Adventures in Keto, Part 5 - Retox

A couple of weeks ago, I went on vacation to Jamaica, at an all inclusive resort. If you haven't been to such a resort, its sort of like being on a cruise ship. Just about anything you want to eat or drink is included in the price. There are multiple bars and restaurants on the property, with different themes and styles of food to choose from. Which all sounds really great. But for someone trying to live low carb, it presents quite a challenge. I knew going in that it would be difficult to maintain my preferred eating habits while on vacation, and I was prepared to make some exceptions. By the second day it had become clear that unless I was willing to severely limit my self, it would be impossible. Breakfast was the easiest meal, because there was an extensive buffet, with plenty of eggs and bacon and cheeses and cured meats and salmon, etc. But once lunch and dinner came around, the keto-friendly options declined. By the end of the second night, I decided to just stop worrying about it and indulge myself while on vacation. I was there to relax, so why stress about food? (Also, as a member of the service industry who has spent years in and around high end restaurants, it was obvious that the staff was less experienced and knowledgeable than I am used to, and I honestly didn't want to be "that guy" making their jobs more difficult. Americans already have a well deserved reputation abroad for being entitled and difficult, and not eating my preferred way was not going to kill me -- at least not in the short term.) And indulge I did. There was a "sweets deli" which was essentially a dessert shop with ice cream and cookies and cakes and candies. The selection changed at least twice during the day, and varied throughout the week. I was delighted to discover a number of delicious chocolate treats, which I enjoyed to my hearts content. I did notice some of my high-carb symptoms returning almost immediately. Mid-afternoon sleepiness was the main one, along with an overall reduction in my focus and energy. One afternoon I was ravenously hungry, and began to feel light headed and weak, and my hands started shaking. I happened to be in my hotel room at the time, so I did a quick blood sugar test (yes, I packed my meter). The reading was 55, which is very low. Even in full ketosis, my readings are usually between 70 and 80. I had to eat something to bring my body back into balance. I hated the feeling of being a slave to food again. Its odd to hear myself say that, because I've never been over weight. I've always been someone people view as being fit and healthy. But after months of not having to eat on a schedule, I realize that anyone who isn't fat adapted is constantly reminded by their body that they need to eat. When I'm fat adapted, I eat when I'm ready, not when my body demands it, I'm in control. It surprised me how quickly my body became dependent on carbohydrates again. I had not expected that. I figured once I got home, I'd get back to eating right and withing a couple days, all would be well again. I was wrong. After months of feeling great and seeing a steady decline in my cravings for sweets and carbs, and rarely feeling hungry, all those things returned. I've been home for over two weeks now, back to eating healthy, low carbs, high fat, moderate protein and feeling better. But I did have to go through a less intense transition period again, complete with lethargy and cravings. Since transitioning back, I still am battling hunger pangs and sugar cravings. When I started eating low carb back in October, I knew it would take awhile for the cravings and other carb addiction symptoms to abate, but I didn't think I'd have to go through that a second time after only a week off my diet. Back then I was prepared, so I could handle it. This time, I wasn't mentally prepared, so its been difficult, and I've screwed up a couple times, which only drags the whole process out longer. Now that I've realized this is how it is, I'm buckling down and getting serious. I know I want to live better, to feel better, to have all the benefits I enjoy from eating right. I screwed up by going off the diet and now I have to do the work to get back where I want to be. I'm not beating myself up, don't get that impression. Its more of a mental shift, of realizing that until my body adjusts back, I have to be vigilant about not indulging my cravings, of recognizing when I'm actually hungry and when I'm just bored, and when I'm making excuses (like yesterday at my friends birthday, when I drank wine and sugary Margaritas and totally put myself out of ketosis.) Over the previous months of living low carb, I've been able to have an occasional sugary treat and return to ketosis easily. What I can't do is spend a week eating carb loaded foods and expect to just pick up where I left off. I learned a lesson about how my body works and what I can and can't do. Eating a lot of carbs makes me feel less than great, and feeling great is my new normal. I wonder how I went through life for so long accepting that as normal. This experience has made me very aware of how what I eat impacts my body and my life. My sleep, my mood, my energy, my mental focus and clarity, all of which go on to impact my relationships, my work, my enjoyment of life in general. When I'm eating right, my whole life is better, its just that simple. I have another trip coming up in a couple months, my fourth trip to Burning Man. Fortunately, at Burn one has to bring all your own food, so I can maintain my healthy eating there with some planning.

