I'm concerned my metabolism and calorie in take after 2 months on Keto - weight loss plateau


(Katie Egervari) #21

@collaroygal According to that formula, I only need an additional 6.5g of fat to remain fasted. I guess that actually explains why I can fast as I do without issues. I just haven’t done anything longer than a 20-24 hour fast almost all of the time because the results were so good. My first 48 hour fast was when the results slowed down, trying to get some progress going and perhaps to heal some inflammation or illness if that was the problem, and to just give my digestive system a break. I think I could easily do 4 days at a time though, and I might do that! For me, I think it would be easier to fast 3-4 days at a time rather than alternate days, that way I can just buy groceries for 4 meals and eat everything before it all goes bad in the fridge.


(Katie Egervari) #22

As long as I can fit into the thousands of dollars worth of clothes and coats in my closets, I don’t really care what the scale says - that’s exactly the result I am looking for :slight_smile: It’s been a little depressing not wearing my dresses for over a year :frowning:


(Katie Egervari) #23

Okay! I’m going to use more butter and eat more nuts then to fill in the differences and do prolonged fasts after the 21st. I can’t do the prolonged fast right now because of groceries in the fridge - everything would go bad if I didn’t eat it, and it’s not freezable other than the wild alaskan sockeye salmon :frowning: I will start ramping in some more fat though with butter and nuts, and after that, I think i’m going to make an honest attempt to eat as close to 1800 calories in 2 meals as I can on my feast days. It’s going to be hard. Satiety for me is like 1200-1600 calories per day, but we’ll work it up there! :slight_smile:


(KetoQ) #24

Katie –

You seem to have a pretty smart approach and solid commitment to keto. Rather than trying to over-engineer the results, my advice is to – be patient – and keep doing the good things that you are doing. You’re obviously getting control of your health and weight.

It might help to “reframe” your weight loss journey. A 40 pound loss in 70 days is phenomenal. Perhaps the remainder of your loss is going to be slow and steady rather than dramatic. For a woman to go from 225 to 145 is significant. Trying to do it all in 4-5 months might be asking a bit much from your body.

Congrats on your progress and good luck the rest of the way.


(Katie Egervari) #25

@Callisto So cool! I just watched both of his videos - the one in March 2017 and the other in 2018 about protein, and wow does this later research clear things up. The confirmation that protein insulin load doesn’t matter on a ketogenic diet is relieving. In the study, insulin only raised 6% with protein, and the ratio to glycogon was the same.

Now I actually have a feeling like I know what really happened… I’ve noticed the acetone breath and the weird smell of my urine not be as pungent as they are usually are, and looking at my meals in chronometer, I crept really close to the 20g of carbs pretty much every day (I really like spinach, asparagus, avocados, broccoli, etc.). I don’t have a ketone tester - never really invested in one, but perhaps I’m not in a very deep ketosis anymore after all.

Instead of drastically lowering protein - since it doesn’t really affect insulin that much according to the 2018 study… which refutes the protein insulin load theory - I’m just going to lower the carbs to 10g max and we’ll see what this does. I’ll probably just make sure I don’t take in more than 80g of protein anymore - I’ll cut the 400g rib-eye steaks in 2 from now on :stuck_out_tongue:

I already eat a fair amount of beef - grass fed/finished pasture-raised steaks, ground beef, etc, so I think I got the right combination of protein + fat + carnitine covered already.

Thanks so much for the videos! I think if I do this and don’t drastically increase fat after all - I’m just going to stick to 1400-1600 calories, which is still over 90g of fat, and I think my body will start taking from my body fat again and we can get this over with in 2-3 more months.

I’ll post back in a week with some results of this. If this works, then I don’t have to fast for more than 18-20 hours and I can keep my routine. In theory, since the insulin to glycogon ratio isn’t that much lower with pure fasting, this should work. If after a week is no change, I’ll do the longer fasts 3-4 days per week.


