Low Carb high Fat and Protein diet.....success?

2

Replies

  • eeejer
    eeejer Posts: 339 Member
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    why would you gain weight? You only would if you eat more than you burn. Carbs are not magical fat-gathering particles.
  • auddii
    auddii Posts: 15,357 Member
    eeejer wrote: »
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    why would you gain weight? You only would if you eat more than you burn. Carbs are not magical fat-gathering particles.

    To be fair, you'd gain a little bit of weight as your glycogen stores replenish with water, but beyond the initial gain, you won't see much. However, many people see this initial gain when moving to maintenance from a decent deficit in general.
  • Shells918
    Shells918 Posts: 1,070 Member
    I'm doing low carb moderate protein and fat. Losing slowly and steadily. I don't plan on reintroducing carbs into my diet due to medical issues so this is a true lifestyle change for me.
  • eeejer
    eeejer Posts: 339 Member
    auddii wrote: »
    eeejer wrote: »
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    why would you gain weight? You only would if you eat more than you burn. Carbs are not magical fat-gathering particles.

    To be fair, you'd gain a little bit of weight as your glycogen stores replenish with water, but beyond the initial gain, you won't see much. However, many people see this initial gain when moving to maintenance from a decent deficit in general.

    ...and we don't care about water weight. I should have said fat of course, but I meant weight that is subsequently hard to lose.
  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
    edited April 2016
    J72FIT wrote: »
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    Why would one made sick by eating carbs ever want to go back to eating carbs which are totally optional for health reasons?
    Because in my experience, most people who go on a low carb diet do it because they think it is the secret to weight loss. They don't realize, that barring some medical condition, it is nothing more then a low calorie diet. So when they finally give up, and they will, they will gain all their weight back because they still have not come to accept that it is a surplus of calories, not some boogeyman macronutrient that causes fat gain.

    That said, if you like low carb and feel you can sustain it, do it. It works, just not better or worse then most low calorie diets.

    Be careful not to confuse the how with the why in regards to fat loss...

    J72FIT I agree if people see LCHF as a weight loss gimmick they may not to be motivated by its life extending features like Chaperone Mediated Autophagy (CMA) for example. I do LCHF for pain management but once I learned more of its features other than just pain management like resolving my 40 years of IBS, etc I got even more excited.

    Its potential to improve quality of life by protecting against diabetes, cataracts (earned OD degree SCO 1986), cancer, heart disease, Alzheimers, etc intrigues me in a medical sense. I have been researching the the why and how Low Carb High Fat works down to the cellular level for a couple years.

    A major driver is I have Ankylosing Spondylitis and knowing how to treat it in my teenagers should the need arrive is important to me as a father. They were watching me become immobile and with a fast declining health status. They had to help me out of the car and even dress me some days.

    I did not want them to see AS as the potential they might experience without hope.

    Today I understand had I known to address the gut bacteria that triggers AS often I could possibly avoided the health and related deformities due to Ankylosing Spondylitis.

    I do now plan to live to be 110 and walking and talking the whole way. The kids watching me walk death backwards by the LCHF Way Of Eating shows them a WOE that may fix them someday if AS strikes them or their potential children.
  • BelleCakes2018
    BelleCakes2018 Posts: 568 Member
    edited April 2016
    Are you guys counting total carbs or net carbs in your percentages? if its net carbs, is there a way to set that up in MFP? I'm glad you all are here and posting.

    For me personally i've noticed that MFP counts just net carbs.. but I do enter a lot of UK food which list carbs as net anyway. If you're listing US food, there may be a difference as they count total carbs there with fiber I think.
  • EddieHaskell97
    EddieHaskell97 Posts: 2,227 Member
    I've used Atkins/ketosis to lose 61 lbs in six months. It does work to accelerate loss, and it absolutely suppresses appetite. It's not a whole lot of fun, and not something I could do beyond six months. I was happy to get out of it.
  • yarwell
    yarwell Posts: 10,477 Member
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    What, no CICO ? Carbs are fattening ?

