low carb diet and having LOW appetite

I went on Atkins to jumpstart my weight loss and it did exactly the same thing to me. I had no appetite, I actually started hating the food after a very short period and the thought of having to eat another fatty meaty meal just turned me off. I also lost energy. I had done Atkins before and lost some, but also could not stay with it for a long time.

This time I lost a few pounds right away and then stalled. Then I added more carbs and put immediately weight on. I also was constipated all the time, something which usually never happens to me.

I decided never to do it again. It is not my kind of food. I do not feel good on it, I could never stay on it. So I went back to my normal food, lots of fruits, vegetable, nuts, some oatmeal, some brown rice and a little bit of eggs, cheese and fish.

I just started low-carbing .. The huge problem I am having is eating *enough* calories. This was only my first week but my appetite PLUMMETED immediately and I know I'm really not eating enough. I'm trying to incorporate more fruit and veg in the hopes I can cram that in without it making me feel so full, even though I know people advocate those to *help* you feel full. I'm eating 800-900 cals a day this week, and getting that much in is truly a struggle. ..
Today was day 6 for low-carbs, and I was suddenly (like overnight) SO fatigued. I was expecting this a few days ago, and I'm wondering if my liver just ran out glycogen now, and this is the "crash", or if it's because I'm not eating enough of anything. ..
Has anyone had this problem while low-carbing...not wanting to eat much at all? And is what I'm feeling today that conversion point ,where my body is out of "easy fuel" and maybe switching to using fat, vs. just too little food altogther?

Thoughts?

I aim for a keto (high fat, moderate protein, low carb) diet and find that the issues you are experiencing (low energy, trouble getting enough calories) are improved with more calories from fat.

Aoili (garlic mayonnaise) - very calorific and tastes great on beirsticks or stirred through a bowl of grated cheese. That I eat with a spoon. Or rolled up in slices of roast beef.

Pouring cream in tea or coffee.

Bacon roses - roll up strips of bacon and put a toothpick through them. Bake them in the oven and you can dip those in aoili!

Yes this is one of the side effects of eating very low carb.....sure you will lose the weight but after awhile you will feel like total crap, eating becomes no fun anymore because as great as it sounded at first to be able to eat all the meat you want, you can no longer stand the sight of it.....oh and just try working out on this diet without passing out....low carb means low energy. That being said, it's a great tool for losing weight fast but it's not a lifestyle, have a plan for transitioning into a sensible diet once all the above happen. (I speak from experience doing Atkins, etc years back)

Could you please let me know when I should expect to start feeling like total crap? I've been in ketosis for the past two months and have never felt this energized or had such mental clarity. Further, I lift 3 times per week and do cardio 3 times per week and have yet to pass out from the exertion.

I didn't start this WOE to eat unlimited meat nor do I eat excessive amounts of protein (since that could throw me out of ketosis). I eat real, minimally-processed, home-cooked foods daily. This is a lifestyle, and an extremely healthy and sensible one at that.

I have been a sugar addict most of my 61 years. Now eating low carb I have trouble eating enough as I mostly have little or no appetite. The first few days I had more energy and felt better than I had in quite awhile. I've been eating low carb for 3-1/2 weeks
now & am tired & dragging. I realize I need to make myself eat more meat ... or perhaps low carb protein shakes. And exercise more! I've only lost 11.5 pounds and need to lose at least 50 more. At least I'm heading in the right direction;)

I actually did it for quite awhile and several times over a few years....each time I did it, it got progressively worse (the symptoms I mentioned).....I have to admit that I have a very negative view of this type of diet because I lump it in with a lot of the uneducated diets, pills and quick fixes I stupidly tried when I was younger before I finally learned that this is a lifestyle change and not some diet flavor of the week (they keep changing the name-Atkins, Keto, whatever but the concept is the same). I think anytime someone tries to permanently restrict whole categories of HEALTHY food choices from their diet, they are setting themselves up for failure at best and potentially harming themselves at worst. But hey, our systems are all different....if it works for you so be it. I just don't buy into it being the way Nature intended us to eat (restricting natural and healthy food choices because they have carbs)....it doesn't even make common sense IMHO.

Atkins and ketogenic diets are actually quite different; they aren't just renaming the diet. Atkins doesn't actively encourage counting calories, but rather starts your carbs off very low (induction) and slowly reintroduces carbohydrates into the diet until people are no longer naturally achieving a caloric deficit due to the high satiety of their diet (generally ~+5g/day/week). Ketogenic diets consistently keep carb intake very low throughout and generally track calories/macros, and some variants reintroduce carbs either on a weekly/bi-weekly refeed day or in a targeted fashion based on your exercise routine. In short, while there are some similarities, these diets are actually pretty different when you get to the details.

