Losing too much weight?!


(Stephan ) #1

Hey there folk, long time no see :slight_smile:
I’ve been doing Carnivore now for around 7 months and my god, on one hand it has helped me tremendously but on the other hand i am getting a little nervous.

I lost around 25kg over those seven months and i am already at 73kg while being 183cm tall.
There is still a little bit of fat on my body but it is kinda scary getting this low regarding weight.

Did anyone else experience something similar and has any tips on how to gain some weight back?

Have a nice day!
Stephan


#2

Went on lion diet the first try with lamb, salt, water only. Lamb had too much fat so i was full pretty quickly and felt nauseous when eating more of it. Resulted in severe undereating. I don’t know what your diet looks like but maybe change it up a little, add more variety, reduce/increase fat to try and change your satiety.

Second try after adding in fish, cheese and other meats I can hold a good weight of 75-80 kg at 183cm


#3

If you love your food, and like eating, like a keto/carnivore like me, and you aren’t starving yourself…then you are just adjusting.

I went down to 68 kgs from well above 100. That’s a bag of coal in weight.

Keep eating correctly. You’ll be OK. i.e. eat keto diet until saited.
Plenty of water.


(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #4

Hey, I’d love to weigh 73kg! Have you ever looked at pictures of shirtless guys from the 1970’s and earlier? Some of them look emaciated by today’s standards, because we are used to seeing a layer of subcutaneous fat on even the fittest athletes.

Woodstock, 1969:


(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #5

World War II, 1939-1945:

Dormitory at the University of Iowa, 1950’s or 1960’s:

As you can see, our eyes need adjusting to the real reality.


(Stephan ) #6

Thanks for the supplies! and the pictures :stuck_out_tongue:

Well most of the time its pork chop and short rips. Its just the tastiest for me so far.
Beef is mostly to blend without any spices so i changed it up a bit.

Was actually wondering if I could just add a view things we are not “supposed” to eat , like cheese and i dont know cereal for breakfast, cuz its quite difficult to eat lots of meat right at the moment.
At around 12am its okay but well thats already 4 hours in for me.


(KM) #7

Depending on you, “carnivore” pretty much just means food made using animals. So milk, cream, cheese and other dairy, as well as eggs, fish, fowl, shellfish, organ meats and even insects all count. Milk is pretty carby if you want to stay in ketosis, but it is animal based. I’d skip the cereal, personally and if adding plant foods look for literal whole foods that aren’t processed.


(Geoffrey) #8

Gee, I hope I can complain about this some day. :smirk:


(Harriet) #9

If you check BMI charts and calculators you’re fine, miles away from underweight. The normal range for your height goes down to as low as 63 kg. I grew up in the 70s and other folks are right, we’ve gotten used to people being pudgy.


#10

You obviously need to eat more. Change your food items as your current ones make you satiated too well compared to your needs. Or add more meals, maybe if that helps.

That easily may help. Of course I have no idea what satiates you, I have read about satiation from zillion people and now I am know that there are no rules at all, it’s highly individual. If I wanted to eat more (I need the opposite, sadly), I could just add 100-200g fat without any difficulties… Drinking calories is easy too.
But eating more meat… I do get bored or have enough protein. I couldn’t even eat only meat, I have plenty of eggs and dairy (it’s animal so it’s carnivore. milk is totally carnivore if you ask me. yes, it’s sugary, and? carnivore doesn’t mean we eat little sugar. I get plenty from my eggs and meat too but dairy really can bump the number. and I feel great. plant sugar feels worse). And yes, I noticed the strong correlation between my calorie intake and my egg and dairy consumption… As they don’t satiate me well, they just are easy to eat in big amounts so calories come without much extra satiation. Many people have the same with cheese, they can eat a lot of it.
Of course, some people can eat a fattier 30oz steak in one sitting but most of us can’t do it :smiley:
So change your items, try to figure out what works better.
If you are unlucky enough, you need carbs to eat much more. In my case, just a wee bit makes me hungrier. It’s still keto for me but I easily eat at a big surplus (at least occasionally, never overate on keto for longer term. I probably could do it if I wanted. when could I say no to some butter when I had a reason not to keep myself from the treat? scratchings work too but they satiate me more for some reason. I blame the protein in it).

