JasonC SBB

To clarify, I did not say "you only need to replenish glycogen reserves after a workout". I said "you only need enough carbs to replenish your glycogen reserves". I also meant "your glycogen reserves are closer to empty after a workout". Which does NOT mean "do not have carbs if not after a workout".

Points to get out of the way:

- there are good carbs and bad carbs. Sugar, juice, soda, grains and other forms of (digestible) starch are bad carbs. For some sensitive folks sweet fruits are bad carbs too, e.g. grapes, ripe bananas, as opposed to berries and green bananas.

- carbs should come from non-starchy veggies, and very little from sugar, grains, and starch (e.g. bread, pasta, rice, etc).



Now some new ones

- A very low carb (VLC) diet is potentially a *ketogenic* diet. This means your body is getting its fuel from fatty acids instead of glycogen/sugar. This is a very fast way to lose body fat, but:

- there is an adjustment period and during this period you can get dizziness, weakness, and brain fog - this is due partly to too-low transient blood sugar as the liver hasn't adjusted to converting fatty acids to blood sugar

- for some obese people a ketogenic or near-ketogenic diet is necessary to lose bodyfat, for others, it's unnecessary. Individuals vary in how many carbs they need to maintain or to lose bodyfat.

- it is actually quite difficult to maintain ketogenesis all the time

- in a VLC diet it can be difficult to get certain nutrients, due to lack of plants e.g. Vit C ... unless you eat raw liver like the Inuit. (and stomach contents too?)

- a VLC diet without resistant (indigestible) starch to feed the good gut bacteria can be harmful in the long run

- you can still get fat force-feeding or over-eating (eating beyond satiety) on a low-carb but non-ketogenic diet


Now more detail on metabolism:

- a person with a healthy metabolism will easily go 4-6 hours between meals (and 12 hours overnight, with no midnight snacks). About 4 hours after a meal the insulin levels are down to baseline and the body seamlessly switches to burning fat stores for energy, without feelings of weakness.

- a person with a broken metabolism (a carbivore, or a sugar-burner), will get hungry and shakey < 4 hours after a meal and will need carbs to feel better. In contrast a person with a healthy metabolism whose previous meal had a good amount of fat and little starch may feel hungry but will not feel the shakes and can go another 1-2 hours without the shakes. To get to this point a sugar-burner goes through an adjustment period just like the one to get used to a ketogenic diet. It is hard to lose bodyfat unless you can go the aforementioned 5-6 hours between meals.

- the adjustment period can take up to 6 weeks, and for many the best way is to not cut the starchy carbs cold turkey, but to gradually reduce them (halve it, til you get used to it, then halve again). It is best to substitute starchy carbs with non-starchy veggies, and to up the saturated fat intake (e.g. animal fat, *real* butter, avocados, coconut oil, etc). For bad cases some supplements during the transition can be helpful, such as L-Glutamine.

- as you adjust try to lengthen the time between meals to 5-6 hours, and to have zero snacks (nothing that provokes an insulin response, not even creamer in your coffee). This forces your body to get used to getting its insulin down to baseline before its next meal, and forces it to learn to burn bodyfat

- have some fat at every meal (this is your primary fuel)

- have lots of protein for breakfast (this improves satiety throughout the day)

- do not overeat (i.e. feed yourself more than needed to last 5-6 hours to the next meal) and do not eat when not hungry

Joe Perez

iTrader: (8)

Edit: Jason, I didn't see that you'd responded before I posted this. Give me some time to digest your post- I'm a tad busy at the moment.

So, forgive my brevity here, but I seem to be sensing an overall theme in your posts, which I can best summarize as "Because you were initially skeptical about the topic, and expressed your skepticism openly, I choose believe that you are incapable of objective analysis, and instead elect to nitpick your methodology and make semantic arguments rather than discuss the ramifications of your results."


I mean, seriously, why does it matter whether I consumed no vegetables vs. some vegetables, if the question is "does a low-carb diet make you lose weight?" Whatever other (potentially valid) arguments might be made on the vegetable subject, you have not yet made it clear to me why you think that my elimination of carbs in every way possible invalidates a test designed to gauge the effectiveness of eliminating carbs from the diet.


In other words, you seem to be back-pedaling and weaseling away from the core subject matter by introducing extraneous points of debate. If all you want to do is let me know that you are closed off to any points of view other than your own, then I'll agree to stipulate that point without any further argument.

mgeoffriau

iTrader: (7)

In other self-experimentation news, I've had 2 or 3 really poor nights of sleep in a row (mostly due to my wife recovering from a cold -- coughing and clearing her throat, etc.). Last night I decided to take 6 mg of melatonin before bed.