(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #26

Wow! You really have this all figured out. Now take a deep breath, KC, and KO! :bacon::bacon:


#27

That’s great, Katie! I’m early in the process also, and found his talks to be very helpful figuring out how to (and how not to) tweak things. I also found that after the first few weeks, I might have been allowing some extra carb creep in the form of too many veggies. It’s a hard mindset to overcome, that need for lots of veggies. Now if it’s broccoli or Brussels sprouts especially (my veggie weaknesses), I still enjoy them but I’m watching the quantity in context of the rest of my daily carb intake. Do let us know in a couple of weeks how it’s working for you. Like I said, I’m tweaking too so I’d be really interested to know!


(Katie Egervari) #28

So, today, I am 181.6, and my body seems to be really reacting well to the changes I’ve been making already. I made sure, every day, I do not go over 80g of protein and I’ve been sticking to 10g of carbs consistently. Weight is flying off again, and ketones seem to be back up again. I raised the fat a little, but satiety is preventing me from eating past ~1400 calories.

I can’t say lowering the carbs to 20 to 10 or avoiding the occasional protein highs of 100g did the trick, but I’m glad it worked. I’ve noticed a lot of changes in my body, similar to the first 2 months.

I’m still fasting 18-20 hours per day - no real changes there. Honestly, I’m pretty happy I didn’t have to fast for over 24 hours to make the change. I like to eat my eggs and bacon :stuck_out_tongue:

Going to make a red sockeye salmon spinach salad with caeser dressing and cauliflower crust pizza today :slight_smile:


(LeeAnn Brooks) #29

Yeah, I wouldn’t be able to get in more than 1000 calories with OMAD. Some people can do it. I couldn’t even if it were 100% fat.

Some experts warn against OMAD for long period because it’s calorie restrictive for most people, and therefore does eventually lower metabolism.

I’m doing it once or twice a week because I want to use it as a bridge to EF. Have you considered trying EF? 1400 calories isnt too bad depending on your height, weight and age, but it might still be low for long term.

Just something to consider as a next step. But sounds like you’ve got it under control right now.
Glad it’s working for you.


(Katie Egervari) #30

I’m actually not too worried about the caloric restriction - the body is getting a lot of fat from the body too, and it’s telling me it’s got enough. I think once I get to my target weight, one of two things will happen:

  1. My body will want more food, and the satiety triggers won’t happen as quickly because the ideal body composition has been reached; or

  2. I need to up my meals to 3 a day, and just eat like a normal person. And then we can probably get it back up to 1600 or 1800, which will be fine for me.

But for now, 1400 seems to be the magic number :slight_smile:

And yeah, I can’t do OMAD either. I tried - I felt like I was overloading my kidneys or intestines or something. It felt awful. I think it has something to do with gender. All of the people demonstrated this on youtube are male, from what I can tell. My stomach just isn’t that big.


(KCKO, KCFO) #31

Glad you figured it out.

When you are at normal weight, it does become more of challenge. I think maintenance is harder than the losing phase and it will never end. So I am trying to learn all I can about maintaining. I have found I get good results with IFing most days, I like 16:8 or 18:6 the best for that.


(Katie Egervari) #32

As an update, I’m 174.6 today, so all of those changes are still working! :slight_smile: That makes it 50.4 pounds lost in 92 days - about 3 months exactly.

What’s really amazing is that I can finally wear some of the t-shirts and tops in my closet again, and I can fit into some older pairs of size 30 jeans. I only have 25 more pounds to go to be able to fit into pretty much everything in my closest - so close!

Thanks everyone!

Recent Meals, besides scrambled eggs, french classic omelets, spinach salads, etc.:

Duck Steak Au Poivre

Duck Confit, with homemade gravy from real duck stock

Butter Chicken, but using almond flour instead of wheat flour, and apple cider vinegar instead of lemons. No sugar/honey added.


(Ashley) #33

Great job! I have a lot more than you to lose and seems like mines going slower, I’ve lost about 40lbs in 3 months.