New to LCHF - are all carbs bad?
Annette_906
Posts: 44 Member
hi everyone!
Im new to this and I'm wondering if all carbs are bad while doing LCHF? Am I suppose to limit the fruit and veggies that contain lots of carbs? ie. Apples?
Thanks for your input!
Im new to this and I'm wondering if all carbs are bad while doing LCHF? Am I suppose to limit the fruit and veggies that contain lots of carbs? ie. Apples?
Thanks for your input!
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Replies
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Welcome! I think it depends on the person. I would recommend taking some time to experiment and judge how a particular food makes you feel. I get most of my carbs from low GI veggies and some dairy based on what other foods to do my blood sugar. I generally stay away from most fruits except berries but if you're new you might consider scaling back slowly.0
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If you're shooting for ketosis, all high-carb foods can knock you out of ketosis regardless of source.
Fruits are typically "worse" than veggies. The good part of fruit is the nutrients, most of which are found in the peel/rind. Apple peels are a good low-carb snack.
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Apples are very high gi comparatively. If you must have some fruit, stick to berries and stone fruits (like peaches, etc.). These can be eaten at small intervals as a treat. Fruit is nature's candy, and most bodies process the sugars in fruits the very same way they process sugars from candy bars, etc.
That being said, if you are not diabetic and are not insulin resistant, you might not have as negative a reaction to some fruits. Me personally, I had to cut my carbs WAY down lower than I expected before I kill the carb/junk food cravings. I would play it by ear, but the first full month of LCHF, you may have to cut out fruits completely until you adjust.0 -
If you're shooting for ketosis, all high-carb foods can knock you out of ketosis regardless of source.
Fruits are typically "worse" than veggies. The good part of fruit is the nutrients, most of which are found in the peel/rind. Apple peels are a good low-carb snack.
About how many carbs do you get from the peel, do you know?
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Don't know exactly -- very few. The carbs are in the sweet core. My BIL is one of those extreme calorie restricted guys trying to increase his lifespan (he's also a professor of chemistry). It's fun to watch him eat orange rinds and toss out the rest of the orange. 0
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I determined the carb limit that works for me (under 50g) and as long as I stick to that it doesn't matter what the source of the carbs are. My preference is for whole foods but I use small amounts of flour, panko and even sugar where needed. I also eat things like bananas (& other high sugar fruits), white potatoes, and black beans in small amounts; things typically excluded from low carb diets.
My diary is open if you want to see an example of how the carb counts work out when eating some of these higher carb foods.
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I try to limit my carby foods to vegetables and fruits with enough fibre to end up with no more than 2-3 net carbs. I tried higher protein and carbs, and couldn't lose weight. They totally knocked me out of ketosis.
So...16g of carbs per day for me it is.
Edited to add examples of fruits and veg I will still eat in moderation:
broccoli
cauliflower
spinach
kale
cabbage
peppers (green, jalapeno)
raspberries
blueberries
-T.
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Click on this to make it bigger:
That's for 100g servings, sorted by net carbs. Mushrooms are sorted to the end and shouldn't be - they should be much higher on the list. In general, everything from the top down to plums is fine in servings of 50g or less. Once you get Brussels sprouts, even 100g is manageable. Some of the things higher than plums are still ok, because you use them in much smaller amounts per serving (garlic, ginger, etc).
The main things you really need to be careful of are starches, corn, potatoes, rice, bread, not veggies, or even a lot of types of fruit.0 -
Thanks everyone for all the info, it's extremely helpful. I'm currently doing 90g per day and hopefully I'll be able to lower that sooner than later. I doubt I'll ever go fully carb free but less carbs are doing me wonders! It's helping greatly with my PCOS. However, there are still times when after I'm done eating a full meal, I still feel hungry and have cravings.... Will that go away the longer I stick to this way of eating?0
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Many times just the habit of eating can make you think you're hungry. In the beginning the food cravings can hit hard too. I noticed they finally decreased, for me, at 50 or less, and are almost gone completely at 20 or less. I had a "hungry" day today, but is the first since dropping to the present level a few weeks ago. Hang in there! It does get easier!0
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I am a type 2 diabetic and dropped my carbs to 20 or less in March 2014 after reading Dr. Bernstein's book. I have been off of my meds with improved sugars for 13 months now but I am still not satisfied with my glucose or weight. Even 20 carbs a day only put me on the fringes of ketosis (per blood meter) so everyone is different. To get into ketosis I had to swig 6-8 Tbsps of coconut oil shots throughout the day on top of my fatty meals but the added fat calories stopped my fat loss so I stopped. Having a hard time getting into ketosis was because of the damage my body had sustained for years and that made it respond poorly for quite awhile. For the last week I have been playing around with increasing my veggie and fruit intake (now at 75% of daily menu) and I am seeing things I did not expect to see. The scales are moving down again and my glucose readings are improving further. What is up with that?? I blew past 121 (75 net) carbs today and my sugars were fine. To put that into context, it took 20 or less just to keep me off meds a few months ago so this whole food eating is paying off in healing my body. So, in my own experience, LCHF was a Godsend for me and a great start but after 6 months the weight loss stopped at 32 lbs and my sugars leveled out so after sitting at that level for another 7 months I wanted to shake things up and also see if I could tolerate more carbs. My husband lost 83 lbs doing LCHF in 5 months so it definitely works. Both of us got our lipid profiles into the excellent ratio, being off the scale on the good side. His went down overall, mine went up but the ratios are great. Again, everyone is different.0
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Welcome! I think it depends on the person. I would recommend taking some time to experiment and judge how a particular food makes you feel. I get most of my carbs from low GI veggies and some dairy based on what other foods to do my blood sugar. I generally stay away from most fruits except berries but if you're new you might consider scaling back slowly.