Adventures in Ketosis - Part 2: Adaptaion

In my last post, I discussed the basics of a Ketogenic diet, and what I was going to monitor while adapting to it. I've found very little about what to expect during the initial adaptation phase of the diet, other than to expect some lethargy and brain fog in the first few days, aka "Keto flu." So I decided to give a detailed account of my experiences.

I have no idea if mine are typical or not, they just are what I experienced. I'd love to hear if other people's adaptations were similar or different.

To begin, I should note that I am a bartender, so my work hours and lifestyle are atypical. I usually work 4 days a week, but could work 3 or 5 days. I usually don't work more than two days in a row, but could work five in a row during busy seasons. On weekdays, I usually go into work at 3:30 in the afternoon, and work until between midnight and 1am, depending on how busy we were and how long it takes to clean the bar. On weekends, my in-time is either 6pm or 8pm, and I usually leave about 3:30am. Which means I usually go to bed between 2am and 4am, even on nights I don't work. Mondays and Tuesdays and usually my "weekend."

I rarely set an alarm, and tend to wake up between 9am and 10am, but sometimes as late as noon, if I had a particularly rough night at work.

Because of the nature of the job, meals are also atypical. All employees share a "family meal" before we open week days, prepared by the cooks. It could be anything, chicken wings, lasagna, ribs, stew... No way of knowing before I get there, so I'll be packing my meals for that, to make sure I stay low carb and better count my macros and calories.

 At home, I use a digital kitchen scale for all my food, and track everything I consume with a the Cronometer app. I do a fair amount of meal prep. Since live alone, I tend to make something and eat the multiple servings over the course of several days. Which makes it easier to track. I love eating out, and thanks to my career, I have the "in" at some of the best restaurants in my city, however, I'll be forgoing that for the next few weeks at least (sad face).

On any given night, we're allowed to take a short break (10-15 minutes) around the time the kitchen closes (11pm weeknights/1am weekends) to eat, if we're not too busy (if we're busy, then no food, its the nature of the business). If I'm the only bartender working, I generally just grab a bite of food between serving guests. Meals are always on your feet. I'll be bringing snacks for this, since our menu doesn't have much keto friendly food, and the kitchen staff gets grumpy with elaborate custom requests from the staff 15 minutes before they want to go home.

My prefered exercise is weight lifting. Currently I'm on a three day split, usually Monday, Wednesday and Friday, for big lifts (Bench Press, Squats and Deadlifts). I'm also working a specific pull-up regimen which has me doing multiple low rep sets throughout the day, almost every day. I rarely do cardo, for a lot of reasons, but mostly because I hate it. If I do, it's HIIT, but I don't expect to do any during the next couple weeks as I'm not training for anything specific.

My unpaid work, my passion, is writing. Currently I'm working on a screenplay and try to put in at least a couple hours five days a week. The mental focus and cognitive boost ketosis is supposed to give is one of the main drives for me, as I feel it will improve my writing.

Week One

My first day in the diet was a Sunday, I had to work that night, but it was only a 4-5 hour shift, then I had two days off, so I figured that was going to be a good time to get through the worst of it.

My goal was to keep my carbs below 50g/day, in reality, I was below 30g almost every day. Most of my carbs were veggies, and since only net carbs (total carbs minus fiber) count, I set my tracking app to account for that.

Hunger was the first major hurdle. Filling up on fat based foods, like bulletproof coffee, and homemade bone broth (I kept the fat, didn't skim it off), didn't do much to stop the cravings for carbs. It was particularly bad at work where there's food in front of me constantly. But I kept at it.

I tend to drink at work, usually a shot or two after we close. I don't drink much or at all on my off days. Since I was monitoring my blood, I figured I'd see if it messed with me ketosis. It didn't. I drink straight liquor, usually whiskey, so no carbs from beers or wine or mixers.

