Saying hello to Ketos

(Eve) #125

I love eggs in any form, but my favourite is a runny yolk! Hard boiled are very easy to carry around though.

#127

Sounds good :slight_smile:
I always poached mine in soup :slight_smile: Or had soft eggs in purgatory…

Oh I don’t mind losing nutrients, I eat way too much anyway. Not nutrients, food. I am supposed to get my nutrients even without some of my eggs. Yes, of course I want to use what I eat but losing a little shouldn’t matter. Okay, there are exceptions. Vitamin A, it’s great if I get less of it but I doubt it would help much. Oh well. My body doesn’t complain about overdoing it yet.

I don’t like hard-boiled eggs so much (except the whites. I prefer hard-boiled whites and soft-boiled yolks, if I ever could make that combo somehow… but it’s probably impossible) but they are still eggs, they are very good and they come handy. It’s often a lot about convenience when it comes to hard-boiled eggs, not just for me. But I do need them for certain dishes.

My fav egg dishes involves whipping eggs :slight_smile: I have a raw dessert and my eggy sponge cakes. I make them a lot, most of my days have one or both. If I keep having 5-6 raw egg whites on some days, I will need to think about my biotin… But probably not. I researched here a bit, nope, my biotin intake must be quite high. I needn’t to worry about it at all.

Eggs aren’t a problem in any form for me. Liver is the problem. Too nutritious. Life isn’t easy. Oh well.

(Eve) #128

I have a question about electrolyte supplementation. I am not sure whether I am taking enough Na/K/Mg because l continue to get ketone adjustment problems - and it has been a while l have been on the diet. I have dropped my carbs even more just recently and maybe coincidentally or not, seem to being having a harder time. Every day l drink water with 1/2 teaspoon of lo-salt, 1/2 teaspoon himalayan salt and then a scoop of Mg citrate. Does anyone take more than this?

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #129

It’s probably not coincidental. If your serum insulin has dropped sufficiently, your kidneys have probably returned to the normal rate of excreting sodium, which is slowed by elevated insulin. This means that people on a keto diet have to work a bit to keep their sodium intake up.

The good news is that getting enough sodium usually helps the body regulate potassium and magnesium (and calcium, too), since the bodily mechanisms that regulate them are all interlinked. But proper salt intake seems to be the key. With the right amount of salt, it may not be necessary to supplement with the other minerals.

A couple of studies that came out a few years ago both showed that daily sodium intake in the range of about 4-6 g (10-15 g of table salt, NaCl) is healthiest for everyone, even salt-sensitive hypertensives. If you look on YouTube for a presentation by Dr. Andrew Mente, one of the leaders of the PURE study, he explains this in detail (he gave a couple of talks that should still be available on the Low Carb Down Under channel).

Personally, I find that low sodium gives me headaches and constipation. Too much sodium makes my stools mushy. If I stay in the sweet spot, all is well. I should probably add that most long-term carnivores eventually find that they no longer enjoy salting their meat, and find that somehow they still get enough sodium, but this is a natural development of being on that diet, and should not be imitated, but rather allowed to occur, if it ever does. (Some long-term carnivores still continue to need dietary salt.)

(Eve) #131

Perhaps I should double up the electrolyte drink then?

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #132

Try it.

Personally, I’d start by increasing salt, since getting it under control automatically helps with potassium and magnesium, but that’s just me. Do more of the electrolyte solution, and see what happens. You don’t need our permission to experiment, you know. You can just do it, and see if it helps. There’s a lot of individual variability in these matters, and your kilometrage is almost certain to vary.

(Eve) #133

:+1:

#134

Hi keto friends!

I am new to posting here, but I’ve been reading the forum for a while. I notice you guys mentioning electrolytes. Has anyone noticed potassium potentially going too high if you take too much potassium chloride at once in a supplement? I had noticed feeling a little nauseous and headache-y sometimes after starting to drink some LMNT every day. Around that time I had some blood work and my potassium was elevated above normal range. And coincidentally soon after that I heard Megan Ramos mention on her Fasting Method podcast that she had tried a popular electrolyte mix recently that gave her symptoms of too much potassium even with only 200mg potassium (which is what LMNT has). Needless to say I have since dropped the LMNT and just started using mostly salt and some magnesium with very little added potassium for my electrolytes, and that feels better. Maybe some of us are more sensitive.

More about me, I am a woman in my early 50’s. I have recently been trying to up my keto game a bit, after being inspired by Dr Bosworth’s Keto Continuum. Last year I had tried monthly rounds of a Longo-style fasting mimicking diet, which worked okay, but the results were proceeding way too slowly, probably because I wasn’t sticking to low enough carbs between rounds. Since late last year, I have switched to a lower-carb diet and then added a 36-72 hour fast each week with just water, salt, coffee, and tea. Over the past 10 months I’ve been able to lower my A1C from 6.3 to 5.7, and I expect it to be out of the prediabetes range by my next blood work appointment if I stay the course. I joined the forum after reading about the importance of support groups from Dr Boz, and deciding that maybe I should start actually posting for accountability. I don’t know anyone in real life who is doing keto.

Thanks for all the interesting posts over the years!

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #135

Welcome to the forums!

As for your question about potassium, it is wise to be careful, since too much or too little potassium (hyper- or hypokalaemia) can be deadly. I’m glad you feel better without the extra potassium.

