Too good to be true?Has to be
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KetoLady86
Posts: 337 Member
Well, I carbed out these last two days, like binged carbed out. Anyway, I told myself today I would do a 24 hr fast (I do this often, I enjoy it). Well, its 3:30 and still going strong. I noticed earlier while tinkling that it smelled like keto pee (sorry, TMI) so I had some of thise lovely ketosticks left from way back then, and for giggles, I just wanted to see what would happen....and it turned pink. Could it be that Im already back to burning fat, or maybe, possibly didn't stop. ...I had so much bread, and ice cream .....hope everyone had a nice Christmas!
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I've never had a carb binge but the whole idea of becoming fat adapted is to be able to get back into ketosis pretty easily. It's certainly easier for some than others. It seems that those of us that are more insulin sensitive have a much easier time than our insulin resistant friends.
When I first went keto I wasn't expecting to test positive ketones for a few days but I was showing ketosis level blood ketones by the end of my first 24 hours.
The idea that's so diffficult to achieve is really overstated.
I forget to add, that even though drinking alcohol is supposed to stop ketone production, it's not unusual for me to still test with trace urine ketones while drinking. It will be negative if I drink enough to get buzzed though... but even then, I'm usually testing trace again first thing the next morning.3 -
That very true...when i see people saying they have eaten' less than 20g of carbs for a week and still not in ketosis, I always think they are doing something wrong, or there is something wrong.
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I think just individual as far as ketosis-some of us have more difficult time getting into ketosis- I'm very careful but took me 3 weeks- just what it is for me but makes me less inclined to carb out2
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also a bit confused here, i pigged out big time xmas day - more carbs than i usually eat in a week - yet i'm pretty sure two days later I'm back in ketosis - in fact my appetite is lower than ever - couldn't make it to my caloric goal yesterday and had to force myself to have a snack bar and coffee today at lunch time - no brain fog, bloated boxing day but today its all gone again.. not that im complaining, but just puzzled1
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Ketosis is a natural process. It's not hard to achieve unless there other factors inhibiting it. All that you read online about how hard it is to get there is either from people that didn't cut carbs enough or have other metabolic factors in play.2
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also a bit confused here, i pigged out big time xmas day - more carbs than i usually eat in a week - yet i'm pretty sure two days later I'm back in ketosis - in fact my appetite is lower than ever - couldn't make it to my caloric goal yesterday and had to force myself to have a snack bar and coffee today at lunch time - no brain fog, bloated boxing day but today its all gone again.. not that im complaining, but just puzzled
Same here doll! Not complaining, just a little confused..lol0 -
Thanks girls, .. now to remember this is not an excuse to splurge lol1
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Someone not low carb can achieve blood ketones over .5 just by adding a couple tablespoons of MCT oil to their oatmeal.
Even without that, some carb eaters wake up every morning at levels of .1-.3.
Of course not everyone. Certainly not those metabolically diseased. But, assuming you're insulin sensitive, it honestly probably means you could have more carbs than you think and remain in ketosis if you are wanting to. Not sugar and starches... but just more of your already low carb options.3 -
Yep, totally that last sentence, @Sunny_Bunnie.2
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I hate to be the bummer here but it could also be that your body is excreting all the excess ketones now that is has been refueled by glycogen. Sometimes after a carb load after being in ketosis you can have fruity breath and keto pee for 1-3 days after as the ketones are being pushed out. Check your pee again in another day to make sure. Hopefully you're still all good.2
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kittykidee wrote: »I hate to be the bummer here but it could also be that your body is excreting all the excess ketones now that is has been refueled by glycogen. Sometimes after a carb load after being in ketosis you can have fruity breath and keto pee for 1-3 days after as the ketones are being pushed out. Check your pee again in another day to make sure. Hopefully you're still all good.
Could be...I'll check! Thanks love0 -
kittykidee wrote: »I hate to be the bummer here but it could also be that your body is excreting all the excess ketones now that is has been refueled by glycogen. Sometimes after a carb load after being in ketosis you can have fruity breath and keto pee for 1-3 days after as the ketones are being pushed out. Check your pee again in another day to make sure. Hopefully you're still all good.
I can't figure out how that works...
