @ctviggen @OldDoug @PetaMarie Please help out as you can and deem appropriate. Thanks.

PS: Maybe one of you admins can copy the relevant posts talking about ketosis and fat adaptation from this topic to the new one?

(Edith) #42

I believe it also has something to do with the degree of insulin resistance one has. A VERY insulin resistant person has a much lower carb tolerance than someone with better metabolic health.

#43

You went right to the point that keeps me hoping. I think I have some undesirable degree of insulin resistance. That’s the main reason I’ll keep eating very low carb, no matter how weak I feel. I think I’ve caught the problem early on and I hope I can heal by eating very low carb.

I’ve never been diagnosed as diabetic, not even pre, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t coming to that point in a near future if I hadn’t taken measures. I’ve decided to do something about it and started keto about 1 year ago. I don’t regret it! I feel super weak, but I’m confident eventually I’ll find something to make it better, all the while keeping insulin as low as possible, to undo the damage, at least in part, that eating low fat has done to my body.

(Edith) #44

I wish I could provide some kind of answer to your feeling weak. That is not something I’ve had after becoming fat adapted. It took me almost six months before I could exercise and not have the lead feeling in my legs, but certainly not a year.

I do eat a lot of protein, more than the 1g per kg of body weight that is suggested. I never found fat as satiating. In fact, I don’t think I got enough vitamins and minerals when I was eating more fat.

#45

The main source would be fat, sure. But the carbs are probably high enough to prevent ketosis. It’s late and the others are so much better with science so I stop here. I just can tell you I lost much fat easily eating <80g carbs, feeling good, nice satiation all day, those were my successful times. Unlike many others, I needed to go lower eventually, though. But I mostly used dietary fat and a tiny bit of body fat to fuel me, clearly, what else?

#46

@Corals I think a normal human body oxidizes dietary fatty acids for energy, and that process produces ketones in anyone. The presence of ketone bodies in the blood doesn’t necessarily mean you’re in “ketosis”. -osis refers to an excess of something. I’m inclined to think @Carnivoor is correct that there is a spectrum of ketone concentration in the blood, and what you call ketosis might at some level arbitrary.

Interestingly, before I went carnivore-ish —and was eating up to 60 g carbs some days—I had periods of such utter exhaustion that I thought I would slip into a coma! Clearly my ability to metabolize my dietary fat for energy was messed up. Now at close to zero carbs (day 5), my energy is incredibly high and constant.

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #47

Oxidation of fat for energy occurs in everyone but synthesis of ketones only occurs when insulin is below a critical level. Yes, presence of ketones in blood is an indication of ketosis - which in this case does not mean an excess. @Carnivoor is incorrect about his ‘spectrum’ description.

#48

This is interesting.

But for the record, I don’t eat 60g of carbs. I only talked about 60g as an example. Because that is still only 240 Kcal. I’m someone is eating for 2000 Kcal, 240 Kcal is still a very small part of that.

As for the ketosis being an excess, I need to read more about this. I’ve seen links were posted. I’ll do some reading.

I don’t feel like excess is necessary. But the problem is that it feels like I’m in serious deficit.

I’ve tried carnivore and felt so unhappy. It isn’t for me. I like to have some veggies, even if it’s just the tiniest stick of celery, or some broccoli. It makes me happy when I eat. Tough I love fat, like butter, I don’t like meat. I could eat just the fat of the bacon, for instance (take all the meat part out). But it gets boring.

(Vic) #49

A few years ago, my youngest daughter, then 10y old. Sometimes played wit my Ketonix.

Sometimes it would be more then zero and even close to nutritional ketosis leven.

She was eating lots of carbs including candy, fruit and junkfood. No way ran out of glucose as we see it.

I agree, I’m wrong.
Saving a bit of scepticism thou, in human biochemistry thing are rarely on/off, black or white, its always shades of grey.

Insulin has the dominating role in this story

(Edith) #50

@Wendy198 and @Corals,

Years ago I was listening to Keto for Women podcast and the host mentioned something about keto limbo: too few carbs to be a sugar burner and too many carbs to be a fat burner. This can cause a total lack of energy because you’re not getting enough carbs to use for energy, but you can’t access your fat stores to utilize the fat for energy. I would imagine everyone’s threshold for limbo would be different depending upon metabolic health, activity level, etc.

#51

@amwassil Ok, I just reviewed the biochemistry on this topic and see I am also probably wrong and that ketosis is more like an on or off state in fatty acid oxidation. Fatty acids that you eat are of course an energy source but the oxidation cycle doesn’t always produce ketones.

I’m intrigued by what @VirginiaEdie mentioned about keto limbo. It sure felt like that was what I was in for a couple months when my carbs were vacillating between 20 and 60, day to day. Maybe my body was not able to turn ketosis on and off quickly enough.

@Corals I am on day 5 of mostly carnivore and can’t say I love it but am trying to learn to live with it for 30 days. The reason is that I have not felt this good in ages. My pain level (a very motivating factor) is way down. After 30 days of this, I’m hoping to add certain veggies I really miss back slowly to see their effect.