Does anyone know of any actual studies that have been done on the effects of a high fruit/low fat diet without the inclusion of carbs such as processed crap, grains, rices, etc, the only carbs coming from Fruit (a lot of fruit at that) and vegetables? Im wondering what kind of effect it has on insulin levels, cholesterol levels, thyroid levels, if it can cause fatty liver, etc. Im trying to convince my husband to give up the large amounts of fruits he eats on a daily basis and I haven’t found any studies that fit those parameters. Most of the studies of high fructose consumption seem to include fructose from processed foods and the glucose/fructose you get from breads, pastas, and grains, not from fruit fructose only.
High fruit consumption
carl
(carl)
#2
I don’t know of any, but we know what fructose does and how it is metabolized. That’s enough for me. You could use a gluccometer and test yourself. You will definitely see a rise in blood sugar.
Sheri_Knauer
(Sheri Knauer)
#3
I’ve been keto for 9 months and might have a handful of berries once a month. My husband has been eating a boatload of fruit everyday and low fat. I’ve been hoping to find something to help him understand how eating that much fruit could negatively affect his health. Once, I tried to take his blood glucose reading but he acted like I was coming at him with an ax to collect the blood so it did not go over well, lol.
Tim_Scudder
(Tim Scudder)
#4
Sheri,
Robert Lustig et al have done the research on fructose (“alcohol without the buzz”, see below). I would recommend watching talks by him on YouTube or reviewing his many PubMed entries (I’ve included a couple below). The key take away for me was that fructose and alcohol get processed by the liver in almost identical pathways. High levels of fructose consumption is a significant causal factor in NAFLD: Non Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease. Once I understood the metabolism of fructose and alcohol and the inflammation they can cause at prolonged, high levels (they are both hepatotoxins), I cut them both out of my diet. I’ve been fructose/alcohol free for a year and a half. This may not be an accurate or fair analogy, but I think giving kids a high-sugar cereal and fruit juice breakfast is not too far from giving them a shot of grain alcohol…from their liver’s perspective…what a way to start the day. This is why we are seeing young kids that consume a high sugar/fructose diet end up with the same Fatty Liver Disease that alcoholics have…and at age 8 and 9! Saddens me to think that I used to feed this food to my (now adult) kids. So…what about the fruit? Fruit is just fructose with fiber…the fiber will moderate the fructose load on the liver, but overconsuming fruit will eventually put the same burden on your liver.
Another angle to think about this topic is to look at the evolutionary reason we love and consume fruit (aka fructose). Just like bears that gorge on berries late in the summer/fall, our hormones and metabolism evolved to crave the sweetness of fruit that came in the late summer and ate it until the end of the season…this fattened us up in preparation for winter. But this food was only around for a few months and only once a year. We now eat a non-stop “…it’s fall, eat fruit, winter is coming…” diet. I, for one, am not surprised that we’re getting sick chronically eating this way. Nothing in biology makes sense, except in the light of evolution (not sure who said that, but it’s should be in the keto-manifesto…I should write that!).
Here is a good YouTube talk from Robert Lustig on Sugar (but he addresses the Fructose component in this talk too)
Here is an entry from a Mar 2013 PubMed article from him:
In the hypercaloric glycogen-replete state, intermediary metabolites from fructose metabolism overwhelm hepatic mitochondrial capacity, which promotes de novo lipogenesis and leads to hepatic insulin resistance, which drives chronic metabolic disease. Fructose also promotes reactive oxygen species formation, which leads to cellular dysfunction and aging, and promotes changes in the brain’s reward system, which drives excessive consumption. Thus, fructose can exert detrimental health effects beyond its calories and in ways that mimic those of ethanol, its metabolic cousin. Indeed, the only distinction is that because fructose is not metabolized in the central nervous system, it does not exert the acute neuronal depression experienced by those imbibing ethanol. These metabolic and hedonic analogies argue that fructose should be thought of as “alcohol without the buzz.”
Tim_Scudder
(Tim Scudder)
#6
I can remember being in line for a movie at the Mountain View Century theaters in 2003 (near where Google is now) and being asked a question about the movie times by a guy behind me…I turned around to answer and it was a, surprisingly, chubby Steve Jobs…I remember noting his weight. I now wonder if he was on the metabolic-syndrome pathway…pancreas and all. I have no right to criticize…7 years later I was in the same place!
Chance
(David)
#7
From memory, Steve Jobs always looked in pretty good shape for his Key Note addresses, or is my memory playing tricks. I wonder if he shed weight for them.
