The Standard American Diet (SAD) is known for having a very obesogenic macronutrient profile of being high in carbohydrate, high in fat (in the form of "vegetable" oils) and low in protein. What makes this macronutrient profile obesogenic? This profile interferes with blood glucose homeostasis.
This means that you have a higher chance of becoming obese consuming the SAD diet, but this isn't a guarantee. It all depends on how long you can preserve proper blood glucose regulation and this varies in individuals. We can safely say that the vast majority of people's blood regulation will succumb to the SAD diet's assault, so never assume you will be one of the lucky ones that can preserve it.
This is why it's so important to follow a well formulated diet. A lot of people will restrict calories during their meal times, consume isolated fats as a "meal", fast for extended periods of time or severely restrict protein. If you eat this way, you will experience a slew of problems and one of the main ones is thyroid related.
Living in a chronic state of "starvation", will shut down thyroid function, as the body goes into adaptive energy conservation. This is basically a chronic slow down of metabolism. The thyroid is crucial for proper regulation of metabolism. Metabolic slow down can cause fatigue, palpitations, hair loss and/or a low body temperature, amongst other symptoms.
Many times thyroid tests will not detect this problem, because it's not a problem with the thyroid gland itself, but with the liver's conversion of T4 to T3. Dr. Atkins recommended for his patients to take their core temperature, for three days straight, and if it was below 97.8 degrees, then it was presumed the thyroid was being affected.
Restructure your diet and make sure you are getting enough calories during your meal times, that you are not fasting for extended periods of time and that you are eating whole foods, not any isolated macronutrients. If you are eating two meals a day and water fasting for the rest, there is no need to restrict protein at meal times. Proper nutrition is extremely important, regardless of the diet being followed.
3. I was told that low carb diets are very complicated.
Low carb diets are the simplest diets in the world. They are just meat and above ground vegetables. That is how all your meals should look like. Ham and eggs. Steak and broccoli. Chicken and zucchini. Etc. That is all.
4. If I didn't have to work, I would be able to eat better.
Where there's a will, there's a way. Working outside the home is not an excuse to eat badly. If you had better health, you would have more energy to prepare meals properly.
If you work outside the home, use a slow cooker. You can make a variety of low carb meals, while you sleep at night using a slow cooker. In the morning, you just separate your portion to take to work with you, and your family's portion can be saved for dinner. When you get home from work, you reheat your family's portion. You won't have to eat, because you already ate yours at work. You can use that time to start preparing the next days meal to cook through the night.
Buy all of the ingredients you need for the week, on your days off, when you do your shopping. It takes the same amount of time to cash out a bag of chips as it does to cash out a pound of beef. There are many frozen vegetables like sliced peppers and diced onions, which make seasoning meats easier than having to chop them yourself.
2. I have been on a low carbohydrate diet and a fasting regimen, for a while, and my hair is falling out.
This is why it's so important to follow a well formulated diet. A lot of people will restrict calories during their meal times, consume isolated fats as a "meal", fast for extended periods of time or severely restrict protein. If you eat this way, you will experience a slew of problems and one of the main ones is thyroid related.
Living in a chronic state of "starvation", will shut down thyroid function, as the body goes into adaptive energy conservation. This is basically a chronic slow down of metabolism. The thyroid is crucial for proper regulation of metabolism. Metabolic slow down can cause fatigue, palpitations, hair loss and/or a low body temperature, amongst other symptoms.
Many times thyroid tests will not detect this problem, because it's not a problem with the thyroid gland itself, but with the liver's conversion of T4 to T3. Dr. Atkins recommended for his patients to take their core temperature, for three days straight, and if it was below 97.8 degrees, then it was presumed the thyroid was being affected.
Restructure your diet and make sure you are getting enough calories during your meal times, that you are not fasting for extended periods of time and that you are eating whole foods, not any isolated macronutrients. If you are eating two meals a day and water fasting for the rest, there is no need to restrict protein at meal times. Proper nutrition is extremely important, regardless of the diet being followed.
3. I was told that low carb diets are very complicated.
Low carb diets are the simplest diets in the world. They are just meat and above ground vegetables. That is how all your meals should look like. Ham and eggs. Steak and broccoli. Chicken and zucchini. Etc. That is all.
4. If I didn't have to work, I would be able to eat better.
Where there's a will, there's a way. Working outside the home is not an excuse to eat badly. If you had better health, you would have more energy to prepare meals properly.
