Fat for fuel seems to promote 40 net carbs a day, otherwise very similar to Keto. It advocates fiber from veggies. It sounds logical, but I’m worried I won’t lose weight on it… wondering what Keto dudes think of this doctor???
What do you think of Dr. Mercola Fat For Fuel book?
PaulL
(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?)
#6
Dr. Phinney’s recommendation for a well-formulated ketogenic diet is anything under 100 grams of carbohydrate a day. These forums recommend under 20 g because that’s a level at which anyone, no matter how metabolically deranged, can get into ketosis.
The point is not meeting some arbitrary limit, but rather to lower your carbohydrate intake to a level that allows your body to switch from using glucose as its primary fuel to using ketones instead.
Too much carbohydrate in the diet has deleterious effects on the body, because of the sustained high insulin levels it causes, and insulin is also the hormone that causes our bodies to store fat, rather than to metabolize it. But the amount of carbohydrate that is dangerous varies from person to person.
The other issue is the addictive nature of sugar. Just as many people can drink safely, but some people get addicted to alcohol, there are people who can eat a reasonable amount of sugar safely, but some of us become addicted to sugar. I suspect that I may be one of those people who could become fat-adapted while eating 100 g of carbs a day, but as a sugar addict—well, really a carb addict—anything more than a very small amount of carbohydrate causes me to binge and develop cravings. So I’m better off keeping my carbohydrate intake to well under 20 g daily anyway.
lfod14
#7
I’m a huge fan of Dr Mercola, but I disagree with him on that, but remember he’s not necessarily Keto, a lot of Docs have adopted a VERY close to keto but not quite approach. I thinks thats fine and for the metabolically healthily and they’d probably get keto results on that, but many of us are two screwed up for that many carbs. I’ve found that over the years of eating like this what I’ve gained is the ability to recovery quickly from a carb-y day when I choose to jump off that cliff. Years ago it would do major damage. For me that’s a win. I got a feeling if I ate double what I eat now almost daily I may relapse. Done it twice now over the years, it creeps up on ya, I know my weaknesses.