@katillac, even after doing keto for most of the past three years I still am finding out how to adjust it to my particular needs, which change all the time. But the protein issue seems to be coming up more recently, I think due to the increased interest in ZC, because people inevitably want to know if it’s ok to eat meat to satiety. So far I’ve found a pretty good balance, with eating fatty meat, some eggs, and my beloved pork cracklings, and then enjoying some veggies and chocolate if I feel like it. Since you understand what it’s like to have a history of restrictive eating, I found that ZC, which initially worked really well, eventually made me feel like I was obsessing about food too much. For some people the simplicity of just eating animal products is very liberating, and I agree with that to some extent for myself. However, for others with a background similar to our own, the thought of eating only meat can trigger that restrict/binge mindset. So allowing myself to eat veggies or other keto foods if I want gave me the freedom to not focus so much on food, and I have gravitated towards focusing on enjoying plenty of fatty meat with the option of including other foods if I want. I also disliked the inflexible and condescending attitudes of people on the ZC forums. Rather than being supportive or understanding, they would often criticize “newbies” when they asked questions about eating vegetables or when they talked about “cheating.” So I had to get out of those because it reminded me of the eating disorder voice that yelled at me for eating “too much.”
Our bodies were not meant to zero carb
That fiber is necessary for gut health is also a myth that’s been debunked. Speaking from firsthand experience, fiber can actually cause constipation. In some it causes IBS, Crohn’s disease and other digestive issues.
Erin, I’m not a ZC type but I really appreciated your posts above. You are finding what works well for you, which is a very good thing!
I’ve even considered that what works well for me now may change a bit in the future so I’m open to that. And it only makes sense that what a 300 pound obese man might need and what the same 190 pound man a couple of years later might need are different. No, I don’t plan to start consuming sweet tea, Mountain Dew, real sugar type donuts and pastries, and Wonder bread by the loaf. I don’t think any of that would be good for anyone, ever, and I don’t want to go back there. But tweaking the amounts of proteins and veggies that I consume I suspect may be an ongoing thing for a good while.
I don’t mean to ramble, but I do appreciate your posts! Thanks for sharing.
@SlowBurnMary I found the whole post to be interesting. Thank you for taking the time to write it out! I just wanted to add that from what I’ve read, it seems that native folks in the Arctic - like aboriginals almost everywhere - loved their organ meats. The one outlying voice on this seems to be Stefansson - which makes sense given some of your context - but even his descriptions have the kids eating kidneys like treats. My concern about ZC is not that it’s low in this nutrient or this other, but more that so many folks seem to eat mostly muscle meat. A diet of all (or even mostly) muscle meat is a new phenomenon for human beings, who have always prized animal foods but especially (well, up until the last few hundred years) the organ meats.
You may want to see what Icelanders it as ( I like to call them Vikings) eat … Shep’s head, eyes , cheeks the works. How about some sour shark, fermented in such a way that you will vomit from the smell alone. You will find that most processes meats have the surplus types of meats we wouldn’t think to eat nowdays. Chicken nugget anyone … How about a nice hot dog ?!
Bunny, I sure think so. It’s certainly not always the case with protein that “more is better.” Past a point, isn’t it going to burden the body with more fat and the excretion of metabolic by-products?
Yes, we don’t have the taste for the fermented meats that many Inuit and Icelanders ate/eat, but most cultures around the world have traditions with organ meats that are familiar to most modern palates (maybe with a bit of re-training!).
I don’t know why but I just don’t like the idea of eating something’s heart. Liver and kidneys are ok depending on how it’s prepared but can’t think I would ever eat a brain or heart of any animal. Unless it’s disquised as a chicken nugget or sausage as then I won’t know that’s what I’m eating . Hey we could start a new diet reveloution … Eat brains and heart diet… You’ll loose a ton of weight as you vomit at the thought lolool
I can tell you exactly what we eat in iceland as that’s where I am from.
Fish mostly just boiled a nob of butter on the plate and some potatoes. It’s so yummy …even without the potato. Skin left on btw
Dried fish called harðfiskur (harðfiskur fish) with butter as snak
All meats are freerange and organic without being said they are … It’s just how it is over there . Shep get sent to mountains in spring and brought back in autumn. Same for horses and yes we eat horse meat.
Milk products
Meatsoup … Massive pot of meat with veg boiled for hours and eaten over a few days .
Smoked lamb
We do now have fruit and veg there but the selection isn’t as big as in the UK by miles . Still I remember majority of my meals growing up involved fish.
Pork
Meatballs
Berries that grow naturally in iceland out in the countryside.
