Is an Egg Fast/Feast the solution?

satiety
eggfast
(Amanda) #1

I have been following the Keto WOE since the beginning of May’18. I feel that overall I have been pretty successful. I have more energy than before starting, have lost around 80 lbs was losing pretty steadily until December, but since then I have been bouncing between 244 and 255 lbs. I eat OMAD M-F and breakfast and supper on the weekends. I mainly eat whole foods, no commercial replacement foods, the occasional homemade “bread” (once every 6-8 weeks or so), drink black coffee and water. I track everything in Cronometer and use my kitchen scale religiously. I usually begin supper at 6 pm and finish at 7 pm. For the last month or so I have chosen not to eat after 7 pm unless there is an extenuating circumstance.

One of my main issues is not knowing when to stop or recognizing feeling satiated. I can just eat and eat and eat. I have to use tracking to know when to stop. I have no problem not eating, I have done several 24-48 hour fasts and a couple 90-hour ones during my Keto time, but once I have the opportunity to eat I am challenged to find the stop button.

I am hoping by eating mainly eggs (a bit of cheese is allowed, by my understanding) is that I will be able to experience “palate fatigue” and be able to focus on listening to my body and recognize satiety.

I have been reading the Egg Fasting 101 thread, but I am wondering if there is any other advice out there. Or if you think this is a good tool to help me become more attuned to my signals? Or any other ideas? I’ve been feeling a bit down for the past 6-8 weeks. I’m not looking to stop eating Keto; I just need something to make me feel like I am making some type of progress.

(Daisy) #2

I have done a couple of egg feasts (First egg (fast) feast (egg diet)) and I eat egg fast transitions days quite regularly. To be honest, I never got the palate fatigue. I think they are great, and would probably be good to break your stall, but if you’re looking to “fix” your satiety signals, I don’t know that it will accomplish that. Worth a try though!

(Bob M) #3

Have you tried eating more protein and less fat? I can eat tons and tons of fat and not be filled up. If I eat protein, though, it’s a different story. You could put a gun to my head, and I wouldn’t eat more.

(Amanda) #4

I live for protein. I cannot help myself. I have never been unable to finish a steak, pork chop or slab o’ chicken!

(Bob M) #5

Try eating some leaner meats, say chicken breasts (no skin), pork chops (leaner variety, little fat), lean beef. See what happens. No added butters, no mayo, no extra fat, no nuts.

If that doesn’t work, an all-egg diet might not be bad. Anything to change things up.

(Raj Seth) #6

I’d read up about the bacon experiment bacon4free.com
If you can tolerate the bacon cooked soft, as the english do, there’s enough fat left.
Or, really really go out on a limb and have breakfast all day - Bacon & eggs only - for 4 weeks.
Eat to satiety - unless you find you are eating over 3-4 lbs of bacon daily - then your satiety signals may truly be broken.

I too, can eat way way too much. Its by eating the same food again and again, that one can truly make it boring enough that the brain may just get a satiety signal through…
Tracking quantity, if its only 1-2 foods, is EZ. I don’t like to track, never have…

#7

I did this twice (3 days each) and it helped me get to a couple lbs below my goal weight after I had been stuck for a long time! (I was only a few lbs away from goal)… I didn’t gain it back, either. :slight_smile:

(Carl Keller) #8

For me, losing weight seems to have increased my appetite. Perhaps this is a body’s way of trying to encourage us to replace that loss. What seems to help me is cooking what I believe is a reasonable amount of food. I always seem to approach the last few bites of steak with resignation because I wish there were more. But I almost always find that my desire to continue eating is gone, 10-15 minutes after the food is gone.

The problems of overeating arise when I cook an extra steak for the next meal and I know it’s there. One of the biggest challenges for me is that keto food tastes so amazingly good that I probably enjoy my food more than I ever have. I truly feel like my taste buds have never been more alive than they are now. I would consider making my food bland and seasonless, like @David_Stilley suggests, but I just can’t bring myself to do it. :stuck_out_tongue:

(Bob M) #9

I think a lot can cause me to overeat: nuts; yogurt; fat bombs; any high fat food/condiment, even mayo, extra butter added for no reason; any fake food; any fake food that’s sweet; etc. I’ve figured out what those are and have ceased to eat them.

Hmmm…Amy Berger agrees with me: “Personally, I’ve always found that protein satiates me far better than fat.”

(Of course, she says this in a paragraph complaining about keto, but I guess I can’t get everything I want.)

(Jeremy Storie) #10

Trying the egg fast will certainly make you more aware of your hunger and fullness signals. After a couple of days you just get tiered of eggs. Give it a try.