    A few pounds of water and glycogen maybe, but that's your lot.
  • KombuchaKat
    KombuchaKat Posts: 134 Member
    Very low carb has never worked for me. I can do moderate carb and be fine but if I go below 30% carbs I get really lethargic and cranky. At this point in my life I could never do it since I'm extremely active, walking 2-7 miles/day along with regular Cross fit, yoga, and other activities. Currently I'm set at 30% carbs, 50% fat and 20% protein (based on The Perfect Health Diet) and that seems to be working fairly well. I would totally agree that low carb leads to lower calories, fat and protein are much more difficult to overeat since they are satiating.

    Keep in mind that men tend to do better than women with lower carbs, although I'm not convinced anyone should do it long term. A woman's body will always need to have more fat because your pituitary gland judges your health based on whether or not you can sustain a pregnancy. This is a totally primal mechanism, it doesn't care if you want a baby or not. Going too low on carbs can have hormonal consequences down the road for women. This will only make it more difficult to lose weight among other health concerns.

    Another consideration is your gut microbiome, which essentially are your second brain. There is SO much interesting information coming out about it now. And your friendly little bacterial bugs like carbs, especially resistant starch and fiber. Keeping them plentiful and happy also helps with weight loss and overall well being.
  • silver_arrow3
    silver_arrow3 Posts: 1,373 Member
    I've used Atkins/ketosis to lose 61 lbs in six months. It does work to accelerate loss, and it absolutely suppresses appetite. It's not a whole lot of fun, and not something I could do beyond six months. I was happy to get out of it.

    After what this guy had said in posts in the past, I decided to try it. I've done it fairly consistently since September of last year. For me, sticking to a keto diet keeps me in control. It gives me structure to work around and a challenge to figure out how to make recipes I find into ones that fit with my diet.

    I'd like to say that I fall off the wagon on occasion. Big holidays, celebrations, my upcoming wedding... I'm going to partake in plenty of carbs, but I'm absolutely positive that I'll return to a ketosis diet after.

    I also have issues with PCOS and while my results may be completely unrelated, Aunt Flo decided to visit regularly for the first time in my life.
  • KombuchaKat
    KombuchaKat Posts: 134 Member
    J72FIT wrote: »
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    Why would one made sick by eating carbs ever want to go back to eating carbs which are totally optional for health reasons?
    Because in my experience, most people who go on a low carb diet do it because they think it is the secret to weight loss. They don't realize, that barring some medical condition, it is nothing more then a low calorie diet. So when they finally give up, and they will, they will gain all their weight back because they still have not come to accept that it is a surplus of calories, not some boogeyman macronutrient that causes fat gain.

    That said, if you like low carb and feel you can sustain it, do it. It works, just not better or worse then most low calorie diets.

    Be careful not to confuse the how with the why in regards to fat loss...

    J72FIT I agree if people see LCHF as a weight loss gimmick they may not to be motivated by its life extending features like Chaperone Mediated Autophagy (CMA) for example. I do LCHF for pain management but once I learned more of its features other than just pain management like resolving my 40 years of IBS, etc I got even more excited.

    Its potential to improve quality of life by protecting against diabetes, cataracts (earned OD degree SCO 1986), cancer, heart disease, Alzheimers, etc intrigues me in a medical sense. I have been researching the the why and how Low Carb High Fat works down to the cellular level for a couple years.

    A major driver is I have Ankylosing Spondylitis and knowing how to treat it in my teenagers should the need arrive is important to me as a father. They were watching me become immobile and with a fast declining health status. They had to help me out of the car and even dress me some days.

    I did not want them to see AS as the potential they might experience without hope.

    Today I understand had I known to address the gut bacteria that triggers AS often I could possibly avoided the health and related deformities due to Ankylosing Spondylitis.

    I do now plan to live to be 110 and walking and talking the whole way. The kids watching me walk death backwards by the LCHF Way Of Eating shows them a WOE that may fix them someday if AS strikes them or their potential children.