I never could eat lots of meat. I used to have 0.25-0.5 pound in the beginning! Okay, that was a bit tough even for me who adored eggs and dairy.
Years later I am around a pound a day at least but that’s it. I just don’t want much more on average and I doubt I ever will go higher. But I never want to abandon my eggs and dairy and if it’s just calories, I can eat a lot of extra fat.
So I don’t think you need a ton of meat every day especially in one sitting. If your protein need is higher than mine, that still isn’t a problem, I eat 130-220g protein a day and never a ton of meat (except my few 1kg pork shoulder days). But I do have eggs and dairy :slight_smile: I couldn’t do 3 carnivore days without them but I prefer to have them every day of the year. I try to keep them low though to avoid protein overeating and fat overeating. I don’t care about carbs on carnivore, it’s never too high anyway.

Or if you want to keep to meat, use different kinds? Pork, fowl, ruminant meat, fish, organs, shrimps, they are all very different from each other. The cuts can be very different, fishes are different, organs are… But these all in huge variety? Even I would be willing to try a meat only week if I had a really big variety with various seafood and ruminants! (I would still miss my other items but I wouldn’t be super bored of meat, probably.)
I can’t have such a variety so I add some processed meats too, they are so easy to eat! They just spice up my diet, I never would eat them in bigger amounts.

Or is it not variety just fullness that keeps you from eating much meat? What if you wait a bit or lot and have more meals, I mentioned that already… But if you get enough protein, you just need to add more fat…

Good luck to figure it out! It’s so sad when one need to leave a good woe because fat-loss just don’t stop :frowning:

It doesn’t work that way. These numbers are fine for some - while others may look truly emacinated after losing a bunch of muscle too. There is personal taste as well. And maybe it’s not the current state but fear from the truly bad future if it continues… I wouldn’t accept it either if I wanted no fat-loss and would have gotten it especially quickly.
I looked back, OMG, that’s a quick fat-loss!

I definitely wouldn’t want to be 63kg for 183 (no matter if I was a male or female) and it has nothing to do with eyes and pudginess. That’s way too little muscle and probably a horrid scrawny figure (depends on the individual, obviously! it surely suits some!).

63kg sounds nice to me, for me, I am 163cm (and female but it matters little IMO, males tend to have a bit more muscles naturally but females have extra fatty parts and they easily balance each other out. but there is a big individual factor on top of it anyway) :slight_smile: I need to get much more muscles for that to be lean enough… I would want 80-100kg as a 183cm male but again, it depends. Shoulder width, how dry I should go for a six pack (I know not everyone can get them but I surely would try. but I like some padding and a comfortable life, not suffering below 10% BF so genetics would decide)… And my abilities to go near natural maximum musculature and keep a low enough body fat… That’s not easy and I am lazy and a hedonist in a way that eating gives me more joy than a really nice body but I want both please :smiley:

But I got carried away :slight_smile: Nice topic. I should go and do my full body workout already, I forgot about it in my forum/food addiction. Hopefully I will be more pumped out this time. I really want those muscles. So when this fat miraculously goes away, I will have something, not just some sticks. I dislike spaghetti arms and so many women have them (the fat ones has sausage ones though).


(Stephan ) #11

first of all WOW. thats a long text :stuck_out_tongue:
thank you.

I guess the reason I am trying to figure some kind of change out is because I am eating around 1kg of meat every day and even though I am doing it I have a big energy deficit during late noon, especially the 2 hours before my last meal.

Eating this amount of meat is totally fine to me but couldnt take much more.
I am adding quite a lot of butter to every meal maybe like 15g per meal i guess.

