Have you ever felt overwhelmed by all the conflicting advice and recommendations regarding the ketogenic protocol—not to mention the dire warnings about how bad for you it is? To whom should listen? What does our experience and common sense tell us about what hasn’t worked for us? And why does everyone seem to be yelling?
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In my private support group on Patreon, members can access a "topic suggestion spreadsheet" and—you guessed—suggest topics for the short videos I record every weekday morning. (After over 850 of these "snippets," it helps to have input about subjects people want to hear!)
One recent submission was from a who advised they kept "falling off the wagon" after about ten days following the ketogenic protocol. They had, in the past, successfully followed the diet. They lost weight, felt great, and all the good things that can come when one lays off carbs. But there was some back-sliding with the predictable results: weight gain, joint pain return, generally feeling lousy. But this time around, staying on track seemed more challenging. In their words:
"Hello, Casey. I have been restarting every 10 days since the beginning of November. I have done keto well and have lost 50 pounds in the past (several times), and now, as I'm older, I feel like I keep falling off the wagon. I cannot get away with anything - I can't have caffeine (can't tolerate it anymore), etc., and I gain weight super fast now. I have just been in a bit of a rut for several months where I start to get back on board, start losing, and then ten days in - I lose focus or something. I guess I'm wondering about being able to really establish this habit ... since I keep getting off course at the 10 to 14-day mark. Thank you!"
A conversation I had just had with another patron inspired my response. During a one-on-one session, they shared with me a point made by a medical professional who cautioned against using phrases like, "I fell off the wagon." That is a passive way of diminishing our responsibilities for our choices. Let's face it—we don't fall off the proverbial wagon: we jump. One of the few things over which we have control is what we decide to put in our mouths. Absent someone force-feeding us, it is our forks in our hands which we raise to our pie-holes.
It may sound harsh, the idea that we are powerless in the face of food. But, c'mon, y'all. After all, we've been through in our lives, as varied as our histories are, do we want to peddle the idea that we are helpless in the presence of cheese puffs, that chocolate bunnies staring at us with their creepy eyes render us defenseless? Are fries omnipotent?
No way! No matter our age, gender, or stage of life, we've been through harrowing things. We've buried loved ones, lost homes to bankruptcy, had partners betray us. People have broken our hearts. We've endured terrifying diagnoses and even scarier treatments. But we crumble when presented with a muffin?
Please know that I used all the mental dodges back in the day. I didn’t do myself any favors. Just the opposite. Look at my before photos to see where self-delusion got me.
"I’m stronger than a cookie" is one of the best-selling slogans on my teespring shop. It's on stickers, shirts, mugs. I bought a shirt myself. And what does that have to do with staying on the wagon? It comes back to what we tell ourselves. Words matter. And those we say to ourselves matter the most. We don't fall, and no one has the power to push us. We decide (whether we want to own that fact or not.)
A suggestion I made was to, first, stop repeating in their head how they’ve failed before. Replace it with affirmations, replacing negative with positive thoughts: I will stay on track for 11 days. Then devise a visual reinforcement for those 10 days. It can be marks on a calendar, post-it notes with numbers 1-11 on them, 11 marbles moved from one to jar another. Whatever inspires. Then, after getting to day 11 successfully, do it again. Soon, there will be weeks of success stacked up. And it becomes easier and easier.
We are strong. We have survived. We choose.
Now, stay on that wagon and enjoy the ride. The view is great from up there.
Disclaimer: I’m not a medical doctor, researcher, or Ph.D., but instead, I’ve been fortunate to have had the time and resources to research the ketogenic diet, also known as LCHF (low carb/high fat). The information I share is based solely on my understanding of that research. We are all responsible for our own choices, including what we put in our mouths, and there’s no substitute for each of us checking things out ourselves. And I’m not a medical professional in any way. Go Keto With Casey is not a medical site. “Duh,” you might say. But best to make it clear to all. I welcome questions, comments, and even civil criticism. I’m still learning. So, if you have something to add, go for it. Links in this post and all others may direct you to affiliate links, where I will receive a small amount of the purchase price of any items you buy through those links. Thanks!
OUR CUCKOO (BEFORE SHE GOT HER MINUTE HAND REPLACED)
We have a cuckoo clock. It's one of my favorite things, chirping throughout the days and nights since it was given to us by the grateful father of a German exchange student our family inherited. (That's a story for another time.) Cuckoo has hung in our kitchen, overseeing our lives for over twenties year. Comings and goings, graduations, parties, weddings, wakes. And innumerable meals.
What does our Black Forest clock have to do with the ketogenic diet—the main raison d'être of this blog? Stick with me here. The metaphor is on deck.
Cuckoo has been ubiquitous in my life, heard in every room of the house, and even in the gardens when weather permitted open windows.
Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock ... *cheep! cheep! cheep!*
Cuckoo is the very definition of complex simplicity. Keep her chains pulled every day to ensure the pendulum continues moving side to side, and let the intricate mechanisms behind her face do the rest. (Can you sense the metaphor building?)
