Newbie with questions :D

#21

Love this.

@jenikinz - I think Dr Berry is excellent and you won’t go far wrong if you follow his advice.

I think you’ve had some excellent advice in this thread and I agree with a lot of it.

Eat when hungry, stop when full. 900 calories is very low and ordinarily I’d be the first person to be anxious - but from what you’ve said, you’re not deliberately restricting.

I am a big advocate for listening to your body, so if you genuinely can’t eat any more, then just wait a little longer before eating your next meal. You don’t have to eat 3 meals a day, and you don’t have to eat every few hours. It’s no problem to eat one meal in 24 hours if that’s what your body wants.

Electrolyte balance is key to not feeling rough through adaptation. If you don’t have any symptoms of ‘keto flu’, then you might not need them. I manage mine by drinking salt water - sounds awful, but if I need electrolytes, salt water tastes amazing whilst plain water tastes insipid and weak. If I don’t need electrolytes, then salt water tastes salty and horrid.

Most of all, don’t overthink it in these early days. Find some foods you enjoy, look forward to your meals, and keep looking forward. Counter intuitively, I found that the more foods I restricted (I am also carnivore), the fewer cravings I had. Your mileage might vary, but if you struggle with desiring old ways of eating, that might be helpful to know.

(Jen) #22

I was eating OMAD, but now I am doing two, only because I can get a bit more in that way. I am not hungry at either meal. I just eat until I cannot eat another bite without wanting to have it all come back up.
I got a lot of good info here and will try a few different things to see if that helps, otherwise I guess I won’t worry too much unless I start to have ill effects.

(Karen) #23

Its called imbue, i use their leave in conditioner and hair styling stuff too though I usually leave it to dry naturally. It is for curl hair types and although I do have naturally curly hair I can dry it straight if I want without using any other product.

You can get it online and I found it cheaper from their own website rather than amazon. They had a good deal on when I was ordering. I don’t know if they do products solely for straight hair but whatever I don’t think you will be disappointed.
I have tried so many products over the years and this has proved to be one of the best I’ve used… and it was a flippin good affordable price. First saw it on the This Morning programme here in UK.

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(Jen) #24

Thanks, I will have to check that out. My hair is curly/frizzy when it is long, but right now with it being short it doesn’t matter :smiley:

#25

Makes no difference how much fat is on your body, wrong mindset. That “I have plenty of fuel stored on my body” mindset was started mainly with fasting, it ignores that our metabolic rate adapts to intake, and completely disregards “weight loss” being because you’re losing muscle mass, which by itself contributes to a slower metabolism. At that low of a calorie intake, your RMR will slow down to it’s new intake, then losing what’s left will be complete hell. Been there, done that, NOT a fun thing to fix when it happens!

(Jen) #26

:frowning: that is what I am worried about. I can’t choke down more food doing this, at least at this point I am getting some calories rather than barfing them up because I forced myself too far. I don’t know what else to do. I may have to add in some of the things I don’t want to eat just to reach my baseline. It is so frustrating.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #27

If you’re vomiting up food from trying to eat too much, don’t eat so much.

In one of the better-known of the overfeeding studies done in the 1950’s and 60’s, one participant simply broke down and wept when he was asked to eat yet one more pork chop. So there is definitely a limit, here.

#28

Are you tracking your intake? Could very well be the breakdown of how you’re eating. Do you know what you eat as far as the fat / protein?

(Marianne) #29

I feel bad that you are having such a difficult time eating. Pre-keto, I used to love eating mass quantities of food; I really did. I would binge to the point of bursting and then go back for more junk a couple hours later. Being all carbs, of course it did not satisfy. What I loved about keto is that I could eat until I was satiated (different than being stuffed), and it held me until I ate again. Anyway…

Hmmm, I was going to attach two recipes that I like that I think are very palatable, but this thread won’t let me attach a Word file. Sorry for the long post, but here they are.

Keto Pizza (my husband makes this in a very large aluminum sheet pan, using ten eggs for the crust. I’m sure you can adjust to the size you wish to make. It’s not a hard and fast recipe.). You can put a little tomato sauce on it, but we don’t do that anymore - it’s just eggs and cheese only.