Wow.

I had the most vivid dream I've had in months. I'm talking a full story-form dream based on a real location and people, with a relatively (for a dream) coherent plot, interactions, events.

Also, I slept past my alarm by about 30 minutes. Fortunately, my first meeting today wasn't until 10 AM.

JasonC SBB

One question for you: Are those 8 lbs gained all body fat? Did your waistline grow?

Now while you're at this:

- as geoff said, avoid mystery meat

- avoid processed seed oils (soybean, canola, sunflower, safflower, peanut). This is very hard to do if eating pre-packaged meals. Pretty hard when eating at a resto. Those oils are polyunsaturated fats, and they oxidize easily and theorized to be a factor in heart disease, cancer, and autoimmune diseases.

- If cooking with oil, use butter for low temps (e.g. cooking eggs). For high temperature coooking use coconut oil, ghee, tallow, lard or bacon fat. Don't cook with olive oil except maybe for very low temps

mgeoffriau

iTrader: (7)

Skeptical != openly mocking.

Really? You are maintaining that based on everything Jason has written, his argument can be summed up as, "Regardless of any other factors, as long as you don't eat carbs, you will magically lose weight." No consideration of micro-nutrients, or portion size (yes, you can still overeat non-carbs), quality of food sources, or macro-nutrient ratios, or anything else?

Jason's argument isn't that simplistic, so why test it as if it is?

Discussing the core subject matter is fine. Acting as if you're testing the core subject matter, when in fact you are really testing the core subject matter + all kinds of additional unaccounted for variables, doesn't help the discussion. You say that you're reducing variables, but you aren't eliminating those variables, you're just choosing to ignore them. They still exist, and they still have an effect on your results.

JasonC SBB

More detail on the timing of meals. It has to do with the Leptin/Insulin system:

The Five Rules of The Leptin Diet | Weight Loss News

JasonC SBB

Melatonin is great as a tool but DO NOT take it for more than a few days at a time (e.g. for jet lag), and you need to WEAN yourself off of it.

Melatonin is a "downstream" hormone and when you supplement with them for long periods the body down-regulates its production and you will become dependent. Additionally the cell receptors that "listen" to the hormonal signals can become *resistant* - i.e. they start to ignore it.

Testosterone, insulin, and estrogen are other examples of downstream hormones. Thus "insulin resistance" means your cells ignore the insulin singal and your blood sugar becomes chronically high. This is why it's so important to be able to go 5-6 hours between meals.

DHEA is an example of an "upstream" hormone. i.e. it's a precursor hormone used to make downstream ones. They're less dangerous.


I greatly improved my sleep quality by wearing blue-blocking amber goggles when lying in bed waiting to sleep and reading my phone. Blue light blocks the brain's production of melatonin. For the same reason your bedroom must be pitch black before waking time.

mgeoffriau

iTrader: (7)

Yup, it's not something I take on any kind of regular basis (for example, it's been at least 6+ months since the last time I took it). I keep it on hand for situations like last night -- another night of poor sleep would have really set me back.

I also realized I had slacked off any Vit D supplementation, which doubly stupid as it's the middle of winter, and my new job has me indoors almost all day.

JasonC SBB

I switched from vitD to cod liver oil and after 4 months my blood vitD levels went from 45 to 36. I added some vitD capsules back in. I want it at 50-60.

mgeoffriau

iTrader: (7)

Here's a recent article from one of the websites that Jason and I often mention that addresses a lot of the issues with your self-experiment.

Meat Leads to Inflammation?

This is why I was so frustrated with your approach. You thought you were eliminating variables, but by cutting out other healthy parts of your diet (and expanding the "recommended protein" category to include unhealthy protein sources) you were actually introducing new variables.

Hinano

Couple points I would like to contribute.

1) Healthy can be quite subjective. In terms of looking lean and fit, one can have a "roundish" body where they may look soft and over weight but in actuality, their muscle type/fat ratio is different but they remain healthy. I do understand some health issues will surface physically but to me, putting obvious obesity aside, health has most to do with the conditions of your insides.

2) Generally though humans can more or less consume anything, and still live a long life, there is without a doubt some combinations of foods which will not only lead us to live longer but healthier. But it seems quite obvious that rather than just healthy food, a good lifestyle must accompany the food or else, it wont work as well.

