How much is too much?

(Marianne) #1

I’ve been zero carb since Feb., and loving it. For the past month or so, I seem to have an insatiable appetite. Generally, I eat OMAD and it’s usually one large piece of meat, or two smaller. I’d say at least a total of 16 oz. I notice sometimes I’ll get hungry during the day and will eat like three scrambled eggs with ghee, and that will hold me. Today, I was really hungry again, and this time made a small round steak (probably 8 oz.). I’ve never done that before - cooked another piece of meat before dinner. I’m just wondering if this is “normal.” I guess for me it is at the moment, because I’m experiencing it, however, I’m just wondering how much meat a lot of you eat on zero carb/carnivore. How many times a day are you eating?

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #2

Maybe the ‘problem’ is OMAD. If you’re doing it to keep insulin under control then I guess you just have to cope. Otherwise, why are you eating OMAD?

(Laurie) #3

For the first year, I ate less than a pound of meat (and/or the equivalent in eggs, etc.) in 2 meals. In some people’s opinion, this was not enough food/calories. But I didn’t want more.

Recently, I want to eat more, so I do. A bit more at each meal, and then some more food in the evening. So maybe a pound and a half. I think this is fine. Someday I might reconsider. But for now, I have no reason to restrict myself.

(Marianne) #4

I don’t really have a good answer, other than I guess it’s the “24 hour fasting” thing that I saw more on regular keto. It’s not about insulin control.

I didn’t like fasting on keto, and I guess I may not be suited to OMAD as carnivore.

(Marianne) #5

I guess the answer is to listen to my body, and if I feel like my body wants to eat more for fuel, then I should eat. Seems so simple. Truth be told, I still am afraid of gaining a little weight or not getting to the weight I would like to be, although I am very happy with my size and body right now.

“Dieting” mentality rears its ugly head.

(Laurie) #6

I don’t want to gain weight either. I’m stuck at a weight, although I’m sure I have at least 10 pounds of unwanted fat around my waist and the top of my hips. If I start gaining weight, hmm…

#7

I still don’t eat much meat, I eat lots of eggs and nowadays more than usual dairy. 20 oz meat is a cute start of a meal but I need waaaay more food than that even if it’s very fatty.
(I have less meaty days too. But 20 oz meat is a nice amount if the meat is fatty and tempting. It starts to be my norm.)

Only OMAD seems good to me now but whatever my body wants.
Of course I eat less meat (or not for every meal) when I have smaller meals. As no way I skip my eggs for any meal (with very rare exception) :smiley:

I wanna lose fat. 20 oz meat per meal just helps with it. Maybe a tad less if it’s particularly fatty… :wink:

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #8

Most long-term carnivores eat two or three times a day. They don’t seem to find any form of fasting or time-restricted eating to be valuable. So I’d say that eating to satisfy your hunger is indeed “normal.”

They also say that people who are beginning a carnivore diet don’t need to worry about gaining weight at first, because that problem will eventually correct itself as they continue eating carnivore.

#9

absolutely normal for many of us. You are great time on plan but you also are still ‘a baby on plan’ in a way LOL

I and tons others do go thru our appetites flipping and changing.

You are in the hungry zone. That is fine. YOU EAT all you need to eat and never give it another thought.

right now you are adapting still and your body is truly healing and balancing hormones and YOU ARE becoming a WHOLE NEW YOU and sometimes your body asks for more nutrition to do just that.

You will flip again :slight_smile: Your appetite will ramp back down, you will later find you want to eat lean meat days for a small bit and then you will desire big fatty meat days and you do exactly what you said…follow the appetite and it is part of your body changes. It isn’t an evil issue at all :sunny:

So yes if you hit this stage of being very hungry again, yes you are doing carnivore in good form cause this is truly a ‘cycle of healing’ that comes for almost every single carnivore holding plan, and yes it is very normal!

Rock on in great form and enjoy all your carnivore meals!!!

