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Cutting out sugar
Base theme by DesignModo & ported to Powered by Vanilla by Chris Ireland, modified by the "theFB" team.
Comments
almost all breakfast cereals have massive amounts of sugar
often 20 to 30%
even cornflakes are extremely sugary
oats are the least sugary pleasant cereal (I would not eat shredded wheat or bran flakes)
Bear in mind that milk is 5% sugar too
Also are you avoiding milk in tea? That's my big mental roadblock to this kind of thing!!
Im going back on it tomorrow.
But, to be honest if you bite the bullet and get on the Keto train to Slimsville, Healthafornia, you'll not be worried about food. Everything tastes good.
Tonight I had a nice big plate of stir fry greens with chicken and a couple of glasses of wine. It tasted great, but that because my taste buds have adapted.
I used to drink a huge latte in the morning with sugar. Now it's a small cup of good coffee with milk*. Delicious!
*double cream - not milk.
Portion sizes have probably halved, feel full for longer (missed lunch today to get to my guitar lesson) and enjoying the food I do eat more.
I live in a bedsit and the actual kitchen downstairs is pretty horrible so no one uses it.
In my room, I've got a microwave and a mobile kitchen trolley with a chopping surface on top so all of what I cook for me and Morgan comes out of a microwave or it's cold food. It's not a bad kitchen-that-really-isn't-one and it's kept us well fed for almost 2 years now like that but what it's done more than anything is forced us away from chips and a lot of fat enhancing oven-ready rubbish and forced us to really think about what we can cook and what we eat.
We eat like kings and it's no bother avoiding shit food.
Some clever shopping and a healthy attitude to it and it's been easy really.
Freshly roasted chicken from Tesco, 13 minutes to heat up
McCain frozen Jacket potato
Birdseye steam fresh veg
Iceland frozen sweet potato mash
Fresh, doorstop thick bread from the bakery, Olive oil butter-spread, nice extra mature cheddar cheese, plain crisps, small salad,...that's a meal itself
We have fish, rice and peas, all manner of salads with fresh meat in them, Pasta dishes, some of the ready-meal casserole type dishes are really nice to "Nuke" and put with proper veg and potato etc.
Most of it has come down to clever shopping but we don't spend a fortune and considering we live in the cheap, beer-can laden, take-away end of town we don't have said take-away's very often, maybe once a month and that's *Pepe's which is almost restaurant quality take-away anyway.
*(If you haven't tried them, 'Pepe's Piri Piri', there's one in every town... FFS go try just once for a treat. Burgers to die for. Yeah, you wait 20 minutes for it but fuck me is it worth it. 'Gourmet Burger meal' is £5 and I struggle to finish it. EPIC Munch!)
I'm at the point now where I'm not restricting myself from any type of food, just watching the overall sugar consumption so I'm having milk in tea and I had a few sweet biscuits after dinner tonight which was a MASSIVE chicken salad. 2 chicken breasts and freshly prepped salad with maybe half a tube of plain pringles.
I had granola this morning and that's it, so I'm watching the overall day but allowing some stuff that means it's not a prison sentence.
To be fair I've already done the hard part so this is just maintaining it now.
I function best with only 1 main meal per day but I will have granola for breakfast so lunch usually gets dropped. If I do have something it's very light.
So, no kitchen and two slim fellas in size 30 jeans so even that didn't stop us losing weight.
It can be done no matter what.
Could be a useful variation
I think we still have it somwhere.
We do also have an electric slow cooker but that only gets used at Christmas really. If we really fancied doing it, we could drag it out for a roast dinner but most times we don't bother.
However now you've mentioned it, that would be nice this Sunday...
Hmmm.
Yum.
I can see that happening now.
Again, it's not hard to make it healthy either.
Roast beef, jacket potato, sweet potato, veg and coleslaw.
I've been back on it since Saturday. Felt a bit low Tuesday and Wednesday but certainly not the full blown Keto flu symptoms I experienced the first time I did it - just a bit lacking in energy. Not sure if it's because I've been through it before or if it's because I've been keeping fluid and electrolyte levels up but definitely a better experience than last time.
Just sat in bed having finished my morning cup of butter coffee and enjoying feeling of being fully awake and clear headed. Completely unheard of for me at this time of day when on a carb heavy diet.
The minor health improvements are really quite amazing - skin, gums, energy, awareness, weight etc. I've dropped 11lbs and feel better just for that.
I can't see myself going back to a high carb diet. This is so easy because I just don't crave food, but eat loads of good greens. I'll probably add in some more items in the next couple of weeks, more fruit and yoghurt.
Salmon, eggs and coffee for breakfast this morning....
I have been high fat low carb for years (not keto, about 150g carbs), but I have been experimenting with eating more protein this week. Instead of chowing down on greek yoghurt at about 09:00 at work, I have been waiting for lunch, and having two canned mackerel in salad instead of one. So far so good; feel strong like bear.
