Carbs - A cautionary Tale

suziecue66

Not really. It's a healthy oil, but it doesn't change human biology. It doesn't magically put the body into ketosis, and it doesn't magically make the brain start using ketones. That's not how it works. Besides, coconut oil isn't unique in its composition of fatty acids, they are all found in multiple other sources.

Coconut oil is pretty much modern day snake oil. It's good for you, but it isn't a miracle cure.

disagree it's snake oil. Did you read the link above re MCT.

tigersword

Not really. It's a healthy oil, but it doesn't change human biology. It doesn't magically put the body into ketosis, and it doesn't magically make the brain start using ketones. That's not how it works. Besides, coconut oil isn't unique in its composition of fatty acids, they are all found in multiple other sources.

Coconut oil is pretty much modern day snake oil. It's good for you, but it isn't a miracle cure.

disagree it's snake oil. Did you read the link above re MCT.

You do know that coconut oil is not the only source of medium chain triglycerides, right? For example, butter is also a great source. Like I said, it isn't magic, it's just another option.

Also, linking to a website called "coconutketones" should be your first red flag on the legitimacy, as she's obviously peddling her book. Not what I would call a scientifically unbiased source.

suziecue66

Another link:
http://perfecthealthdiet.com/?p=2479
"So we have three ways to make the diet ketogenic:

1)      Make Wilder’s “ketogenic ratio” high by eating a lot of fat, very few carbs, and not too much protein.

2)      Supplement with the ketogenic amino acids lysine and leucine.

3)      Supplement with coconut oil or another source of short-chain fats.

If we do (2) or (3), then the diet can be ketogenic even if it has a fair number of carbs.

So now we have an arsenal of ways to generate ketones. We have to look at diseases and diet risks to figure out which way of making the diet ketogenic is optimal."

lunglady

I was going to say something sensible, but nevermind. Sigh.

tigersword

Another link:
http://perfecthealthdiet.com/?p=2479
"So we have three ways to make the diet ketogenic:

1)      Make Wilder’s “ketogenic ratio” high by eating a lot of fat, very few carbs, and not too much protein.

2)      Supplement with the ketogenic amino acids lysine and leucine.

3)      Supplement with coconut oil or another source of short-chain fats.

If we do (2) or (3), then the diet can be ketogenic even if it has a fair number of carbs.

So now we have an arsenal of ways to generate ketones. We have to look at diseases and diet risks to figure out which way of making the diet ketogenic is optimal."

If you're eating a fair number of carbs, your brain is running on glucose, not ketones, even if the rest of your body is ketogenic. Ketogenic means you have no stored glycogen (that is what causes ketosis.) You have no stored glycogen because all the glucose you are eating is being used by the brain.

Where do you think those carbs go? Do they magically disappear? Does the coconut oil magically erase them?

How about a link to a scientifically controlled study?

islandjumper

Ahh so you think you have early onset Alzheimer's and naturally came to the conclusion it must be your low-carb diet.


It's quite amazing that our species even managed to survive this long really isn't it....what with them living for 190,000 years on a hunter/gatherer diet and only the last 10,000 years with the agrarian culture that allows high carb intakes. Yup, your Altzheimer's *must* be down to a low-carb diet :laugh:

Yeah cause all Paleo man ate a low carb diet, oh wait...

Eaton et al. Paleolithic nutrition revisited: A twelve-year retrospective on its nature and implications. European Journal of Clinical Nutrition (1997) 51, 207±216

http://www.direct-ms.org/pdf/EvolutionPaleolithic/Eaton Paleo Nutri Review EJCN.pdf

^^^ this

hunter gatherer does not equal carnivore...try going out into the wilderness and catch/gather all your own food...it's far more likely you'll be eating fruits and veggies than just meat...and fruits and veggies are (wait for it) Carbs!

I don't have a good vs. bad opinion about the low carb diet, but I do think cutting out any one macro isn't the best thing to do...it's more about making better choices and moderation.

_Ben

Alright everyone, for the time being, this thread is being locked. I will be reviewing it. Please remember that disagreeing with someone's opinions is fine, but do so respectfully. Warnings, blocks, and other disciplinary actions will be taken if necessary

_Ben

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jeff261159

This is not self diagnosis, my GP discussed my diet with me and mentioned about carbs in my diet. Most days I have been eating less than 75g. HE said that this could have caused damage to my body over the past 18 months and has said that there is a link between carbs and brain activity. If I was going to self diagnose it woould be something a lttle more pleasant thant alzheimers, and something that wasnt going to cost me my HGV licence and in turn my job!!

jeff261159

thank you, from all the replies to my post, yours is probably the most reasonable. I am now awaiting an appointment with a consultant neurologist and will go from there. Havent booked a place in the nursing home just yet!!

Isolt

This is not self diagnosis, my GP discussed my diet with me and mentioned about carbs in my diet. Most days I have been eating less than 75g. HE said that this could have caused damage to my body over the past 18 months and has said that there is a link between carbs and brain activity.

GPs can be wrong. 10 years ago, when I couldn't walk more than the length of a room and I was wracked with pain, my GP said I 'probably had depression'. Why did he say that? Because the tests he ordered gave no clue what was wrong and he resorted to a lazy diagnosis instead of digging further. It wasn't depression - it was ME (or CFS for people in the US)

There are scientific studies that have shown that limiting carbohydrates not only DOES NOT cause Alzheimer's, but in fact results in far less production of the Amyloid plaques in the brain which are a hallmark of Alzheimer's. If your GP is correct that Alzheimer's is caused by low-carb eating then I'd suggest he whips off a quick letter to Dr Richard Isaacson, a NEUROLOGIST at the University of Miami who puts all his Alzheimer's patients on a diet that restricts their carbohydrates. He is not the only one because there are a number of neurologists who do exactly the same.