Don’t worry on weight gain. If it hasn’t happened at all, don’t give it any thought, if you eat more and start to gain, then you have questions, but don’t focus ever on anything that has not happened thru your eating actions on carnivore :slight_smile: It isn’t like you are eating cause you are bored, you are stuffing your face in front of the tv mindlessly, you aren’t eating ickier type sub par carnivore foods like woofing down sticks of pepperoni for no reason and grazing thru the day on extra dairy and cheese cause you can ya know…you need a bit more meat in your day, your body is signaling directly to you it requires it and your body will use that nutrition for internal repair and changes for healing…it is an OK thing truly!!!

After this flip and change, you will go into a new zone on carnivore again but each of us do this on our own timeline, on our own path but you are very normal!

#10

have you tiptoe’d into carnivore cause I have to say Paul for being a non-carnivore person, you truly do understand the truths of this plan. I like that :sunny:

#11

I’ve listened to a lot of podcasts where carnivores went through 6 months of eating everything in sight and then their hunger changed.

It took a little longer for me but it has calmed a lot of late. I also have a massive uptick in hunger around my cycle.

I don’t eat to a pattern - I eat when hungry and stop when full, rinse repeat. It doesn’t matter to me if I eat 1 meal, 2, 3 or even 4 - if I’m hungry, I eat. By the same token, if I’m full, I don’t force it - earlier this week I didn’t eat for 20 hours because I still felt full. I sometimes ‘try’ some food as @Fangs has suggested in the past (I did this last night) but wasn’t hungry at all, so put it back in the fridge.

In the early days, I generally ate around 16-24oz of meat and 4 eggs in a day. It rose to around 32oz of meat and 6 eggs for a while. Around my cycle my hunger would increase further - I could eat 42-48oz meat - but then I would quickly drop back to 8-16oz a day or so later.

I haven’t been hungry of late, so I’ve been eating around 1-1.5lbs. I’d recommend what Fangs and Paul have said - if you can just go with it, it should work out.

Despite eating these amounts, I have lost fat. It’s slower than a traditional weight loss diet, but there are many other benefits which make this the best approach for me. Some of the carnivores on the podcasts do talk about a weight increase in the first few months BUT they also talk about it coming off again afterwards - and that’s the important part.

#12

I never did carnivore for a longer time but it always makes me eating less than on any other woe ever (not every day always, I have my very fatty meaty carni days but my average calorie intake always significantly drop whenever I do carni again)… And I doubt I ever would have low-cal and especially lean times, that’s not me :smiley: But it’s perfectly normal to have such times too. My own calorie intake and fat/protein macro never can stay put, it varies from day to day and that’s normal too, I am not a robot… Just like it’s normal to eat very similarly every day macro wise, I had those times as well…

20oz isn’t big appetite to me, many people needs way more on OMAD so it may be just a necessary amount of food on a day with zero hunger. I often have close to zero or zero hunger and even zero appetite on carnivore but my body still demands fuel. And even having extra fat, I need some decent amount of it. 20oz meat isn’t much calorie wise unless very fatty, I never could eat only that tiny amount of food (for 1-2 days in the beginning when my body was confused, yes. as I do more carnivore, I eat more food, I only underate in the beginning here and there). But I still can’t eat much more. But a year ago, 1 pound per day for a whole week was out of question so I improved.
(Maybe 5 years ago, 1 pound a month would have sounded excessive but that was another albeit low-carb and often keto world. When I tried out carnivore, I felt surreal for many months, I never knew such a day could come. Carnivore is an extreme woe, surely not for me :smiley: I thought I knew myself and that the things I felt basic will stay so. Surprise, it’s not always the case.)

So I still can’t comprehend how anyone can consider this amount of meat surely much even for a normal person. It may be much for someone to eat, yes. But many of us needs it, if not each and every day but often or sometimes…
(I saw 4-6 oz as normal too often too but at least not from carnivores :smiley: It still surprise me from ketoers… Oh well. It doesn’t matter, I never cared about other people’s opinion much when it was about my own personal business.)