(Raj Seth) #11

and thats the down side of doing the bacon experiment - you may get tired of bacon
:scream: :scream: :skull_and_crossbones: :skull_and_crossbones:

I advocate for it, but have never done it, for fear of the above…

:eyes: :heart: :bacon:

#12

You don’t get tired of eggs because there are so many recipes using eggs that are easy and unique so you’re not just eating hard boiled or scrambled eggs every day. And you don’t get tired of bacon (I’ve done that one too) because… it’s bacon. :slight_smile: Just like you don’t get tired of coffee every morning! :slight_smile:

(*Tame Those Ghrelin Gremlins) #13

I agree with you. For me I never really understood why everyone kept saying, if you’re hungry eat more fat. The more fat I ate the hungrier I felt. If I eat protein on the other hand it fills me up quick, so I tend to eat my proteins first off my plate.

(Libby) #14

yes you would :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

#15

Hi Amanda,

I’ve been LC for a while but have generally struggled with satiety. I once tracked my calories for a few days and was easily between 2,500 and 3,500 per day without ever getting really full (just for reference, I’m moderately active and about 130 pounds). I’m the one at the table who reaches for a second and third piece of chicken while everyone else seems satisfied.

Recently I’ve been staying at a meal until I really don’t want to eat anymore. Not uncomfortable but to the point that I’m genuinely not interested in another bite. If I have a steak for dinner and don’t hit that point, I’ll boil 3 eggs or add beef jerky (or something) until I really can say that I’m fully satisfied. I used to try to add fat to get to satiety and have had more spoonfuls of mayonnaise than you can imagine, but that didn’t do the trick. Trying to do it with cheese really didn’t work because it turns out I can keep eating cheese pretty much endlessly. But eggs, meat are perfect - at some point I really do hit satiety, and then it lasts for a nice long time.
I’ve been worried about getting too much protein so I generally do TMAD and I fast a few days/week to try to balance things out.

I know that you said you’ve never had trouble finishing a steak, etc, but I wonder what would happen if you stuck with the protein at a meal until you really don’t want any more.

I’m curious about how the egg fast goes if you do try it. Can you keep us posted on here?

(Amanda) #16

UPDATE: So for the past week and a half, I have continued to feel pretty down and out. Bleh would probably be the most technical term for it. I upped my egg consumption and was eating TMAD on most days. I had intentions to try an egg fast, but life kept seeming to interrupt. I did a big grocery shop before I thought of the egg feast (I gotta finish up the broccoli and zucchini, then I’ll start), my wife would have supper made for us when I got home (this NEVER happens), or other such nuisances. I wasn’t committed to doing an egg feast; it was just a thought.

Anyways, I have developed a head/sinus cold this past week and the last 3 days I have felt more like my earlier Keto self. Greater mental clarity, not as focused on food, having to pee more often and feeling more positive (even though my head is full of snot). And my weight has started going down!

Today I am at a new all-time low (other than on my way up :wink:). I’m pretty sure I was in Ketosis this entire time as my carbs are almost always under 20g total, but I think maybe my body was taking a weight-loss break and doing some healing. Is this possible? It has only been three days that the scale is moving down, but I feel like the tides are turning. I know it’s not all about what I have to lose, but what I am gaining. But I have to admit; it’s nice to see lower numbers than I have for the past three months.

I’ve also seriously reduced my veg consumption, as I haven’t felt like it and upped my meats and eggs. I don’t know if this is part of it too. So many variables, I’m not a good scientist. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

(Jeremy Storie) #17

An egg fast/feast is ultimately a carnivore diet. Vegetables are optional. I only have vegetables if I am craving them and generally feel better and see more weight loss without them in my diet.

(Susan) #18

@Daisytoad

So how did it go, Amanda? Did you try it and it helped? I hope so, was just curious if it worked for you.

(Karen) #19

Ditto… share the results

(Shane) #20

I’ve been thinking about this myself. Chooks are laying eggs faster than I can eat them (at a ratio of 4 or 5 eggs per pan of bacon).
So yesterday I cooked up a few eggs, 5 for breakfast and a dozen boiled to eat whenever.
I only ate 5 or 6 boiled eggs for dinner and felt satisfied. All up 10-11 and maybe a little bit of cheese for the day. The young bloke helped me eat boiled eggs last night and lunch today and I had fried eggs for dinner tonight and a slab of quiche a bit later. My weight was down this morning, but maybe just from the smaller volume of food from just eating the eggs.

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We had our 1 1/2YO Grandson stay a few days this week and he’s been enjoying eggs and bacon as well as boiled eggs, but not enough to help me keep up, so it looks like just eggs days more often in the future to clear the backlog.
He got a bit upset when his Nanna tried to take the eggs off him to take inside. He has the dummy when he’s out there to reduce the amount of chook poo in his diet.
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