I'll post this link again - it is a study in the 'International Journal of Alzheimer's' where one group of mice ate a normal diet and one group ate a diet that was carbohydrate restricted. The group on the carbohydrate restricted diets did not form the brain plaque associated with Alzheimer's.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3144673/

Whether you change your eating is entirely up to you, but I can assure you that going from one extreme to another and stuffing yourself with carbohydrates certainly isn't going to ward off, or magically clear up, Alzheimer's if that's what you have and there is absolutely NO scentific evidence whatsoever for an assertion that restricting carbohydrates causes Alzheimer's so I'm sorry to say that you either misunderstood what your GP was saying or he was talking total rot.

islandjumper

thank you, from all the replies to my post, yours is probably the most reasonable. I am now awaiting an appointment with a consultant neurologist and will go from there. Havent booked a place in the nursing home just yet!!

Good luck and I hope for the best.

Isolt

hunter gatherer does not equal carnivore...try going out into the wilderness and catch/gather all your own food...it's far more likely you'll be eating fruits and veggies than just meat...and fruits and veggies are (wait for it) Carbs!

I don't have a good vs. bad opinion about the low carb diet, but I do think cutting out any one macro isn't the best thing to do...it's more about making better choices and moderation.

Ok, there's a lot of misinformation in this post that I just want to clear up.

1. Nobody, anywhere, ever has said that hunter/gatherers were carnivore. The clue is in 'gatherer' - our species evolved to be omnivorous, to eat what it could, where it could find it.

2. The statement that it's far more likely that we'd be eating 'far more' fruits and veggies than meat rests upon the assumption that fruits and veggies were to be found year round and that's simply not the case. For large swathes of land, take Northern Europe for instance, fruits would only be found during a few short summer months and veggies would be extremely scarce for a good 6 months of the year. The truth is that they would eat lots of fruit and veggies *when they were available*, but for the months they were not they would make up the deficit with meat.

3. The statement that fruit and veggies are carbs is a half-truth; rather like saying 'a car is metal' - it contains metal, but it has an awful lot of other stuff in it too. In the case of fruit, a great part of it is fructose and there's also fibre. If we're talking berries (which is the main wild fruit type in Northern Europe where I'm from), the carbohydrate content is low (4g carbs per 100g of redcurrents, 8g carbs per 100g strawberries for instance) and if we're talking leafy vegetables then they are also not high in carbohydrates...but they are high in fibre. Spinich for instance is 2g carb for 100g, Kale is 6g, turnips 5g. I'm obviously not counting potatos here but there's a good reason for that.....we didn't have them in Northern Europe until the second half of the 16th Century when the Spanish brought them back from their conquest of the Inca empire.

Someone who eats primal is, by default, eating *far* fewer carbohydrates than someone who is eating the USDA recommended diet that puts carbohydrates (bread, rice, pasta, cereals) at the base of the food pyramid. NOBODY cuts out carbohydrates all together, not even Atkins people on induction do that.

tigersword

Did you skip over the whole scientific report posted in this thread that showed paleo man ate between 300-400g of carbs a day?

Also, fructose is a carb. Carb means sugar. That includes all monosaccharides (glucose, fructose, etc,) all polysaccharides (sucrose,) and even the oligosaccharides (starch.) You can't just redefine what a carbohydrate is because you don't like them, it doesn't work that way.

mmapags

thank you, from all the replies to my post, yours is probably the most reasonable. I am now awaiting an appointment with a consultant neurologist and will go from there. Havent booked a place in the nursing home just yet!!

Thanks for the update Brother. As you move forward though the process, you may well find that you GP's initial opinion is inaccurate. The Neurologist will help you to start filling in the picture. I don't think enough is acutally known and established about your condition to draw any conclusions yet. You will remain in my prayers (for me, the most powerful medicine!). Looking forward to updates.

Clarecbear82

thank you, from all the replies to my post, yours is probably the most reasonable. I am now awaiting an appointment with a consultant neurologist and will go from there. Havent booked a place in the nursing home just yet!!

I hope it goes well! Good luck for the future!

Isolt

Did you skip over the whole scientific report posted in this thread that showed paleo man ate between 300-400g of carbs a day?

Nope I didn't skip it....and I also didn't skip the fact that fibre was not deducted from the carbohydrate count and the fibre intake back then exceeded our current intake by approximately 4 times. Take the fibre out of that carb count and it'll be significantly lower.

The other thing that report states is that, it being pre-agrarian, the carbohydrates come from vegetables and fruit.........todays USDA food pyramid advocates lots of starchy carbohydrates which even that report concludes is not a good thing:

"The glycemic index of wild plant foods is typically,
though not invariably, lower than that of agricultural
staples (such as potatoes, bread, spaghetti, rice, corn, etc.)
(Thorburn et al, 1987; Brand et al, 1990) and current
processing techniques, especially ®ne roller milling,
accentuate this tendency. (Brand et al, 1985; Heaton et
al, 1988) The net effect is that carbohydrate from current
sources is more rapidly digested and absorbed than it was
during ancestral experience, a factor of potential signi®-
cance in the etiology of diabetes mellitus."


And though I'll probably be pissing into the wind even to say it, I'll just mention again that low-carbers DON'T shun vegetables. They eat rather a lot of them - they shun starchy carbs like rice, potato, pasta, processed grains.

tigersword

Right, even taking the fiber out, it's still 200-300 grams of carbs a day. Which is more than I eat a day, after taking out fiber, and I'm nowhere near a low carber. The source of carbs doesn't really make a difference, 300 grams of carbs is not low carb, no matter how you look at it.