How can I want to become ketogenic again?

#143

I like listening to my body but

  1. I am aware it’s not that simple for everyone
  2. even I needed to use my brain and try things. My poor body just had no idea low-carb is so much better when it never experienced it. It’s a talented one, I felt quite okay on high-carb and didn’t even realize I eat way more than others with my stats (I gain fat super slowly due to my slightly interesting genetics).
    So I combine these things. I listen to my body but try to make my lifestyle better.
    Anyway, if we do things wrong, maybe our body and/or mind are affected and their attitude/desire/opinion is wrong. I think many of us knows that, even if we usually are fine with listening to our body. It’s rarely perfect. The body is in its own little vicious circle, at least our mind should be smart.

I personally feel what my body wants/need. The wrong cravings come from my mind (and it feels different) except if I feed wrong things to my body, that’s a problem, I should avoid that. As time passes, I slowly learn what is good for me, I need and use this knowledge.
I have several different types of urge to eat (even different types of hunger) and I easily distinguish between them as I clearly feel differently. It’s not only “hunger” or cravings/compulsions (the two types are very different, I can’t imagine having only one sign for everything). Experience and trying out things help, I don’t remember I had this huge variety many years ago. But probably not everyone has zillion types of urges to eat, normal people should live and not being addicted to the topic of food like me. I experiment and analyze and think about it a lot. It’s very interesting. Food in general is my greatest hobby.
But maybe it’s just individual. I have zillion types of headaches too and I usually now the reason, it feels different when it’s due to sleep problems, too much stimulus, lack of fresh air or something else. My body gives me lots of information, it seems though it requires some brainwork to translate it, I need to listen well and use my experiences, sometimes I make an educated guess. It’s way more clear regarding hunger/cravings. But sometimes I am not sure what is the right thing to do, nothing is perfect. My mind should came up with a solution (or I may wait for my body to make a demand and I don’t do anything until then) and hopefully it will be good enough, experience really helps there.

(Paulene ) #144

Hmm…I know this is a keto forum and some people may not like or agree with what I am about to say, but I’m going to say it anyway: I don’t believe Keto is the absolute bee-knees, end-all of diets to be on for the rest of my life, for ever and ever, amen. (Aarrgh!! There, I said it.)

I do see LOW CARB as a fantastic way to become a healthier, more energetic and slimmer version of me, and Keto is certainly one way of maintaining a low carb diet. But #@$#@ happens and there are times in life that a full Keto diet does no suit me. I actually want to enjoy a special meal with my children, no holds barred – that is part of my lifestyle that I don’t want to give up.

Food holds all sort of traditional, cultural and emotional touchpoints for our family, and my being on a keto diet does not change my family’s connection with food. For example, my dad was a huge lover of White Christmas with extra cherries and ginger and we made it for him every Christmas. My dad died 6 years ago so we continue to make Dad’s White Christmas in memory of him, even though we don’t love it like Dad did. I would never pass up a piece of Dad’s White Christmas just to stay in ketosis. Two years ago, my sister was tasked with bringing the White Christmas to our family dinner and she made a vegan zero-sugar low fat version (yeah, why bother?! I have no idea what the #$@!& was actually in it but it tasted like Vaseline.) It was such a disappointment to everyone – we all felt that Dad had no presence at that Christmas.

I actually feel a lot better eating things like (real) White Christmas now (on Low Carb/Keto) than I did before. Before, I knew it wasn’t good for me, just like I know now, but I ate it anyway and then just felt guilty. Now, I know what it does to my blood sugar and how my body will react. I also know that I can slip back into Keto again within a couple of days and will be back to burning fats.

The difference between now and then is that the locus of control has shifted. Before, I felt that I didn’t have control. Now, I know I have control so I can slip in and out of ketosis as I choose. I choose what I eat with the knowledge of how it will affect me. Most times that knowledge enables me to choose not to eat certain foods. But some days I choose not to avoid a certain food. So I will have that piece of White Christmas, then I move on. The gift that low carb/keto has given me is the ability to walk right past carbage without giving it another thought. Previously, I could not do that.