If you work outside the home, use a slow cooker. You can make a variety of low carb meals, while you sleep at night using a slow cooker. In the morning, you just separate your portion to take to work with you, and your family's portion can be saved for dinner. When you get home from work, you reheat your family's portion. You won't have to eat, because you already ate yours at work. You can use that time to start preparing the next days meal to cook through the night.
Buy all of the ingredients you need for the week, on your days off, when you do your shopping. It takes the same amount of time to cash out a bag of chips as it does to cash out a pound of beef. There are many frozen vegetables like sliced peppers and diced onions, which make seasoning meats easier than having to chop them yourself.
Eggs can be baked in a muffin tray with sausage and/or bacon inside so they can be easily frozen and heated up for a quick breakfast.
5. Do glycogen stores need to be depleted for my blood glucose to remain very low?
First, target blood glucose should be around 83 mg/dl. This means it should never "remain very low". Postprandial (2 hours after a meal) blood glucose should never go higher than 100 mg/dl and the closer to 83 mg/dl, the better. Target HbA1C should be 4.5. “The lower the blood glucose, the better”. False. "The more normal the blood glucose, the better."
Glycogen storage is a complicated subject, when it comes to people with metabolic syndrome. This is because, diet and fasting will only deplete liver glycogen, but muscle glycogen can only be depleted with exercise. So, if you want to get anywhere near lowering your glycogen levels, you must exercise so you can burn it off. It doesn't just magically evaporate into thin air. You also need insulin to synthesize muscle glycogen and people with insulin resistance, have a very difficult time doing so.
People with diabetes and metabolic syndrome do the "glycogen shuffle", rather than depletion. They have an enormous, excess amount of glycogen, stored in their muscles, and if they aren't moving, it's not going anywhere. It just sits there, sort of like they are doing. This is why it can take years for them to lower blood glucose to normal, while sitting in front of a computer.
To achieve metabolic health, not only are you supposed to not put more glucose in; you are supposed to get the glucose you already have OUT. Sitting all day is not going to accomplish this. Exceeding glycogen storage capacity, is only an avenue for exceeding fat storage capacity. This is the pathology of metabolic disease: Exceeding all storage capacity.
Your muscles can hold way more glycogen than your liver can. For this reason, liver glycogen is depleted fairly quickly and replenished just as fast. Your muscles on the other hand, can store a lot of glycogen and it takes longer to deplete it, as they are very metabolically active, if they are being used. This is why diabetics and people with metabolic syndrome have such a hard time "depleting" their glycogen stores. Even though they are rigorously following a fasting and dietary regimen, glucose continues to pour out of them. Not only is their glucagon converting everything to glucose, at an exaggerated rate due to insulin resistance, this glucose has simply no where to go. The main storage unit, the muscles, are already full, so this glucose goes right back to the liver to start the shuffle once again and serum blood glucose continues to remain high.
Anyone, that talks to you about metabolism, and how it works, should know that exercise is fundamental for hormonal regulation and homeostasis. They should know that exercise improves the muscle cells insulin sensitivity, because they are being depleted of excess glucose and regain the capacity to store glucose, once again. This is the first thing that is lost in diabetes. In diabetes, the muscles become insulin resistant and the fat cells become highly insulin sensitive.
5. Do glycogen stores need to be depleted for my blood glucose to remain very low?
First, target blood glucose should be around 83 mg/dl. This means it should never "remain very low". Postprandial (2 hours after a meal) blood glucose should never go higher than 100 mg/dl and the closer to 83 mg/dl, the better. Target HbA1C should be 4.5. “The lower the blood glucose, the better”. False. "The more normal the blood glucose, the better."
Glycogen storage is a complicated subject, when it comes to people with metabolic syndrome. This is because, diet and fasting will only deplete liver glycogen, but muscle glycogen can only be depleted with exercise. So, if you want to get anywhere near lowering your glycogen levels, you must exercise so you can burn it off. It doesn't just magically evaporate into thin air. You also need insulin to synthesize muscle glycogen and people with insulin resistance, have a very difficult time doing so.
People with diabetes and metabolic syndrome do the "glycogen shuffle", rather than depletion. They have an enormous, excess amount of glycogen, stored in their muscles, and if they aren't moving, it's not going anywhere. It just sits there, sort of like they are doing. This is why it can take years for them to lower blood glucose to normal, while sitting in front of a computer.
