When does the weight loss stop?

#1

I’m not at a goal weight yet, but my trajectory’s good. What I’m wondering is how my body will know ‘that’s enough’ if my WOE doesn’t change? I don’t want to continue losing weight forever!
Does anyone have an opinion on this, scientifically sound or layman’s best guess? Is it just that the body has a healthy set point and it simply knows when that’s been reached?

(bulkbiker) #2

In my case my body decided to stop 30 pounds above where my mental ideal weight is…I’ve dropped 10 of those pounds by going mainly carnivore over the past year and will strive for my ideal goal next year… I fear it will be a battle!

(Bunny) #3

That’s if your in a constant high storage mode, then reaching a healthy set point will not be a long-term thing, your metabolism has memory and remembers what you did to it before.

The only way to maintain a healthy set point that I’m aware of is for your body to be capable of oxidizing carbohydrates as well as oxidizing fatty acids equally by increasing carbohydrates so you don’t become intolerant to oxidizing carbohydrates.

Staying in a constant state of low carb ketosis or fasting too much will do the opposite and cause your body to hold onto what it has, then when you do eat any little carbohydrate your metabolism just holds onto it even more than it did before (continuous storage mode).

Eating too much fat on a ketogenic diet can do the opposite also, besides not increasing carbohydrates so your body can adapt to oxidizing rather than storing glucose as lipid droplets in adipose cells.

Took me many years of experimenting to figure it out and I now know exactly what to do to keep the balance.

If you don’t re-train your body to oxidize carbohydrates which is part of its natural function it will default (set point) to storage mode and that’s what you don’t want to happen?

(Jack Bennett) #4

My best guess and N=1 experience is that this is so. I’ve gained and lost the same 40lbs three times in the past decade, using three different diets.

My set point when I’m eating SAD / junk food is about 215 lbs and my set point on keto appears to be about 175 lbs. I believe that if I did another Super-Size Me or Fit2Fat2Fit cycle, I would be 215 lbs within a few months (depending on how poorly and/or carb-heavy I ate).

(Scott) #5

With this way of eating my body seems to self regulate so I don’t see any reason to worry about making changes to avoid further weight loss.

(Bob M) #6

I keep fasting (long term, 1+ days and intermittent), keep low carb/keto, and keep losing. I’m at my lowest weight since starting on 1/1/14. I also have the most muscle mass since then, though I still have torn rotator cuff muscles. I just went down in pant sizes (from 43+ to 34 now), and had to buy a smaller winter coat. On the days I eat, I usually eat two meals a day. Sometimes one, but that’s rare.

I’m still heavy enough I can’t do an unassisted pullup, so I have to use machines for pullups. I continue to go down in weight, though.

(Robert C) #7

Hi @Annoula,

Generally it is the case that you have a number (or look) in mind about what you want - and it might have little in common with what your body wants.

I do not think there is a set point but, there are ways you can affect the weight your body wants to settle at.

Over stress yourself (with excessive exercise or no exercise, career climbing at any cost, bad relationships, not enough sleep, not enough or too much food etc.) and your body will want to hold on to more fat for the (perceived) tough times you are in.

A regular amount of exercise, meditation, not biting off more than you can chew, removing toxic people from your life, enough good sleep etc. will let your body feel like it doesn’t need to grip so tightly on to that life-preserving fat as times are good.

#8

Thank you to everybody who chimed in (and forgive my late reply due to busy season). I admit I’m probably now every more confused :slight_smile: but that’s okay. I’ll try to read up a bit and maybe just cross that bridge when I come to it?!

(Windmill Tilter) #9

That’s not going to be a problem if you are eating to satiety. If you are not eating to satiety, and you are using intentional daily calorie restriction to lose weight, your problem is going to be regaining the weight.

I’ve never seen data showing that weight rebound isn’t every bit as much of a problem on keto as any other diet. If you are restricting calories in any way, stop doing it. The probability of weight regain is influenced by how quickly you came down. Think of your weight like a ball, the faster it’s going when it hits the ground, the faster it will go back up. Keto is not different in that respect.

Another strategy is a “diet break”. The science is in it’s early stages, but it appears that diet breaks seem to help reset the metabolism if you’ve done something like intentional calorie restriction. This is a great study. It about as well designed and executed as anything I have ever seen in the field of nutrition and the results are compelling.

(Davy) #10

So Ann, how many lbs away from your ideal weight do you think you are?

(Davy) #11

So AtomicBunny, what should one do in this case? I don’t know, so asking. Should one eat say 50 carbs or even more ever so often or what?? Do this once a week?

(Bunny) #12

I would increase complex carbohydrates not simple carbohydrates like junk food.

Complex carbohydrates are not the same as simple carbohydrates (highly refined sugars and grains).

I eat can eat up to 200 grams of complex carbohydrates (e.g. fermented grains, natural sugar) and still be in the kind of ketosis when I was a teen or pre-teen or what a metabolically fit person would be in because I’m beginning to understand the mechanisms that start to diminish the capacity to oxidize carbohydrates and fatty acids.

I hear all these success stories about keeping carbs at 20 grams or eating no carbs at all, but I’m very very skeptical about that long-term many years into the future. They go right back to the simple carbohydrates.

Most people cannot maintain 20 grams of carbohydrates long-term and just go around circles gaining the weight right back again and even more weight on top of that. Again they go right back to the simple carbohydrates.

I thought zero carb was miraculous until I messed up my gut flora and managed to kill off all my gut bugs in the process of doing that and remember feeling super strange and no doctor to diagnose my condition, going to an ER became a nightmare of the staff saying nothings wrong with you, but it took me a while to figure out it was my gut…lol

(bulkbiker) #13

Define long term please?

(Bunny) #14

?

(bulkbiker) #15

Define “many” then… I’m trying to figure out when my weight regain will commence… cos it sure as hell hasn’t yet.

(Bunny) #16

I would guess when you deviate or give up on your diet, but most people are probably not as disciplined as you are.

I see most people like to try to balance there caloric intake on the head of a pin and ignore there physical fitness because somebody said “…exercise does not work…” but fail to reason they are not getting the right kind of physical exercise so they will forever remain a storage facility for carbohydrates, thinking they can out smart Mother Nature by not eating enough carbohydrates.

(bulkbiker) #17

So never than… that’s fine I just wanted to make sure…

As I’m sure you are aware your statements of your own opinion as fact can get quite confusing at times…

(Robert C) #18

I think this is likely true for most people.

No birthday cake, no garlic fries at the ballgame, no pizza after the scout troop hike, no sugar in your coffee, having to choose between blood ketone testing or not knowing, cruises are out, trying traditional dishes while traveling - probably can’t, avoiding social situations - yup.

Then - after you stop keto - habits like cheese on everything, frying steaks in butter etc. are kept but carbs are added -> disaster.

People that view it as a WOE, learn how to cook for it and either take the time to engage in this forum or follow a good detailed book on keto have a much better chance of long term success.

But, I think to most people, it is the latest “diet” they’ll try for a while and quit due to the feeling that it is simply too restrictive (food wise and socially).

(Robert C) #19

If you have never deviated from a diet in your life, wouldn’t you still be on the first diet you tried?

Given time, anyone can burn out on anything. Best to have a fallback plan like cycling keto with bouts of paleo (like seasons) rather than falling off of the wagon.

(bulkbiker) #20

Well no because it didn’t “work”…

Once you have found something that does “work” why would you deviate from it to eat the stuff you listed above. It’s simply illogical…