These are Zucker rats, genetically modified to grow fat and stay fat. It's their genes that dictate where the food will go: To fat tissue, or to lean tissue, and how much to each. We call this "fuel partitioning". In Zucker rats, most of the food will go to fat tissue. So, even if we starve them, most of the food will go to fat tissue anyway, hence they die of lean tissue wasting, with their fat tissue virtually intact.

LC doesn't have to be intentionally calorie-restricted up front. It is spontaneously calorie-reduced eventually. However, it doesn't have to be calorie-reduced anyway, since what regulates fat tissue is not Ein, but primarily insulin. So even if what we eat contains the same amount of calories, if it stimulates less insulin, fat tissue shrinks anyway. It's the basic principle of low-carb.

For a high-carb diet, it must be calorie-restricted up front, because it contains mostly carbs, which stimulates more insulin. Rather, when you start with a high-carb diet, and then cut total calories, you invariably cut total carbohydrates, because that's where the bulk of calories are. Basically, a calorie-restricted diet is a low-carb diet in disguise.

More on fuel partitioning.

Taubes often cites the example of the Jersey cow vs the Angus beef. They eat about the same, but one is lean with large udders, the other is fat. It's their genes that dictate where their food will go: Toward making milk, or toward making fat. If we believed it was a matter of Ein, then we'd have to explain how the Jersey cows are so lean, yet produce so much milk. Jersey cows are so lean, we could say they're emaciated, so we could say they're starving, right? But if they're starving, then where do the calories in their milk come from?

This made me spit soda out my nose.

I think it's great you found something that works for you, but it sounds like your eating LC with an eye on calories. welcome to the board - I don't see the real conflict here.

Sarah

I'm not sure everyone responds to ketosis the same.

I'm not sure everyone responds to fat-satiation the same.

I'm not sure everyone responds to carbs-slash-insulin the same.

I started out LC. I lost 170# in ridiculous speed. I was a weight-lifting, landscaping, hyperactive weight-loss low-carb recipe freak. I love LC food. I was so happy about the likely rest of my life.

And then my liver and/or thyroid crashed hard and I had 'crisis events' telling me (literally at hallucination-level) I'd die if I didn't go eat superfast dense carbs within minutes, that even my vital organs didn't have enough energy. And I couldn't lift weights (would burst into tears if I tried to force my body) and then I couldn't do anything at all. Literally I barely had the energy to get up and go to the bathroom. Thank god my job consists of sitting with a laptop. I became a nearly motionless vegetable.

I had to start eating carbs, and enough to try and keep me out of ketosis.

Keeping a 400# body out of ketosis is actually not easy. Pretty sure I'm lightly in it if I even go too long between meals, let alone overnight. And the amount I have to eat per day to stay well out of it I don't know -- I recently got a ketone blood meter and I'd like to discover this -- but I actually feel best if I'm eating about 50-100 carbs a day, with some days lower and some higher.

I spent a long time training myself to eat VLC or even ZC, which was easy because the food is totally awesome and totally filling and satiating. What's not to love?

It was really, really difficult for me to expand to eating carbs. I still find myself reticent over something like a bowl of peas with butter (funny, as I am less reticent about the occasional ben&jerry's ). Once upon a time I worried about having too much bell pepper and onions in my salad. Now that makes me crack up. It would take two roasting pans stuffed with salad to merit enough calories or carbs to even be worth eating (aside from liking the taste or nutrients), unless it's drowned in meats, cheeses, and fat-based dressings.

I am mostly prevented from eating anything but 'real food' by my reactions to gluten, rice and MSG. So "opening up" to eating carbs didn't really open my food sources so much, as just make it so now I could have fruit (I only mostly like berries anyway), or starchy tuber (the rare potato) or veg (I don't like veg much), or more nut&seed meals (I'm usually too lazy for those but I'm hoping this summer to do a bit more with that).

It's been a long time of experiment trying to do this, since ironically, most carbs are in grains which I can't eat for other gluten reasons, or in desserts which I usually won't eat for other reasons (just not wanting to OD on sugar or they contain grains or they just have no redeeming value), or in fruits or starchy veggies which I am not that fond of.

Now: Berries, fresh-squeezed citrus, potatoes, corn, peas, and occasionally some nutmeal with non-gmo organic blue cornmeal, are my main sources of carbs. And occasionally ice cream. Sadly since I quit eating pork (OMG I do miss bacon), I seldom get enough calories unless the IC is in the picture, unless it's a big butter-cheese and avocados day.

I am still not to any place I consider even good let alone ideal, since "energy for motive function" is my primary measure. I have a whole lot more than I used to... I am nearly functional in a highly sedentary lifestyle, but that is night and day difference between what my personality, my accomplishments, my life was like, back when I could stay deeply ketogenic and have tons of energy and associated weight loss.

