Where dietary fat goes without insulin.

Filmlotus

Hi everyone,
I'm new to low carb ketogenic dieting. I've been listening to Gary Taubes and Jeff Volek among other MDs and scientists about the effects of insulin in fat storage on the human body. This is especially true for those with insulin resistance.
Lately I have been trying bulletproof coffee, eating the fat on chicken wings, drizzling coconut oil on my food and just really curious where all this dietary fat is going in my body.
Without an insulin spike, where does the energy go exactly? Would 100% of the 1400 calories I've eaten consisting of fat be used up to maintain my body and activity, or is it possible that some of it will be stored in my fat cells, even without the presence of too much insulin? In other words, is it impossible to store dietary fat on a low to zero carb diet?

Can someone who has done some research shed some light on this?

butterbear1980

I'm definitely not an expert, but after reading Taubes, it seems like he is saying, yes, your body is using all that fat for energy. Lots of people on here (and right now that includes me) seem to do the calorie counting. After I loose my goal weight I look forward to playing around with more liberal calories. In the Taubes book he seems to think calorie restriction isn't necessary for sustained long term weight loss. There are a couple of studies in the book where low carb with no calorie restriction saw amazing results.

I look forward to hearing what other people have to say to answer this quesiton too!

~m

huneydrop

bumping as I would like more info too..........anyone????

ejdp254

Interested in where this is going

FIT_Goat

Having read Taubes and other information on this subject, I think I have some idea on this.

The fat you eat can/will be stored in your fat (adipose) tissues. It does not strictly need insulin to be stored. I recall (possibly incorrectly) reading that the food energy we eat is constantly being stored in fat and then cycled out of that same fat when we're not eating, even if we are eating maintenance or below. Taubes even says, in one interview, that it would be possible to get fat eating 10k calories of butter a day, if you were able to _force_ yourself to do it. And, force is the operative word here. It becomes very difficult to massively over-consume calories strictly in fat. Last night I had a cup of heavy cream for dinner (long story). That's ~800 calories that were essentially pure fat. I'll tell you, you could not have paid me enough to up that to two cups. There's no way. I would have been sick. As it was, the last bits were pretty hard to get down because my body was telling me that I was overfull.

I could easily sit down and polish off a 2,000 calorie meal of steak and potatoes. Mainly because the effect of insulin is to help store those excess calories more expediently. So, I don't hit my limit as fast.

The fat you are eating now is primarily being used to fuel your body's needs. Excess calories (from fat or whatever) are dealt with in various ways. Some are stored, some are burned off as excess heat, and some may be burned off as you move around more simply because you find you have the excess energy. This is most beneficial when you're near your goal weight. Your body will become more self-regulating without you needing to strictly mind the calories. Small excesses will be burned off or result in less hunger in the future, small deficits will be compensated for by slightly increased hunger or a decrease in activity to compensate. Your weight, at that point, will be essentially stable unless you create an excessive deficit or surplus.

FXOjafar

You are right about over eating. I just polished off a 1222 calorie lunch to complete an IF day, and I feel like I'm about to explode! I will likely still be full later tonight as it consisted of 92g of fat.