So, rather than seeing Keto as a thing I do, I see my eating as on a carb continuum. Lots of the time I am in the Deep Keto range (deep ketosis), sometimes I am in Low Carb territory (mild or dietary ketosis), and sometimes I am in Mod Carb territory (no or very minimal ketosis). Even moderate carb territory is better than SAD (Standard Australian Diet) and definitely better than SADer (Standard American Diet).

And I truly get the fake sugar thing. “Do or do not, there is no try”.

#146

It’s your life, your decision, I personally see nothing wrong with it. Especially that I don’t do keto all the time myself… You have a more noble reason than most of us to quit keto for Christmas for a short time, it works for you (some people gets into a mess for months if they dare to do such a thing or get very sick, that’s a very different case), it’s fine. It seems to me as well that you are in control, you know what you are doing.
I can’t possibly know what is good for you, even physically, we handle carbs differently. And there’s a mental, emotional part, I am against big stress and being miserable just to stick to a diet too strict for us for some reason. Sometimes we need to do it because we are killing ourselves or suffer from severe addictions but in many cases, even doing whatever feels nice and easy may work, with some knowledge and nudges, not real force. I do that as a hedonist. Most of us are bad with forcefulness long term, some of us can’t do it for 2 days… It’s fine as long as there are other working methods and it doesn’t matter if some/most people find those wrong if they that just great for us.

(Marianne) #147

I agree.

My meaning was that what was the biggest motivator for me for starting keto was cosmetic, primarily, and then health. I’m not implying that is right, that’s just how it was.

(Paulene ) #148

A member on another low carb forum has this quote on her signature:

“I don’t believe low carb should be a wagon I can fall off; I believe it should be the valley I call home.”–rightnow*

I ain’t home all the time, but when I am, it’s right and I love it.

#149

Good thought stream. I’ve been listening to Dr Robert Cywes interviews. He is a man of letters who treats certain carbohydrates as addictive. Thus he classes them as pharmaceutical, or medications, rather than food.

We eat carbohydrates, in particular sweet carbohydrates for endorphin system activation. We eat a treat to literally treat our self with an internal dose of morphine/opiate. Opiates are strong pain relievers but also create euphoria. Confusing bastards. We eat processed carbohydrates and sweet foodstuffs aiming for pleasure but gaining addiction. Within carbohydrate ‘foods’ are some nutrients. The endorphin activation helps us remember the emotional (happy or calming) response to that eaten substance, we remember how and where we accessed, not the ‘food’, not the nutrients, but the feeling.

@Paulene talks a bit about similar things where food becomes of traditions and family bonding. If we all emotionally eat together and feel happy together, this strengthens/renews community and family emotional bonds. Endorphin release is not all bad.

Food, food for nutrients, that generate a sense of satiety are influenced by hormones that control physiological homeostasis; the balance between “stop” and “go” body signals. When nutrients are needed we get hungry, we start eating/ go signal. When we have enough of the required nutrients such as essential amino acids, important electrolytes, and essential fatty acids, the homeostatic hormones switch off the ‘need’ the ‘hunger’ for those foods, we stop. Essential nutrients have tight homeostatic control, and almost subconscious drive, to obtain them, or, to stop putting them in the system.

Food, food for pleasure, food for emotional reasons, food purposely for learned endorphin activation (it feels ‘good’ but may be bad, hence the psychological confusion) are usually not essential nutrient containing and a better regarded as other than food. As such, not essential nutrients that need tight body regulation to maintain life, they do not have as tight physiological homeostasis control. They are more about higher thinking, psychological torture, or manufactured joy. Those ‘foods’ can feel like they are needed (addiction) despite their potential harm, so a person starts eating, but there is no physiological homeostatic stop point. [insert imagined food here].

Sorting out craving and hunger (an idea for an algorithm)

  1. If you feel hungry, eat food. When you don’t feel hungry, stop. (similar to @richard 's haiku)

  2. If you feel craving, stop and think. Can you eat food that is mainly essential amino acids or essential fat (e.g. steak - if that’s your bag)? Yes. Then go to 1. No. Then go to 2.

https://www.ketogenicforums.com/t/cravings-hunger/93515?u=frankobear

Metabolic Flexibility - Get Real
#150

Um.

