ffskier, I agree with you regarding carbs. It has been my own experience, regardless of what popular science in the lowcarb and ketogenic field says, about carbs not being essential, that what will happen when carbs are entirely omitted, is that the body will find a way to compensate, it will downregulate. It has been my experience that when you add carbs in your WOE, still keeping it keto, your body ramps up its metabolism, and so weightloss ensues. To simply vilify carbs and omit them for the rest of your life, does not ensure against the body not storing energy/fat. In fact, the way I see it a zero carb WOE will encourage the body to hold onto the energy, to store the fat. Even if excessive amounts of proteins are consumed. Variety is the spice of life, and moderation, well, it’s just common sense. But I do believe this has a lot to do with the biome, which bacteria feeds off which foods and elicit cravings. If there are no such cravings, I’m certainly fortunate enough not to have any, then perhaps it’s due to having changed the biome, science shows we change it all the time through what we eat, so the saying, we are what we eat, is true in that sense. I don’t see carbs as not essential, or all plants as poison, that is a very black and white way of looking at it, and in life, there are no absolutes, and so many variables, so those two popular statements do not apply to each and every single individual.
Eating in moderation works
It’s a good question, and agronomists I trust insist that the data show that it doesn’t get passed on into the meat. However, one of the benefits of regenerative grazing is that the health of the animals is so much better after a couple of years that synthetic fertilisers, antibiotics, pesticides, and herbicides become unnecessary. (This has the added benefit of allowing the rancher a greater profit, without having to charge as much as other ranches must for their grass-fed beef.)
Unfortunately finding such a regenerative operation can be tricky. Many such operations do not find it worthwhile to apply for “organic” certification because it doesn’t fit their way of doing things, and many certified organic operations still use pesticides and herbicides (those permitted by the certification standard, of course). If you can find an operation that employs sound regenerative practices, however, you are likely to discover that their meat tastes better than equivalent organic grass-fed meat. A lot of people don’t like the taste of organic grass-fed, but the improved soil quality and greater variety of forage when regenerative methods are applied make for a tastier product.
The key as I have said is a balance in the diet that keeps a healthy amount of healthy carbs, and staying away from the carbs that cause issues. So my goal is not eating a strict keto diet but a diet low enough in carbs to be healthy and keep the body satisfied. And that seems to be an average of about 50 total carbs per day, some days I will have closer to 75 carbs other days I may be down below 25 carbs. I am also some days have a heavy protein day and some days a heavy fat intake day. It seems at least for me that I need to satisfy my body by keeping it guessing as to what I am eating but with the overall concept of staying within the low carb lifestyle. So far my no no has been wheat and oats, and to keep my starchy carbs to the bare minimum.
Hi Chuck, it boils down to N=1. It’s whatever works for you, and clearly, how you are eating has been and is working very well for you🙂
“Leptin-resistance” is a loaded phrase. When insulin is elevated, it competes with leptin for the leptin receptors in the ventromedial hypothalamus. This is what I would call “leptin blocking,” not leptin resistance. (This blocking effect makes evolutionary sense when one thinks of eating quantities of carbohydrate in the autumn in order to put on weight for winter hibernation.)
When we embark on a ketogenic diet, most of us find that our leptin receptors work just fine, without insulin getting in the way. Hence we experience what has been called the “anorexia of ketosis.” Dr. Phinney complains bitterly about this term, by the way, on the grounds that (to paraphrase), “They tell us to eat less, and then protest when we find a way of eating less without getting hungry.”
The way things are supposed to work is that we get hungry, eat enough food to last us for a while, the adipose tissue signals the brain with leptin to say that we don’t need any more food, and the brain shuts off ghrelin for a while. Eventually, we get hungry again, and the cycle repeats.
As for losing muscle mass on a well-formulated ketogenic diet, when eaten to satiety, this way of eating is protein-sparing. People who lose a significant amount of weight can expect their muscle mass to decline somewhat, simply because they will need less muscle because of not having so much fat to haul around. This is perfectly benign, and doesn’t count as muscle wasting. On a high-carb diet, however, as you point out, muscle wasting is very hard to avoid, especially if we are following the recommendation to limit our protein intake.