I have quite wide shoulders but a slim tummy which is why it kinda looks weird to not have much “meat” on my upper body etc.

I am a quite lazy person myself, just sitting in front of my computer either for work or pleasure so yeah, quite the couch potato. maybe more exercise would get more weight and muscles on my body.

Thanks for the reply! I am just a bit nervous I guess. 35kg in one year just by changing the woe is crazy to me


(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #12

You can eat whatever you want to eat, just don’t call it carnivore. Call it “carnivore-adjacent,” or “almost carnivore,” or something. My sister is theoretically carnivore, but she sometimes eats carbs, and she feels that when she does, it amounts to strict keto, so she’s still really okay. I prefer to avoid plant foods entirely and am doing fine, so far.

Breakfast cereals have lost their appeal for me. I’d rather have bacon and eggs, when I eat a morning meal, because it’s an easy meal to make and highly satisfying. Lately, I’ve been breaking my fast in the early afternoon with eggs and burgers. And bacon and eggs is not just for breakfast, but for any time of the day. :bacon: :egg:

“Carnivore” is an imprecise term. It can mean meat-only, but it can also mean plant-free, in which case dairy is okay for those who can tolerate it (though it is preferable to avoid whole milk, because of its sugar content. But a lot of carnivores consume heavy cream and aged cheeses, which are pretty much carb-free. (BTW, honey is to be avoided, both for its sugar content and because it comes from plant pollen.)

Coffee and tea are plant foods that many carnivores feel are acceptable on a carnivore diet.


(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #13

I’ve told this story before, but when I first watched the movie “Houseboat” I remember thinking that Sophia Loren, while lovely, was the very definition of “zaftig.” She was shapely and curvaceous, but very well-padded. I recently had occasion to look at some stills from that movie, and by today’s standards, Ms. Loren looks actually fairly thin. Our eyes have definitely gotten used to fatter people.


(Harriet) #14

You could be undereating fat, rabbit starvation. Modern meats aren’t fatty. Honestly, I think adding 15 g of butter per meal is nothing! I read Jimmy Moore actually has a bite of butter for every bite of steak and AFAIK he’s keto only.

Might be a good idea to run your numbers and see how much fat you’re actually getting. Or just double or triple your added fat, see how you feel.


#15

1kg meat surely have enough protein for you, no need to eat more but you should add fat. Seriously. Way fattier meat (do you like pork belly, for example? I do. and I need the leanest meats I can tolerate :frowning: life isn’t fair! pork belly is so extremely fatty that you may keep eating your leaner meat, a smallish piece boosts your fat intake. I love sausages too. the good ones that are almost half fat…). Dairy could help with fat a lot, I do my best not to get half of my fat intake from them, it was a fight. I heard about many people who ate heavy cream galore every day.
There are very very many fatty options on carnivore, choose one or two or a dozen, variety is nice…


I don’t think my eyes changed but I am not so old yet :smiley: My views changed though, I couldn’t care less about muscles when I was very young and now I appreciate them (I never aesthetically liked fat ones - with very rare exceptions, once I met a sexy and quite chubby girl, she looked amazing naked. I was thinner and I was simply fat in an ugly way, in my eyes at least - and it didn’t matter I always was fat, it can’t change my taste). Lean guys without proper muscles can be quite scrawny undressed… But it’s individual, my SO looks good but he has a little padding and his skeleton is fine and that helps. A proper ribcage makes wonders :smiley: And he has thick legs at least (buying trousers already is a problem, stupid clothes industry where still pretty normal just not average people have problems).
Everything is better than being badly obese though. Except being almost a skeleton. But both are wildly unhealthy.

