Sorry to disrupt the chain of thought, here. I have a question: do any of you experience persistent hunger eating this way? Since I've been keeping my net carbs to 20-25 and my protein around 75, I've been getting hungry. Today, for example, my carbs and protein were used by 7 pm, but I still got hungry. I ate about 2400 calories, so I'm getting as much fat as I can figure out how to eat. My weight-loss has been good, so I may try to bump up protein a hair and see if that helps. Any suggestions or thoughts?

I was feeling hungry for a while. I raised the protein (and carbs) which helped the hunger but stopped the weight loss. Then I lowered the protein (and carb). I've been shooting for about 60 grams of protein per day. Carbs have been around 20. Fat about 3 times the protein. I haven't had excess hunger since I started that, and I'm losing again.

I've been trying to spread the protein out equally over three meals. Not always successfully, because I'm used to having mostly fat at breakfast. I was trying to distribute the fat equally too, but the last two days I had a lot less fat at lunch and wasn't uncomfortable. Both days I had an "Orange Julius" at bedtime made with diet orange soda and enough cream to bring my fat for the day up to 3 times protein.

At least for now that's working without me being very hungry. I had lunch at 2 both yesterday and Sunday. And I only ate because I felt like I should. Not because I was particularly hungry.

DAY 23 August 7, 2012
Weight 151.4 *
Glucose 85
Ketones 1.1 **

1745 Calories
49 g carbs (38 net)***
61 g protein
150 g fat

*I am not surprised, it has been hot and I have been drinking a lot and other reasons. It will be gone soon. Woke up with slight ketosis headache and cotton mouth.
** I knew this would be high when I woke up. It is interesting, I went through a bit of a foggy head yesterday, like before when I was getting to NK. Now I am clear-headed and feel wonderful.
***Ate out and I had a sourdough dinner roll.

This is not a disruption at all. This is a good question. Costello answered it very well. There is a maximum of protien needed a day to keep muscles strong, but according to this formula,<According to the book, I need a daily protein intake between 1.5 and 2.5 gram per day per kg of reference weight. I used a goal about 10 pounds lower than where I am, ended up lowering it. > you can find the amount Dr Phinney says you need. If you are sensitive to protein, and it is the thing that stops hunger, then you may need to keep it lower. The trick is to find the amount you can eat and still lose weight. Carrbs make you hungry so don't eat carbs if you are hungry so go for high fat and a bit of protein? Eventually, you will not get as hungry.

I get hot flushes from CO too, but I've never found it helped with weight loss. I wonder if perhaps the extra calories from the oil are enough to counteract whatever thermogenic value it has.

But I guess if you were using it in place of other oil it would be fine.

I am tracking everything, and do use it in place of other oil. I do not use it if olive oil or butter is eaten. In all the research any fat is lowered to get a calorie reduction if needed, then at maintenance, more is used to fill in the calories, instead of adding protein or carbs. But still, to lose weight, we have to watch the fat and other calories.

Thank you for the hunger tips. I love the orange Julius idea! I will continue to experiment and find a balance.

Again, Arlene, thank you for sharing your data. It's fascinating and I'm learning a lot from your experiences.

DAY 24 August 8, 2012
Weight 150.8
Glucose 85
Ketones 1.2*

1587 calories
59 g carbs (39 g Net)**
44 g protein
140 g fat

*These numbers are all nice to see, as my ketosis symptoms are almost non-existent now and I had a higher amount of carbs yesterday than I usually have because I had a dinner roll. I am going to have some cantaloupe and cream cheese for breakfast today. YUM, can't wait!
** High because I had a quarter of cantaloupe and a salad for dinner, but on my, it was worth it….

Hi Arlene,
You certainly have more staying power than I would. Being in nutritional ketosis did nothing for me, and having fooled around with the high fat diets before, I abandoned lower protein/higher fat rather quickly. The second book by these authors was written for elite endurance athletes, and it states that the higher fat diet is designed for their needs. If weight loss is your goal, then the diet should be lower in fat.
In their first book, the example they give for a 5'6" women in OWL is only about 96g of fat, so the remainder of energy needs can be drawn from body fat. Being so near to goal, over 60, and not an endurance athlete, I have found lower fat, which means lower calorie, works better for weight loss. I am not in NK anymore, but can lose weight. I know you have other goals beside weight loss, so it has been interesting to follow along with your NK results. Many thanks for posting them and have a good trip.

