Keto

quixoticcriss wrote: »

I started the keto diet on the 6th. I'm finding that meal prep helps me to eat regularly, but I'm struggling to get enough calories due to lack of appetite. Not only have I lost my hunger, I am getting queasy after half a portion of anything. I did jump in pretty strict, even if I'm currently doing "dirty" keto based on budget restrictions. Still, according to the test strips, I'm already in ketosis and otherwise feeling great. No "keto flu" here. I'd be happy to buddy up with you as I have nobody in my life with whom to talk about it.

That quesiness is probably just your digestive system adjusting to higher fat. Ease off a bit, and see if you can increase protein to make up some of the calorie reduction (it's a myth that you need to limit protein).

yirara wrote: »

If you think that keto is just a way to lose weight and you will stop again once you've reached your goal weight then please don't do it. Only commit to it if you see youself eating like this for the rest of your life.

a) Keto is not a way to lose weight. Some people feel less hungry on it, others find it too restrictive, again others feel super hungry.
b) during weight loss you learn healthy habits. If you eat in a way that is not natural for you, you learn these habits on keto, not on what you normally eat. Thus that's useless, and the risk of regaining weight is very likely.

I already know how to eat healthy and have done so for several years. My dietitian, who has a medical degree, has worked with me for over 5 years to lose weight and despite changes in diet and exercise, we are both in agreement that my body just holds onto weight. Also, who said I wasn't planning to stick with keto as a lifestyle? I was simply giving my own, albeit limited, opinion on keto. I like the diet, I like the food, I even like the planning that goes into it. I feel great; I'm just not hungry anymore.

lemurcat2 wrote: »

quixoticcriss wrote: »

I already know how to eat healthy and have done so for several years. My dietitian, who has a medical degree, has worked with me for over 5 years to lose weight and despite changes in diet and exercise, we are both in agreement that my body just holds onto weight. Also, who said I wasn't planning to stick with keto as a lifestyle? I was simply giving my own, albeit limited, opinion on keto. I like the diet, I like the food, I even like the planning that goes into it. I feel great; I'm just not hungry anymore.

Presumably that post was directed to the original poster who started the thread, not to you.

I actually don't agree that one must lose weight eating exactly as they intend to maintain, as I find certain foods (starchy sides, added fat) easier to cut than others, and tend to eat lower carb when losing than when maintaining, but I can see asking OP why keto and what she hopes to get from it, given the original post (although in my mind "seemed like something that might be fun to try and my husband was on board" a perfectly good answer -- if someone doesn't like it easy enough to change).

I do believe very firmly that calories and not macro mix are what determines weight loss, but I also think some find keto or low carbing to reduce appetite (and some most definitely do not, as yirara said).

Exactly what I was going to say. Actually, the whole post. It doesn't have to be sustainable for life. I don't even necessarily think it needs to be sustainable for one's entire weight loss. Sometimes things change along the way, and as long as a person recognises that and is willing to adapt, then no problem. Case in point - I have always eaten lower (but not very low) carb whilst losing weight, around 100-120g total, because like Lemur, I find carbs the easiest thing to cut. Following significant weight gain due to ill health, this time around my usual approach wasn't cutting it. My hunger levels were nuts, and I was miserable trying to stick to my deficit. It was not sustainable. So I switched things up, dropped carbs some more, and voila! Chugging along just fine now. But I'm not married to the lower carbs, and if/when things change, I'll adapt.

Nony_Mouse wrote: »

lemurcat2 wrote: »

quixoticcriss wrote: »

I already know how to eat healthy and have done so for several years. My dietitian, who has a medical degree, has worked with me for over 5 years to lose weight and despite changes in diet and exercise, we are both in agreement that my body just holds onto weight. Also, who said I wasn't planning to stick with keto as a lifestyle? I was simply giving my own, albeit limited, opinion on keto. I like the diet, I like the food, I even like the planning that goes into it. I feel great; I'm just not hungry anymore.

Presumably that post was directed to the original poster who started the thread, not to you.

I actually don't agree that one must lose weight eating exactly as they intend to maintain, as I find certain foods (starchy sides, added fat) easier to cut than others, and tend to eat lower carb when losing than when maintaining, but I can see asking OP why keto and what she hopes to get from it, given the original post (although in my mind "seemed like something that might be fun to try and my husband was on board" a perfectly good answer -- if someone doesn't like it easy enough to change).

