Keto and the Cuckoo

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.

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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!

Hunger? What Do You Mean, "What Does It Mean?"

Okay. I've got to admit that I think I have this who ketogenic diet thing pretty dialed in. I've lost 95.4 pounds since I started the program whose tenets are pretty basic and straight forward: keep carbohydrate intake below 20g a day, eat only from the allowed food list and eat only when hungry. The point is that, when carb intake is low enough, the liver stops pushing glucose into the blood. Without the glucose for fuel, the body switches to burning ketones (fat). And as long as one doesn't overeat dietary fat (more on that in another post), our body's on board fat is mobilized and all is right with the world.

Yes, yes. I'm the queen of ketosis. I'm a happy fat burner. Let's go down that simple check list:

• Carbs low? Check
• Keeping to the allowed food list? Indeed
• In ketosis? Always
• Eating only when hungry? You bettcha....uh... well... Let me think.

This What is hunger on keto? What is it when NOT on keto? That is the question. For more information on the ketogenic diet and links to items mentioned in this video, see below.

Here's the thing. Figuring out what hunger actually is has been a true challenge. Several months into eating this way I was tripping along, loving life and this diet. I had lost about 45 pounds but things had really slowed up. I had an opportunity to ask a world expert on the ketogenic diet, Dr. Eric Westman, why I had seemingly stopped losing weight when I was in ketosis. He asked several qualifying questions and then got to that last one, "Are you eating only when hungry?" I replied pretty much as I wrote it above. I stammered out something and then realized that, no, I couldn't say I did. I ate when it was mealtime. Only low carb and proper 'keto' foods, but the meals were mandated more by the clock than my body needing to be fed.

This led to a practice of asking myself whether I was eating out of hunger or habit. The next trick was to figure out what hunger actually felt like. It doesn't seem like we should have to really over think something so basic as whether we're hungry or not. We don't spend a lot of time pondering whether we're tired, chilly, hot or if we have to poo. We just know.

But our bodies have been jacked up on glucose for decades now. And since glucose can't be stored in the blood (we only have about 5g of the stuff in our bloodstream) our brain keeps calling for more every couple of hours. That's when you feel the need to mid morning after having downed a gracious large breakfast of a slice of whole grain toast with a slather of fat free strawberry preserves, a glass of orange juice - which is really a slice of sugar with a slather of sugar and a glass of sugar. Ten thirty rolls around and you need a muffin (sugar). So goes for lunch, then mid-afternoon slump, then dinner. All you can do all day is think about food because your brain is hankering for glucose.

Ah, but when fat-adapted, your brain doesn't have to yell at you to eat. The steady flow of ketones (our brains do beautifully using ketones for fuel) which come from our body's fat stores, quiets all that noise. No more 'feed me, feed me, feed me now or pay the consequences!'

The thing is we can still be in the habit of eating, even long after the roller coaster of glucose induced hanger is gone. And more than that, we an be so worried that we'll get hungry, we fret about being more than 45 minutes away from our next feed.

So I've been working on being truly mindful of eating. What is hunger? Am I hungry? How much is enough? And I find the more I practice this, the less space food takes up in my mind. As I've said and written before, food is no longer the boss of me. 

While humanity has spent millennia trying to be free from hunger, we're in a position to be free from food. Maybe we can spend the extra time and brain power or solving other problems. 

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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!

January. The Cruelest Month? Or Just the Weirdest?

Something weird is going on with me. Or inside me. Or maybe something is going on with the rest of the universe and it's just showing up on my scale. Because that's a thing, right? The universe conspires to consternate us, or at least me, and edge my weight up for no discernible reason. Again.

Don't misunderstand. I'm happy and content with my weight. Let me type that again. .... I'm happy and content with my weight. This is no small thing for a woman who has been unhappily overweight for over 30 years. But having started following the ketogenic diet and successfully losing more weight than I ever allowed myself to believe was possible, I'm in a good place.

My scale? It's in a weird place. Success of any sort is never without turns in the road, challenges and surprises. And even as my weight has come slowly, gradually and steadily down, it has ticked up, then down, then up, then lingered in one place. This is the life cycle of weight loss.

Over the last week or so, though, has been more 'not a straight downward trajectory' than usual. This got me to wondering. I'm in ketosis. My blood sugar is perfect. No foods not on the allowed list (except some ill-advised packets of cashews. Wrong, wrong, wrong.) But in general, I've been doing what I've done all along. So what gives?

Thank goodness I have what must be the longest running daily weight log in the surrounding seven counties. I looked back at the last time I had an unexplained weight gain after having reached a new low. Turns out it was this exact time last year. January. Could be a coinkeedink. Could be seasonal. Or could be the universe messing with me. 'Cause the universe has nothing better to do these days...

Moral of the story? If your weight loss or whatever goals you have are challenged, step back and analyze why. You owe it to yourself to not give up. Keep on keeping on, to cite a worn out phrase. Keep the faith, to repeat a more spiritual ad soulful one. 

Now, roll tape...

A couple of observations about my own situation and suggestions for others. Success is never in a straight line. For more information on the ketogenic diet and links to products used in this video, see below.

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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!