How I Deal With Plateaus

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #21

Nina Teicholz says something similar. The ancient Greeks apparently used olive oil as a skin conditioner; they cooked with lard.

(Bob M) #22

That’s my sole reference, too.

After my post, I did research and saw I can get Omega 3/6 and fat tested by blood. Not sure that would tell me what I want to know, which is how much PUFAs are in my fat. Cate Shanahan says if your HDL is less than 60, you have high PUFA in your cells. I’m not sure that is true, but my HDL is less than 60, even after almost 7 years low carb. Though I did not know what a PUFA was 7 years ago, or even 2 years ago.

And I’ve seen estimates that it takes 4 or so years to get rid of the PUFA. Yikes!

Thus, my push to try a “low” PUFA diet. There’s only so far you can take this, though, as all fats have PUFAs in them. Even duck fat and goose fat are about what lard is, and I like those (if I have them) for cooking. I don’t mind any of duck or goose fat or lard, but birds and pigs are what they eat: if they eat high PUFA, they’ll be high PUFA. So, you can’t really tell what’s in any of this stuff, especially with the trend to have chickens and other animals eat “vegetarian” which I assume is all high PUFA.

And I still like a salad every once in a while, and EVOO just goes with salad. Tallow isn’t going to work. :wink:

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #23

Lard

Type Percentage (by weight)
Saturated 39%
Monounsaturated 45%
Polyunsaturated 11%

Butter

Type Percentage (by weight)
Saturated 65%
Monounsaturated 28%
Polyunsaturated 7%

Butter apparently contains 3% natural trans-fats, most of it as vaccenic acid.

Olive oil

Type Percentage (by weight)
Saturated 8-25%
Monounsaturated 55 to 83%
Polyunsaturated 3.5 to 22.5%
(Nicolas) #24

Yes, exactly. This is what happens when I weight myself, but at the same time I have a measuring tape so I measure myself, and all the weeks it goes down on some places or dont move in some places. Because I jog all days 20 min at 70% my Max Hearth Rate my legs are going up (Quads are growing).

This September Im gonna weight and measure all days. This was already known, body weight does not decrease the same all weeks or even days. Some days will be more, some will be less, but of course you need to weight at the same conditions (In my case at 9:30 Am, fasted, after going to the bathroom, in my underwear) so you can at least decrease some confounding variables.

Good job on not decaying, being strong, if you know you are doing things right, and the empirical evidence layed out there, you need to maintain your fortitude.

#25

Just an update. I hit another plateau (one about which I forgot) about a month ago. 211. I’ve been there for over 4 weeks. But you know what? I. DON’T. CARE. I really don’t. I’ve lost over 25 pounds this year and if you had told me that I would do that, I would have been thrilled and I am thrilled. My size and body composition has changed. A LOT. I am naturally mesomorphic. I put on muscle very easily. I have been putting on muscle steadily since starting Keto. As I have become more fit and lost weight, I am able to do more and work harder. I’m down well over 1 size - probably closer to 2 sizes (for me, one size is around 20 pounds - I’m very tall). I have limited weighing myself to no more than once a week. For about a month I stayed right at 212.5. Then yesterday it dropped to 211. We’ll see what next week brings.

I continue to eat Keto, but have become a bit more relaxed about my portions (especially of fat) instead of doubling down, which is my modus operandi when it comes to dieting. I do not go over 20 grams of carbs, ever, and try to keep it to 10 and under. I also really try to keep my fat intake at 75% or more of my entire intake, and watching to make sure that I don’t overdo the protein is still something of which I have to be very careful. I think that my body needs more fat and calories right now (see next paragraph), so I’m not limiting myself. If I’m still hungry in the evening I eat 2-3 ounces of macadamia nuts/ pecan/ walnuts. Or 2-3 ounces of cheese. Or both. Whatever. When the scale decides to move, it will move. If it takes me all of next year to get to 185ish, then so be it.

One thing that I’ve added to my life is cold water swimming. I live in NYC right on the beach. I live on the beach block in the Rockaways. I decided to swim year-round as much as possible. I started about 6 weeks ago, after swimming most of the summer. My tolerance for the cold has been steadily improving. I swam/ worked out in the water for 45 minutes yesterday. The air temperature was about 45 (with wind chill) and the water temp was 57 degrees F. I work out HARD in the water. I always make sure that I blow out my lungs and have to breath hard, AND, I do the same for my muscles. This is easier because I’m swimming in the ocean and there are strong currents at this time of year on my beach. While I don’t really feel cold at all while in the water, I do have quite bad “after drop”. After drop occurs after you get out of the water, when your body starts to circulate your warm core blood back to your extremities and your cooler blood in the extremities comes back to your heart. I’ll shiver for up to an hour after getting out of the water, even after taking a quick (tepid) shower and putting on some warm clothes. It takes me several hours to actually warm back up. This is a good thing. When this happens we activate “brown fat” which is responsible for heating the body. It’s a calorie burning, and using brown fat creates more of it. Or at least that’s the theory.

So, I just wanted to say that, if you have hit a plateau, try not to stress about. This is a journey, and it takes the time that it takes.

(Laurie) #26

Thank you for checking in.

I live on an island on Canada’s west coast. The island is nestled between the mainland and Vancouver Island. A few years ago (I was about 60) I started going in the water daily, just for a dip, not a swim. The water got colder over the winter, but it was okay. Until Valentine’s day, when it was just too cold. I could feel my capilaries dying. Unfortunately, the runoff from the surrounding rivers made the water colder than actual sea water. But I knew of women older than me who went in every day of the year.

Anyway, it cured my hemorrhoids.

Thank you for your words of wisdom about plateaus. I’m 5’6" and bounce between about 170 and 200. I will keep on ketoing and will not give up or slide when I reach 170. If I ever get down to, say, 150, maybe I can rethink things.

I don’t have a scale now, so I don’t know my actual weight most of the time. But I can check it occasionally elsewhere to get a ballpark. I can lose weight, but the challenge is sticking with it for the long term.

#27

I find Keto super easy, day-to-day. I find fat super satiating and it eliminates cravings for me. I don’t know how I’ll do it once things get back to normal and we decide to start traveling again. We went to Italy last Feb and I can’t imagine not eating pasta and pizza in Italy or baguette in Paris. I guess I’ll cross that bridge when traveling is back on the table. .

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #28

Pasta is actually not a significant part of Italian cuisine in Italy. Yes, you can get pasta and pizzas at most restaurants, but I always had the feeling they were on the menu to satisfy the tourists. (And the pizzas were small, individual pies, not the giant pies we are used to in the U.S.) The really fancy places focus on meat and, to some extent, vegetables.

The same is true of the French diet. You might have a piece of bread to dip in your bowl of coffee in the morning, but it’s not the focus of the diet. Meat in lovely sauces is the epitome of French cooking.

#29

We were in Italy just last year. There’s a lot of starch and it’s very hard to avoid it. France is difficult as well because it is so bread-centric. Just try to find a meat/ egg based breakfast in Paris that doesn’t involve bread or crust. Much of Europe, at least where we’ve been, is this way. Greece is a good exception where eating Keto would be pretty easy.