Keeping sodium in the right range (about 4-6 g/day, or 10-15 g/day of sodium chloride) is important, because it helps keep the other electrolytes in balance as well. Many people find that with the right amount of sodium they don’t need to supplement magnesium, potassium, or calcium. If you think you do need some extra potassium, a good way to get it is “lite” salt, which is half sodium chloride and half potassium chloride. Magnesium is found in green vegetables and in bone marrow, among other foods.

(Robin) #136

Welcome! So glad you joined in.
You got this!

#137

Thanks Paul! I definitely feel better with extra salt. Especially when first getting back into keto again after being out of it. I can actually feel light-headed with low blood pressure when trying to get out of bed if I don’t keep the salt up.

I have read before to be careful with potassium supplementation, and I’m glad I happened to have blood work this time to show me the difference it makes. I didn’t think 200mg was particularly high, although I have read they usually limit the amount in a supplement to 99mg per serving. Yes, I too have read that both high and low blood potassium can be bad. Mine was only a point higher than normal, but it also corresponded to feeling off, so I don’t take any chances with it. It may have corresponded with me having also some high potassium foods like avocados that week. But like you said, just keeping our sodium levels up helps us maintain our potassium.

#138

Thanks Robin, your story is inspiring!

(Eve) #139

I definitely need some advice here, if anyone can help. I have found that l am missing several important strains of good bacteria in my biome and so my practitioner is prescribing me the appropriate probiotics plus a prebiotic to support their growth, called prebionutri powder which contains several soluble prebiotic plant fibres including inulin, marshmallow, green banana starch, apple pectin, acacia gum and arabinoglycans. I can’t find the carb content but there are 5g of ingredients per required dose. So, l am now panicking that it is going to kick me out of ketosis but realise that healing my biome is crucial to my overall health. So, do you know whether taking this prebiotic will be OK alongside maintaining my keto WOE? Feeling very worried …

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #140

I’m sorry you are having to cope with all this. In the old days, it was considered enough to eat live-culture yoghurt. If you take all the recommended products, how much carbohydrate does that amount to? If necessary, you could probably cut out something else, to fit under your limit, right?

Try going to the Web sites of the various product manufacturers. There should be a tab or page detailing the ingredients and giving a nutrition panel. It should help to have that information.

(Eve) #141

Thanks Paul. I did go to websites and even though all ingredients were listed, there was no breakdown re fat/ carbs etc. I have emailed them to ask. But l suppose at the end of the day you are right- if l start to lose ketone production/ use, then l will just have to cut out something else.
I just wanted to see if you knew of anyone who was taking prebiotic fibres successfully on the keto diet.

(Robin) #142

Is your practitioner your regular physician or a specialist? Just curious. Most of don’t have that kind of information about our gut biome.

(Eve) #143

She is a specialist nutritional therapist complete with PhD, so looks to treat and heal with food and supplement programmes,.not mainstream drugs,.plus really knows her biochemistry / hard science behind it all. She is private and my stool analysis was also done privately as the NHS in England wouldn’t pay for something like that!

(John Dulleck) #144

Hello all,

Brand new carnivore here.

A few years ago I was a high carb vegan, a WOE that I followed for a few years. But living with a spouse who eats the standard Americad diet, maintaining a vegan lifestyle proved difficult, and I slowly drifted into a SAD as well, but still with a high card emphasis.

For years my doctor told me my blood glucose was too high, ranging from 120ish to around 145. And withan A1C as high as 6.5, she pronounced me a diabetic. She kept telling me, cut the carbs and exercise more, but the more quality carbs (whole grains, etc.) I cut, the more I replaced them with junk carbs (refined grains, sugars, etc.). So, over a period of a few years, my weight crept up from a little under 200 lbs. to 228. I am 6’1, so that is a BMI of 30.1, which makes me obese. I am 70 years old.

I realized that my efforts to cut carbs were only making my situation worse, so I started investigating the Keto and carnivore WOEs seriously, mostly through YouTube. And I liked what I saw as far as the benefits here concerned, so…

I ate my first carnivore meal last Saturday morning, six days ago.That was sort of an experiment, just to test the waters. I had 3 slices of thick sliced bacon and 4 eggs fried in the fat from the bacon. YUM! So, Sunday I at mostly carnivore all day, and the same since then.

I say mostly carnivore because I have not fully eliminated carbs yet. I have done this in an effort to reduce the effects of Keto flu, and it seems to have worked. I’ve felt a little run down the past couple of days and maybe a little fuzzy headed, but nothing bad. I’ve been cutting the carbs little by little and plan to cut to as close to zero as possible by the end of the weekend,

And, this morning, I had no sense of hunger, so I skipped breakfast. It’s now nearly lunch time and I am beginning to have an appetite.

I have read a number of posts here on this forum and am impressed. I am glad to join and be a part of this community.

I would be glad to hear any, hints, tips, or corrections from the community. I am always ready to hear good advice.

#145

Welcome!
Maybe come and see us in our monthly carnivore thread :slight_smile:
The little you wrote about your woe sounds good this far. Eat enough and ask the knowledgable veterans if you have some problem. They don’t know everything either, everyone is different, we typically experiment to some extent to see what our individual body finds the best.
Good luck!

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #146

The term “keto flu” is a misnomer. It is the result of a lack of sodium (the kidneys excrete sodium more readily when insulin is not interfering with them), and a little bit of extra salt in the diet will prevent symptoms.

You may find this lecture by Dr. Stephen Phinney to be interesting and useful:

There is an adaptation period required for both the ketogenic diet and the carnivore diet, so don’t be alarmed if you feel off for a while. It is perfectly normal and doesn’t mean you are doing anything wrong.