I'm not going to come out and say it's how nature intended us to eat, because nature doesn't have intent with respect to any diet - we evolved to survive in various different environments and with different macronutrient compositions, and in any event I'm more interested in what science has shown rather than what people suspect nature intends. We've moved so far beyond basic survival these days that I suspect it's a moot point anyways. Nor would I say it restricts healthy food choices, because individual food choices generally should not be viewed as "healthy" or "unhealthy" in isolation (at least in my opinion). Sorry to hear it didn't work out well for you, but many people function and even thrive on low carb diets, particularly when it comes to cutting weight, and the symptoms you listed are almost always associated with the beginning of a low carb diet and disappear shortly thereafter. That said, there are valid criticisms to low carb diets and I almost never recommend them to people unless they've already expresses an interest/reason in low carb dieting (although I do find myself defending them in threads like this one ).

Yes this is one of the side effects of eating very low carb.....sure you will lose the weight but after awhile you will feel like total crap, eating becomes no fun anymore because as great as it sounded at first to be able to eat all the meat you want, you can no longer stand the sight of it.....oh and just try working out on this diet without passing out....low carb means low energy. That being said, it's a great tool for losing weight fast but it's not a lifestyle, have a plan for transitioning into a sensible diet once all the above happen. (I speak from experience doing Atkins, etc years back)

Could you please let me know when I should expect to start feeling like total crap? I've been in ketosis for the past two months and have never felt this energized or had such mental clarity. Further, I lift 3 times per week and do cardio 3 times per week and have yet to pass out from the exertion.

I didn't start this WOE to eat unlimited meat nor do I eat excessive amounts of protein (since that could throw me out of ketosis). I eat real, minimally-processed, home-cooked foods daily. This is a lifestyle, and an extremely healthy and sensible one at that.

You should expect to feel like crap in about 2 to 4 months based on my experience.....that's what happened to me, after 2 months I was pumped up! Lost a boatload of weight, had great mental clarity, etc....then about 2 months later the bottom finally started to drop out.....I felt and looked like hell-skinny fat, drawn eyes, zoned out, just blah. Energy and mood went to crap and it just wasn't worth it anymore......I eventually binged and gained all the weight back. I would sincerely like to talk to you in year or two and see if you have the same view....I personally feel that any diet that restricts whole categories of healthy natural food choices because they have carbs is a recipe for failure sooner or later.....great for cutting short term weight (I lower my carbs here and there-carb cycle, etc) but not a valid life long diet plan. I am not attacking you, just my personal view. I lift 5 to 6 times a week HEAVY and do about 3 to 4 hours of cardio a week.....there is no way in hell I could do all of that without evil carbs.

How confident are you that you weren't undereating on calories if you lost a boatload of weight in such a short period of time? Are you sure you weren't experiencing carb creep where you inadvertently were slipping into/out of ketosis, causing you to feel sluggish? You mention looking skinny fat at the time - I'll assume your protein intake was adequate if you got sick of eating meat, but were you lifting while cutting? Were you using a food scale, tracking your macros, logging everything you ate, and so on? I can think of lots of reasons why you started feeling that way, but honestly none of them have to do with the diet as a whole.

And honestly our exercise routines sound pretty similar. It's doable.

I respect your well thought out response.....I have to admit I did the diet when I was younger and not as knowledgeable about general health and diet.... I did the diet hardcore, pretty much NOTHING but meat....did the keto strips and I can assure you I was in ketosis nonstop....I was also eating low calorie 1200 to 1400 calories a day so no doubt that played a role as well. Exercise was nonexistent because I was really just trying to lose a lot of weight as fast as humanly possible, again it was another fix, not a permanent lifestyle change. I definitely did not use a scale, think about macros, etc. I do this all now religiously (a lot easier with MFP than it was 20 years ago).
How long have you been doing it? I am truly curious what people thoughts are that are able to stick with it for years and years.....the different variations of low carb have existed for 30 plus years now but you don't seem to see people that are still doing it after many years and stand by it....that to me is telling in itself. I do appreciate your thoughtful point of view on the subject.....not enough of that on MFP. :-)