3) Although I do see that JasonC's diet looks to be quite healthy, I think it is important to understand the interconnectedness of food and lifestyle. Also, I think it is important to really consider the moral question of eating meet, for example, even grass fed beef will face a brutally painful death.. I will say, I do in fact eat meat myself but I am trying to limit it to eggs, fish and chicken.

4) Aside from nutritional factors, there does not seem to be much on eating organic foods. I've done plenty of research on this topic and I have been spear heading a campaign to get organic options provided on our campus and would suggest you guys to do some research on this very important topic. The science has only started coming out in the past few years BUT there are clear peer reviewed studies which pointed to damage and danger from eating foods with pesticides and herbicides. It is a accumulative affect in which the more you eat, the more you store in your body. In particular, the organs in your body that have to do with cleaning out the toxins in your blood, your kidneys, liver and intestinal tract. There even is a study done on pregnant mothers in Canada which showed that pesticides and herbicides that are associated in the production of "middle class" food with lots of meats and dairy, transferred through mothers body to the placenta and fetus. These types of chemicals are extremely dangerous especially for a developing baby.

5) All things considered, I would like to just say, I am half Okinawan. Okinawans are know to be in average the longest people in the world. We (at least the older folks) suffer from less from health problems including things like alzheimers, heart disease and cancer. I will say, there is most defiantly a genetic factor, called the "fox gene" which affects the ability for our bodies to regenerate itself BUT, there is without a doubt a very strong connection to lifestyle and food being very important in maximizing your natural lifespan. What is interesting is that since American culture has become very prevalent in Okinawa, foods with lots of meats and cheese, processed foods, non labor work/car transportation, the young generation of Okinawans are becoming increasingly unhealthy. This is very unfortunate.

What do most believe is the key to long life in Okinawa? Genes, lifestyle, and good food.

Here is recipe to live as long as your genes will let you.

1) Eat mostly vegetables and fruits. Eat dark veggies. Your plate of food should consist of 3/4 veggies and fruits and 1/4 for grain and protein.
2) Eat root foods like carrots and sweet potatoes
3) Don't eat junk food, make your own chips with healthy oil
4) Cook your own damn food cause you can make it taste better than any restaurant and do it cheaper than eating out. Also, buy from local farms because most of the crap you buy at the store is **** brought over from another country which was picked before it even ripened, then gassed with chemicals to ripen. It's also very important for the environment and community to shot local. LOCAL LOCAL LOCAL! Support local farmers, support America.
5) Excise - Heavy or moderate like walking. Do all kinds of **** like paddle canoe, hiking, throwing rocks, whatever.
6) Have a hobby to master, work on cars. Put your heart into things, work, hobby, family, whatever, just do it with your whole heart.
7) Be a part of your community, help others, be kind to others, love MANY people. This takes time, it's never too late to contribute to your local community.
8) LOVE LOVE LOVE! Chronic stress is one of the biggest factors in stopping you from living a long and healthy life. Some stress is good but lots of it for a long time is not good for you. Try to move toward a loving and caring attitude. This may sound gay to some but trust me, this **** will make you live longer!

Now look, no body is perfect and it is a work in progress for all of us and **** you know what, once in a while I still end up going to Mcdonalds and buying a Bigmac meal, chicken club and a coke! LOL But it's baby steps yeah and as we all become more knowledgable and wise, we will be able to to continue to guide this country into supporting healthy practices for both our foods and the environment. Mind you, I aint talking about some utopia but things can get better in a significant and meaningful way. Do it for for your family, children, bloodline, country, world, mankind!

supercooper

Anyone on here use Vemma products?
Are they really up to par with all the hype? or just another Scam? (the product itself i mean... the company itself is a blatantly obvious pyramid scheme)
I got some for christmas oddly... doesnt taste bad... and boasts alot of stuff about the benefits of its use...
BUT.... Could be like those ***** enlargement pills... They advertise the hell out of them, and make wild claims, and goofy commercials, but according to medical research they do nothing.... (did a paper in human sexuality/psychology.... didnt look into buying any. lmao)

z31maniac

I'll be honest and say I quit reading here.

Most cows slaughtered in the "west" is an actually relatively quick and painless. If you're talking about Halal compliant meat, yes, that is absolutely a horrible way to kill an animal.

For those that don't know, the way we slaughter beef in the west is typically something along lines of a high-powered bolt (or other projectile) to the brain that kills the animal basically instantaneously, whereas Halal compliant entails taking a cow, putting it in a cage while it's throat is cut and letting the animal bleed out while wailing and kicking.

You may have had other good points, but I couldn't get that far. Especially when you consider how non-organic chicken is raised.