Just thinking about my T1D daughter when she was in DKA. The ketones will be completely eliminated in a matter hours upon getting insulin and blood sugar back to normal. What mechanism would leave old ketones sitting around in the body for up to 3 days?0 -
Sunny_Bunny is correct here.Sunny_Bunny_ wrote: »kittykidee wrote: »I hate to be the bummer here but it could also be that your body is excreting all the excess ketones now that is has been refueled by glycogen. Sometimes after a carb load after being in ketosis you can have fruity breath and keto pee for 1-3 days after as the ketones are being pushed out. Check your pee again in another day to make sure. Hopefully you're still all good.
I can't figure out how that works...
Just thinking about my T1D daughter when she was in DKA. The ketones will be completely eliminated in a matter hours upon getting insulin and blood sugar back to normal. What mechanism would leave old ketones sitting around in the body for up to 3 days?
Unless there's a medical emergency, ketones are eliminated (or used as fuel) quite quickly in the body. It doesn't take days to eliminate ketones, it's a matter of minutes-to-hours from the time they're produced by the liver.
If you're producing ketones for days, it's because you're liver is producing them as a result of gluconeogenesis. This can be from eating low-carb, too-few calories, prolonged exercise, (a combination of any/all of the previous) or if you have uncontrolled T1 diabetes.
The ONLY time for concern with ketones is *IF* you also have extremely high blood sugar (high-ketones plus high-BG = Diabetic Ketoacidosis; the "DKA" that Sunny_Bunny mentioned above)... which low-carbers generally don't.2 -
albertabeefy wrote: »[
Unless there's a medical emergency, ketones are eliminated (or used as fuel) quite quickly in the body. It doesn't take days to eliminate ketones, it's a matter of minutes-to-hours from the time they're produced by the liver.
If you're producing ketones for days, it's because your liver is producing them as a result of gluconeogenesis. This can be from eating low-carb, too-few calories, prolonged exercise, (a combination of any/all of the previous) or if you have uncontrolled T1 diabetes.
Gluconeogenesis - - > ketones?
I'm confused...
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kittykidee wrote: »I hate to be the bummer here but it could also be that your body is excreting all the excess ketones now that is has been refueled by glycogen. Sometimes after a carb load after being in ketosis you can have fruity breath and keto pee for 1-3 days after as the ketones are being pushed out. Check your pee again in another day to make sure. Hopefully you're still all good.
Still good here thanks kittykidee
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Thanks Sunny_Bunnie. ... think you have nailed it ... maybe some extra salad with my fatty meat tonightSunny_Bunny_ wrote: »But, assuming you're insulin sensitive, it honestly probably means you could have more carbs than you think and remain in ketosis if you are wanting to. Not sugar and starches... but just more of your already low carb options.
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Yup. During the switch from a higher-carbohydrate diet to a low-carb diet, blood glucose levels don't drop immediately - they're maintained for a couple days (the homeostasis effect) through gluconeogenesis, and the brain doesn't burn ketones during this time. And yes, one by-product of gluconeogenesis is ketones.Gluconeogenesis - - > ketones?
I'm confused...
Mike Eades explains it pretty well (remember, we can substitute "carbohydrate-restriction" for "starvation", below): From this page:Mike Eades wrote:Early on, the metabolic system doesn’t know that the starvation is going to go on for a day or for a week or two weeks. At first it plunders the muscle to get its sugar. And remember from a past post that a normal blood sugar represents only about a teaspoon of sugar dissolved in the entire blood volume, so keeping the blood sugar normal for a day or so doesn’t require a whole lot of muscular sacrifice. If we figure that an average person requires about 200 grams of sugar per day to meet all the needs of the glucose-dependent tissues, we’re looking at maybe a third of a pound of muscle per day, which isn’t all that big a deal over the first day. But we wouldn’t want it to continue at that rate. If we could reduce that amount and allow our muscle mass to last as long as possible, it would be a big help.
The metabolic system could solve its problem by a coming up with a way to reduce the glucose-dependent tissues’ need for glucose so that the protein could be spared as long as possible.
Ketones to the rescue.