I'm also doing vastly more supplementing than I used to, and I do believe that is greatly part of feeling better over time. I do notice that when I have a full spectrum of vitamins and minerals, some green stuff like spirulina and chlorella and chlorophyll, and an emphasis on good fats in my diet, I feel better.

I seldom have hunger issues compared to most people, Leptin problem due to my size I guess, just not hungry usually. But most the things I like to eat just happen to be LC and filling, which is why it was such an awesome plan for me.

It's been a few years now and, when I can remember or bother to eat, I've gotten better at keeping carbs high enough to stay out of ketosis (on purpose). I don't try for as much protein as I used to solely because I am sensitive to my liver needing some more coddling for awhile (I am not implying that LC is bad for the liver. LC is good for the whole body period. I am simply saying that MY liver apparently has significant NAFLD and needs some more healing before I megadose it with 100+g of protein daily again.)

I'm not weighing, though between my scale and my body the fluctuations are so extreme that is nearly pointless except over the long term anyway, but I believe I am gradually losing some of the weight I regained (from 520 to 357 then back to 440). At least, I feel better, more limber, having less issues with calf muscles/knee, those are all signs of reducing some.

Pretty sure it is not active ketosis doing that feeling ok and weight loss, since when I am in that I generally have no energy. Even the periods between eating or when I forget to eat for a day I often realize it simply because I realize I don't feel like getting up for something trivial, wonder why, and then realize the last time I ate was the day before yesterday... so then I eat, and have some energy again.

If I want to have energy, I have to eat carbs. If I'm losing weight it is rather slow and gradual, but I attribute that slowness more to my NOT eating (I've tracked this in excruciating detail in the past -- eating 1000 calories a day lost me NOTHING for a month, whereas eating 2200 calories a day lost me quite a bit, all this on VLC) than to the fact that I'm eating carbs so "my insulin must be higher."

I tend to have erratic BG if I don't eat -- my blood sugar is actually managed far better by eating, even if it includes carbs (as long as it's not out of this world) than by not eating, when my blood sugar tracking looks like a mountain range. I don't have a pre-diabetic response like most do; I'm chronically hypoglycemic actually. It still indicates the same sorts of problems but at a different place in the cycle I expect. But it means that my eating regularly, and eat SOME carbs (~20-40 in a meal) actually makes me feel better, and operate better, than I do otherwise.

Ketogenic low carb works fabulously for many people -- until it doesn't, like with me, or just not at all for some. And that likely has nothing to do with lowcarb food -- because it's awesome food -- and everything to do with the health of an individual's liver and hormones, primarily, though likely other things matter too.

I find if I eat "real food" and "lots of good fats" and specifically avoid foods that trigger me to eat like a starving hyena, such as wheat and soft dairy (e.g. no milk!), that has a dramatic impact on how much I eat, how well I eat, and whether or not I'm going to lose any weight. The fats issue for me at least is much more powerful an effect on my food and satiation factor than ketosis. This is likely because Leptin already has the appetite-killing effect on me that ketosis has on most people.

But the point is that eating plans vary by the person of course; what you put IN your body is really only part of the equation; what it needs, and what it does with what you put in it, are the other 2/3 of that measure.

It looks to me like you're doing awesomely Lee. If what you're doing is working for you, go to it!

I might add that I had a hard time for a long time with being in the forum and feeling like I shouldn't be because I wasn't eating LC -- at least, not compared to the VLC which was my mainstay for so long. But my friends were here! I finally got over that. There are people on all kinds of eating plans here and I discovered that my friends totally do not care whether I'm on the ice cream diet or lowcarb.

I don't know that anybody I ever heard, suggested that one couldn't lose fat without ketosis. It just helps-like-hell in a few ways. But really, I believe that if one is not eating (or not very much of) grains and processed foods, and IS eating real foods, and particularly makes sure to get a decent chunk of good fats, that you're going to be doing your body a favor. In a perfect world, barring other organ/hormone issues, it will then decide to let go of some fat. With or without ketosis being involved, I expect.

PJ

I wanted to add: that although I had no issue sticking with LC, I think many people really do. But over time, observing others as well as myself, I've come to think that a lot of this has to do with ingesting things that affect the body including brain -- sometimes many days down the road -- in a way that changes it.

For example, and I know this from it actually happening repeatedly years ago, if I were to have 1 Tbsp (literally!) of milk in the morning, or one single bite of toast, let alone anything that mixed wheat and dairy together, I'd eat rabidly all day (or suffer agony if I tried to prevent it). I could eat enough for two people MY size and gain yet more weight. But stay the hell away from those things and eat plenty of good fats and I have no problem -- whether it's lowcarb or whether it's my current focus.