Tim_Scudder
(Tim Scudder)
#8
Maybe “chubby” is the wrong word…let’s say he was plumper than I was expecting. No disrespect to the man…he did amazing things for Apple.
Sheri_Knauer
(Sheri Knauer)
#10
Yes, true. I did mention that to him a when he first started the high fruit last Sept but he made some stupid comment about how he survived longer with the pancreatic cancer because he started high fruit diet and I think I just left the room before I said something not that nice because I figured after that comment, whats the point? I will relook at some stuff in regards to Steve Jobs and his diet.
trekkin1
(Jo Lo)
#11
Be sure to watch the links on Dr Lustig above. They are quite definitive.
The material on Jobs is controversial, but warns against the fad of frutitarianism IMO.
Part of the problem is that modern fruit is hybridized to have extremely high sugar content. Fruit was healthier 50 or 100 years ago, when it was eaten seasonally, not every day all year long. Major consumption of fruit fails when put through an ancestral filter. Our bodies are not adapted for that and bad things can happen. Plus, fruit is really not very nutritious. Cellulose, sugar, and little else. Just look at the data table given by Dr Zoe Harcombe in this post:
http://www.zoeharcombe.com/2015/12/sugar-in-fruit/
ApexOnKeto
(Fran)
#12
This article was so helpful. I wish I could explain to my MIL that I don’t feed my kids fruit because it’s ultimately not good for them. She is worried about them not having enough nutrients despite the fact that they eat copious amounts of vegetables like brussel sprouts, spinach, cauliflower, cabbage, and avocado. She is horrified by our diet despite the science I present to her and my progress on becoming healthy. I guess some people just won’t be convinced.
trekkin1
(Jo Lo)
#13
Yes, we are fighting belief=religion vs reason=logic. Religion tends to win in many cases. Frustrating, isn’t it?
janknitz
(jketoscribe)
#14
I live in Santa Rosa, California, home of John McDougall who preaches a very strict vegan diet, with NO fat whatsoever. Just like Carl and Richard intend to turn Carl’s Connecticut town keto for a weekend, McDougall in the 80’s tried to convert this whole town permanently to his starch and plant-based no fat diet. He doesn’t allow ANY animal products whatsoever, very low salt and even tells people to avoid nuts, seeds, avocado, because of their fat content. (He has been known to say that a bottle of Coca Cola is healthier than a glass of milk because at least the Coke doesn’t have any fat). Until very recently there were still a few restaurants in town featuring “McDougall” entrees (how many ways can you serve steamed vegetables and grains with no salt???) on their menus. A lot of people I know adopted the diet, lost a lot of weight and looked sick and drawn in the process. Nobody I know stuck with it for very long and all regained their weight.
He used to have a radio show on a local station where people could call in and ask their questions about his diet. One call I particularly remember was from someone who complained that his triglycerides went through the roof on this diet. Without skipping a beat, McDougall told the guy to stop eating fruit–he knew that the must be eating a ton of fruit and mentioned that too much fruit is not healthy because of the fructose’s effect on the liver and pancreas. Dr. Plant-based himself was saying this.
I don’t think fruit is inherently dangerous, especially for kids who don’t really need to be at ketogenic diet levels of carbs. As with everything, the dose makes the poison. I’d stillrather see my kid eat an apple than a slice of chocolate cake, but certainly wouldn’t want her to get the majority of her calories from fruit every day.
Sheri_Knauer
(Sheri Knauer)
#15
Ugh. I was just reading some crap about Dr McDougall about an hour ago. What a whack job! I agree about kids and fruit. Id rather my kid have an apple than some candy. Now if you have a child that already has metabolic issues, like the ones you hear are diagnosed with type 2 diabetes or fatty liver or something like that as young as 2, then I would eliminate fruit. But as long as they don’t have those issues and they are active, then a few servings of fruit a day is fine.
ApexOnKeto
(Fran)
#16
Yes, I agree fruit is better than cake. And I do let my kids eat fruit. I just don’t buy it often and I try to buy what’s in season. But my kids will eat their body weight in fruit if they could and that was before I went keto. So I treat it like a treat and let them enjoy it once in a while. But when they’re at a friend’s or grandma’s I don’t worry about it.
farmgirl
(Arlene)
#17
Did you notice a small milk chocolate bar had virtually the same amount of sugar, and more vitamins and minerals than the fruit? Just think, I could’ve eaten so many more chocolate bars and totally skipped the guilt helpings of healthy fruit instead. Ah, the years wasted. 