Metabolic Flexibility - Get Real

(bulkbiker) #128

So what?

Does that make them in any way desirable things to eat?

(Greg) #129

I think metabolic flexibility means you can bend over and touch your metatarsals.

But I stand to be corrected too …

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #130

I can’t do that. :woozy_face:

#131

Front or back bend? :wink:

(Jenna Ericson) #132

Regarding the phosphagen system, I wasn’t aware of this method of energy use until I looked a little into metabolic conditioning, so I don’t really know much about it. My understanding is that in activities where you need a lot of power for about 10 seconds or less your body will rapidly mobilizable your reserves of high-energy phosphates in skeletal muscle and the brain to recycle ATP (got that from Wikipedia). I think creative phosphate is originally made from the amino acids arginine and glycine, but my understanding is that it is a whole different system than glycogen use.

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #133

Pertinent, I think:

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #134

Is this an example of metabolic inflexibility? Or symbiotic entanglement?

https://www.enr.gov.nt.ca/en/services/lynx/lynx-snowshoe-hare-cycle

(squirrel-kissing paper tamer) #135

Symbiotic entanglement exacerbated by metabolic inflexibility? Thanks for sharing, very interesting article.

#136

I’m really enjoying your posts @fabia. I find they challenge my thinking and current dietary beliefs.

The insulin resistance that persists and results in increased and persistent elevated insulin levels (hyperinsulinemia) is a gateway metabolic state that leads to metabolic disease.

The glucose intolerance called physiological insulin resistance (misnomer?) in a fat adapted metabolism that accesses ketones and the primary energy source in a low insulin context does not result in hyperinsulinemia and chronic metabolic disease. If an insulin response is initiated in this specific contextual state, then any very transitory hyperglycemia is resolved.

I understand what is being said; that the glucose intolerance, that being the reduced ability to readily produce an insulin spike (which is currently regarded as healthy, and for some reason more healthy than a steady state insulin plot) can be manipulated by implication into the suggestion of metabolic inflexibility. Rather than being considered a buffered metabolic state that does not respond with large variations in insulin production and steep and sudden blood glucose changes.

And, possibly, fair enough, that inability to spike insulin in a modern contemporary society fuelled mainly on processed carbohydrates may be out of synchronicity with the times. It does hint at a lost seasonality of fat adapted metabolism balanced by a season of higher insulin accessibility when carbohydrates are more readily obtained from the environment. But I’d argue that the manufactured modern food environment is out of synchronicity with human metabolism, rather than the human metabolism is flawed in its inability to constantly respond to the modern food environment in the case of glucose intolerance for fat adapted metabolisms.

In terms of a higher level interpretation, better metabolic health over an accumulated time period may favour the fat adapted state with a recognition of transitory hyperglycemia under a carbohydrate challenge, as compared to a persistent higher insulin state.

The video below is book marked to start at the relevant point and has Dr. Professor Ben Bikman explain the nuance.

(Utility Muffin Research Kitchen) #137

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4qVdiCzNck

As said in another thread, my working theory is that evolution designed us to eat a specific mix of nutrients, and looking at hunter-and-gatherer populations there were about 15-20 percent carbs in there (that always come with fiber btw). And any significant change in diet bears the risk of long-term negative consequences (go ask the dinosaurs if you don’t believe me).

Your claim that ketogenic diet is the best way to eat reminds me a bit of Ancel Keys claim that high-carb is the best. After all, what harm could come from it? It has to be good, because all the good effects of BHB and such? But there may be effects that show up after decades. We do have a population wide experiment that shows that harm does come from a high carb diet, but it takes a long time. It’s much faster nowadays because children are born to insulin resistant mothers, but if the child is metabolically healthy then it will take many decades for most people to develop metabolic syndrome. And frankly we have no data what happens if millions of people go keto fo decades. We might be all right, but it’s still a deviation from what evolution designed us for and it may be that we’ll not be all right, or that some of us will be all right. After all, I’ve talked with people who couldn’t adapt to keto even after many months of trying. If some people can’t tolerate it, then chances are that some people tolerate both but will be better of with some carbs.

If we ate too much carbs for decades then we have to go ketogenic because our body is out of whack, sure.

But for people not in metabolic syndrome, if you really claim that a ketogenic diet is more healthy than a diet with some starchy or sugary vegetables (no processed carbs, mind you) then the burden of proof is on your side. If evolution designed us to eat 20% carbs, then both 5% carbs and 50% carbs are extremes that may have detrimental effects.

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #138

What carbs do you think our hunter gatherer ancestors were eating during the Pleistocene? Other than a lot of cellulose. As for sub-5% carbs long term, I’ll keep you advised.

(bulkbiker) #139

So to me it sounds like this fabled “metabolic flexibility” is giving us an excuse to go back to eating what made us fat and ill in the first place.

Bit like saying you can’t have put T2 into remission if you cant eat a houseful of carbs… and equally ridiculous.

Food is fuel not entertainment?

(Utility Muffin Research Kitchen) #140

What exactly in If evolution designed us to eat 20% carbs, then both 5% carbs and 50% carbs are extremes that may have detrimental effects. is an excuse to go back to 50% carbs, plus toxic additives like emulsifiers?

