FIT_Goat wrote: »

Protein way too high? This does not compute.

{had approx. 256g of protein yesterday... wonder if that counts. Nah... it would need to be higher than that}

Edit: And I've graduated out of keto. Been there, done that. I think keto is fine. Some people do well on it. Do I think it's necessarily the "right" way to low carb? No. Do I think it's a "higher level" of low carb? Nope. It's just one approach to it.

Do you actually track your blood ketone level? Probably not. The "low carb'ing" that you believe to be effective is actually getting undermined by excessive levels of protein. If your true goal is to lose weight (a lot of weight) then over-eating protein sabotages any LC diet.

SnowFlinga wrote: »

FIT_Goat wrote: »

Protein way too high? This does not compute.

{had approx. 256g of protein yesterday... wonder if that counts. Nah... it would need to be higher than that}

Edit: And I've graduated out of keto. Been there, done that. I think keto is fine. Some people do well on it. Do I think it's necessarily the "right" way to low carb? No. Do I think it's a "higher level" of low carb? Nope. It's just one approach to it.

Do you actually track your blood ketone level? Probably not. The "low carb'ing" that you believe to be effective is actually getting undermined by excessive levels of protein.

As a matter of fact, I have tracked my blood ketones when eating 200g+ of protein a day. And, yes, they remained solidly above the 0.5 cutoff for ketosis (I think the lowest was 0.7). I stopped bothering because nutritional ketosis isn't my primary goal. It's a secondary effect that I am unconcerned about. So, why waste money testing for it?

Like I said, I graduated from keto. I'm done with that. The excess-protein claims are unfounded anyway. Maybe "reduced" level of ketosis, but not "kicked out of ketosis." The beneficial effects of higher protein may even offset the reduced benefits of higher levels of ketotis. I am skeptical that the level of ketosis itself is related to the rate of weight lost anyway.

If your true goal is to lose weight (a lot of weight) then over-eating protein sabotages any LC diet.

Can you find one single well conducted study that shows "over-eating protein sabotages any low carb diet"? Or is this just a hypothesis you happen to hold? It's an awfully bold claim to make. Especially with that word "any" and the vague description "over-eating."

Edit: I guess it's good I already lost a lot of weight--eating keto for most of it but way over protein the entire time, even when keto--and only have a little to go (if any, since I consider myself at maintenance). It would be a shame to find out that all my previous weight losses didn't actually happen because I over-ate protein the entire time.

I wasn't going to mention it, but since you brought up his blog -- his latest blog post also pertains to this thread:
http://caloriesproper.com/carbs-low-vs-lower/

.... what about low carb vs. lower carb?

Apparently, it doesn’t matter

Thank you all for this thread! I was feeling a bit like LunaKate and the guilt over having half a low carb flat bread to wrap my meat and spinach in for lunch. Getting caught up too much with "lowest must be best" in regards to me to has been making me feel....anxious. I will still shoot for 20net or less but nice to have the studies to read, and to see how supportive everyone is.

wabmester wrote: »

http://caloriesproper.com/carbs-low-vs-lower/
.... what about low carb vs. lower carb?
Apparently, it doesn’t matter

So...
"The participants were obese & sedentary, and according to HOMA-IR (a measure of insulin resistance), they were insulin resistant. Why is this important? Because in general, obese insulin resistant patients respond better to low carb than low fat diets, whereas the reverse is true for insulin sensitive patients… but what about low carb vs. lower carb?"

How do I know if I'm IR or IS (or neither)? I sure as heck don't want to switch to a low fat diet. But I sureR than heck want to be losing weight... My weight losses, as per almost every post-menopausal woman, are *really* slow. Is there a corelation? I doubt anyone in the scientific world is going to do a study on that, but I'm interested in everyone's thoughts.

That's a great link, FIT_Goat.

GrannyMayOz wrote: »

Thank you Goat, that was interesting. So now we have...

Insulin Resistance profgrant.com/2014/01/24/am-i-insulin-resistant/
"Checklist
I’ve had trouble controlling my weight my whole life
I have a high waist circumference (I’ve got a fat gut) – more than 100 cm men, 85 cm women
I always feel hungry
I feel like something sweet after dinner to stop my hunger
Fatigue, exhaustion, depression
High blood pressure
Frequent hypoglycemia (low blood sugars)
You are over 50 years old

BTW – if you have failed one of the glucose tests then don’t bother with the checklist, you are already insulin resistant."

Insulin Sensitivity ehow.com/facts_5724311_insulin-vs_-insulin-sensitivity-definition.html
"Tissue responsiveness to insulin, meaning how successfully the receptor operates to permit glucose clearance, is termed insulin sensitivity. In the case of optimal insulin sensitivity, after a high sugar meal, insulin rises sharply, pushing glucose into the tissues rapidly, then dissipates. In the case of poor insulin sensitivity, however, insulin's elevation is sustained due to an inability to force glucose into muscle tissues."

But can I find a list of symptoms for IS? No, I cannot. But the IR certainly sounds mostly like the pre-LCHF me; particularly the hypoglycemia. I would get shaky and feel faint and nauseous if I didn't eat every 3 hours.

The "85 cm" waist for women annoys me very much though. I'm built like a sherman tank, I'm not going to have an 85 cm waist until I'm a skeleton. That figure is normally written as 88 cm anyway, and wouldn't that be over-weight for an Asian woman? Generalisations like that, with no allowance for build, make me spit chips I'm a labdrador. Nobody expects a labrador to diet itself into being a greyhound!

I think that's generally why a waist to hip ratio is used more often. The main point is that if you're insulin resistant, you store most of your excess weight in your abdomen area, which increases your waist and alter your waist to hip ratio. (The so-called "apple shape.")

The at-home way to test is to take your morning glucose. Anything over 100mg/dL is generally considered insulin resistant. You can also do your own tolerance test by eating a set amount of carb-heavy food or liquid (ideally simple carbs for purposes of the test), then test at 1, 2, and 3 hours afterward. An insulin sensitive person will not likely have their blood sugar rise above 140mg/dL or so, while an insulin resistant person will see a number quite a bit higher at the 1 and 2 hour mark. Likewise, an IS person will have normal readings at 3 hours, while an IR person's may still be elevated, or may drop abnormally low.

If your fasting glucose is normal, but you still suspect insulin resistance, have your doctor run a fasting insulin test. This is different from the glucose test, and will tell you how much insulin is required to keep your fasting glucose at the level it's at.

Also, there are no "symptoms" of insulin sensitivity, because that's the functional state for humans. Insulin resistance is the dysfunctional state. "Symptoms" of insulin sensitivity would include, then, something like: ability to lose weight by adjusting intake or activity level, even/typical fat distribution (even if obese*), low/normal body fat percentage (if not overeating), fasting blood sugar of 60-99mg/dL (ideally, 60-80mg/dL), etc.

* While many people think that obesity is what leads to insulin resistance, it's actually often the other way around. You can actually tell which people had the insulin resistance first by looking at their fat distribution. The people with "beer belly" type distribution -- a lot of abdominal fat, but lean extremities -- were likely insulin resistant before they gained weight.

GrannyMayOz wrote: »

But can I find a list of symptoms for IS? No, I cannot.

No symptoms because it's not a condition --- insulin sensitivicy is what we want.

Here's a conversion chart. 5.7 is mildly elevated. 4.4 is very good.

http://www.diabeteschart.org/mgmmol.html