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Are low-carb diets unhealthy? - Dr. T. Colin Campbell
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I just want to say that I lived for about a year on an almost 0 carb diet (hard keto diet) and I ruined my digestive system by doing so.
I only *kitten* once or twice a week (because what do you know, meat, fat, dairy and minimal green vegetables kill your bowel motility) and it was like rocks. Scarred the inside of my large intestine and eventually ended up with a deep anal fissure too. Now I constantly need medications (a combination of Movicol supplemented with Metamucil sometimes) to poop because my intestines are stretched out and the muscle action doesn't work correctly.
Works like a charm for weight loss though, must've lost about 4KG/8lb that way and managed to keep it off.1 -
Why would you continue to do something for a full year if it had that effect on you??
Wow.1 -
tlflag1620 wrote: »Why would you continue to do something for a full year if it had that effect on you??
Wow.
Cuz I'm in vanity pound territory and I'd do pretty much anything to get as skinny as I'd like to be.
Also, I wasn't suffering at all. When I actually got the fissure is when I was like "welp, okay, guess I'm not doing that anymore". Not to mention there are plenty of 24/7 keto lifestylers out there and an entire subreddit on it and I've never seen people complain about such problems (except for bowel irregularity/only going a few times a week).0 -
Okay... Only moving your bowels once or twice a week is one thing; though that would be a pretty significant decrease in frequency for me, some people just don't go very often. Having the BMs be "like rocks" is something else. You were constipated for a year. That sounds like suffering to me, but I get seriously uncomfortable if I go more than three days without "going". Different strokes I guess.
Fwiw, I've been doing low carb (not keto tho) for over three years. More regular than I ever was on a high fiber diet.1 -
tlflag1620 wrote: »Okay... Only moving your bowels once or twice a week is one thing; though that would be a pretty significant decrease in frequency for me, some people just don't go very often. Having the BMs be "like rocks" is something else. You were constipated for a year. That sounds like suffering to me, but I get seriously uncomfortable if I go more than three days without "going". Different strokes I guess.
Fwiw, I've been doing low carb (not keto tho) for over three years. More regular than I ever was on a high fiber diet.
Yeah, my experience and reading around is telling me that people can react very differently to such a diet. I didn't feel any discomfort during it. How low carb are you, roughly speaking? I've been able to do relatively restricted carb diets without issue, it was just the full-out keto that I didn't manage.0 -
I get between 50-80g per day. Sometimes a tad less, sometimes a tad more, but 100g is my upper limit - that's where I notice an uncomfortable uptick in appetite.0
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Low carb means "net carbs" so fiber is not included. It's possible to have very low net carbs - single digits or low double digits - and still eat plenty of fiber. As long as you don't add a bunch of starchy vegetables, croutons, and high-carb dressing, a salad is low carb and has plenty of fiber. Or you can take fiber supplements. Often, I've heard that a lack of magnesium is what causes keto-ers to have hard and infrequent stools, so a Mg supplement might work too. To go a year without looking into these things seems hard to believe.1
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midwesterner85 wrote: »Low carb means "net carbs" so fiber is not included. It's possible to have very low net carbs - single digits or low double digits - and still eat plenty of fiber. As long as you don't add a bunch of starchy vegetables, croutons, and high-carb dressing, a salad is low carb and has plenty of fiber. Or you can take fiber supplements. Often, I've heard that a lack of magnesium is what causes keto-ers to have hard and infrequent stools, so a Mg supplement might work too. To go a year without looking into these things seems hard to believe.
Enter flax and chia. Very low carb fiber power houses! Saving my entrails, one amazing seed at a time....0 -
tlflag1620 wrote: »Okay... Only moving your bowels once or twice a week is one thing; though that would be a pretty significant decrease in frequency for me, some people just don't go very often. Having the BMs be "like rocks" is something else. You were constipated for a year. That sounds like suffering to me, but I get seriously uncomfortable if I go more than three days without "going". Different strokes I guess.
Fwiw, I've been doing low carb (not keto tho) for over three years. More regular than I ever was on a high fiber diet.
Yeah, my experience and reading around is telling me that people can react very differently to such a diet. I didn't feel any discomfort during it. How low carb are you, roughly speaking? I've been able to do relatively restricted carb diets without issue, it was just the full-out keto that I didn't manage.
So true. Some experience constipation, others have diarrhea, and others find there is no change (majority).
I personally experienced D, off and on for the first few months. Eating too much grains or plants stops me up. Fats get me moving.1 -
When I low carbed, I was constipated. Meat constipates me horribly. Fat is neutral as far as that issue is concerned.
I was amazed to become regular for the first time in my life after becoming a vegetarian.
It's amazing how differently bodies respond to these things.1 -
midwesterner85 wrote: »Low carb means "net carbs" so fiber is not included. It's possible to have very low net carbs - single digits or low double digits - and still eat plenty of fiber. As long as you don't add a bunch of starchy vegetables, croutons, and high-carb dressing, a salad is low carb and has plenty of fiber. Or you can take fiber supplements. Often, I've heard that a lack of magnesium is what causes keto-ers to have hard and infrequent stools, so a Mg supplement might work too. To go a year without looking into these things seems hard to believe.