Keto Pizza

Crust

  • 6 eggs
  • 6-8 oz. shredded cheese, preferably mozzarella or provolone

Topping

  • ½ c. pizza sauce (optional – we don’t use it anymore)
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • 5 oz. shredded cheese
  • 1½ oz. pepperoni, sausage, bacon, etc. (optional)
  • Green pepper, onion, olives, etc., if you wish

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F.
  2. Start by making the crust. Crack eggs into a medium-sized bowl and add shredded cheese. Stir to combine.
  3. Use a spatula to spread the cheese and egg batter on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. You can form two round circles or just make one large rectangular pizza. Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes until the pizza crust turns golden. Remove and let cool for a minute or two.
  4. Increase the oven temperature to 450°F.
  5. Spread pizza sauce on the crust and sprinkle oregano on top. Top with cheese and toppings of choice.
  6. Bake for another 5-10 minutes until the cheese melts to preference and vegetables soften.

Sausage Soup - you can put any kind of meat in this that you want, or leave it out. I do like it using breakfast sausage, although I bet bacon would be delicious.

Keto Sausage Soup

Ingredients:
• 1/4 stick of butter
• 1-1/2 c. heavy cream (or ¾ c. cream, 4oz. cream cheese)
• 2 c. water
• 1 chicken or beef bouillon cube (or more, if needed)
• 1-1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 2 teaspoons hot Mexican chili powder (or regular chili powder)
• ¼ tsp. cayenne pepper (or more)
• ½ tsp. onion powder
• ½ tsp. garlic powder
• 8 oz. shredded cheddar cheese
• 6 small breakfast sausage (like Jimmy Deans), microwaved and chopped (or you could add chicken, shrimp, bacon or just leave it plain, without meat)

Directions:
Add butter, crushed bouillon, cumin, chili powder, cayenne and flour to a medium pot. Cook to release flavors and form a roux. Slowly add cream, water and sausage, stirring continually to incorporate. Simmer until thickened. Add cheese; stir until melted.

Good luck!

(Jen) #30

@gingersmommy
It is amazing how much I was able to eat before. I just had this conversation with my husband. I was like how could I eat a whole big bag or doritos and then a half pint of ice cream and still want more and not be full? But now, I eat two bites of beef and I am ready to explode! How on earth does that work?? (this is a bit of sarcasm, I do understand the science, the full conversation had me saying that my brain doesn’t recognize it as food and is telling me to keep eating…but yes, I do understand how insulin works and why certain foods/ingredients work this way etc :smiley: )

@PaulL
I feel that pain :frowning: I am extremely frustrated because I feel good eating all meat, but I can’t force enough down to maintain eating this way long term.

@lfod14
Yes I am tracking my intake, my fat and protien are close, with fat coming in higher most of the time.

Last night I had chicken fingers, I pulled off as much of the batter as I could, but within an hour I had knee pain. I am not sure if I am going crazy, or if it was what the chicken was fried in. I hope I don’t have issues with chicken as I can eat a whole bird with less problems than beef eating. I wish I could eat red meat the way I eat chicken! I haven’t tried eating all my meat from chicken yet, but that will be coming next. I am trying everything I can to make this work without me feeling ill stomach wise.
I did buy some ground bison today, never had it before, fingers crossed I love it.
This morning I had plain greek yogurt with fresh blueberries and 2 tbsp of heavy whipping cream and got 453 calories, which is pretty good, but 20g of sugar/24.8 net carbs :frowning:
I bought cheeses and other things I figured I could use for calorie boosts, but I am feeling pretty down that either my body or brain seems to want to work against me. At least that is what it feels like right now.

#31

Because they aren’t food…?
I could eat 0.5kg bread with plenty of butter and honey and I just got hungrier as it had almost no protein.

But carby and non-carby food is very close regarding satiation on OMAD for me. As far as I can tell, at least, it’s not like I am able to eat high-carb under normal circumstances. But 2000 kcal was enough for me for a meal even on high-carb (and okay for OMAD though I have little experience with that combo) and I normally need at least 1600 kcal on carnivore too (for my first and hopefully only meal)…
But carbs still mess with me and if I have multiple meals, the differences are way bigger.
Oh and don’t think I didn’t have tiny meals (never on keto, only on carnivore), once I was hungry and got satiated after ONE egg… But eventually my body learned, I learned too and figured out what I should do. There are different times so it’s good if we have ideas how to eat enough when satiation comes way too early. And it will be enough or not but mitigating the problems is something.