Sophia Loren (I admit I don’t remember much and just googled images and base my opinion on them. and my vague memories as well) was what I call curvy (past time as I write about her young figure). Not as euphemism of fat, I call fat people fat, just a bit fat women chubby. Curvy is more like the hourglass figure to me :slight_smile: As it should. Nowadays words are used in a strange way sometimes…
She wasn’t too skinny but she wasn’t too chubby either (not like that is a thing, it’s about taste. I like when people are slim and she was slim, with curves. the best combo). She had (not thin) thighs and that may be a problem nowadays for some reason but I never agreed with that. And this too thin ideal is very long, even before my times there was Twiggy…
Thighs should have not very thin, there are so many important big muscles there :smiley: Sophia Loren had a slim waist so she was slim. With curves :smiling_face_with_three_hearts: And nice thick thighs, those looked good too :slight_smile: Even if I don’t want mine like that, I want mine being more muscular looking. But not the realistically possible level, a bit below.
Modern super thin models make me feel very, very sorry for them. They aren’t even pretty at all due to their thinness.
But I can’t look at chubby people and see them normal. My taste is choosier than that. I feel sorry for fat folks too, well sometimes or potentially, it depends. I don’t feel sorry for myself as it’s my fault I am not thin, I always was healthy enough and anyway, I don’t care so very much (but I am stubborn and will win in the end), I am glad there are beautiful slim and muscular people to look at!


#16

That weight loss spread out isn’t crazy, but pushing the upper limit of what people can usually pull off, problem is at that speed (over 7 mo) I’d find it nearly impossible that you’re not loosing muscle mass at a near 1:1 at this point, which isn’t good and will lead to a lowered metabolic rate, assuming it hasn’t already. Keep an eye on everything, are you less hungry than you used to be? Do you work out? Do anything that would tip you off that that’s happening? Your muscle mass is your key to keeping your metabolic rate up, making fat loss easier, and most importantly, making it harder to regain.


(Stephan ) #17

actually I havent really thought about it…mmh
I always thought that it was fat that I lost especially on my upper body, but you might be right that i might have lost a lot of muscles. would explain quite a lot.
Before i was pretty sturdy and now there is not a lot left.
Well I am under quite some stress atm but dont think thats why i am less energetic.
Might be more about trying new things out instead of sticking to it. Someone told me about “Low-Fodmap” and i wanted to give it a shot and see if the IBS stays away. maybe thats why

@Shinita I actually have never tried pork belly, looks quite delicious. It’s partially kinda weird here in germany with meat. they try to cut off every piece of fat at the butcher etc but i wouldnt have any problem with upping my butter intake. It’s quite delicious :stuck_out_tongue:


(Marianne) #18

Me, too. :sob:


#19

Maybe try to find a butcher that actually butchers. Most of them just have pre-cut pieces. My butcher caters mostly to Muslims but they actually have cows and lambs hanging around and cut down pieces of meat from them.

There was a lot of confusion, at least on my side, what a rib eye equivalent is in germany. They don’t know “ribeye”. When I ask for an entrecote it is very lean. I found out that asking for “Hochrippe” results in them giving you nice fatty meat which is the same as the one rib eyes are cut from. But in germany they cut it differently so it looks differently.


#20

In Germany too? What.
We have tons of super fatty pork here :slight_smile: It’s the norm for pork, after all. There is pork loin light in LIDL but that’s a very tiny part of the meat counter. LIDL has the fattiest green ham, I like that. Nice fat layer on the otherwise lean pork and quite cheap! Yum. Still leanish but I need that.

On the other hand, I often buy “scrap meat”/“sausage meat”. It’s 70/30. Don’t you have that there? I know ground meat (something I never buy) is available in fatty versions in many countries, be it pork or beef…
Chicken is somewhat fatty too, I usually buy thighs with skin and bemoan its high fattiness that ruins my macros (well I easily overeat protein on those days too, it doesn’t satiate me well. but it’s nice and tender).

There are some nice fatty fishes and people can’t take out the fat from those :wink: Salmon, mackerel… Still not really fatty pork level but still something. And you may add butter to salmon too…

There must be fatty meat options in Germany too (apart from sausages :upside_down_face: ).