On my second day, I worked out. It went well, setting a new person record for my bench press, in spite of feeling a bit lethargic.

Day three is when the worst hit me. I woke up feeling like crap. It took supreme effort to drag my ass out of bed. I loaded up on high fat foods, but basically, I sat on the couch all day doing nothing. It was a little better the next day, but still pretty tired and lacking focus. My workout suffered from either lack of strength or just lack of will power to push through.

I also realized I had to stay off my motorcycle, and limit driving altogether for two days. My focus was so bad it scared me to be on the road. My mind kept drifting, and I had one close call.

My glucose was staying low, sub 90, but my ketones were also low, staying below threshold (0.5mM), until Thursday, when they suddenly jumped to 2.7mM and continued to say in the 2 to 4mM range.

By day four, I was feeling pretty good, but every time I did anything that required real physical exertion, I drained quickly. On Friday, I was able to set a new personal record deadlift, but literally could not do a single power clean after. My HRV score tanked the next morning, which I would normally expect after a deadlift workout, so not surprise.

The biggest issue the first week, besides the couple days of lethargy and brain fog, were hunger pangs. It gets easier to walk by carb loaded foods as long as I have snacks (Cheese, nuts, avocados, etc.) available, but I still feel hungry a lot, despite having eaten plenty of calories.

In the middle of the week sleep was an issue also. I would have a hard time getting to sleep, I'd lay in bed tossing and turning. That lasted a few days, but seems to have stopped.

The other thing I notice is I feel tired, like I've just run out of energy. Which I normally associate with not eating enough in a given day. But I know I've eaten plenty of calories, and I feel better after I've eaten a snack. I'm assuming this is because my body still isn't burning the available fat, is looking for carbs, and in the end settling for food that just came in rather than stored energy.

The mirror tells a tale, too. Years ago, in preparation for a photo shoot, I did a crash no carb diet, followed by carb loading, similar to what body builders do before competition to look swollen. As the carb stores in my muscles was depleted, I began to look smaller and scrawny. I'm seeing that again. Hopefully, its a temporary side effect.

Body weight and body fat stayed consistent over the course of this week. A lost a bit in some of my measurements, which I expected as the carbs and water drained out, but nothing too significant.

Week Two

Had a rough night on the bar Saturday night, then woke up very sick Sunday morning. Not Keto flu, but genuinely ill. I rarely get sick at all. Its been a few years since I can remember anything worse than a runny nose. So this was out of the ordinary, and I felt really terrible.  HRV was in the basement (expected if I'm ill), but Ketones and glucose were good, so the diet is on track. I felt better Monday.

The whole second week, my workouts suffered. I failed all my major lifts, but easily got all my warm ups (up to 90% of target), so I feel like I'm at least maintaining so I'll be able to get back on track once I'm through adaptation.

I have no endurance for anything physical. I'll feel fine, then do something physical, like change a keg (which weighs less than half what I just deadlifted a few days ago) and I'll be out of breath for 5 minutes.

That lack of strength and endurance  lasted all week, and its depressing as hell. I'm nearing the end of a 12 week workout cycle and I've been breaking personal records for a few weeks, and suddenly that's stopped. Its a big temptation for me to carb load pre-work out, but I believe this is temporary and will pay off in the long haul, so I'm sticking to the diet.

Mentally I feel pretty good, but still feel like I'm hitting the wall when I should not be. For example, I went to work Saturday night at 8pm. By that time I'd already eaten over 2500 calories, about 80% fat, 21g carbs, and around 100g protein. My daily minimum is 2300 calories to maintain weight. I try to get about 500 more than that to help gain muscle mass. So I was well within my normal range, and should have been fine all through the shift.

But by 11pm, I felt like I was hitting the wall -- tried, mentally unfocused and starving. I ate some cheese and that helped, but I had to eat again an hour later. I at a whole avocado, and more cheese. All in, my calories for the day were over 3400, (almost 150% normal!) but I still was hungry and feeling like I hadn't eaten enough.

Coming to the end of two weeks, its clear I'm still not adapted. Hunger pangs have gone from every couple hours to virtually constant, no matter how much I eat, there's a constant dull hunger. My guess is this is the last desperate attempt by my body to get me to eat some carbs, but instead I just give it  more fat.

