Macros, low carbs and heart healthy

kimmiecoley1396

not sure if I am posting in the right section. I am wanting to know what numbers I need to hit each day and what things I should keep below in heart healthy and low carb sections

neanderthin

My answer to your question is going to go into just some basic detail that covers my personal knowledge of lower carb metabolism that I'm sure is more than what you expected but it's a topic where other people might find interesting and valuable but it will answer your questions.

Let me start by saying that there's other factors like environmental ones and genetics that also play an important role in heart health but in the context of diet, it mostly has to do with inflammation considering heart disease is primarily caused by inflammation and not cholesterol or saturated fat, which I suspect if you believed that to be the case you wouldn't be interested in a diet where most of those nutrients exist.

The "numbers" are flexible and can have a wide variance dependent on individual tolerances to restriction and food preferences but the foundation should be mostly a whole-food diet predicated on the idea that eating natural, minimally processed foods supports overall health, metabolism, and longevity. Instead of focusing on micromanaging nutrients which is often the "standard of care" referred to as 'dieting" so to speak, this approach is based on eating in a way that naturally regulates hunger hormones, stabilizes blood sugar, increases satiety on a continuum that coincides with carb restriction, generally speaking, and minimizes inflammation which translates into better heart health.

Without getting into the politics of low carb studies, everyone in that space considers low carb to be around 100 grams or less per day. Paleo type diets are generally around 50-150 or more grams a day based on individual lifestyle and are more concerned with eating a certain way, a philosophy if you like.

Lower still is a ketogenic diet which is basically a therapeutic diet based on the existing research as it originally applied to children with epilepsy. Since then, research has expanded its potential benefits to other therapeutic applications including metabolic disorders where increased insulin sensitivity can help manage type 2 diabetes. As well as neurological health Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and traumatic brain injury as well as cancer research and mental health and cognition where it's shown to improve dementia symptoms. Mental clarity seems to be very high on the benefits list.

Lower still is the carnivore diet which forgoes all plant based carbohydrates but there is still some in animal products, mostly in dairy. This is an extreme version of low carb where people have found relief from many lifelong health complication even when compared with a ketogenic diet which pretty much all of these people have tried as well in that journey figuring out and trying to improve their own health problems.

The body’s ability to burn fat and produce ketones is a fundamental survival mechanism, allowing humans to sustain energy levels during food scarcity. Now of course that has dramatically shifted toward high carb, processed foods, leading to metabolic dysfunction, insulin resistance, and weight gain. Returning to a low carb approach aligns with how our predecessors commonly thrived where cycle of feast and famine was the norm, relying on fat stores and ketone metabolism. Humans if enough body fat was accumulated could exist for extended periods of time without eating, so when someone says they're hungry after a few hours is an interesting concept in this context. This ability to shift between glucose and ketones for energy is a built in survival mechanism one that modern diets often suppress due to constant carbohydrate intake and the satiety that low carb offers and the rebalancing of those satiety hormones, ghrelin and leptin quieten and reduce the food noise in our heads and the desire is neutralized, so to speak and why this diet works so well for weight loss.

Anyway low carb and paleo is generally around the 50-150 grams of carbs a day with protein anywhere form 20-35% and fat in the 40-60%. Ketogenic is generally lower in protein around the 20-25% area with fat upwards of 75% and carbs around 5% These are all flexible and can conform to any possible lower carb diet because like I said the lower the carbs we actually consume, the lower chronic inflammation will be.

Another point I want to make for people that might be interested, is our genetics are deeply rooted in our evolutionary past. For millions of years, our genes have adapted to environmental pressures, survival needs, and dietary patterns and like I mentioned which was basically being in a state of ketosis for most of that time and one of the reasons why it works so well for metabolic dysregulation basically. We've moved well off that plan lately and anthropological evidence suggests that was not the greatest idea humans ever had and without getting into a deeper scientific explanation there is some evidence that when people consume to excess and consume mostly a SAD diet there is completion metabolically speaking, which energy fat or carbs source will be prioritized and that's called the "Randle Cycle" which can and is one of the main factors for the manifestation of metabolic syndrome and inflammation.

Glucose will always be prioritized as the preferred energy source, not the better one but the one used first simply because it can be used for immediate energy as opposed to the metabolic pathways needs to release the energy from our stored adipose because that is where the body gets it, glucose is just quicker. Also in a ketogenic diet it's mostly (95%) protein and fat the Randle Cycle is not implicated and even if a person was to consume this diet to excess, which is almost impossible but nevertheless none of the metabolites that are present to facilitate metabolic syndrome are there, so basically eating in excess doesn't lead to diabetes or effect chronic inflammation very much so basically even this consequence of weight gain from eating too much is still heart healthier than eating a whole food diet that's higher in carbohydrates.

I've been on a low carb and ketogenic lifestyle for quite a few years, so I suggest you fact check me, I try to stay impartial, but we all can be and are bias to some degree. 😊