To achieve metabolic health, not only are you supposed to not put more glucose in; you are supposed to get the glucose you already have OUT. Sitting all day is not going to accomplish this. Exceeding glycogen storage capacity, is only an avenue for exceeding fat storage capacity. This is the pathology of metabolic disease: Exceeding all storage capacity.
Your muscles can hold way more glycogen than your liver can. For this reason, liver glycogen is depleted fairly quickly and replenished just as fast. Your muscles on the other hand, can store a lot of glycogen and it takes longer to deplete it, as they are very metabolically active, if they are being used. This is why diabetics and people with metabolic syndrome have such a hard time "depleting" their glycogen stores. Even though they are rigorously following a fasting and dietary regimen, glucose continues to pour out of them. Not only is their glucagon converting everything to glucose, at an exaggerated rate due to insulin resistance, this glucose has simply no where to go. The main storage unit, the muscles, are already full, so this glucose goes right back to the liver to start the shuffle once again and serum blood glucose continues to remain high.
Anyone, that talks to you about metabolism, and how it works, should know that exercise is fundamental for hormonal regulation and homeostasis. They should know that exercise improves the muscle cells insulin sensitivity, because they are being depleted of excess glucose and regain the capacity to store glucose, once again. This is the first thing that is lost in diabetes. In diabetes, the muscles become insulin resistant and the fat cells become highly insulin sensitive.
Exercise, isn't about calories or being beneficial "for many other things" besides weight loss. No, this is exercise directly playing a role in blood glucose metabolism and weight loss. These benefits of exercise are just not being acquired through the burning of calories. They are being acquired through metabolic hormonal regulation.
You MUST exercise if you want to improve your metabolic health.
6. Is the goal of a ketogenic diet to have as many ketones as possible, because ketones are "beneficial"?
The goal of the ketogenic diet, and why it's beneficial, is because of the mobilization and burning of fatty acids from your own body fat. This is done by maintaining steady and normal blood glucose levels which in turn cause better insulin function. Better insulin function allows access to stored body fat. A low glucose diet, allows for fat to become the dominant fuel, for the body, because it no longer has to compete with glucose metabolism.
Ketones are a byproduct of this process and they are used as an alternative fuel, mainly for the brain. Everything else in the body is primarily fueled by fatty acids, which can now be mobilized.
The body prevents ketoacidosis, because insulin moderates ketone levels. As long as you are able to secrete insulin, you prevent this dangerous condition from occurring. So, ketones stimulate insulin release. If you purposely consume excess fat, on a ketogenic diet, you will have higher ketone levels, but they will also be stimulating basal insulin, in order to keep them under control. This effects fasting blood glucose homeostasis. The excess fat that can not be mobilized will go into storage. This is why you can get fat, while maintaining high ketone levels. Ketogenic diets have been used to gain weight as well as lose weight.
The only thing you need to be concerned about, when on a ketogenic diet for weight loss and metabolic health, is the mobilization of fatty acids through better blood glucose control, so you can burn body fat. Ketone levels are irrelevant. If you are losing weight, then the benefit is occurring.
You MUST exercise if you want to improve your metabolic health.
6. Is the goal of a ketogenic diet to have as many ketones as possible, because ketones are "beneficial"?
The goal of the ketogenic diet, and why it's beneficial, is because of the mobilization and burning of fatty acids from your own body fat. This is done by maintaining steady and normal blood glucose levels which in turn cause better insulin function. Better insulin function allows access to stored body fat. A low glucose diet, allows for fat to become the dominant fuel, for the body, because it no longer has to compete with glucose metabolism.
Ketones are a byproduct of this process and they are used as an alternative fuel, mainly for the brain. Everything else in the body is primarily fueled by fatty acids, which can now be mobilized.
The body prevents ketoacidosis, because insulin moderates ketone levels. As long as you are able to secrete insulin, you prevent this dangerous condition from occurring. So, ketones stimulate insulin release. If you purposely consume excess fat, on a ketogenic diet, you will have higher ketone levels, but they will also be stimulating basal insulin, in order to keep them under control. This effects fasting blood glucose homeostasis. The excess fat that can not be mobilized will go into storage. This is why you can get fat, while maintaining high ketone levels. Ketogenic diets have been used to gain weight as well as lose weight.
The only thing you need to be concerned about, when on a ketogenic diet for weight loss and metabolic health, is the mobilization of fatty acids through better blood glucose control, so you can burn body fat. Ketone levels are irrelevant. If you are losing weight, then the benefit is occurring.
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