There came a time recently where the usual tiny adjustments to Cuckoo weren't enough to keep her going: a little nudge to the cabinet to make sure it was plumb, correct the placement of the maple leaf on the pendulum, up or down, to speed her up or slow her down—gravity has its effect on clocks as well as people—all to no avail. The ticking faltered again and again.
We're fortunate to have a clock specialist in our city. He brought my late mother's grandfather clock back to chiming health. Could he help poor Cuckoo, or was she beyond hope?
Happily, she' back home, cleaned up, her chains are shiny, and the wooden components have a rich stain. She now even has a minute hand! (Yet another long story.)
The real work, though, is inside the cabinet. It turns out that her delicate works were gummed up and grimy. I learned that just a little check-up every few years is in order.
Alright though. What is the connection between Cuckoo and keto? When she was reinstalled at her vantage point overseeing our lives and started back with the ticking and chirping, she sounded different. I realized that her sounds to which I had become accustomed before were not at all how they should have been. Her now smooth, clear cheeps were in contrast to her pre-cleaning. She had been clanging before. And haltingly so. I had gotten used to it, not noticing the changes because they were gradual—chronic, if you will, instead of acute. Cuckoo was sending signals that changes were needed. *CLANG JANGLE CRACK*
And now the allegory arrives.
Our bodies are let us know when things aren't right. From joint pain to weight gain, blood sugar to blood pressure issues, brain fog to heartburn to depression, the signals are there. The changes for the worse can be so gradual as to be unnoticed. We get used to the clangs of our joints. Putting on ten pounds turns into an extra fifty. Our moods can't seem to come out of the basement, and having energy is a nostalgic memory.
For me, all those messages from my corporeal self were ignored and for too long. The solution was to eat the food I am designed to eat. The ketogenic diet has brought me to good health—no more clanging.
I guess one could say I cleaned bad health's clock.
That metaphor might be too tortured, though.
Disclaimer: I’m not a medical doctor, researcher, or Ph.D., but instead, I’ve been fortunate to have had the time and resources to research the ketogenic diet, also known as LCHF (low carb/high fat). The information I share is based solely on my understanding of that research. We are all responsible for our own choices, including what we put in our mouths, and there’s no substitute for each of us checking things out ourselves. And I’m not a medical professional in any way. Go Keto With Casey is not a medical site. “Duh,” you might say. But best to make it clear to all. I welcome questions, comments, and even civil criticism. I’m still learning. So, if you have something to add, go for it. Links in this post and all others may direct you to affiliate links, where I will receive a small amount of the purchase price of any items you buy through those links. Thanks!
The tenets of a well-formulated ketogenic diet are pretty straightforward: keep carbohydrate intake to 20g/day or fewer (total carbs, not net), eat fatty sources of protein and don't eat if you're not hungry.
That's it. Truly. And the simplicity of it may be what gives some people pause. There must be more to it than that, right? The next question that many ask is, "Wait. What about eating plenty of vegetables & fruit? You forgot to add lots of veggies to the protocol."
In a previous post, the topic of fruit was covered and, you may be shocked to read that fruit is just not part of the program. Fruit = sugar. But what about veggies? We've been told to load up on brightly colored vegetables and that veg is pretty much "free" good. I think even some well known fee based diet programs still follow that recommendation. Not only must they be good for you, how in the world will you be able to... ahem.. "go" without copious amounts of vegetables?
The thing is, there are no unlimited foods on the diet. It's illogical to think one could eat endless portions of anything, keto-friendly or not, and not either stall out or, more likely, gain weight. In the end, consuming more fuel than your body needs for its energy requirements will result in exactly what common sense tells us will happen: nothing good. And there are no minimum requirements for vegetables, leafy and green or otherwise. To the contrary. For most people, the majority of carbohydrate intake comes from non-starchy vegetables (for a partial list of those, see the 2 page document of the food list I follow) and since the program is to keep total carbohydrate intake to 20/g/day or fewer, there are maximum veggies to consume. Not minimum. It comes to about a cup a day of non-starchy veggies (before cooking) and about 2 cups a day of leafy greens a day. Again, maximum. I often go days without eating any vegetables at all.
This is a haul of veg that lasted us quite a while. Some days we eat more vegetables. some less. Some none.
This is so NOT what we've been told for decades. Keep in mind, carbohydrate is not an essential nutrient. That means we don't have to consume it. We do indeed need to consume protein and fat since the components of those two macronutrients can't be created by our bodies. But carbs? Not so much.
And the nutrition in vegetables is paltry compared to that in animal products. Check out the writing of Dr. Georgia Ede and Zoë Harcombe and their deep dives into this very topic. The ketogenic diet with the delicious, luscious, satiating - and a whole bunch of other positive adjectives - foods is simply very nutrient dense. Veggies can't compete
As for it idea that our bodies won't be able to process foods and then be able to eliminate the waste without vegetables, I can share that hasn't been even close to a problem for me, nor for the many people to whom I speak. Keep in mind that many things about our internal workings will behave differently when we're fat burners than when we were sugar burners. You'll be amazed just how many things. Seriously.