You have some insane difference but I have heard about people who only could starve on keto, EVEN when already underweight. There was some big problem with their satiation signs or I don’t know how that could happen.

Oh, chicken! The only meat I found that doesn’t satiate me. It’s good for boosting calories and protein, too bad I don’t need the second ever and rarely the first. But it’s good to know.

Skip the berries or reduce the amount? It sounds very much, what are the amounts? Though there is the calorie count, I could do some research…
[EDIT] Oh I see. Less yogurt, more (whipped :D) cream? Cream isn’t very carby. And I used raspberries on keto, they are very low-carb and still nice. I almost never ate blueberries but they seem very sugary so a small amount is needed to enjoy them without lots of carbs.
(I used banana too but frozen and very little. It has huge flavor so a little went a long way. But I didn’t eat yogurt and now that I do eat greek yogurt, I eat it all alone. I guess it would need a lot of fruit it make it fruity…)

(Jen) #32

@Shinita
LOL I should have put that what I said about eating all that and never being full was a bit of sarcasm on my part. I was telling my husband that eating that way I was malnourished because my brain wasn’t registering it as food and was telling me to keep eating :joy:

When I lost the weight before eating whatever I wanted, just smaller quantites, I could tolerate about 150 carbs before I started craving food. But I was also eating every 2-3 hours until I reached my calorie choice for the day. (I used to eat a varied amount of calories each day so I wasn’t eating the same amount day to day)
I really don’t want to eat that high, but if I can’t meet my minimum any other way I may have to try and find the highest calorie/lowest carb/sugar thing I can find. Today I will eat 10 big cheez itz to reach what I need by the skin of my teeth and give me 42 carbs (in total for the day). I am trying to keep it under 50 at maximum.
I had 6oz of the ground bison, and I like it better than ground beef, but it is lower in calories, so I will alternate.

I had a half cup of blueberries, 1 cup of yogurt and 2tbsp of heavy cream. 12.7g sugar from the yogurt and 7.4g from the blueberries. I think next time I will cut the yogurt to half cup and do half cup of heavy cream, or fiddle around to make it lower.

(Jen) #33

I just realized there is this graph on cronometer, you can see roughly what my calorie range has been for the last 4 weeks.

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#34

It makes perfect sense not to get satiated with a not enough nutritious food… Calories and volume isn’t enough. I always wondered how people can get satiated with a sandwich containing a very thin deli meat between bread slices and a little butter… My body doesn’t work that way. Maybe that’s why I ate nutritious, protein-rich food all my life. I ate bad stuff too but I got my most important nutrients for sure. It’s allegedly very normal so most people feel something is off…?

I only could lose fat below 80g net carbs :slight_smile: I ate too much above that to get my satiation all day. But it doesn’t work anymore. Or not so simply. OMAD and high activity surely could help. But I have other reasons to go very low with my carbs. And I don’t want to raise to need for doing absolutely everything right all the time, I am not that perfect.

Oh that’s familiar, nothing wrong with that if we can do it, I think. I did the same, just with 3 hours. On low-carb, keto and carnivore alike (high-carb meals lasted a bit - or much - longer, being bigger and I had 1 hour on carnivore sometimes, how I hated those days… too easy satiation is horrible as I get hungry again and again and again and I am hungry a lot. I need my bigger meals with long term satiation, that’s wonderful, uninterrupted perfect satiation for almost a whole day… love that. I like eating twice but I can’t make it work, usually too many calories, too much hunger and I get hungry after my 2nd meal too).

These things can change, probably will for you. I had 3 meals on keto first… Then 2. And I have either 1 or 4-5 on carnivore. Timing and food choices matter, of course but sometimes the body just changes.

It’s good you like bison, I never ate it. Can you add some butter or something? Though if you manage to eat enough cream, that is a nice extra too. And some people get satiated from the added fat and that is probably contraproductive for you.