This has actually led me to think that the real issue might be a lot more about
a) digestive tract integrity
b) liver functionality
c) avoiding brain-sparking-appetite foods [for that individual]
d) ensuring some protein and sufficient quality fats
e) something else for spectrum nutrients (vitamins/minerals/FAs)

And maybe that's enough. With or without the low carb high carb zero carb or carb cycling or whatever.

But I wouldn't have learned most of what I have about my body and its response to food if LC hadn't got me in the doorway to 'real food.'

PJ

Your journal, my journal, most any of my journal-friends' journals. We don't care what you eat, unless you care, and then we only care in the context of whatever you choose to do.

Currently our discussion is on intentional community living and the repeating saga of my obsession with DMSO and other chemistry, but we diverge into whatever topic gets brought up. ;-)

PJ

Leebase - I also follow a non-keto low-carb diet. I more or less follow the guidelines of Dr. Wolfgang Lutz, from my all-time favorite LC book called Life Without Bread. He recommended about 72 grams per day. No induction periods or anything like that either. I find it to be a very sustainable framework, as it allows for generous consumption of vegetables and some low sugar fruits. I also like that the book is more about HEALTH benefits of LC, than weight-loss. If you have not read it yet, it's truly a MUST-Read IMO.

I'm not even sure why this is in the warzone? A guy following a low-carb diet (Just not ultra-mega-low) is made to feel like a second-class low-carb citizen? How goofy is that?!

I think the OP actually started the thread in here himself, Jeff, as he assumed he was going to get some flak!

I realize OP started it here. And I also surmised it was because he assumed he'd take some heat for it. As I have also, since I'm also not an EXTREME low carb follower, but rather a 70 grams per day kinda guy as per Life Without Bread recommendations.

I'd just like to see those of us who don't do keto versions of LC not be treated like outcasts of some kind. It's just food after all.

I personally could care less what others eat, as long as their diet works for THEM.

Do you REALLY think you're treated like an outcast here because you can eat above ketogenic levels? I think there are many here who can do that. What I think for me is there is a sliding scale of carbs vs calories: If I'm willing to keep to 1000-1200 calories per day, I can eat more carbs (on the order of 50-100 per day). It leaves me hungry and anxious however and I find by cutting carbs back to 30-40, I can eat substantially more calories (mostly added fat) - on the order of 1400-1700 per day - and have the same weight loss/maintenance results. I choose to do the latter because it keeps me less anxious, more satisfied, easier to live with.

I think the OP came in with the position that we were going to say you could ONLY lose with ketosis and for most people that is not true. However, for a few it may absolutely be true and who's to say it's not right for them to do that?

I don't know if you know the history of that particular poster, but this post is one of a series of provocative posts here and also on Gary Taubes's website. IMO, he came in looking for a fight.

I fully agree with your concluding sentence.

Lots of us here eat 50-100 net carbs a day, Jeff, so I don't think anyone treats those who eat at the higher end of "low carb" as being an outcast.

I'm sorry if you feel you have been treated thus, but if you stay round longer this time maybe you will start to feel more like one of the family instead of an occasional visitor.

What makes you feel that way? We've got people eating at many levels of carb, including CAD, Dr. Kwalkswki (sp?), higher carb paleo. Why do you feel singled out?

I suppose there might be some folks, especially new ones, that have the fervor of the newly converted. Have people actually given you grief over eating slightly more carbs than they do?

People do pounce on others who mention adding some carbs to their diet. Maybe this is a vocal few, some of whom have major metabolic issues and/or diabetes. There is an assumption by some that ALL carbs are bad and will lead to diabetes etc if you eat them.

My experience is a bit like Rightnows. I lost weight easily initially and was a low carb convert. My carb levels got lower and lower. In time I stopped losing weight, had trouble sleeping, felt cold etc. Adding some starchy carbs back in helped resolve those problems. I've seen people here and on other sites (like MDA) criticised for this.

I do have to be careful about what carbs I eat, because I do get some reactions. I think Dr Davis is probably on the money when it comes to the grain based carbs. I do like my home made corn meal cheezy muffins though.

Maybe I've been hanging around in the wrong joints, but I've seen it go the other way more often, where VLCers and ZCers receive near-hysterical reactions. Granted, the fervor of some VLC/ZCers can be annoying, but I've rarely seen them insisting that absolutely nobody can eat 50 or 100g of CHO/day and be healthy. Most of us have seen plenty of evidence that there are people who can. But I lost track a long time ago of the number of people who have told me that *they* can tolerate more carbohydrate, so I must be some kind of deluded religious zealot for eating the way *I* need to eat.