(Sidebar-- I've never had to diet to lose weight, and I've been guilty of judging others who fail at their diets. No more. I now know what's like to feel hungry ALL THE TIME. I can manage to get through a couple weeks of this, but if I was facing a life of constant hunger and food cravings, like a typical weight loss dieter, I couldn't stick to it either. I think after a month I'd fail, too. So to all those people I secretly judged, I'm sorry.)

I do have periods of really good mental clarity and creativity that I've noticed. I don't know if I can attribute that to ketosis, but I do feel like I'm having that "spark of inspiration" more often than normal.

In addition, I've gotten much better at doing chores. I'm a terrible housekeeper, always have been. But in the last couple weeks, I've managed to get myself to do daily cleaning and housekeeping, book keeping/finances, and other dull but necessary life stuff that I usually put off until the stress of not doing is too much to take. Caused by keto? I don't know, I don't have an MRI or whatever to measure brain function, but I'll take it whatever it is.

I also started practicing piano again. I started about a year and half ago, then fell off after a couple months. Now I'm back at it. I felt like I only had so much time and energy to devote to learning something new, so I choose writing instead of piano. Now I feel like I can devote plenty of time to both, but nothing else has really changed in my life, its an attitude shift I can't explain. Keto? Maybe, I don't know.

Overall, I'm noticing changes in my behavior and thinking, even how I interact with guests at work (I'm more tolerant, less easily frustrated, and more creative in conversation), that I believe are attributed to keto, but I can't quantify those changes. The changes I can quantify are blood glucose and ketones, which are where I'd expect them to be, and energy levels/strength versus caloric intake, which are not where they should be... yet?

My HRV scores are yoyoing, but I expect this. I'm in week 10 of a 12 week cycle, pushing for new personal records, so I expect my HRV to drop the morning after a workout. It is bouncing back up the next day, signalling a good recovery. Keto is supposed to aid in recovery, but so far, what I'm seeing is normal.

My body weight is down 4 pounds, and body fat is down 1%, which equates to about 2 pounds of lean mass lost, but this is also well within the normal deviation for me, and could easily be nothing. According to much of what I've read, about 50% of weight loss in the first two weeks is usually water, since hydration is an issue when adapting to ketosis (I have been peeing a lot!). I'd personally rather see the scale go up, while my body fat stays the same or drops, but maintaining for two weeks is nothing to worry about.

Week Three

On Monday, day 15, I woke up feeling great. The constant hunger pangs were gone, replaced by seemingly normal hunger around meal times. Meals made me feel full. My energy and focus throughout the day were good and constant. My workout didn't totally drain me, instead I felt good after.

I woke up around 7am (VERY early for me) feeling great, and when I finally went to bed around 1am it wasn't because I was exhaust, it was because it was time. I slept great.

I was also extremely productive that day. I've said before that my productivity has been rising, and it has. I studied new drink recipes I need to know for a new bar opening a couple weeks, I practiced piano, I tried three new recipes (including keto cookies for the holidays), I cleaned house, I still manged to watch several episodes of a TV show I'm binging, started a new book, went grocery shopping, did a little work on my motorcycle and worked out. And I never felt like I had "too much to do" for the day. 

I think its safe to say I've made it through the initial transition.

Thanksgiving!

The rest of the week has gone really well. I was a bit dumb in planning this whole journey right before the holidays, so half way in to week three was Thanksgiving. My plan was to spend it with my brother and his family who live an hour away, so I planned ahead.

I baked some keto-friendly almond shortbread cookies, I tried two different recipes, both were good. I also made a keto-friendly peanut butter mousse (basically peanut butter and heavy cream, because my brother loves anything peanut butter. Just being a good guest, I also made an asparagus dish I knew was keto friendly.

At dinner, I ate dark meat, a lot of it with gravy made from the turkey drippings (the gravy's only carb was corn starch, about a teaspoon for the whole batch, so not much per serving), and veggies. I skipped the sweet potatoes and stuffing and rolls, which were temping. I forewarned my family of my restrictions so no one was pushing those things on me.