We just ordered some great farm meat 
SO much cheaper than the cheapest beef but well, it’s pork 
The available amount is small, I already didn’t get my perfect pork chuck (the best cut ever 
my firm forever favorite) after some hours after the notice but I calculated how much it would cost to eat only good farm meat and as good as I can get eggs… Even if I could eat in a very disciplined, simple, modest way (and I am quite far from that), I surely would go over $5 a day and I can’t afford that. But maybe later. It’s not THAT much more expensive and if I could do some simple carnivore OMAD, it wouldn’t be more expensive than my wilder, higher-cal days. Wow, that farm is good. And I know them and trust them and they have great pork… I only tried smoked pork and piglet this far so I am curious and excited. But it will be good.
Why? My body surely doesn’t do that but even in general, what is the logic in that? And one can’t store fat they don’t eat or need to use up. Overeating fat and/or protein? Sure, that’s a problem but eating right? Sounds perfect to me and ask the carnivores, they don’t see mysterious fat gain… Or you mean it’s harder to lose fat on carnivore? It’s not true for me but I can imagine it is for some, maybe carnivore isn’t for them if they only focus on fat-loss and don’t get benefits from carnivore… But I still don’t see some more general logic.
I agree that plants are very different for different people. I never could consider them toxic at all. Yeah, they have potentially problematic substances, it’s individual if they are bad for someone, good or neutral. I believe they are okay for me except they are carby so I should be careful with them. But for now, until I get more trained, it’s mentally easier to try to be stricter. And losing fat is so very difficult for me that I need to be stricter too. As much as I am able to, that’s not so much, actually… But I never plan to embrace plants regularly again as those carbs mess with me. But it’s me, I am fine with others eating lots of plants and carbs if it’s healthy for them.
Hi Shinita, I think in my case it was clogged lymph and water retention. But some people do put on weight on carnivore, and I was pondering that, wondering if the body could be compensating and downregulating because of the lack of carbs. Or that excessive protein could kick one out of ketosis. As to plants, yes it’s probably a matter of some being good, some bad some neutral, to different people. To me they have shown me benefits. When I was carnivore I noticed the skin on my hands was becoming so dry. I kept moisturising like crazy, but it didn’t fix the problem. After adding back in vegetables, berries, fruit (avocado, cucumber, bell peppers) and nuts, my skin is turning smooth again. So that’s one way they’ve shown me to be beneficial. I also felt I looked more tired on carnivore, and more youthful on keto. So these plants, they do have value. But the most important benefit by far is that they appear to improve the functionality of my lymphatics. We’re all different, and all our experiences and stories will be different. Now I’m off to bedfordshire to catch some beauty sleep.
I find the same thing re good and bad veg for me - l absolutely can’t eat spinach , potatoes or aubergine at the moment and bananas send my blood glucose through the floor! Yet others are well tolerated!
Hi Eve, which vegetables does your body do well with? I generally find vegetables fine, if steamed, cooked, or fried, but I don’t tolerate cucumbers and raw bell peppers very well, as they give me digestion issues. So I stick to avocado and berries, steamed broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and greens beans, and alternate these foods, so will choose one or two foods instead of them all in one day, and that seems to be working well. Do you tolerate fruits such as cucumber, bell peppers, avocado?
But why, what would be the logic in it?
That’s possible according to what I have read on this forum but according to it, it’s not so easy to get and it doesn’t last long. I wouldn’t think it should matter but for some individuals, possibly. Of course, getting out of ketosis isn’t enough to gain fat but it may “help”.
Interesting what vegs and lack of them can do to people… My body is super stubborn, my skin, energy level and almost everything else is the same on every woe… Only the carbs interfere and mess with me, causing certain important differences. I am so thankful for that, proper eating when one is me is difficult enough when I know the simple rules I should follow…
Hi never2late, l avoid all the root veg and starchy ones due to the high carbs. At the moment l cook all veg as raw stuff gives me indigestion, so ones that are OK are kale, celery, pak choy, courgettes, broccoli, cauliflower, cucumber, small amounts of tomato, avocado. No citrus, raspberries or strawberries, but blueberries and blackberries seem ok. Cooked peppers are fine but l don’t have too many at a time due to the carbs. The key for me at the moment is to stay away from anything raw and too acidic. Parsnips were one of my faves but they are too high in carbs for me to currently eat. Unfortunately lots of other stuff gives me indigestion as well- all processed and canned meats and fish are just dreadful 
- l look 6 months pregnant within 10 minutes of eating them! I am hoping that these issues will ease somewhat in time.