Hinano

z31maniac, if you think those bolt guns are painless, you must not have seen it. I don't think eating non organic chicken is okay, and sometimes I do slip up and go to McDonalds BUT, most of the chicken I eat is supposed to be non caged but I cannot say exactly what conditions they lived in and how they are killed. I am in no way saying it is okay, and I am not pretending to be all high and mighty. Its easier for some as they were raised that way but for the majority of the public, it is extremely hard to change their diet unless forced to. That is why I am understanding of the "human condition" but that does not mean we should not strive to be incredible as we can be.

And yes I did have good points that followed so it would make me happy if you read them.

JasonC SBB

What is "healthy"? I consider longevity and being free of disease, with highish, even energy levels and a good mood, to be markers of a healthy person. To me looking good naked is secondary, and athletic performance 3rd. However fortunately the last 2 items tend to improve with health.

chicksdigmiatas

iTrader: (11)

I found some raw unpasturized goats milk yogurt around here that is by far and large the best yogurt I have ever had in my life. It has the perfect amount of tanginess and creaminess and it is just magnificent mixed with some fruit and nuts.

Admittedly, being a nutritionist working for the government, I was slow to buy into the grains suck thing, but they really do. The further I have progressed with my studies (I am debating on whether I should go for my masters at this point, because with the exception of some of the food science classes, the dietetics bachelors I have is basically just how to regurgitate facts someone else gave you, and if you didn't you are wrong) I have found that the high carb low fat diets just don't work that well for most. They work ok for some.

I think people need to pay attention to what their body is telling them. If anyone ever truly feels great after injesting free radical infested burgers and fries, I would be shocked. I just don't think choking down wheat bread and plain oatmeal at every meal while avoiding delicious, nutritious meat, eggs, and vegetables is a sign of health. I can't eat right ATM and I feel like ****.

JasonC SBB

I tested my hs-CRP (inflammation marker) after a few months of paleo eating (but with raw-milk kefir, cheese, some raw milk and lots of eggs), and it was very low.

Some people do OK with dairy, and some are sensitive to either lactose or caseine. I think homogenization which alters the fat molecules, is bad. Pasteurized but un-homogenized milk from healthy antibiotic-free cows is probably OK if fermented (e.g. kefir or yogurt), because the lactose is converted (pasteurization destroys the lactase which helps lactose digestion).

Agreed. However when kicking a sugar/starch addiction, you have to slowly wean yourself off. If you quit cold turkey you will feel like crap because it takes time for your body to convert from being a sugar burner to a fat burner. Mark Sisson calls it being "fat adapted":
What Does it Mean to Be Fat-Adapted? | Mark's Daily Apple

I get a pleasant high from coconut oil in my morning coffee, and I feel good for hours after eating a high-fat low-starch meal.

y8s

iTrader: (8)

I had some raw milk in california. I picked it up at the campbell farmer's market. it tasted like regular milk. sadly we can't get it that easily in virginia.

Joe Perez

iTrader: (8)

Ok, getting back into this thread after a few weeks off...

I ended the test on Dec 23, as that's when I flew down to FL to visit the family. Over the roughly five weeks which preceded this, I gained approximately 11 pounds (from 202 to 213) while eating as described in post # 130.

What I find rather more interesting is what happened over the period of Dec 23 - Jan 4. During this two week period, I was staying with family and eating what most Americans of the 1950s would have recognized as a "traditional" diet. Reasonable portion sizes, and "well balanced" according to the USDA food pyramid, but very heavy on processed grains, starches and sugars. Pancakes with real maple syrup for breakfast, a sandwich at lunch, and dinner always contained a generous potato or rice dish. Furthermore, a reasonable amount of pie and cake was consumed, this being the holidays and all. During this period, I gained 2 lbs.

That's kind of remarkable, actually. It's pretty much a given that consuming a high-calorie "pie & cake" diet during the holidays is going to produce some weight gain, what's interesting is how little weight gain this diet produced as compared to a very high-calorie but nearly carb-free diet.


(hint: I don't suffer from any sort of abnormal metabolic disorders.)



So, I'm now back home and ready to re-start, though I'm going to fall back on a more conventional low-calorie, high-fiber diet for a while, in order to get myself back down to a reasonable baseline.


Furthermore, since Jason has on many occasions made reference to insulin / blood glucose as a principle mechanism of action in this theory (starting at post #25), I have purchased an inexpensive blood glucose meter which I will be using to gather data.