(Jen) #35

@Shinita
I like the feeling I have in my body on the meat only/very low carbs (15 or under), not having bad knee pain and being able to move around with less pain has been amazing and I don’t want to lose that!
I wish I could just do OMAD and get all I needed in one sitting. I love that I am not constantly thinking about what I want to eat, or feeling hungry and grouchy for my next carb load.
Right now it is easier because I am out of work, but I may have a job starting soon and it is going to be tough because my only opportunity to eat will be early in the morning. Otherwise I will have to eat at night as well and wait hours before going to bed so I am not laying there in digestion mode.
At this point I feel that progress is progress. I will keep working at it and trying to figure out what works and what doesn’t. I was hoping to do a full 30 days meat only so I could add things back in one at a time to see what causes issues and what doesn’t.
Fun times :rofl:

#36

I aplogise ahead of what I’m about to state, but hopefully this will even give you some hope…but I’m male, so I’m not sure (as hormones are different) our experiences will align.

Yes, I’ve noticed things like this. My hair was thinning, but then again I drink alcohol and I’m 47 this year…but yes, I have noticed scratching of scalp problems. I’ve managed to sort this, through topical coconut shampoo and conditioner prodocts, but also proper nutrition, and maybe B12 and D vitamin suppliments :-).

Also, I’m even reluctant to say this…make sure your nails are short, clean and smart, because long nails can cause unescarry damage to your scalp if you scratch, inflammation wise. Cionsult a proper trained medical experet- this is just me.

Listen, Good luck!

(Jen) #37

Funny you mention nails, I can’t stand long nails on myself. They look nice on other people, and I used to get them done every now and then, but I would always cut them down and/or pull them off after a day or two. They drove me nuts. My nails are currently clipped very short and clean :smiley:
Washing with just cold water and using my fingertips to massage my scalp, and using a boar bristle brush before and after washing, has made a complete recovery of my scalp. I was shocked when several weeks went by and I realized I hadn’t touched my scalp at all, so I ran my fingers through and NOTHING! No scabs, no bumps, no itchiness. My pillow, the back of my shirt and the drain used to contain tons of my hair, now there is practically nothing.
I would like to find a shampoo or something that doesn’t have all the chemicals in it, but for now I will stick with just a small drop of what I have for when I feel the need to use shampoo until it is gone, and will definitely check out the coconut shampoos!

I do try and get out in the sun for at least a half hour a day, and I was taking a D supplement as well as a multi vitamin and the reaction wasn’t great. It could have just been the multi. I will have to experiment. I don’t like taking any type of pills, medication or otherwise, if I don’t have to.

#38

Brilliant!

You will work it out! I know it.

You’ll be OK.

For me, as a male,I’ve been looking into it recently.
But, for me, I’ve given up the ghost because both my Father and Grand Father experiencienced the problems I’m going through.

i still have hope though, freind!

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #39

It’s very simple biology. The elevated insulin from eating a large amount of carbohydrate blocks the satiety hormone leptin from registering in the brain, so the brain doesn’t think we’ve eaten enough. When we eat low-insulin foods, such as meat, insulin doesn’t rise that high, so when our fat cells detect enough energy on board and send out the leptin signal, the brain registers it and shuts off the hunger hormones. As I’ve posted many times before, as a carb-burner I would eat pasta to the literal point of stomach rupture and still be hungry. On keto, I am probably only about half-full when I’ve had enough. Partly that’s from satiety hormones and also partly from the fact that fats have over twice the caloric value as the same weight in carbohydrate, so they are a lot denser, energy-wise.

(Jen) #40

:sweat_smile: I do know this, I have edited my post for a bit of clarification. I was being a bit sarcastic or hyperbolic when I said that.
After I said that to my husband I was explaining why that was. He doesn’t really care about his health or why things work the way they do, he is fully invested in his sugar addiction and is fine dealing with all the misery it brings him for that sweet taste :grimacing:
But I am hoping that in time he will see my example and want to feel better himself. He thouroughly enjoyed the steak and fat I couldn’t eat so I can at least help him with one meal a day!