If any diet is making you feel unwell, then you should stop it. I recommend you dump "keto", if that's what you're following, and follow a more moderate low carb diet. It works the same.
Some people react very negatively to the presence of ketones and so they should never try to sustain ketosis for long periods of time but rather naturally cycle in and out instead. Cycling in and out of ketosis is the natural state we evolved in. This cycling does not require the introduction of any carbs into the diet. It occurs naturally through the adequate consumption of protein.
2. You can not "overeat" and gain body fat on "keto".
Ketogenic protocols can be used for weight gain as well as weight loss. Weight gain is much easier to achieve if you are already overweight/obese because of poor leptin expression (leptin resistance). You need to be leptin sensitive in order to burn fat. Fat is the main fuel used in ketogenic diets, whether dietary or from your own body.
Any diet can cause you to gain weight but "overeating" is too generic of an explanation and might not help you target exactly what's going on. This is because overeating is usually measured using total daily calories. Total calories is a very blunt tool for measuring overeating. For instance, bodybuilders overeat all of the time but they do so in order to gain muscle.
You can be disrupting your blood glucose without necessarily going over total daily calories. This occurs when the diet is composed primarily of the macronutrients carbs and/or fat, which disrupt blood glucose homeostasis and this shifts your metabolism to where it becomes easier and easier to gain body fat. For instance, high carb diets or high fat diets.
"Keto" can do just that as it's usually followed as a high fat diet. This is especially true of the fad "keto" we see online that tries to address metabolic conditions with a bastardized version of the classic ketogenic diet for epilepsy.
3. Should people with thyroid disease fast?
Fasting is not a good protocol for thyroid disease. The longest fast you should do is a 12 hour fast, which would basically only be an overnight fast.
4. I lost a lot of weight on low carb in the beginning and reached goal weight, but I am now gaining while continuing to follow the same exact diet that helped me lose.
What has happened is a decrease in leptin expression. This is normal as it occurs to everyone. It is the way that body weight is managed. But it has a pathological effect in people who are/were overweight/obese.
People who are/were overweight/obese have a very difficult time sustaining leptin expression even when they temporarily acquire it during active fat loss. Once they lose a significant amount of body fat, their leptin expression reduces more than it should and they begin building fat mass once again.
No one knows exactly why this occurs. It could be a long term adaptation of the fat cells or a defect in leptin communication in the brain itself or both. There is also some hypothalamic/pituitary/adrenal (HPA) axis abnormality that can play a role in this as well. The function of this axis is usually abnormal in people who are/were overweight/obese.
No one knows how to resolve this. If they did then the problems with weight management would have been solved decades ago. There are a few things you can address to minimize this occurrence and/or prevent significant weight regain.
- Electrolytes - Make sure that your electrolytes are not going down over time, especially potassium. Imbalanced or insufficient electrolytes can put the body under stress which in turn can ramp up glucose production and begin to interfere with insulin function once again.
- Diet - Revisit your diet. You might think you are still following the same diet you were in the beginning but you would be surprised how very small changes can begin adding up. These changes usually occur when the person sees they are losing weight or have reached goal weight and they start loosening the reigns of what they include on their menu.
- Not eating enough - Nothing effects leptin like not eating enough. You can almost describe weight gain from leptin as being under nutrition induced obesity, rather than over nutrition. Make sure that you are eating enough. The amounts you were consuming to lose weight may no longer be appropriate for weight maintenance. Leptin will stop body fat burning if it senses that not enough nutrients are coming in through the diet. If you stop burning fat, you will start seeing the results of its storage. The leaner you are the more calories you can consume from dietary fat.
You will also have other health issues that will come up as you get older and more time passes. This might cause you to have to modify your diet or exercise routine, which can effect your previous results. For instance, you might develop rheumatoid arthritis and can then no longer walk the distances you use to before or you might develop digestive issues which can force you to have to modify what you eat. Any of these might cause a set back in your previous achievement.
You just have to choose your battles wisely and make sure to stay under obesity. This will always be a never ending work in progress.
5. You should only eat red meat on carnivore and not chicken.
Red meat has a better nutritional profile than poultry but poultry is just fine to consume. You don't have to only eat any one meat. You can eat whatever variety of meats you wish to.
6. It is not difficult to get rid of fat from around the waist because visceral fat is the first to go.
The waist is usually where subcutaneous fat is also stored. The body doesn't like storing fat on its limbs as this reduces mobility. This means that the waist is up for grabs. We can all reach down and grab some fat from around our middle. This is the normal location for fat storage.
Women also store fat along the hips, buttocks and thighs because women have a body that is designed for more fat storage. So even if you lose all of your visceral fat, you might still have the infamous muffin top.
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