Yeah, fair enough.

You Queenslanders!

#151

Paulene, really, stop making the YouTube clips that show how the magician does their tricks.

“It’s not a party, if it’s every night” (might be from a Saints song)

Don’t you remember your first keto high? It was like teenage love. Wasn’t it? Best Friends Forever!

The thing is we have to make impossible statements of endearment when we think we’ve found something in the forever now that will last for now and forever.

We see all the young keto Turks (newbees) profess undying (key word) allegiance to the keto way. And we jaded ones should allow their joy.

The reality is we are in a memory of a moment so nothing really exists. So there is no way anyone will be keto forever.

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#152

That was one of the best explanations I have ever seen! I am truly grateful you shared that. That is logical, simple balance. The water example was perfect for me. I have never thought that should be forced. I gag after 1 glass of water usually. I’m just not a person who dehydrates very easily. However, I have a cold so I am upping that consumption to hopefully encourage my immune system to work better. Again, thank you and I will be following this dr!!

(Paulene ) #153

Is that one of those…

:joy::joy:

And I’m a New South Welchwoman! I just work in QLD.

#154

I dream of chocolate cake at times, but I find my actual craving is fresh fruit. I then assume it’s my body telling me I need some sort of nutrient they contain, and I will eat some of it.
There is a difference between learned cravings and cravings for physical reasons. It’s hard to distinguish sometimes. In this case, while my craving appears to be chocolate cake, it is totally satisfied with a ruby grapefruit, or whatever you like. This works for me. The grapefruit doesn’t throw me off course, but the chocolate cake would. Yet, the grapefruit proves to be just as satisfying once I actually eat it.
I do give myself leeway to satisfy actual cravings. Probably it’s not actually the sugar in the grapefruit I wanted, it’s maybe some vitamin or mineral and that is why it hits the spot. It’s just that my mind is conditioned to thinking of chocolate cake when craving anything to do with sugar. And it’s kind of interesting that the chocolate cake would totally throw me off and just cause future cravings, while the grapefruit does no such thing.
I conclude that, at least for me, cravings are often misdirected, depending on conditioning and previous addictions. I don’t think it’s good for me to ignore them, but I do need to get to the bottom of what may be satisfying them without falling off the sugar train.
Unrelated to this, after reading a lot of this thread, I want to comment that for me, it’s not about how long I live, it’s all about how well I live. I want to be well and not sick while alive.

#155

Ah-ha! Ok you’re off the hook then.

You must have slipped into a Queensland accent when talking about the US dietary recommendations :wink:

#156

Hi Melzell,

I hope it’s going well for you! You can do it!

#157

Thank you!!!

#158

It’s getting better. I am making changes again and they are good ones. Now my husband and daughter are wanting to eat better so hopefully we can be a low carb family! Thanks for the encouragement!! :heart:

(Susan) #159

It will be awesome for your family if you are all low carb, and it will certainly remove a lot of temptations for you, and make cooking a lot easier. That is terrific. (I would love if my family would be more interested! hehe).