(Windmill Tilter) #141

No, you were definitely not carb shaming; that’s not even a real thing. I was making light of the reductionist, ad hominem argument that those of us arguing in favor of retaining the ability to metabolize carbs are nothing more than addicts rationalizing self-destructive behavior with made up words.

I thought it seemed unreasonable, and a bit funny. Sometimes, the absurdity of an argument can be brought to light by taking it to it’s logical extreme. If someone actually believed that supporters of metabolic flexibility are simply carb addicts making up words, then “metabolic flexibility” would be a defensive term, a rationalization. I was trying to imagine what an attacking/offensive made-up word would be. In the current zeitgeist, there is no more cruel and vicious attack you can make than to accuse someone of oppressing or victimizing. Hence the made-up word “carb shaming”. It’s the sort of word a self-deluded carb addict would invent to attack those who would deprive him of his fix.

There is no such thing as “carb-shaming” obviously, and anyone who used it in a sentence with even a hint of sincerity would be laughed out of any room they happened to be in (and rightly so).

An ad hominem argument is wrong because it’s a classic logical fallacy that attacks the speaker rather than his arguments. Attacking an hominem argument is not wrong, because it is an argument put forth against a logical fallacy either directly or by highlighting it’s absurdity. To your point though, the mocking tone I adopted was passive aggressive and less constructive than simply pointing it out explicitly. Sorry.

At any rate, this has been a fascinating discussion that has gotten me thinking about “metabolic flexibility”, which I had never given thought to previously. I’m following it with keen interest.

(bulkbiker) #142

Are you quoting my post for a reason… ?
“If evolution designed us to eat 20% carbs” is the question… not the answer.

(Windmill Tilter) #143

The Pleistocene was 1.8 million years in duration. Homo Sapiens have only existed for 300,000 years. We should probably restrict the discussion to when we existed.

It’s true that vast ice sheets covered much of the earth, and caused extinction events. It’s also true that Africa was minimally affected. It was a temperate climate. Homo Sapiens evolved in Africa. Put differently, our ancestors were happily eating as many carbs as they could find on the African Savannah. They also ate lots of meat. They were omnivores, like most modern humans.

My understanding is that most of those that left Africa did so during the great migration 130,000 years ago during the African “mega-droughts”. They followed the animals . The animals followed the plants. Our ancestors didn’t wander off into vast glaciers; they followed grazing animals. No carbs, no prey. That’s why North America didn’t get it’s first humans until 12,000 years ago. Even if a minor fraction of our ancestors followed the coastlines and lived primarily on fish, they probably would likely have lived much like the “modern” Inuit. Even the Inuit ate 10%-20% carbs. You really think folks liking in temerate or semi-temperate climates didn’t? That doesn’t make sense.

I’m not an expert on any of this stuff obviously, but the thesis that the majority of our ancestors lived in vast plains of ice free from vegetation doesn’t make sense to me.

#144

I second that.

#145

Could “metabolically flexible” also have a broader definition, not just carbs vs fat?

I am quoting FrankoBear from Another Carnivore Thread, where we were talking about anemias. FB wrote this under one of his posts and it made me think… If you eat carnivorously, some can run into a risk of hemochromatosis, but by eating veggies and adding phytates, you actually decrease the absorption of iron and this way decrease the possibility of developing hemochromatosis. Then you have Fangs, Ilana Rose, David and others successfully eating carnivore, each attacking it from different angles as some are focusing on muscle meat, others on 2:1 ration, some nose-to-tail, etc. My friend is anemic and a vegetarian - from what we discussed, she should be decreasing her intake of veggies and increase her meat intake.

I am histamine intolerant and the majority of fruits and veggies are off-limits. The dose makes the poison…a very small amount of veggies delivers a large dose of histamine, oxalates, etc. Keto has done wonders for my symptoms of histamine intolerance and I feel that I do much better with lower carbs, since I can’t have the majority of “carby” foods. No more migraines, no more brain fog, no more swollen hands and feet, no more bloating, etc. I only get blotchy red cheeks when I really overdo it on cold cuts and restaurants. I have been eating sauerkraut without a single reaction from my body whereas pre-keto, I would just look at sauerkraut and my face would be blotchy. Could we say I gained metabolic flexibility because my body can get rid of histamine more efficiently than before and the dose that was my poison is no longer my poison? My body is functioning better, so maybe the loss or decrease in the efficiency of glucose metabolism isn’t a bad thing?

I guess we are only as metabolically flexible as our genes and environmental factors allow us to be?

(mole person) #146

“The Pleistocene is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the world’s most recent period of repeated glaciations.”

We were all over the planet by the end. I think for vast swaths of humanity access to carbohydrates would have been almost nonexistent for most of the year. Even where I live in Canada, in the present day, there is virtually nothing 9 months out of the year.

Wild edibles was a favorite hobby of mine for many, many years. It’s always been something that troubled me. What the hell did the natives eat in early spring, winter and fall? Even in summer natural tubers are really hard to forage much of. And berries, (which I’m sure we always did eat whenever we found them) are only around about two months out of the year. And everything, animal and bird, goes for the berries. It not like an orchard where they festoon bushes untouched.

#147

I like this qualification. It delineates within the nutritional ketosis experiment between the n=1 therapeutic diet for those with metabolic (could add neurologic and immune-mediated?) disease and claims, if any, that it is a broad spectrum species appropriate way of eating.