    This is very interesting, thank you so much for sharing! Have you eliminated gluten or maybe all grains? I bet if you are off gluten that helped immensely right there. This goes against some of the things I said but I do see the benefit of LCHF for specific health issues like yours and I am so glad that you have been able to heal yourself with diet. Also ketogenic diets have been used for seizures for years. Your brain is made mostly of fat, so any way you slice it low fat is NOT the way no matter how many carbs you decide to eat.
    I was pretty entrenched in the LCHF way until I went off hormonal birth control and did some reading up on getting your hormones back in balance as well as reading The Perfect Health Diet. Now I am careful to include "safe starches" like potatoes and white rice...I won't get into all the specifics but when you eat safe startches with protein and an acid and not by themselves it should buffer the blood sugar crash from carbs. All that being said I think one needs to look at their entire medical picture when weighing how many carbs they need.
  • JasonWatcher
    JasonWatcher Posts: 1 Member
    I had tried a very low carb diet about a year ago to shed some extra body fat before I went to Vegas. My carbs were set at 20 grams a day. I kept my protein high as to not lose muscle mass, about 200 grams and weighing 176 pounds. Fats filled in the rest of my calories for the day, which was 2,300 total at the time. It did wonders for my physique and I had become much more vascular. However, since I work 12 hour shifts as an aerospace technologies machinist, I became very lethargic and found myself running out of energy half way through my work day. I had only tried it for a month, so maybe I hadn't kicked into ketosis yet. I took the daily recommended dose of creatine to help maintain strength and help retain water in my muscles, and replenish lost glycogen. That being said, my muscles looked flat compared to when I consumed 100+ grams of carbs a day. I was still able to go up in strength, and my intensity didn't suffer when lifting. I just found myself running out of gas during the work week.
  • Jeffrey300050
    Jeffrey300050 Posts: 93 Member
    Add the other 10%. This works for me! Fat doesn't make me fat, carbs do. For a long time I bought all the low fat products and stuffed my face thinking no fat meant I could devour them. Huge mistake! Those products are laced with extra sugar and simple carbs. BUT one caveat. You need to exercise. I walked off 60 pounds. No other exercises. Good luck.
  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
    J72FIT wrote: »
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    Why would one made sick by eating carbs ever want to go back to eating carbs which are totally optional for health reasons?
    Because in my experience, most people who go on a low carb diet do it because they think it is the secret to weight loss. They don't realize, that barring some medical condition, it is nothing more then a low calorie diet. So when they finally give up, and they will, they will gain all their weight back because they still have not come to accept that it is a surplus of calories, not some boogeyman macronutrient that causes fat gain.

    That said, if you like low carb and feel you can sustain it, do it. It works, just not better or worse then most low calorie diets.

    Be careful not to confuse the how with the why in regards to fat loss...

    J72FIT I agree if people see LCHF as a weight loss gimmick they may not to be motivated by its life extending features like Chaperone Mediated Autophagy (CMA) for example. I do LCHF for pain management but once I learned more of its features other than just pain management like resolving my 40 years of IBS, etc I got even more excited.

    Its potential to improve quality of life by protecting against diabetes, cataracts (earned OD degree SCO 1986), cancer, heart disease, Alzheimers, etc intrigues me in a medical sense. I have been researching the the why and how Low Carb High Fat works down to the cellular level for a couple years.

    A major driver is I have Ankylosing Spondylitis and knowing how to treat it in my teenagers should the need arrive is important to me as a father. They were watching me become immobile and with a fast declining health status. They had to help me out of the car and even dress me some days.

    I did not want them to see AS as the potential they might experience without hope.

    Today I understand had I known to address the gut bacteria that triggers AS often I could possibly avoided the health and related deformities due to Ankylosing Spondylitis.

    I do now plan to live to be 110 and walking and talking the whole way. The kids watching me walk death backwards by the LCHF Way Of Eating shows them a WOE that may fix them someday if AS strikes them or their potential children.

    This is very interesting, thank you so much for sharing! Have you eliminated gluten or maybe all grains? I bet if you are off gluten that helped immensely right there. This goes against some of the things I said but I do see the benefit of LCHF for specific health issues like yours and I am so glad that you have been able to heal yourself with diet. Also ketogenic diets have been used for seizures for years. Your brain is made mostly of fat, so any way you slice it low fat is NOT the way no matter how many carbs you decide to eat.
    I was pretty entrenched in the LCHF way until I went off hormonal birth control and did some reading up on getting your hormones back in balance as well as reading The Perfect Health Diet. Now I am careful to include "safe starches" like potatoes and white rice...I won't get into all the specifics but when you eat safe startches with protein and an acid and not by themselves it should buffer the blood sugar crash from carbs. All that being said I think one needs to look at their entire medical picture when weighing how many carbs they need.