Now, in the mean time, some interesting responses have been posted to what I'd written earlier, which merit consideration:



While I lack the equipment to measure BMI, I think it's reasonable to assume that for the most part, they are. 8-11 lbs over a 6'2" 200 lb body isn't a huge amount- certainly one one full pants size. But yes, my jeans are no longer loose-fitting as they were before, and a bit of extra flab is visually observable.



I would be curious to hear an explanation as to what exactly "mystery meat" means, and the mechanism of action by which it is supposedly harmful. I'm not explicitly saying that you're wrong, only that this seems to be the sort of advice that's based on FUD / "common sense," rather than any particular hard science. If you look on the ingrediants on the back of a can of Turkey SPAM, there's actually not much in there at all other than some dextrose...

None the less, I find it to be fairly loathsome to eat, and will henceforth eliminate SPAM from the test. The only "processed" meats of any kind shall be Trader Joe's Turkey Meatballs (35% fat, 19% carbs, 46% protein, no preservatives, and only a hint of refined sugar) and Libby's Country Sausage Gravy, which is high in sodium and contains a few refined ingredients, but is nearly carb-free and consists mostly of pork fat and salt.





At present, I am using no pre-packaged meals, and I almost never dine at restaurants.

At home, the only oils I have on the shelf are oilve oils. A bottle for pouring over fresh mozerella and tomatoes, and a can of Pam brand olive-oil spray, which consists of oilve oil, grain alcohol, and lecithin.





Someone (Jason?) has also said "you need to start eating breakfast," and while, again, I don't quite understand the basis for this suggestion (I do not typically consume anything other than black coffee between the time I wake up and lunch), I will now be consuming one hard-boiled egg before I run out the door each morning.






Mostly because that's how science works. In order to conduct a rational experiment, you really need to strip the subject matter down to just one element (or one element per test group, for very large sample sizes.)

In this case, there has been a lot of vague conjecture about microbes, micro-nutrients, etc., but no actual hard data has been presented. Thus, there's nothing I can yet test for in this realm. What has been put forth as alleged fact can be basically summarized as: "grains are bad, bread is bad, sugar is bad, starch is bad." Thus, I elected to begin be reducing intake of these foods as much as possible, and consuming both vitamin and fiber supplements to replace the lost nutrients.

I would welcome any other specific suggestions you might have here, so long as they have some provable basis in fact. EDIT: ... or can be tested for in a reasonable manner using simple, monovariable experiments.


You'd previously objected to my elimination of green vegetables from the diet, though I'm still not quite sure what the justification for this was. (eg: you called me an idiot for doing it, but didn't give any explanation for why.) None the less, I will happily re-introduce green beans and brussels sprouts to the diet, but with the obvious caveat that in so doing, they are displacing some fat / protein intake and thus biasing downward the total caloric count of the meal. We would expect this to produce weight loss even in the absence of all other factors.

JasonC SBB

I gained 1/2 a lb. I had way more dessert than I usually do.

Based on your recent experience it does seem to me that you can tolerate way more starch than I could. (My (regular) starch tolerance seems to have improved tremendously since starting the indigestible starch)

If you want even more data, the following are useful:

Triglycerides - reflects how much carbs you eat
A1c - average blood sugar
Fasting insulin - this is your baseline insulin and is a reflection of how much insulin resistance you have

If you're willing to pay out of pocket for them you can go to Discount Online Blood Chemistry Tests & Results, Wellness & Anti Aging Direct Access Laboratory Testing.
Walgreens has A1c for walk-ins for $35, not sure about Trigs.

Morning after-crap before-breaky waistline measurement is a pretty good method, if done consistently. So is a scale that has some kind of electronic bodyfat% measurement.

Grains have such low essential nutrient-density that substituting it with veggies or meat will increase your micronutrient intake. Veggies have more fiber than grains, per calorie.

BTW, while this would add variable to your experiment, but you may want to start taking indigestible (resistant) starch. It is a type of fiber. Two guys at work have tried it and they both report large decreases in post-meal blood glucose. Bob's Red Mill Unmodified Potato Starch (not "flour"!) is available in many groceries' baking section. Just increase the dosage slowly as there is an adjustment period during which you will greatly contribute to global warming.

FWIW to me the main effect of reducing starch and increasing (good) fat is that the "slow burn" reduced my appetite (reducing caloric intake) and allowed me to go 5-6 hours between meals. And between meals I never got feeling "famished" with the attendant slowed metabolism (i.e. no reduction in caloric output between meals). The reduction of carbs that allows this varies from person to person.