The liver requires energy to convert the protein to glucose. The energy comes from fat. As the liver breaks down the fat to release its energy to power gluconeogenesis, the conversion of protein to sugar, it produces ketones as a byproduct. And what a byproduct they are. Ketones are basically water soluble (meaning they dissolve in blood) fats that are a source of energy for many tissues including the muscles, brain and heart. In fact, ketones act as a stand in for sugar in the brain. Although ketones can’t totally replace all the sugar required by the brain, they can replace a pretty good chunk of it. By reducing the body’s need for sugar, less protein is required, allowing the muscle mass (the protein reservoir) to last a lot longer before it is depleted. And ketones are the preferred fuel for the heart, making that organ operate at about 28 percent greater efficiency.
Fat is the perfect fuel. Part of it provides energy to the liver so that the liver can convert protein to glucose. The unusable part of the fat then converts to ketones, which reduce the need for glucose and spare the muscle in the process.
If, instead of starving, you’re following a low-carb diet, it gets even better. The protein you eat is converted to glucose instead of the protein in your muscles. If you keep the carbs low enough so that the liver still has to make some sugar, then you will be in fat-burning mode while maintaining your muscle mass, the best of all worlds. How low is low enough? Well, when the ketosis process is humming along nicely and the brain and other tissues have converted to ketones for fuel, the requirement for glucose drops to about 120-130 gm per day. If you keep your carbs below that at, say, 60 grams per day, you’re liver will have to produce at least 60-70 grams of glucose to make up the deficit, so you will generate ketones that entire time.
That explanation is fairly basic ... I could get into the actual biochemistry of it all, but that'd take several pages - and I'm pretty sure 99.9% of the forum visitors don't want that. It's enough to say that both gluconeogenesis and ketogenesis result in ketones as a by-product. There's usually more showing up in your urine during gluconeogenesis (in the absence of ketogenesis - and yes, they can occur at the same time), however.3 -
Sunny_Bunny_ wrote: »Ketosis is a natural process. It's not hard to achieve unless there other factors inhibiting it. All that you read online about how hard it is to get there is either from people that didn't cut carbs enough or have other metabolic factors in play.
Also of note - for people who temporarily 'carb up' ... if these are folks who've recently been long-term fat-adapted (ie: in "nutritional ketosis", as Phinney/Volek call it) - it is MUCH easier/quicker to get back into that state - especially if they exercise regularly.4 -
Good to know. Thanks guys. I should have fact checked more before sharing my personal experience as fact. Such a pet peeve of mine. I've had keto pee up to a day and a half after carbing. .. But I also have problems with low blood sugar (from long before my keto days) so maybe that plays into it??1
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kittykidee wrote: »Good to know. Thanks guys. I should have fact checked more before sharing my personal experience as fact. Such a pet peeve of mine. I've had keto pee up to a day and a half after carbing. .. But I also have problems with low blood sugar (from long before my keto days) so maybe that plays into it??
No biggie. I recall stating a misunderstanding regarding these darn test strips when I was new here too. There's so much to learn and honestly I think it's cool to keep learning more every day. There's so much amazing interaction between one mechanism and another. Nobody could keep track of it all.
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albertabeefy wrote: »
Yup. During the switch from a higher-carbohydrate diet to a low-carb diet, blood glucose levels don't drop immediately - they're maintained for a couple days (the homeostasis effect) through gluconeogenesis, and the brain doesn't burn ketones during this time. And yes, one by-product of gluconeogenesis is ketones.Gluconeogenesis - - > ketones?
I'm confused...
Mike Eades explains it pretty well (remember, we can substitute "carbohydrate-restriction" for "starvation", below): From this page:
That explanation is fairly basic ... I could get into the actual biochemistry of it all, but that'd take several pages - and I'm pretty sure 99.9% of the forum visitors don't want that. It's enough to say that both gluconeogenesis and ketogenesis result in ketones as a by-product. There's usually more showing up in your urine during gluconeogenesis (in the absence of ketogenesis - and yes, they can occur at the same time), however.
Whew, thanks. That's a mouthful!
Doesn't quite square with the facile images in my mind's eye. Excess dietary fat? Ketones from protein (meaning that excess protein converting to glucose in fact does not defeat ketosis)? Aaaaaiiieeee!1