    I am not familiar with The Perfect Health Diet but I think the best diet for everyone is the one that works for them and they can stick with long term. :)

    Yes I left off all types of grains and any form of them.

    The doctors wanted me to start Enbrel injections for pain management and my brain and wife were saying NO WAY so I just went off sugar and all grains cold turkey and that step helps me to eat <50 grams of carbs daily. From my research ZERO carbs are needed for humans but then I think they are fine to eat if they do not give on a toxic response like in my case. The world lives on carbs and most in the blue zones (living to be 100) eat carbs but they are whole carbs and not processed carbs.

    I am glad you found a way of eating that worlds for you
  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
    I had tried a very low carb diet about a year ago to shed some extra body fat before I went to Vegas. My carbs were set at 20 grams a day. I kept my protein high as to not lose muscle mass, about 200 grams and weighing 176 pounds. Fats filled in the rest of my calories for the day, which was 2,300 total at the time. It did wonders for my physique and I had become much more vascular. However, since I work 12 hour shifts as an aerospace technologies machinist, I became very lethargic and found myself running out of energy half way through my work day. I had only tried it for a month, so maybe I hadn't kicked into ketosis yet. I took the daily recommended dose of creatine to help maintain strength and help retain water in my muscles, and replenish lost glycogen. That being said, my muscles looked flat compared to when I consumed 100+ grams of carbs a day. I was still able to go up in strength, and my intensity didn't suffer when lifting. I just found myself running out of gas during the work week.

    Yes 200 grams of protein would not likely permit one going into Nutritional Ketosis. Nutritional Ketosis is muscle sparing but most have to keep protein down to 70-100 grams otherwise that high amount of glucose from the protein prevents ketosis. The period of adapting was long for me and it sounds like it was having a negative impact on feeling well at work which is not acceptable. Thanks for sharing.
  • KombuchaKat
    KombuchaKat Posts: 134 Member
    J72FIT wrote: »
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    Why would one made sick by eating carbs ever want to go back to eating carbs which are totally optional for health reasons?
    Because in my experience, most people who go on a low carb diet do it because they think it is the secret to weight loss. They don't realize, that barring some medical condition, it is nothing more then a low calorie diet. So when they finally give up, and they will, they will gain all their weight back because they still have not come to accept that it is a surplus of calories, not some boogeyman macronutrient that causes fat gain.

    That said, if you like low carb and feel you can sustain it, do it. It works, just not better or worse then most low calorie diets.

    Be careful not to confuse the how with the why in regards to fat loss...

    J72FIT I agree if people see LCHF as a weight loss gimmick they may not to be motivated by its life extending features like Chaperone Mediated Autophagy (CMA) for example. I do LCHF for pain management but once I learned more of its features other than just pain management like resolving my 40 years of IBS, etc I got even more excited.

    Its potential to improve quality of life by protecting against diabetes, cataracts (earned OD degree SCO 1986), cancer, heart disease, Alzheimers, etc intrigues me in a medical sense. I have been researching the the why and how Low Carb High Fat works down to the cellular level for a couple years.

    A major driver is I have Ankylosing Spondylitis and knowing how to treat it in my teenagers should the need arrive is important to me as a father. They were watching me become immobile and with a fast declining health status. They had to help me out of the car and even dress me some days.

    I did not want them to see AS as the potential they might experience without hope.

    Today I understand had I known to address the gut bacteria that triggers AS often I could possibly avoided the health and related deformities due to Ankylosing Spondylitis.

    I do now plan to live to be 110 and walking and talking the whole way. The kids watching me walk death backwards by the LCHF Way Of Eating shows them a WOE that may fix them someday if AS strikes them or their potential children.

    This is very interesting, thank you so much for sharing! Have you eliminated gluten or maybe all grains? I bet if you are off gluten that helped immensely right there. This goes against some of the things I said but I do see the benefit of LCHF for specific health issues like yours and I am so glad that you have been able to heal yourself with diet. Also ketogenic diets have been used for seizures for years. Your brain is made mostly of fat, so any way you slice it low fat is NOT the way no matter how many carbs you decide to eat.
    I was pretty entrenched in the LCHF way until I went off hormonal birth control and did some reading up on getting your hormones back in balance as well as reading The Perfect Health Diet. Now I am careful to include "safe starches" like potatoes and white rice...I won't get into all the specifics but when you eat safe startches with protein and an acid and not by themselves it should buffer the blood sugar crash from carbs. All that being said I think one needs to look at their entire medical picture when weighing how many carbs they need.