I do believe very firmly that calories and not macro mix are what determines weight loss, but I also think some find keto or low carbing to reduce appetite (and some most definitely do not, as yirara said).

Exactly what I was going to say. Actually, the whole post. It doesn't have to be sustainable for life. I don't even necessarily think it needs to be sustainable for one's entire weight loss. Sometimes things change along the way, and as long as a person recognises that and is willing to adapt, then no problem. Case in point - I have always eaten lower (but not very low) carb whilst losing weight, around 100-120g total, because like Lemur, I find carbs the easiest thing to cut. Following significant weight gain due to ill health, this time around my usual approach wasn't cutting it. My hunger levels were nuts, and I was miserable trying to stick to my deficit. It was not sustainable. So I switched things up, dropped carbs some more, and voila! Chugging along just fine now. But I'm not married to the lower carbs, and if/when things change, I'll adapt.

I hear what you're both saying. I still think it's a good idea to point out to people that treating weight loss as a project (as something with an end date, followed by "normal life") has some potential downsides. It's important to have a plan, IMO, even if that plan is to evolve eating patterns over time. An abrupt "what now" at goal weight can be a plan, I guess, but it's good IMO for individuals to think it through a bit, since fairly quick gain after weight loss is so extremely common.

Apologies, digression.

AnnPT77 wrote: »

I hear what you're both saying. I still think it's a good idea to point out to people that treating weight loss as a project (as something with an end date, followed by "normal life") has some potential downsides. It's important to have a plan, IMO, even if that plan is to evolve eating patterns over time.

I agree with this, of course, but I don't think that depends on whether one changes their way of eating or not while losing. I mean, even if one were merely counting cals, one obviously is not going to eat at a 500 cal (or whatever) deficit forever, and we have seen people who struggled once they started adding cals back. Beyond that, I don't really think most people just eat a slightly smaller portion of everything. I think at lower cals it's common to cut down more on some less satiating items (whatever they are for you). And I also think it's common to try different things when losing--often even if one is not struggling. The "don't do this unless you plan to forever" never makes sense to me. (I've heard similar things about, say, eating no animal products too, whereas some do it for 30 days and decide to do it forever only after that.) After all, how would you know you like something if you don't try it?

Back when I was first losing, I dropped added sugar since so many people claimed it was difficult, and because I often did stress eat snacks in the office (especially later in the evening), and many were sugary. I thought having those off limits would help. I never intended to do this more than a month or so, and it was useful, both because I proved to myself it wasn't all that hard and because I broke the bad habit of mindlessly eating sugary stuff that happened to be in the office. I don't think it was bad to do that because I didn't intend to do it permanently (or even during most of weight loss).

Dogmom1978 wrote: »

In particular with keto, I’ve seen MANY people who gain ALL the weight back when they stop doing keto.

It seems to be used a lot for the super quick let me drop a few lbs. Then go back to eating whatever they want and gain everything back. It seems that many of these people don’t learn how to keep the weight off.

If you can, awesome! I won’t succeed unless I have a plan that I can stick to forever. I’m super picky and I can’t just start eating things that I hate. So, for me, it works to eat what I would normally eat in smaller portions. For satiety, that does mean only having one dessert a day instead of 2 or 3 like I did prior to counting calories and I’ve added some more servings of fruits and veggies, but not many and that’s really the only BIG change that I made (other than simply weighing).

Different things work for different people, but I agree with Ann that you need to have some sort of plan and treating it like a diet with an end in mind does cause many people to become human yo yos (been there done that more than once).

And plenty of people just calorie counting gain all the weight back too. Because they don't learn how to keep it off. None of us can go back to eating whatever we want in whatever quantities we want.

We all agree that you need to have a plan for maintenance. That doesn't necessarily mean your weight loss diet should just be smaller portions of what you plan to eat going forward into maintenance. If that's what works for you, awesome. It is a great way to do it. It's not the only way.

Dogmom1978 wrote: »

I still think having an “end” in mind regardless of weight loss method is what causes most of us to repeatedly fail.

Just to be clear, absolutely no one -- and certainly not me, since it seems to be my post people are responding to -- has said there shouldn't be plan for maintenance. Obviously going back to the eating and activity levels that one had before weight loss, or old bad habits, don't allow for maintenance.