I agree with Sugarbeat. In my case basically all carbs are bad for me after abusing them for 40 years.
Being 63 when I started very low carbing last year was a huge factor in my case because of my very poor general health. Had I started at age 23 or even 33 cutting back to say 150 carbs a day I may would never had a reason to go <50 grams daily like I need to do today.
If one cuts out carbs and a year later are at the same weight and general health then cutting out the carbs was not required in their case perhaps. I expect it is the chemical load that builds and builds from eating processed carbs that gets many of us after we hit 40-50 years old. Only eating processed foods that have three or fewer listed ingredients is helping my health in my case.
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Annette_906 wrote: »Thanks everyone for all the info, it's extremely helpful. I'm currently doing 90g per day and hopefully I'll be able to lower that sooner than later. I doubt I'll ever go fully carb free but less carbs are doing me wonders! It's helping greatly with my PCOS. However, there are still times when after I'm done eating a full meal, I still feel hungry and have cravings.... Will that go away the longer I stick to this way of eating?
What are your percentages of calories? Did you replace the carbs with healthy fats? If not, I can see why you are hungry and unsatisfied. Are your total calories in line with the goal of losing weight? They still count for many of us.
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sljohnson1207 wrote: »Annette_906 wrote: »Thanks everyone for all the info, it's extremely helpful. I'm currently doing 90g per day and hopefully I'll be able to lower that sooner than later. I doubt I'll ever go fully carb free but less carbs are doing me wonders! It's helping greatly with my PCOS. However, there are still times when after I'm done eating a full meal, I still feel hungry and have cravings.... Will that go away the longer I stick to this way of eating?
What are your percentages of calories? Did you replace the carbs with healthy fats? If not, I can see why you are hungry and unsatisfied. Are your total calories in line with the goal of losing weight? They still count for many of us.
My calorie intake is 1200. I have started eating heathy fats, slowly. From what I've been reading on other posts, I'm wondering if I'm not eating enough food. I may have to up my calories and see how I do with that.0 -
Try this calculator for a good estimate. Depending on your stats and how aggressively you are trying to lose, 1200 is pretty low, esp. if exercising, too.
http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/0 -
sljohnson1207 wrote: »Try this calculator for a good estimate. Depending on your stats and how aggressively you are trying to lose, 1200 is pretty low, esp. if exercising, too.
http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/
So based on my hip/waist/neck/height ratio, the calculator estimates 62.65% body fat. My scale at home as well as my the handheld body fat thingie both say 45% or so... I'm between the pictures usually for 45-55%... That is such a huge variation of body fat possibilities... What do y'all think?0 -
KnitOrMiss wrote: »sljohnson1207 wrote: »Try this calculator for a good estimate. Depending on your stats and how aggressively you are trying to lose, 1200 is pretty low, esp. if exercising, too.
http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/
So based on my hip/waist/neck/height ratio, the calculator estimates 62.65% body fat. My scale at home as well as my the handheld body fat thingie both say 45% or so... I'm between the pictures usually for 45-55%... That is such a huge variation of body fat possibilities... What do y'all think?
Think about where all your excess weight is, in no small part due to the PCOS. Now think about what the waist-hip-height ratio measures. That's why it measures high.0 -
That's what I was thinking, because I carry most of my weight shoulder to thigh... I don't have tree trunk arms or legs... It just seemed odd.... I wish that calculator had allowed for weight to balance out the measurements - that would have been interesting!0
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Yeah, that's why use the Covert Bailey calculation. It includes the forearm, wrist, and calf measurements, which help balance out the waist and chest measurements. My waist to hip ratio sucks.0
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That gives me 42%!0
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KnitOrMiss wrote: »That gives me 42%!
Yeah, none of them are going to be perfect, unless you do a BodPod or DEXA scan (and even those aren't perfect, though they're most accurate). That gives you the same as the bioimpedence one, though, so I'd say they're the more reasonable than that other one.0 -
KnitOrMiss wrote: »That gives me 42%!