It’s probably useful for many people, definitely not for me :slight_smile: I can’t try things. I eat nothing - or a lot. If I don’t want food, I won’t force-feed myself and trying is force to me then. If I don’t want food but “can eat” and I feel I need fuel, I eat then. But it’s not trying, it’s a full-blown substantial meal. “Trying” makes me hungry unless I am really very satiated.
20 hour is short, I had 23 hour fasts this week and it was great, I keep that - unless my body wants something else, of course. But with my bigger meals and reaching long term satiation only through really substantial ones OMAD makes most sense. I always preferred smaller eating windows, it’s probably something I was born with (even as a tiny babe, I slept through the night). Each to their own, I always say. Just don’t force things if possible :slight_smile: One huge pull regarding carnivore was the nice chill in the carnivore thread :smiley: I liked that. And I have that when things go well and they do it easier than in the beginning when some kinds of harships were present. Not much compared to many others but still some.

I am sorry, I try not to write so much about myself all the time.

#13

I don’t deliberately fast, so 20 hours is a very long time for me. :rofl:

It’s more a recommendation when you’ve had issues with hunger signalling. I think there’s a real difference between, “I’m full and I am not hungry,” vs “Am I full? Am I hungry?” vs “I am definitely hungry.”

The middle option is where I will sometimes try some food, because I feel unsure. Sometimes it turns out that I am hungrier than I expected - sometimes it turns out that I wasn’t hungry at all.

#14

I totally accidentally made 40 hour fasts in my past… I did IF all the time before I had any idea IF is a thing with a name. I never ever forced fasting on me but I had a few intentional fasts before (only when my body cooperated as I eat when I get hungry and usually way earlier).

I am not sure I know what is “full”, I don’t care about that, actually. It’s satiation to me. That’s important. I always ignored the state of my stomach as it matters nothing to me (unless it reached its impressive maximum capacity but that is hard to reach for me especially on carnivore).
Sometimes I feel kind of full but my stomach is clearly empty so I just don’t use that word.

I don’t think I am ever unsure… But I often have very conflicting urges. And hunger isn’t very important for me either. Satiation and especially wanting food or definitely not is more important. If I want food, I eat. If I don’t want food, I usually don’t. Hunger has a smaller role but I always eat when properly hungry, I just rarely am or it happens when all my urges agree and it’s a nice time for it anyway (except maybe I don’t want food at all but that goes away if overpowered).

I never get bored of this topic, it’s so fascinating to me.
Oh and it’s blissful when every urge is silent so I just fast. I love fasting. Until I want or need to eat. I love eating too. When I need and want it. And, not or. It’s not so nice when they are conflicted. I think OMAD helps with that in my case. Not always but usually.

(Marianne) #15

Thank you; that makes me feel better. I’m going to be making eggs now for a second meal because I think I require it to make it through a day comfortably. I can get paranoid when I eat cheese, like I shouldn’t be doing dairy. I’ve got to calm down about my weight and just be.

(Marianne) #16

Thank you! Once again, being talked off the ledge by my forum buddies! Such wise counsel, which I truly appreciate.

I’m going to be prohibited from responding to everyone in this go-around (limit three responses), so I will thank everyone now for the advice and guidance.

(Marianne) #17

Thank you; that makes me feel better, not because I need permission to eat that kind of quantity, but because now I know it’s “normal,” per individual. If there are days that I require that now, I won’t feel anxious.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #18

I am highly sympathetic to carnivore eating, but can’t manage it at the moment, for reasons having nothing to do with a need for carbohydrate and everything to do with my life situation. It may become possible in future, however, and I plan to give that way of eating a try. I like the descriptions Georgia Ede and Amber O’Hearn give of their experiences eating this way.

(Marianne) #19

Based on your responses, I, too, thought you were carnivore. Love that you consider and research everything without bias. :hugs:

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #20

There’s weight, and there’s fat. We don’t necessarily want to lose weight, if it comes at the cost of weaker muscles and more brittle bones.

As a long-time member of the forums once put it: “So you want to lose thirty pounds? Well, would you rather look as though you lost thirty pounds and stay the same weight, or lose thirty pounds and still look just as fat?” For myself, I choose the former.