Is it grams of carbs or percentage of the day's nutrition?

DAM5412

Hi Everyone,

I am very new to the LCHF and was in ketosis for a few days and lost 4 lbs. I am eating this way specifically for weight loss purposes so find it successful for that.

Today I had a big carb day and ate over 127 grams, which equaled 30% of my calories for the day. I had a high calorie allotment due to exercise today. Yesterday, also a big workout in the morning, my carbs were only 19 grams for about 5% of my calorie allotment. For the week prior, my carbs were around 50 - 75 grams, never going over more then 20% of my daily calories.

I know with CICO you can take a 24 hour or weekly view of your intake and say one day is high, then the low day balances it. Is it the same for Carbs? I have the keto sticks and yes it's reflecting trace this afternoon (as opposed to moderate which is the highest I get to, even yesterday when I was only 19 grams) after the spike in carbs, so I know I am not in ketosis any more, but since today was a special case (MIL birthday and one small piece of cake along with a much needed Coconut water after my workout), will I get back into ketosis quickly or still need a few days of low carbs?

So I guess my main question is what matters more, the grams or the percentage?

Thanks!

FIT_Goat

It's grams and only grams. It's also a 24 hour period, you can't average high days with low days.

kkimpel

I am doing percentage.. but used the number of grams that showed up to help set the percentage... I think there is a blog about how to do that.

I found this calculator http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/

Leonidas_meets_Spartacus

It's niether grams nor percentages. There is no fixed limit on grams you should or shouldn't eat. Your body goes in to ketosis when you don't have enough glycogen in liver to feed brain and other organs. The glycogen stores in the muscle can't be used by other organs. Ketosis depends on your glucogen stores of muscle and liver. I ate 150 grams of carbs and still had a blood ketone level of 5, but those were on the days I ran 2-3 hours. That was because my body has utilized all the glycogen. when I ate carbs, the body stored them as muscly glycogen store rather than in liver. It also depends on nutrient timing, best time to consume carbs if you must is before a long or intense workout. Deplete the energy stores, you will be back in ketosis. i have been in ketosis when I ate 150g and I wasn't when I ate 60g of carbs depending on activity, stores etc. You need to experiment and figure out your limits.

sljohnson1207

If your goal is to stay in ketosis, you should not cycle carbs like that. It will constantly throw you out, and you have to reset the clock. Most folks it takes at least 3 days of <20 g NET carbs to get into ketosis. It seems you are saying you got into ketosis by eating 50-75 carbs (is that NET carbs or total carbs?) last week. You must exercise a lot. And if you can get into ketosis and stay in it at 50-75 net carbs, go for it, and consider yourself lucky! Keto adapted takes longer, usually 3-4 weeks of consistent, no cheating, LCHF moderate protein eating.

DAM5412

Thanks everyone for your responses. I am using ketostix to test my urine and prior to yesterday's birthday cake, I was showing moderate and more levels of ketones. I also have the awful taste in my mouth and the lovely keto breath.

I think based on what I am reading here and other places, I am going to focus on grams of carbs. Aiming for about 50 - 75 total carbs.

I would ask, PU_239, that my percentage of nutrition will change based on how much I exercise, correct? At least on MFP, as the more you workout the higher calories they will allocate to you and therefore your number of each nutrient will also increase. So one day 100 grams may equal 30%, but if I work out a lot the next day, then that same 100 grams will only be 20%, right?

sljohnson1207

Most LCHF diets tell you to count NET carbs, not total carbs because you can eat 50-75 total carbs in cheese or you can eat 50-75 carbs in veggies, but the cheese has no fiber. The veggies do, so your carb intake could vary wildly depending on how much fiber you are eating.

So, NET carbs equation is:

Total Carbs - Fiber - Sugar Alcohols =NET Carbs

If you track your fiber in MFP, it's easy to subtract the fiber. Just make sure you consistently log one way or the other regarding total carb entries vs. net carb entries. Also, I didn't look to see where you live, but I believe in Europe, the labels list NET carbs already.

DAM5412

Thanks again!

SLJohnson, I am in the states and do track fiber also and knew the relationship...however, I did not look at my fiber intake on my splurge day and consider that my net carbs was lower. Going to take a look at it know, but know my higher carbs came from the cake and coconut water...yeah, my net carb was still 113. Still much lower than my prior carb consumption.

I will keep learning as I go, right. Happy Monday.

deansdad101

Thanks again!

SLJohnson, I am in the states and do track fiber also and knew the relationship...however, I did not look at my fiber intake on my splurge day and consider that my net carbs was lower. Going to take a look at it know, but know my higher carbs came from the cake and coconut water...yeah, my net carb was still 113. Still much lower than my prior carb consumption.

I will keep learning as I go, right. Happy Monday.

DAM;

If you are using the desktop version of MFP it's a relatively easy proposition to add the "Net Carbs" column to your daily food tracker.
(I don't use mobile version so not sure if it's working on that or not)

Doing so makes it MUCH easier to visualize the macro relationships and percentages.

This page gives step by step directions (it does involve running a script but this one has been used countless times and is safe).

http://tinyurl.com/a8schwz

Basically you first have to make sure you are currently displaying the "fiber" column (that's a MUST or it won't work). You will lose one of your current columns (due to limitation of MFP) but be sure to keep cals/fats/proteins/fiber and, of course carbs.

Once that's done you install the extension (depending on which browser you use) and restart the browser.

The location of the script has changed a few times so don't panic if the one referenced doesn't work right out of the gate, you might have to read the most current posts or do a search on the googlemachine but it's out there.

If you decide to proceed, would you please report back the results and if there is a new location (it will help others to have the most current info.

Once installed you will be able to reset your macros exactly to your liking.

Sounds worse than it is, you might want to print out the webpage instructions to follow step by step if that's easier for you.

DAM5412

Thanks deansdad, I tried to run the scripts, but wasn't able to. I will give it another go from home later today.