I also had a couple glasses of whiskey and water, instead of beer or wine, and began the day with 500 cal coffee, and ended with 500 cal Chia (with 2 Tbsp each of butter, coconut oil and heavy cream blended in), to push my fat to protein ratios up.

I didn't measure my macros, I just tried to eat smart and get lots of fat. I'm pretty sure I way over did my protein, and was way over my calories for the day, but I expected both of those. Around 7pm I checked my blood work, ketones 0.3, glucose 79 (this is about 30 minutes after finishing the chai. So I crashed my ketones, but had kept my glucose down. I also felt sleepy, so I took a nap in front of the TV.

I woke up about 30 minutes later feeling pretty good. I checked my ketones again, 1.6, so I was back in. I was awake of productive the rest of the night (I even experimented wit making sphereified cocktails around 11pm). The next morning, ketones were still in range. I survived.

Sunday, day 21, I woke up feeling good, well rested, which is not always the case after a Saturday night behind the bar. Hunger pangs have continued to reduce, and the feeling of being full last longer after each meal. I'm definitely through the worst of adaptation now.

I've been really good about my meals, and having a lot of fun cooking new things that are keto friendly. I've felt good all week, waking up rested, and having consistent energy all day. I've found several good resources for keto-friendly food recipies that don't taste like "diet food" substitutes. Keto Connect and Carrie Brown (She has several cookbooks, including one very promising one all about keto ice cream I'm dying to try! I miss ice cream!) and Ketovangelist kitchen also has an associate pod cast. So there are lots of resources for cooking.

Thoughts and Observations

The first 10 days were tough, especially the Keto Flu. Getting genuinely ill didn't wasn't great either, but I think that's anomaly. My energy level suffered, my workouts suffered, and I was hungry most of the time, craving all my comfort foods. It was depressing and I was plagued with concerns that it wasn't working that whole first week.

Food prep is key. Keto is a new way of eating, so its not automatic to choose the right foods. Over time I know this will get easier as I learn, and as cravings fade away. I'm used to trying to force tons of protein to build muscle, now I have to be careful not to over do it. As I progress I'm sure I won't have to prep as much or plan ahead, there's just a learning period.

Learning about keto, and how the body processes excess protein has been an eye opener for me. As someone who has always been underweight, and worked hard to build muscle for nearly two decades, I was always of the belief that extra protein was good. Now I understand that excess protein is converted to sugars and spikes insulin, which can be bad for people who are insulin resistant. So not having to focus so much on proteins will be a shift for me.

I'm interested to see how keto effects my performance and ability to build strength. Its supposed to produce quicker recovery, which should improve muscle growth. In the past I've had problems gaining weight because I couldn't eat enough calories, with keto, that's much easier, just down a couple tablespoons of olive oil! 

My goal is to keep going for eight weeks total, and see how I'm feeling, and assess how its impacting my life. A Keto diet is "limiting" from the stand point of not eating a lot of things that the average population eats, so there could be a sense of missing out. On the other hand, I get to eat a lot of things they don't, like tons of fatty foods. And, if the reports are true, the desire for sugary foods will wane as I progress. 

Socially, I've made one important observation: When sharing food I made, like desserts, unless I want to have a long conversation about what a keto diet is and the health benefits, and argue that fat is healthy, just don't tell anyone the food is "keto friendly." People tend to look at anything that's a "diet food" as not tasty and don't want to try it. Most keto food isn't traditionally diet-food, they're full of fat and salt, which are two of the major flavor enhancers, so the food tastes great. If people don't know before trying it that something is "healthy" or diet related, they taste it with an open mind, and I avoid yet another long explanation.

Besides the social aspects of food, I also want to see how it affects my overall life. Will I have more energy? Will my workouts and recovery improve? Will I be able to build muscle? Will I get shredded? Will be more focused? Will my moods improve? If I'm feeling great, and energetic and happy, and writing a lot and being creative, and productive, those things will easily out weight any social-food related issues.

I've already had several people comment that I look really good. I've not lost any weight or fat (Remember, those aren't goals for me. A lot of people are very successful using keto to lose fat.), but people are still commenting that I look better and asking what I'm doing.

Guess I'm gonna find out!