The people who successfully stay in maintenance DO change the way they eat for life. Not all of them do so by only calorie counting, but they have to make lifelong changes or they won’t successfully stay in maintenance. 🤷🏻‍♀️

What I said did not disagree with this either. What I said is that I don't agree with the commonly asserted claim "don't do anything for weight loss that you don't plan to do forever." As pointed out, many people have end plans that don't involve, say, eating at a deficit forever (obv!) or counting cals forever, and I don't see why low carbing is necessarily different. It's one way of getting a deficit.

More to the point, people try lots of things that they don't know if they will do permanently, or even for specific reasons for a shorter period of time, and those things aren't inherently bad because you don't have a pre-set plan to do them forever. For example, often people cut out trigger foods for a while with the intention of working them back in, or try something like only home cooked for 30 days to try to set some habits if those aren't ones they've developed.

As far as what the specific changes one must make for maintenance to work, it depends on the person. For me, it had little to do with diet (my diet would have been considered generally healthy when I was getting fat), but instead a tendency to drop exercise as too hard to fit in whenever things become crazy at work, to snack at work (usually when I work late) due to stress/emotional soothing, to treat weekly restaurant meals as special occasions that allowed for no thought to how much I ate, and generally to have an all or nothing approach vs a logical, mindful one. These were things I had to work on, and I definitely think everyone--regardless of what eating styles they try--should think about why they happened to overeat and work on those things (which could just be bad habits or not being mindful enough and letting the weight creep up over years).

Dogmom1978 wrote: »

Nony_Mouse wrote: »

Dogmom1978 wrote: »

In particular with keto, I’ve seen MANY people who gain ALL the weight back when they stop doing keto.

It seems to be used a lot for the super quick let me drop a few lbs. Then go back to eating whatever they want and gain everything back. It seems that many of these people don’t learn how to keep the weight off.

If you can, awesome! I won’t succeed unless I have a plan that I can stick to forever. I’m super picky and I can’t just start eating things that I hate. So, for me, it works to eat what I would normally eat in smaller portions. For satiety, that does mean only having one dessert a day instead of 2 or 3 like I did prior to counting calories and I’ve added some more servings of fruits and veggies, but not many and that’s really the only BIG change that I made (other than simply weighing).

Different things work for different people, but I agree with Ann that you need to have some sort of plan and treating it like a diet with an end in mind does cause many people to become human yo yos (been there done that more than once).

And plenty of people just calorie counting gain all the weight back too. Because they don't learn how to keep it off. None of us can go back to eating whatever we want in whatever quantities we want.

We all agree that you need to have a plan for maintenance. That doesn't necessarily mean your weight loss diet should just be smaller portions of what you plan to eat going forward into maintenance. If that's what works for you, awesome. It is a great way to do it. It's not the only way.

No of course it’s not the only way. There might be 6 million ways to lose it, but when it comes to keeping it off tons of us fail.

I still think having an “end” in mind regardless of weight loss method is what causes most of us to repeatedly fail. The people who successfully stay in maintenance DO change the way they eat for life. Not all of them do so by only calorie counting, but they have to make lifelong changes or they won’t successfully stay in maintenance. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Sure. But I also agree with those who're saying that "don't do anything for weight loss that you don't plan to do forever" has problems, too. It's not a black and white thing.

I'm sure I've slipped into "don't do anything you aren't willing to do forever" sometimes here, but I think the better formulation is something more like "weight loss is maintenance practice, so experiment to find what will work for you long term, to stay at a healthy weight".

(I know I'll get some disagrees on that formulation, too. I understand the point that it's fine to do some extreme-ish thing that's doable for a while, that one wouldn't remotely entertain doing permanently, as a loss strategy, somewhere along the line. But sooner or later, I think most people would be well served by experimenting to find long-term sustainable eating practices - ideally before day one of maintenance, ideally while there's still a cushion of deficit to absorb any major mis-steps. Last few months of loss, which should be slow anyway, may be a good time.)

Also, of course people are going to change their habits, even within overall successful maintenance, over many years. The potential sticking point for many, though, I think, is that transition point from a "being on a diet" to maintenance. Arriving there without a tested plan, IMO, is going to make maintenance more challenging. Still a key piece is the mindset "project with end date" vs. "permanent practices".

Keto is sustainable and Ive been eating that way for years, I don’t see it as a “diet” it’s a way of life. It’s just what I eat to stay healthier.
I’m healthier medically since changing to keto l, it’s a proven fact and I feel I have more energy and more satisfied with just 3 square meals a day.

psuLemon wrote: »

Nony_Mouse wrote: »

Agreeing with both Lemur and Ann.

