Stavia wrote:Hi kimberlamb - no I never did it properly, it was just far too hard to work out the macros to fit with what is optimal for me. The protein was really difficult to get to 60 grams (which I find best for me) while keeping the carbs low enough and the fat high enough. All whole food vegetarian protein sources come mixed with a significant amount of carbs. I did start, but just couldnt keep the carbs low enough to stay in ketosis with whole food. And I wasnt going to just eat coconut oil or processed pea protein. I try really hard to only eat whole foods and it became apparant that my intent was impossible.
I can see how a traditional vegetarian/vegan diet works - it is easiest to do it with a diet that is low fat/high carb. And how they have become linked. But I need a bit of ketosis to be cognitively at my best.
But if anyone has tried...
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Hi Stavia,
I understand the issues with trying to eat certain protocols. I get exasperated on a regular basis, as my functional medicine doctor keeps telling me to go completely dairy-free and lower the refined carbs (the ONLY refined carb I sometimes eat is a thinly sliced piece of real sourdough bread from starter, not grocery-store produced, toasted with my eggs in the morning). And the only dairy I usually take is 2 T of organic half and half in my one cup of morning coffee, and sometimes half to one ounce of feta in my eggs. No other refined carbs or dairy.
Because I have (or had) insulin resistance (haven't been tested for a while but went down from 16 to 8.9 I think last lab showed) I have to cut the carbs down drastically, including no starchy vegetables or fruit other than small amounts of organic strawberries and blueberries. No beans or legumes. No grains. Keep saturated fat as close to 9 grams or less as possible.
And since my uric acid has increased to the point of gout (presumably from my intermittent fasting, but no gout attack, just as Jason Fong says happened with his gout patients) she says I have to eat a low purine diet -- no tuna (the only fish I'd eat other than wild Alaskan salmon) and limit the vegetables I eat the most which are broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus, mushrooms. Yet other sources say there is no proof that vegetables are deleterious as far as purine issues. (I eat spinach, arugula and romaine daily, as well as olive oil and half an avocado. I eat a little chicken breast, salmon, and once in a very great while a little grassfed ground beef.). I figured out I ate way too many nuts in a 2-3 day period in January and ended up with a really bad diverticulitis attack...so I'm gingerly easing back into an ounce of walnuts a day....it was cashews that did me in, as we all know they are really beans, and it was my own fault!)
I feel there is almost nothing left -- the same very few things over and over -- since I embrace all of the no's Gundry lists for Apoe4's, too. And I've read that almond flour is dangerous if you consume too much, too! (What is too much?!) I spend hours and hours researching recipes, without much success.
Everyone says a Mediterranean diet is supposed to be best for us. But I find many of the recipes heavy on carbs (beans, chickpeas, hummus, potatoes...)
It is the diet protocol that gives me the hardest challenge.
(There is a positive note to this post is that since our mandated stay-at-home coronavirus order, I've been forced to cook more and have lost 12 pounds more. I seem to be kind of stuck here, though. I track my food on cronometer.com, keeping within my 70-20-10% and 1050-1350 calories. When I'm really adherent, my ketones are between 0.8 - 1.7, usually on the lower end. )
I read I shouldn't even take small quantities of resistant starches in order to solve the insulin resistance.
Since our coronavirus lockdown, my source of aerobic exercise (pool) is closed. I still need my second knee replacement, but I try to walk 30-40 minutes a day in pain regardless, as I need something! Exercise with this knee issue is difficult, though I hope when elective surgeries are permitted again, it won't always be.
My hardest challenge is finding/learning recipes with the approved foods which actually taste good. My functional medicine doctor's reply to that is an insultingly trite, "Food should not be joy." Food should absolutely give pleasure, although of course not become self-medication. To suggest we need to be eating food that has no taste value is contradictory to helping people change eating habits.
Still (and forever) asking for food help, if anyone would care to weigh in?