Some people will mourn not eating mixing bowl sized salads. Some will be relieved they don't have to eat one more spear of asparagus or floret of broccoli. If you're in the former situation, take solace in the fact that you can dip your steak in the bleu cheese dressing that used to cover your garden-on-plate.
It's hard to feel too bad about that.
Disclaimer: I’ve been fortunate to have had the time and resources to research the ketogenic diet, also known as LCHF (low carb/high fat). The information I share is based solely on my understanding of that research. We are all responsible for our own choices, including what we put in our mouths and there’s no substitute for each of us checking things out ourselves. And I’m not a medical professional in any way. Go Keto With Casey is not a medical site. “Duh,” you might say. But best to make it clear to all. I welcome questions, comments and even civil criticism. I’m still learning. So, if you have something to add, go for it. Links in this post and all others may direct you to affiliate links, where I will receive a small amount of the purchase price of any items you buy through those links. Thanks!
This is the second time that I've hit a new weight loss low and received a delivery from Stitch Fix on the same day. Maybe I should increase the frequency of my subscription! You can see my post about the first happy coincidence here.
First, apologies for the wretched sound situation on the video, if you decide to watch it. Equipment malfunctions! Second, some of the clothing pieces appear larger in the video than they do in real life. (The same can be said for me.) A couple of subscribers to my YouTube channel questioned the sizes. But it is an optical illusion. The clothes are pretty small. Amazingly small, considering where I started out. That, or I'm just not a good videographer and don't know how to stage things.
Ignore the horrendous lighting and my puffy eyes. That's me with some 22W jeans, so smaller than those I wore when I started the ketogenic diet. The photo is from several months, and about 15 pounds ago.
My history with clothes was not so much of a love/hate relationship as a hate/detest relationship. I've never been one to feel bouyed by retail therapy. Just not my thing. And this goes for even grocery shopping. Don't love to go to stores. Pair that with being very heavy and the result was my clothes came from tables at Costco. I simply bought the largest jeans and cotton blouses available. See the before photo at the top of the sidebar of this site for an example. Those are 24Ws straining across my ample backside. The blouse? I believe it was a XXL. So, more than not want to shop in general, buying clothes in any manner was excruciating. The result? My uniform of giant jeans and $13 blouses was pretty much all I owned. Those and Dansko knockoffs because my very wide feet couldn't fit in the real things.
There are downstream impacts of hating the clothes you own and the body those clothes cover. Social invitations are declined. Going out with your Lovely Mate feels like being put on exhibit, a cautionary tale to anyone who fears they'll be next in the fatty parade. Formal occasions? Forget it. I didn't even buy decent clothes for my daughter's wedding. And seeing photos of myself from the happy day sent me in to a true emotional tailspin. One of the deepest and longest lasting bouts of depression I've ever had. And I felt I ruined the day. Of course, no one was paying attention to me, as is proper. But we all struggle to see things from anything other than our own perspective. And the view from mine was miserable.
But as I lost weight after starting the ketogenic diet, that began to change. I not only needed to get new clothes, the ones I had being simply too large, I wanted new clothes. Something about my self-image was transforming from self-loathing to self-love. Sound sappy but it's accurate.
A friend suggested I try the service of having clothes not only delivered to me (no retail stores! Huzzah!) but chosen for me as well. And so started the building of my wardrobe, one box at a time.
There's more to all this, but it will have to come another day. I'm preparing to meet a friend for cocktails at a nice bar, and I'll be wearing snazzy clothes and probably some sassy pumps. No more clunky shoes, dumpy shirts or humongous jeans for me. BTW, I continued to buy jeans from Costco as I lost weight, always the same brand and style, in progressively smaller sizes and each new purchase was a victory. The first one was when the size wasn't followed by a "W". The next when I fit into size 14s, that of the average US female. I don't buy them there anymore. They don't carry a size small enough, size 6 being the smallest. True story.
And, oh yeh, as of this morning I've 93.3 pounds. Maybe I WILL up my Stitch Fix shipment schedule!
Here's the unboxing.....
Another New Low & Stitch Fix Unboxing! For more information on the ketogenic diet and links to items mentioned in this video, see below.
Disclaimer: I’ve been fortunate to have had the time and resources to research the ketogenic diet, also known as LCHF (low carb/high fat). The information I share is based solely on my understanding of that research. We are all responsible for our own choices, including what we put in our mouths and there’s no substitute for each of us checking things out ourselves. And I’m not a medical professional in any way. Go Keto With Casey is not a medical site. “Duh,” you might say. But best to make it clear to all. I welcome questions, comments and even civil criticism. I’m still learning. So, if you have something to add, go for it. Links in this post and all others may direct you to amazon.com, where I will receive a small amount of the purchase price of any items you buy through my affiliate links. Thanks!
@ Casey Durango 2024
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