Also, why is there this automatic assumption that things like keto, or even low carb, aren't sustainable for the long term? Some people actually like eating keto, and may be perfectly happy to eat that way the majority of the time going forward. Personally, I wouldn't want to do 'traditional' keto (ie high fat and very low carb) either for weight loss nor as my 'normal', but I recognise that other people may, and may be perfectly happy and satisfied. There are also people who do it for medical reasons, or because they genuinely believe they feel better. Same with low carb. And actually, my maintenance diet is still generally lower carb (actually just checked back in my diary, and mostly I'd be eating around the 150g total carb mark on an average day, with higher days here and there). That's just how I eat when I'm being a healthy, mindful adult (not that I think eating higher carb is unhealthy or unmindful).

Diet breaks are super handy for maintenance practice. I highly recommend them, for multiple reasons.

OP, apologies for the thread hijack!

The thing that drives me nuts is that every keto/low carb thread has to divulge into arguing over semantics, but that same level of scrutiny is not applied to WFPB and vegan threads, which comes with just as high for failure and other semantics that if not address can actually cause malnutrition (i.e., lack of b12 or iron deficiencies).

The simple fact is all plans fail when there is not a long term plan to transition out. That doesn't matter if it's LCHF, vegan, zone, Med, etc... And I certainly recognize that the more flexible diets tend to have high success rates. But I also recognize that people often have to try several different strategies before they find the solution that works. So if this strategy seems appealing to the OP, then it doesn't need to be a debating on why.

Wellll . . . I think there's some "eye of the observer" in that observation. (I do agree with your main point. What I disagree with is that keto is a special victim of hate in some way. Does it get some? Sure. Asking "could you keep this up forever" (or at least "longish term") is IMO a useful thought-point, for any dietary mode someone's considering. It's not necessarily and always synonymous with "don't even think of doing this if you can't keep going forever".)

There's weirdness that routinely hits vegan/vegetarian threads, too, though I admit it has a little different cast to it. ("you can't get enough protein to build muscle" has been a common thing, although the otherwise pretty execrable "Game Changers" has perhaps moderated that myth in the popular imagination.)

Part of the reason is that people are often adopting vegan/vegetarian eating for reasons in addition to (or completely separate from) weight management, usually something about avoiding animal exploitation, reducing environmental impact of one' eating, or that sort of thing.

Frankly, if I see a thread from someone who seems to be saying they're going vegetarian *just* in order to lose weight or for improved health (no other reasons), I routinely push back on that . . . even though I'm long-term vegetarian. For health or weight management, it's tangent to the important issues (nutrition and calories), and can distract from them; plus being vegetarian is slightly more difficult (nutritionally and especially socially) than being an omnivore.

Most people who are starting keto (that we see here) are doing it for weight management. Some of them are doing it because of popular mythology lately that it's somehow required to go low carb, or one can't lose weight. (I know you, Psu - and Nony - are much better informed that that . . . MUCH. And even I, who would never consider low carb personally - absent a health condition requiring it - recognize that carb reduction can have appetite control benefits for some people.)

It's pretty common for vegetarians here to think people here pick on vegetarians, IF-ers to think people pick on IF-ers, and so forth. Yeah, some people pick on things they don't do themselves, but I think we all tend to notice more when our own modes are criticized, especially when unreasonably criticized. That little burst of emotion cements the memory.

. . . speaking of digression. 😉😆

psuLemon wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

psuLemon wrote: »

Nony_Mouse wrote: »

Agreeing with both Lemur and Ann.

Also, why is there this automatic assumption that things like keto, or even low carb, aren't sustainable for the long term? Some people actually like eating keto, and may be perfectly happy to eat that way the majority of the time going forward. Personally, I wouldn't want to do 'traditional' keto (ie high fat and very low carb) either for weight loss nor as my 'normal', but I recognise that other people may, and may be perfectly happy and satisfied. There are also people who do it for medical reasons, or because they genuinely believe they feel better. Same with low carb. And actually, my maintenance diet is still generally lower carb (actually just checked back in my diary, and mostly I'd be eating around the 150g total carb mark on an average day, with higher days here and there). That's just how I eat when I'm being a healthy, mindful adult (not that I think eating higher carb is unhealthy or unmindful).