The other guys in my band are vegetarian and they can barely comprehend the idea that I could fit EVEN MORE MEAT into my diet!
I've found that pork scratchings and sugar free jelly are good substitutes for crisps and sweets if you really need something between meals. The odd chunk of cheese helps as well.
I'm not really monitoring my weight. While I could certainly stand to lose a few pounds it's the other benefits I'm interested in.
I think I've mentioned the effect it seems to have on my migraine occurrence but I was also suffering with heartburn at night a lot seemingly regardless of amount/quality/spiciness of food which meant that I wasn't sleeping well. Cut out carbs and it vanished after a couple of days.
I'm not sure what your approach to alcohol is but I think you mentioned having a couple of glasses of wine so I'm assuming you are still drinking? All I will say is be careful with it. Some advise avoiding alcohol altogether as it can knock you temporarily out of ketosis while your liver deals with the alcohol (obviously the carb content matters as well). I'm not too bothered about that but I have found that my tolerance vanishes and that the morning after can be very painful even after a small amount. If I drink while on keto it'll be limited to one small glass of whiskey and I'll still feel it in the morning.
I've done a bit of research on Ketogenic diets since starting. Reduced inflammation seems to be a reoccurring theme in the science.
The effect is has had on my cold symptoms, asthma and snoring is dramatic. My asthma is pretty mild and controlled, but I have had no symptoms at all since going on this diet.
Highly recommended if you suffer with any of these.
If I slip out of keto occasionally - holidays, weekend celebrations, I don't see that as a major problem. I'm monitoring myself with Ketostix and am fluctuating between 4-5 on their scale, even with the occasional glass of wine.
Just got through a family weekend of celebrating the in-laws 50th anniversary without any problems. Ate and drank what I wanted, whenever I want to.
Alcohol intake went up, Friday and Saturday evening had a good few glasses of wine, but didn't feel too bad the following morning. The risk of snacking on nibbles after a few glasses wasn't an issue, I just kept on the celery and cheese and it was easy.
Friday evening we had beef stew, greens and dauphinoise potatoes (I skipped the spuds). Saturday was BBQ (in the snow) so meat and greens and Sunday was a pub lunch. I had scallops followed by chicken salad, both of which were delicious, but as soon as I'd eaten the scallops I got sugar sweats from the sauce and later I could feel the inflammation in my mouth.
Tested my Ketone level when I got home last night and it had reduced to 3 on the scale. Weight identical to Friday morning.
If I can get through a weekend like that easily, I should be able to maintain the diet for most of the time without being a difficult eater.
Haha, I have always maintained that "meat sweats" is not a Thing, and can be easily avoided by not having the chips with your 48 ounce steak.
The purpose of the diet wasn't necessarily to lose weight, so I have eaten well and never once gone hungry.
My diet before going Ketogenic was pretty good, no junk food, all home cooked, probably too many cakes! My weight was considered on the top side of the healthy range by NHS with a BMI of around 27.
I think what this diet is telling me us that I was just eating too much of the wrong thing.
I assumed that I would naturally carry more weight in my 40's than I did in my 20's & 30's as this it's the received wisdom, but I'm beginning to question this.
The weight loss is so quick and so easy I'm really surprised. I'm also slightly annoyed with myself because had I been the weight I am now I probably wouldn't have ruptured my Achilles and given myself three and a half years of grief, and the NHS a large cost to repair it.
Once I'm finally signed off by the surgeon I'll get back to giving blood regularly to pay some back.
Since starting, and experiencing the very quick and pretty dramatic results, I've looked further into the various forms of this diet and the science behind it, it's fascinating.
As I understand it, eating a relatively high sugar / high carb diet increases the insulin levels and also reduces the body's response to the insulin hormone. This results in further increased insulin levels. Insulin is basically an energy storage hormone which tells cells to store sugar. When your body becomes poor at coping with the levels of sugar being ingested (often for men in their 30's or 40's) the cells store it and the muscles are deprived it. They then scream out for more carbs, hence the feeling of hunger some people get after eating a high carb meal. The cycle continues with the body continually redirecting sugar / carbs to the wrong place.
The ketogenic diet works by 'rewiring' the body's fuel source from the incoming food to fat reserves which have already been stored. That way there is a constant source of stored energy which avoids the feeling of hunger or the dip in energy levels after eating.
I've outlined the positive results above, but I've also noticed how much more chilled I have been. I can still yell at the kids at bathtime, but just don't get so uptight for long, it's really helped my mood.
If anyone is interested in further information I've read / listened to;
Michael Mosley (The Blood Sugar Diet)
Don't Eat That Blog
Jeff Volek
Dr Stephen Phinney
Joe Rogan Podcast
Amongst other health improvements I've lost 20lbs in two months - from 14st 6lbs to to 13st.