    I am not familiar with The Perfect Health Diet but I think the best diet for everyone is the one that works for them and they can stick with long term. :)

    Yes I left off all types of grains and any form of them.

    The doctors wanted me to start Enbrel injections for pain management and my brain and wife were saying NO WAY so I just went off sugar and all grains cold turkey and that step helps me to eat <50 grams of carbs daily. From my research ZERO carbs are needed for humans but then I think they are fine to eat if they do not give on a toxic response like in my case. The world lives on carbs and most in the blue zones (living to be 100) eat carbs but they are whole carbs and not processed carbs.

    I am glad you found a way of eating that worlds for you

    I am so glad to read this! I work in a field where I see so many people get sucked down the pain management drug spiral. It's definitely part of what has driven me to research wellness so much. You are living proof that most health issues can be cured or at least made much better with diet change.
    PHD is basically just paleo but with safe startches. I'm not enamored with the name because it sounds gimmicky but it is basically what you describe in the Blue Zones, moderate and non-toxic carbs, healthy fats, very low sugar. Personally I think if everyone just seriously lowered or even eliminated processed sugar and ditched the gluten we would all feel much better.
  • nvmomketo
    nvmomketo Posts: 12,019 Member
    Are you guys counting total carbs or net carbs in your percentages? if its net carbs, is there a way to set that up in MFP? I'm glad you all are here and posting.

    I count total carbs. I keep an eye on fibre. If fibre is not producing a lower net carb than total carb, that is a sure sign that I am eating the wrong carbs; the right carbs are veggies - green leafy is best for me.
    Keep in mind that men tend to do better than women with lower carbs, although I'm not convinced anyone should do it long term. A woman's body will always need to have more fat because your pituitary gland judges your health based on whether or not you can sustain a pregnancy. This is a totally primal mechanism, it doesn't care if you want a baby or not. Going too low on carbs can have hormonal consequences down the road for women. This will only make it more difficult to lose weight among other health concerns.

    Another consideration is your gut microbiome, which essentially are your second brain. There is SO much interesting information coming out about it now. And your friendly little bacterial bugs like carbs, especially resistant starch and fiber. Keeping them plentiful and happy also helps with weight loss and overall well being.

    Men do slightly better than women in weight loss in general. I have never read that LCHF works better for men. I haven't seen that.

    LCHF often helps women with evening out their hormones, especially if they are dealing with PCOS.

    A well planned LCHF diet has a fair amount of fibre rich veggies; it should feed your gut fauna okay. I think a LCHF person'ts gut bacteria may end up a bit different than most people's but I am guessing that is because it is dealing with different foods (meat, eggs, full fat dairy, nuts, veggies versus, grains, sugars, fruits, starchy veggies and the other foods a low carber would also eat). Different doesn't mean worse though. It will be interesting to see where this goes over the next few years.
  • plami_9209
    plami_9209 Posts: 67 Member
    It`s different for everyone. I`m good with a long term low carb high protein diet because I don`t like carbs as much as other people do. I can do perfectly well without bread and with minimum amounts of fruit. But that`s not for everyone. I`ve done it as a diet before and I lost 8 kg for about 3 weeks, didn`t gain it all back because I never started to eat a lot of carbs again
  • Christine_72
    Christine_72 Posts: 16,049 Member
    edited April 2016
    cgvet37 wrote: »
    The question is, can you maintain it. As soon as you reintroduce carbs back into your diet, you will gain weight.

    It drives me nuts when I read things like this!

    I recently went from low carb, around 50g a day, up to 120- 150ish, and I put on a whole....... .5lbs which I've lost already. Yes my weight loss has slowed down dramatically, but I'm still losing and certainly haven't gained back everything I lost whilst doing low carb.

    You will regain the weight if you go back to over eating calories on any diet, not specifically low carb.