Hi Shinita, it sounds like you’re a metabolically healthy person, and very lucky in being so. We all have different starting points and varying goals, but generally we all just want to feel well in ourselves, strong and healthy. I don’t think it’s a problem to implement changes to our WOE, so long as we focus on nourishing whole foods, one ingredient foods as opposed to ultra-processed foods. Of course, heavy whipping cream and cheese are processed foods, even though they are also one ingredient foods, and bacon has nitrates and nitrites. But we can’t let perfect be the enemy of good. The food we eat and have access to now is not entirely the same as that of our ancestors, so we can only do our best.
I think it could be worth considering that our behaviours are a way of confirming our beliefs. Changing our core eating behaviour’s is hard as it might not relate to hunger but to our core self beliefs.
I have done 3 weeks on OMAD without losing weight as I can’t limit quantity when I eat.
I have to finish what’s on my plate otherwise -
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Like my mum said I won’t grow ( or did she mean she can’t afford to give me other food and she’s too tired to make me something else)
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It’s a waste of my money in an over populated world running out of resources (or do I want to eat the food my family won’t eat because I don’t deserve what I want).
Just learning this so I could be wrong but someone else could know better?
I don’t see the problem with finishing the plate? I always finish my plate, unless I have a cold in which case my appetite goes, and eat till I’m pleasantly stuffed. I don’t do OMAD but eat 2-3 meals a day, some days my body is quite happy with just 2. My late breakfast today 3 of my pastured eggs fried in butter, with plenty of butter on and generously salted. Delicious. Later I’ll eat some smoked mackarel fillets. I don’t know where you are weight wise? I was 52-53kg last I checked, but I’ve since stopped weighing myself as I don’t believe it’s very useful. Better to just assess how your body feels, how your clothes fit, and how you think you look in a mirror. OMAD isn’t for everyone though, Dr. Jason Fung believes it’s better to switch it up, keep your body guessing. Ever watched Dr. Fung? He has a youtube channel I listen to sometimes, though I don’t fast myself, just follow hunger and satiety signals. But I don’t think you should let yourself walk around feeling hungry, but then it might get easier for you once you’re fatadapted? As by then, cravings you might have had at the start tend to go, and your hunger will be much less, sort of a gentle nudge rather than your body screaming feed me.
I don’t see the problem with not finishing the plate. Why would it be wasteful, we just eat it later…
But if one knows what amount they need on OMAD, they just don’t put more than that on a plate…? So I don’t get the mental need to overeat on OMAD…
I only would do it if I stayed hungry otherwise but OMAD would work well for me I believe. I just rarely can do it.
I often don’t finish my plates (no way I only have one plate per meal, sometimes my food can’t even fit my tray and I don’t use big plates/bowls) because I just get satiated earlier. It was almost completely unknown for me before carnivore but now it happens. Sometimes I even have a proper stop signs and I CAN’T physically eat more then. I don’t even have a chance to finish and it’s cool.
It probably isn’t the same for everyone and some get it right in ketosis, apparently but it’s exactly what happened when I got fat adapted. Well, softer, not necessarily less. I still can have a soft but still annoying little hunger that can’t abate until I eat a ton of food. But that’s the worst case and it’s still way better than my old out of the blue attention seeking one. I usually can wait a bit now. Sometimes hours. Convenient (I usually could wait before too, it would have been totally awful to have that strong, sharp and impatient one all the time… But it happened regularly. I am so very thankful to keto to lose that.)
Shinita, I was the same on my HC/LF WOE or probably worse, I used to get hangry every couple of hours, lol. I too am grateful for my proper hunger and satiety signals, and for feeling absolutely fine and nicely satiated many hours between my meals. Also, I agree with us all being different, and getting different results and benefits on a ketogenic WOE.
If you are a legal adult, then you have the moral and legal authority to do as you please; your mother can’t order you around any more. (Took me years to realise that!) So what is to stop you from putting what remains on your plate into the fridge for later? You don’t have to eat it all in one go.
Alternatively, use a smaller plate, so that if you can’t stop yourself from filling it up, the quantity is less.
My mother, who, like yours, also grew up during the Great Depression, wasn’t so big on making us eat a large quantity of food, but she did insist that whatever we put on our plates we had to finish. I learned to take small portions, because we could always take more, but not less. But even that notion can be a trap, one that it took me decades to overcome.
I can’t evaluate this because you didn’t define what it means to eat in moderation. Are you saying portion control? It so, I have to disagree with you and can prove you wrong. When I was diabetic, but before I knew it, I lost 35 pounds eating in a caloric deficit on a plant-based diet by portion control—moderation! My a1c was 10.4. Therefore, moderation didn’t work.