(Andrea Johns) #160

I hear Keto proponents often say that you can live without any carbs. They explain that early man only ate meat he could catch so ate only periodically and filled in with carbs when meat was not available. Hmmmm? If men descended from apes and apes are vegetarians why would human man evolve away from the vegetarian foods his predecessors existed on? It seems more logical to me that carbs were the base foods humans always relied on (plants don’t run away or turn around and attack you) and man learned sometime later that meat was pretty good. The logic of carbs as being superfluous nutrients we don’t need does not ring true to me. Or maybe I just don’t want to quit gardening and growing fantastically delicious veg and fruit? If the soil you grow in is alive (not sprayed into submission so nothing will grow until it’s pumped full of chemical NPK fertilizers) then those plants contain vital nutrients our bodies need that are not provided by meat. Scurvy killed sailors who subsisted on dried meats and breads. When fruit and or veg was added to their diet there was no longer scurvy on sailing ships. Rickets, pellegra, and beri beri are all diseases caused by malnutrition of macro or micro nutrients. I’ll step off my soapbox now. I’d really like to understand the “fruit is nature’s candy” and “a carnivorous diet is sufficient for all bodily functions” considering what is known about dangers associated with missing nutrients. Additionally, how do we know we’ve discovered all the nutrients we need for good health? Especially since info about the gut biome and living soils have been discovered within the past 20 years or so. [The main cause of beriberi is a diet low in thiamine. The disease is very rare in regions with access to vitamin-enriched foods, such as certain breakfast cereals and breads. Beriberi is most common in regions of the world where the diet includes unenriched, processed white rice, which only has a of the amount of thiamine as brown rice. In addition to scurvy, other scurvy-like conditions can develop from a deficiency of vitamin C, such as adult acne, easy bruising, sore gums, and hemorrhages around bones. Good sources for vitamin C are citrus fruit, broccoli, strawberries, cantaloupe, and other fruits and vegetables. The discovery of micro nutrition was made in the early twentieth century as a result of finding the cure for certain diseases, the nutrient deficiency diseases such as scurvy, beriberi, and pellagra. The new dimensions of fully understanding and using our knowledge of nutrients remain to be established from the ongoing research in this area of nutritional science.] text within brackets pulled from online medical/ nutrition sites.

#161

I would love to enjoy fresh garden vegetables. I’ve tried quite a few times and have failed every single time. We have farmers markets but they are pricy (understandably) and aren’t always honest that they don’t use glyphosate or other pesticide nasties. So I might as well run over to Walmart and get their “locally grown” produce.
As for the scurvy and such, it isn’t difficult to see how to avoid that. And thus far no one has gotten scurvy from the carnivore diet. The theory is that the sailors ate DRIED meat which affected the amount of C in it. Modern day carnivore dieters love that red, not overcooked steak.
As for thiamin(e) that too is present in red meat. It doesn’t matter to me which way you choose to eat; low-carb, carnivore. I enjoyed carnivore but I also love a good home-grown salad, regardless of the carbs in it. Our bodies can handle some carbohydrates. Are they necessary? Not in all situations. Do they enhance life? For me, at times they certainly do. Now…where’s my ranch dressing? :yum:

(Jack Bennett) #162

The vitamin C question is one that recurs all the time in the carnivore community. Fresh meat contains enough vitamin C to prevent deficiency and to reverse scurvy. (That is apparently not true of canned meat or the hardtack biscuits used to keep sailors fed - hence, scurvy.)

There may be other reasons to eat vegetables - diversify the diet, enjoyment, etc, but long-term carnivores appears to get “enough” vit-C for some definition of “enough”.

(Bunny) #163

I highly doubt ancestors were only eating muscle meats, that surely is not an ancestral diet or mostly muscle meats because it was probably not easily eaten unless cooked and went for the easier to chew internal organs, but if you think of muscle meats in terms of protomorphogens it is certainly going to affect or improve your skeletal muscle mass as long as your not depleting your calcium (phosphorus in your bones and teeth) faster than you are replacing it?

Vitamin C holds your skin collagen and connective tissues together but so does hyraluanic acid in organ meats which is better than vitamin C and what keeps you looking young and why your skin starts to sag as you age from dear gravity. Less sugar in the diet certainly helps! High sugar diets mimic Vitamin C. Carnivores are probably getting the real form of vitamin C not the analog?

But there is no possible way the ancestors were only eating meat long-term. No evidence.

There is evidence of drinking the animals blood, milk and eggs, insects/bugs, dirt but better raw for long sprints of not eating anything but once you cook food, your highly concentrating it and making it easier to digest, the less easier to digest the thinner you get? The more you cook your food the less you need of it because you are pre-digesting it (outside the body) and highly concentrating it.

They were not sitting around thinking or saying “I’m a carnivore dieter” they ate whatever was edible like scavengers.

Same can be said about vegetables/plants your better off drinking the water it’s boiled in or steaming it?

So what happens when you cook food or process it, you take away the ancient microbiome that you once had to produce the enzymes that breakdown the food your eating by cooking it?

The industrialized world of food pre-digests your food for you so when you try to eat/digest something raw, guess what? You can’t!