DAY 25 August 9, 2012
Weight 149.4*
Glucose 95
Ketones .7

1839 calories
65 g carbs (43 g Net)**
54 g protein
164 g fat

*Yea! Higher but below 50 net carbs? Maybe!
** Really high, I added peanut butter for lunch, foolishly. And I worked out today, had dinner already and I am hungry!

JEY, the most important thing about thos whole process for all of us is to find what will work for us for a lifetime. Granted you and I (both over 60) have the experience that younger people here do not have and our bodies are different. I do not want to tell anyone that this is the only way to go, I was really curious what would happen to me during this process.

I have lost weight on higher fat, but what I am finding is that I would like to eat a bit more protein, although I love my coconut oil and butter) and not have to worry so much about it. Right now I am keeping it below 90 grams, usually a lot lower, and I think the next thing I am going to look at is going to about 100 grams and see what happens. I am at my first goal, would like to stay at least here, so I can watch what happens to my glucose, especially with the added protein.

I'm going to have to tentatively disagree, Janet. I'm still working this thing, and it's early days yet, but I'm seeing good results with moderate protein, high fat.

My calories are hitting around the 2000 range, just a bit over. I was eating about twice as many fat grams as protein and not having any luck. Then I lowered the protein a bit and pushed the fat grams to three times protein, and the weight is shifting downward. (A confounding factor is carbs. I added a small salad at lunch for the week when the weight moved upward a bit. So carbs went from around 20 or 21 to about 33 net. I'll be cautiously adding more carbs in the weeks to come while trying to hold the protein down and fat up. We'll see how that works.)

I'm bigger that you and Arlene, so maybe that's part of it. And I'm a bit younger, but not much. I'm 50. And definitely post-menopausal.

I just wanted to chime in with my early results in case anyone else here is in my boat - stalled well above goal weight and even drifting upward. This might be the answer for us. I don't get excited easily, because I've had so much disappointment, but I'm feeling a stirring of hope again.

A p.s. for those who don't like measuring/weighing/recording everything that passes your lips: I was in your group for years. I bought a good food scale. I'm working on learning all the ins and outs of My P.L.A.N. I find that once you get used to it, it's not so bad. And I love having all the data.

Glad to hear you're having results, Costello! Oh yes, I wanted to ask, how much protein are you eating?

My protein grams are in the mid-60's. Here's a week's worth of data. This morning my weight was 226.2. My serum ketones on Sunday were .7. (Wish I could make a table. )

Data in this order in each line: date, total calories, fat grams, protein grams, net carb grams (total carb grams), fat/protein/carb ratio, a.m. weight. (There's older data in my journal, but I consider it unreliable. Sometimes things weren't recorded; other times they were recorded twice.)

8/1: 1966: 166:81:34 (44) 75/16/9 230
8/2: 2159: 190:78:33 (45) 78/14/8 230
8/3: 1996: 187:64:23 (23) 82/13/5 230
8/4: 2135: 204:66:21 (21) 84/12/4 228.4
8/5: 2034: 188:67:27 (28) 82/13/5 228.2
8/6: 2019: 190:62:20 (21) 84/12/4 228
8/7: 2067: 195:64:20 (20) 84/12/4 227.8
8/8: 2094: 198:63:21 (21) 84/12/4 226.4

Eventually I'd like to reduce the protein a bit - to 60 or just under. And keep the fat grams at 3 times protein grams, which would, of course, bring down calories and fat grams a bit. But frankly I think I'll ride this train until it stops working for me. When something works for me, I just hold my breath and try not to change anything. It's really, really tempting to try lowering the calories or adding more exercise or something. That's what I usually do, and it's the kiss of death in my experience.

I have a very limited diet right now. Hamburger, cheddar cheese, American cheese, cream, butter, olives, eggs, sausage, and a tiny bit of lettuce, onion, pickle, and ketchup. I'll be adding in other foods slowly, trying to hold to these ratios as much as possible, and checking for what happens to my weight and serum ketones.

I've failed to track AS use so far. I do use 2 or 3 packets of Splenda per day, and I've been drinking some diet pop (about 8-16 oz/day?).

Exercise for this whole period is one leisurely walk (under 3 mph) for about 20 minutes yesterday.