"Net carbs" is a source of debate in the "keto" world. Since it's impossible to know whether any given food contains soluble versus insoluble fiber, a lot of people recommend you stick to "total carbs" when attempting to force nutritional ketosis (which makes sense, to me at least).
There's also plenty of debate over whether dietary fiber is even necessary (seems the answer is 'no' from a *physiological* perspective, just like there is no such thing as an "essential carbohydrate").
Personally, I'm a huge fan of the "keto" way of eating. I don't think it's a way of eating that *everyone* should embrace - just those who adapt well to it. There are some people who think their way of eating is best - and it is, for themselves - but only themselves. The person standing right next to them? Probably not. Seriously, you are probably going to absolutely *fail* with a ketogenic diet if you dislike salty and/or savory foods.
In contrast, I personally find nothing palatable about the Vegan way of eating, and would probably fail miserably if forced to eat that way. I have also failed many times at doing simple CICO - even though the majority of people seem to accept straight/simple CICO as dogma. It wasn't until I discovered this Keto business that I finally settled on a way of eating I could actually *enjoy*, which will hopefully increase my chances of long-term success.
To the original poster's point though (and the topic of this thread), I think it's foolish to think that any single diet can keep all of humanity equally healthy. But to outright label a diet as "dangerous" because it eliminates a single macronutrient that isn't even physiologically essential? Sounds like a big ole pile of dog squeeze to me.6 -
CICO isn't a diet. One loses, gains, or maintains doing vegan, keto, or whatever other diet or none based on CICO. Anyone sensible will choose a diet that is healthful, satisfactory to them, and easy for them to sustain and which allows them to meet their goals based on CICO principles. That could be keto or vegan, of course.5
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lemurcat12 wrote: »CICO isn't a diet. One loses, gains, or maintains doing vegan, keto, or whatever other diet or none based on CICO. Anyone sensible will choose a diet that is healthful, satisfactory to them, and easy for them to sustain and which allows them to meet their goals based on CICO principles. That could be keto or vegan, of course.
To expand on this, CICO is an energy balance equation the takes into consideration several components; metabolism, thermal effect of food, non exercise activity thermogenesis, and thermal effect of activity.3 -
SuperCarLori wrote: »Enter flax and chia. Very low carb fiber power houses! Saving my entrails, one amazing seed at a time....
Warning to those on blood thinners: flax and chia will interfere with their action.0 -
SuperCarLori wrote: »Enter flax and chia. Very low carb fiber power houses! Saving my entrails, one amazing seed at a time....
Warning to those on blood thinners: flax and chia will interfere with their action.
Thank you. I didn't know this! I have been eating a small amount of either flax or chia almost daily. How much is safe to eat or are they best avoided altogether? Are other seeds OK?0 -
Dr. Dean Ornish and his anti low carb preaching also blamed dietary fat for heart disease. Although I found low carb too restrictive, cholesterol and triglyceride levels actually drop dramatically on higher fat lower carb diets.
I think the Ornish diet is a little more than anti-low carb, it's low fat, which still works for many. I just don't see the use for low fat anymore than low carb unless you really can't do it any other way. As far as blood work, any time you lose weight that improves, on matter what diet you choose, and I haven't seen any evidence to contradict this.
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I'm not generally a fan of really low fat diets, but I found this piece by Denise Minger worth reading, and it changed my views somewhat on Ornish et al.: https://rawfoodsos.com/2015/10/06/in-defense-of-low-fat-a-call-for-some-evolution-of-thought-part-1/
And yes, for most people just losing weight improves bloodwork. Some do have negative reactions to increased fat in a HFLC diet, and some benefit from cutting sat fat, but that seems to be a minority. My own dad (who was never overweight) has controlled his cholesterol and improved his tests by reducing sat fat, so I think it depends on the person and understand why doctors often want to try that, especially with non-overweight patients.2 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »I'm not generally a fan of really low fat diets, but I found this piece by Denise Minger worth reading, and it changed my views somewhat on Ornish et al.: https://rawfoodsos.com/2015/10/06/in-defense-of-low-fat-a-call-for-some-evolution-of-thought-part-1/
And yes, for most people just losing weight improves bloodwork. Some do have negative reactions to increased fat in a HFLC diet, and some benefit from cutting sat fat, but that seems to be a minority. My own dad (who was never overweight) has controlled his cholesterol and improved his tests by reducing sat fat, so I think it depends on the person and understand why doctors often want to try that, especially with non-overweight patients.
For me, losing the extra weight/maintaining a weight towards the lower end of the healthy bmi range has been enough to produce great cholesterol numbers. But my husband's mother, who has always been slim, has struggled with high cholesterol numbers and her doctor recommended reducing her saturated fat intake. It's the only thing she changed in her diet and the results have been improved numbers. Her mother, who is also very thin, has had a host of health issues-high glucose numbers (she's been a pre-diabetic for years), crazy blood pressure issues (several strokes) etc. But you'd look at her now/younger years and would think she's done everything 'right' to be healthy (active/healthy weight/eats a very 'healthy' diet etc). So I agree with you 100% that it really can be different for each person.1 -
I'm not sure how an eating plan that lowered my triglycerides by 80%, lowered over all collateral 40%, raised HDL, lowered LDL could be bad for my heart health.
And LCHF is also recommended for diabetics.4
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