Is your bf% making much difference in the calculator? None of them are accurate for me because of the fluid retention, but I tried it with the 58 I get from the waist/hip ratio and the 47 that the calculator suggests based on height/weight. I saw a difference of about 6 calories/day if I switched from sedentary to light activity, but nothing profound.0 -
KnitOrMiss wrote: »That gives me 42%!
Is your bf% making much difference in the calculator? None of them are accurate for me because of the fluid retention, but I tried it with the 58 I get from the waist/hip ratio and the 47 that the calculator suggests based on height/weight. I saw a difference of about 6 calories/day if I switched from sedentary to light activity, but nothing profound.
The protein calculation is usually based on lean body mass.0 -
And yes, the body fat% and therefore lean body mass in grams/percentage was MASSIVELY different as far as what protein levels I needed. With the higher body fat, I need 56-92 grams of protein. With the lower body fat, I need 81-135 grams of protein. So there is only an 11 gram overlap there that is a massive difference... Almost 30 pounds off on the minimum...over 30 pounds off on the maximum... So yeah, it makes huge differences there. I'm not counting/tracking right now, so I don't know where I'm falling currently, but I'm definitely enjoying my meat.0
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KnitOrMiss wrote: »sljohnson1207 wrote: »Try this calculator for a good estimate. Depending on your stats and how aggressively you are trying to lose, 1200 is pretty low, esp. if exercising, too.
http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/
So based on my hip/waist/neck/height ratio, the calculator estimates 62.65% body fat. My scale at home as well as my the handheld body fat thingie both say 45% or so... I'm between the pictures usually for 45-55%... That is such a huge variation of body fat possibilities... What do y'all think?
I think online calculators for bf% are notoriously wrong. The keto-calculator link above says according to my height and weight, that I may have 32% bodyfat. Via hydrostatic weighing and bio-impedence it was 21% and 20.5% respectively on March 30th. The calculators that use girth may be a little more accurate, but only use the ones that have many points of measure, because we are not all shaped the same. Overall, I wouldn't go by any of those online "guesses" because that is exactly what they are. And really, I don't think comparing pictures is that great either, particularly, when some of us have been/are plagued with a bit of body dysmorphia (sp?).
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sljohnson1207 wrote: »KnitOrMiss wrote: »sljohnson1207 wrote: »Try this calculator for a good estimate. Depending on your stats and how aggressively you are trying to lose, 1200 is pretty low, esp. if exercising, too.
http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/
So based on my hip/waist/neck/height ratio, the calculator estimates 62.65% body fat. My scale at home as well as my the handheld body fat thingie both say 45% or so... I'm between the pictures usually for 45-55%... That is such a huge variation of body fat possibilities... What do y'all think?
I think online calculators for bf% are notoriously wrong. The keto-calculator link above says according to my height and weight, that I may have 32% bodyfat. Via hydrostatic weighing and bio-impedence it was 21% and 20.5% respectively on March 30th. The calculators that use girth may be a little more accurate, but only use the ones that have many points of measure, because we are not all shaped the same. Overall, I wouldn't go by any of those online "guesses" because that is exactly what they are. And really, I don't think comparing pictures is that great either, particularly, when some of us have been/are plagued with a bit of body dysmorphia (sp?).
Yeah, twisted body image issues. I actually thought I was about three settings lower than my body image matched up too, mostly because I don't carry my weight traditionally. I always blame my Polish heritage, but I dunno why it really is. LOL Maybe because I know how bad it used to be! I just kind of go for an average. I just shocked the heck out of me that the one said I was 63% fat!
I mean here that if I match the core of my body, the arms, chest, legs, etc. don't match up. If I look for the best balance between the two, I'm still off. I still don't know how to see myself completely clearly...
I really liked this one ... Covert Bailey calculation ... because it took into account wrist, forearm, calf and neck measurements... My weight is mostly central - chest, butt, and gut, so balancing out with my lower measurements, it gave me a lower number, which matches up with the chart my doctor's office uses. I wasn't really concerned for any reason other than calculating protein needs. So an average range works for me!0 -
KnitOrMiss wrote: »And yes, the body fat% and therefore lean body mass in grams/percentage was MASSIVELY different as far as what protein levels I needed. With the higher body fat, I need 56-92 grams of protein. With the lower body fat, I need 81-135 grams of protein. So there is only an 11 gram overlap there that is a massive difference... Almost 30 pounds off on the minimum...over 30 pounds off on the maximum... So yeah, it makes huge differences there. I'm not counting/tracking right now, so I don't know where I'm falling currently, but I'm definitely enjoying my meat.
Ah. My protein stayed in range at either number, so I didn't really consider that as a change.0
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