I respect your well thought out response.....I have to admit I did the diet when I was younger and not as knowledgeable about general health and diet.... I did the diet hardcore, pretty much NOTHING but meat....did the keto strips and I can assure you I was in ketosis nonstop....I was also eating low calorie 1200 to 1400 calories a day so no doubt that played a role as well. Exercise was nonexistent because I was really just trying to lose a lot of weight as fast as humanly possible, again it was another fix, not a permanent lifestyle change. I definitely did not use a scale, think about macros, etc. I do this all now religiously (a lot easier with MFP than it was 20 years ago).
How long have you been doing it? I am truly curious what people thoughts are that are able to stick with it for years and years.....the different variations of low carb have existed for 30 plus years now but you don't seem to see people that are still doing it after many years and stand by it....that to me is telling in itself. I do appreciate your thoughtful point of view on the subject.....not enough of that on MFP. :-)

Currently on TKD since October 2013, although I've used it to cut in years past with a lot of success. I don't know that I will continue it for years to come, but I really enjoy it for fat loss, as it's very muscle sparing and helps keep my otherwise voracious appetite in check and I hate feeling hungry (I'd much rather deal with food restrictions than feel hungry, but I know most people are probably the opposite). I plan to continue cutting until December this year and hopefully take a break (at least from dropping weight) at that point, but we'll see. That all assumes I've hit my current goals by then, haha, but I'd love for 2015 to be a slow bulk.

8-900 calories per day,seriously?
Go back to 1700. Losing weight faster isn't worth
Eating UNHEALTHY.

I totally understand it's not enough, that's why I posted asking about it. I have NO appetite and am forcing myself to eat even that much. My motivation isn't to lose fast, it's to improve my diet (which previously included a lot of *unhealthy* carbs), and this is what my DOCTOR recommended. I'm trying to make improvements to what I'm currently doing.

So is this something you are planning to stick to long term? Sounds miserable to me. You say you feel pretty great, but you actually don't right? You feel sluggish and don't have energy? How is that healthy? I would have some bread/carbs and just count calories. This sounds awful and not worth it to me.

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I aim for a keto (high fat, moderate protein, low carb) diet and find that the issues you are experiencing (low energy, trouble getting enough calories) are improved with more calories from fat.
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This advise on fat is one of the most important things about any low carb or Keto diet! Most people take a long time to learn it. Meet your protien and carb macro's, then add fat to satiety. Fat is your energy, be liberal at first then adjust as needed.

Also if your feeling fatigue/cramps you should read the keto faq over at http://www.reddit.com/r/keto. It's photo - friday over there right now and it's always fun to see results!

There's a ton of information there about getting your electrolytes in, which was a problem for me at the start with fatigue. Eat the suggestions for salt/potasium and magnesium. Those recommendations are good for anyone on 20-30 carbs a day.

Yes this is one of the side effects of eating very low carb.....sure you will lose the weight but after awhile you will feel like total crap, eating becomes no fun anymore because as great as it sounded at first to be able to eat all the meat you want, you can no longer stand the sight of it.....oh and just try working out on this diet without passing out....low carb means low energy. That being said, it's a great tool for losing weight fast but it's not a lifestyle, have a plan for transitioning into a sensible diet once all the above happen. (I speak from experience doing Atkins, etc years back)

It sounds like you briefly tried an Atkins diet years back, but so much of what you've said is wrong for the vast majority of people. Some people feel groggy at first on a low carb diet but this goes away after a few days. Most people don't feel like "total crap" after a while - most feel just fine after just a few days, provided they actually stick with it, and not everyone has "keto flu" symptoms. The notion of you can't stand the sight of meat after a few days... wow. Perhaps if you're a flexitarian eating mostly vegetarian meals and you switch to an Atkins diet you'll struggle from eating more meat, but I'd say a lot of low carbers don't eat a lot more meat than non-low carbers. As for working out, performance does tend to suffer a bit at first (e.g., you might see lifts decrease slightly) but recovers after a couple of months, and adapted individuals hardly suffer from low energy. Quite to the contrary, energy levels tend to be decoupled from your carb intake and many people find they have ample energy and have an easy time with endurance activities, even when fasted. Glycogen depletion is a potential issue for some people but an addressable one.

There are downsides to a ketogenic diet - namely, it's very restrictive and eliminates a lot of food choices. That's not a good fit for many people, and I'd probably say it's a poor fit for most people. But so much of what you've said is simply transitory in nature or flat out incorrect for the majority of people. Personally, it sounds like you just didn't stick with it long enough or kept your carbs at a level where you constantly went into and out of ketosis.

You...I like.
Very well explained.