Skyr it’s high protein yogurt a bit like Greek yogurt 0% fat just add some blueberries and heavy cream and a small pot will fill you up for hours. You can but it in Waitrose and I’m sure they also sell this in USA if that helps.
Generally speaking my diet growing up meant mum cooking at home and takeaway wasn’t ever considered. I had my first McDonald in the UK age 15.
Mostly meat fish and some veg. Very little of fruit . Every so often the odd banana or orange perhaps an apple but as I wasn’t used too it I could never finish a whole apple.
Also in iceland they have sweats days on Saturdays
Sweets are half price on Saturdays to encourage only eating it once a week . It worked as I rarely had sweets growing up.
One thing we do love is ice-cream … Gallons of ice-cream but that’s not a traditional Icelandic Viking history thing.
So here is what us Vikings have in the modern day world and what I’m getting more and more into having again since I’ve cut carbs out
Oh yes! The organ meat dimension is another thing that’s sometimes downplayed. Apparently traditional Arctic peoples often ate hunted animals raw whilst still warm, including the organs. The taste of raw meat - such as sushi - is entirely mild and different that cooked! I have yet to eat any raw meat besides sushi in distant decades past. But if I was in a hunt situation, would definitely!
The northern traditional peoples also ate fermented sea birds, stored underground for months to get… tasty! Probably one of the most fragrant things eaten up there is the fermented meat.
Brilliant idea… focus on the 6 days of lower consumption rather than the one day sugar-up! 
From what you’ve described here, it sounds like you aren’t having enough fat. Eggs aren’t that high, beef alone isn’t high enough…try more olive oil, coconut oil, butter and cream. Make sure you’re eating the bacon FAT as well as the bacon. And if that doesn’t work, fast!
Just for reference, an egg is over 60% fat by calories as is a ribeye steak. Both are 70% if cooked in butter/bacon grease etc.
I hit a 75% fat macro without any “extra” fat like Co, OO etc. except what I use to cook things in (which I count a tbsp at a time if not in the count for the cooked item)
Well… thing is, they must be tasty to the Arctic palate because they’re very popular amongst certain tribes, maybe it’s the concentrated sea salt and sea air which makes them… savory???
Sort of reminiscent of the Chinese “100 year old egg” which isn’t actually 100 years but called that cos it’s naturally preserved dark green and hearty, and much prized also due to beliefs about its help for elderly longevity. But those things have always skeered me… 
Lots of cultures have had fermented meat products. It’s hard to imagine liking them (with our modern palates) but it’s so cool that it’s a practice that spans so many cultures, continents and time periods.
Roman garum was fermented fish intestines:
Pliny stated that garum was made from fish intestines, with salt, creating a liquor…
Yum 
But it must have been pretty darn nutritious, and I think there were lots of variations (whole fish left to ferment, so you’d get all the minerals from the bones in the mix). There were actually garum factories in various parts of the Roman empire, and lots of other cultures have culinary/health traditions involving fermented fish.
So glad you’ve found yourself a balance, @Emacfarland. I get what you’re saying about limiting to only meat as in ZC giving a restrict/binge mindset. This is definitely something I’ve efforted to avoid since recovering-- anything that makes me feel too restricted. But at the same time I know in myself that I am easily overwhelmed and stressed by choice, especially food choice! When I visit friends and open their fridge and it’s overflowing with so many things (not necessarily SAD things, just a lot) I get so stressed! So I don’t keep much variety at home. So I don’t have to choose. No analyzing the perfect thing to eat. I think that’s what it is for me-- seeing all the things and then I must maximize the “perfect” thing to eat-- largely healthwise, but also not even knowing what I feel like having. I take forever looking at restaurant menus. Perfecting my food.
(FYI- perfection/restriction isn’t why I came to keto. I suffered from really bad digestive issues and found myself eating Paleo many years ago before I had heard of Paleo, then someone alerted me ‘sounds like Paleo’, and then transitioned more away from carbs because they are my digestive culprit, and again someone alerted me ‘that sounds like you’re eating keto’, before I knew what that was)
I purposefully only go to small grocery stores also to minimize food choice overwhelm A couple weeks ago I had to go to a ‘regular’ large grocery store and even with just a modest list, ended up spending 1.5 h and left in a bad state (trip included setting my basket down as I was running up and down the aisles trying to find something, a staff thinking it was an abandoned basket and taking it and putting things away, and me coming across this and flipping my shit. It was actually pretty hilarious.)
So with this in mind for me I wonder if my food stress can largely disappear if my only choice is meat. I might give it a go.
But also keeping the mindset: ALL FOODS ARE ALLOWED. I can eat anything I want. Even in keto-- all foods are allowed! Even in ZC. I just choose to eat the ones that make me feel and function my best.