Diet breaks are super handy for maintenance practice. I highly recommend them, for multiple reasons.

OP, apologies for the thread hijack!

The thing that drives me nuts is that every keto/low carb thread has to divulge into arguing over semantics, but that same level of scrutiny is not applied to WFPB and vegan threads, which comes with just as high for failure and other semantics that if not address can actually cause malnutrition (i.e., lack of b12 or iron deficiencies).

The simple fact is all plans fail when there is not a long term plan to transition out. That doesn't matter if it's LCHF, vegan, zone, Med, etc... And I certainly recognize that the more flexible diets tend to have high success rates. But I also recognize that people often have to try several different strategies before they find the solution that works. So if this strategy seems appealing to the OP, then it doesn't need to be a debating on why.

Wellll . . . I think there's some "eye of the observer" in that observation. (I do agree with your main point. What I disagree with is that keto is a special victim of hate in some way. Does it get some? Sure. Asking "could you keep this up forever" (or at least "longish term") is IMO a useful thought-point, for any dietary mode someone's considering. It's not necessarily and always synonymous with "don't even think of doing this if you can't keep going forever".)

There's weirdness that routinely hits vegan/vegetarian threads, too, though I admit it has a little different cast to it. ("you can't get enough protein to build muscle" has been a common thing, although the otherwise pretty execrable "Game Changers" has perhaps moderated that myth in the popular imagination.)

Part of the reason is that people are often adopting vegan/vegetarian eating for reasons in addition to (or completely separate from) weight management, usually something about avoiding animal exploitation, reducing environmental impact of one' eating, or that sort of thing.

Frankly, if I see a thread from someone who seems to be saying they're going vegetarian *just* in order to lose weight or for improved health (no other reasons), I routinely push back on that . . . even though I'm long-term vegetarian. For health or weight management, it's tangent to the important issues (nutrition and calories), and can distract from them; plus being vegetarian is slightly more difficult (nutritionally and especially socially) than being an omnivore.

Most people who are starting keto (that we see here) are doing it for weight management. Some of them are doing it because of popular mythology lately that it's somehow required to go low carb, or one can't lose weight. (I know you, Psu - and Nony - are much better informed that that . . . MUCH. And even I, who would never consider low carb personally - absent a health condition requiring it - recognize that carb reduction can have appetite control benefits for some people.)

It's pretty common for vegetarians here to think people here pick on vegetarians, IF-ers to think people pick on IF-ers, and so forth. Yeah, some people pick on things they don't do themselves, but I think we all tend to notice more when our own modes are criticized, especially when unreasonably criticized. That little burst of emotion cements the memory.

. . . speaking of digression. 😉😆

I bet if you pulled the latest 10 keto threads and 10 last plant based threads, the response would be significantly different. 😉

Could be. I'm sure you, as a mod, read more of 'em than I do.

Could also have something to do, in a statistical sense, with the recent mythologizing of keto, and the baselessly-soothing recent effect of "Game Changers" when it comes to vegan nutrition. 😉 Popular culture has effects, not always good ones. Maybe even "not usually". 😆


(I took that photo myself, pre-pandemic, at my local Barnes & Noble. Not cherry picked in any way, just a photo of the "diet" section of magazines. Trend-o-meter reading: Vegan, 4; Keto, 8. And some of those cover-teasers make keto advocates look kinda silly (I hate when they do that to vegetarianism! 😆)

I hope you know that I appreciate your intelligence, experience, and insight on these threads, Psu. I also know this is a continuing digression, and recognize that I'm just random-chatting. 😬

dragon_girl26 wrote: »

Dogmom1978 wrote: »

I have YET to see that with a vegan/vegetarian thread (with one exception where someone didn’t understand how they could go vegan and GAIN weight as if CICO doesn’t apply to vegans).

I can attest that they exist...I guess I've been around on MFP (8 years now!) long enough that it's run the gamut. Usually it was something like "meat and dairy are evil and cause weight gain!" or something similar, usually accompanied by a YouTube "science" video. Typically I'd see it a lot with commenters to the standard "why am I not losing weight?" posts too..("I went vegan and lost 50 pounds just by cutting out meat and dairy!!") The recent WFPB trend seems to have restarted some of those ideas, especially in FB groups.
Honestly kind of seems like keto has been on the decline lately compared to what it used to be...but maybe that's just ny observation.

This is what I see too. I almost wrote an overly long post, but you said it better than I would have.