Reintroducing Peaty Eating after Very Low Carb, Low Calorie

[kimbriel]

Hi all -

I had a series of health problems (culminating in lung carcinoid) that led to me hitting the obese category for the first time in my life (Hashi's didn't help).

For the past 4 months I have been on a very low carb (less than 60g a day), high protein (100-130g a day), and low PUFA diet (less than 4g a day) with moderate fat overall. However, the calories were so low (800 a day, it was medically supervised), that it kind of doesn't matter I was low PUFA - I was low everything.

I lost 45 lbs in the past 4 months. I feel okay actually, but I know I tanked my metabolism. We are now in the reintroducing phase of the program, so I'm up to 1100 cals a day and going up by 100 cals a week.

Has anyone reintroduced Peaty eating after extreme anti-Peaty eating? Any tips or tricks? My health markers actually look decent, other than my FSH being obscenely high and I stopped menstruating regularly. I'm back on Progest-E, 3 weeks per month.

Looking for tips and tricks as I don't want to be low carb/ low sugar forever, since I know it isn't good. I was thinking of starting with a spoonful of coconut oil and some salted orange juice to sip throughout the day. My cortisol actually doesn't look as bad as I thought it would.

Any ideas for me?

 

[Blossom]

It’s just an idea but someone suggested to me to go up by 5 grams of carbs per week until you reach your goal range of carbs. I don’t know if there’s any science behind it but I like the idea of going slow and making steady progress rather than staying stuck forever on low carb eating. Congratulations on making it through everything you have so far and best wishes!

 

[Peatful]

1- know your body is going to hang onto any nutrition for dear life
2- you will gain (water) weight
3- you may get discouraged
4- remind yourself that your body is healing and healing takes time and be gracious to yourself
5- you may actually go diabetic. Sugar has a hard time entering a stressed cell. Your body will need to relearn
6- help yourself by keeping your blood sugar steady. Mini meals of 40/30/30. Carbs/protein/fat. Mini meals so there are no dips in your bs. This helps you heal.
7- taking your temperature helps you figure stuff out once you’re in a good consistent state
8- don’t get discouraged. Be proud of yourself. Healing isn’t for wimps.
9- food as medicine. Supplements are to be used judiciously and simply to supplement short term prn.




I came from a history of starvation.
Self inflicted
I was an idiot

Healing was hard aesthetically
I was so messed up in the head
But
I started to feel so much better

It wasn’t easy
It took time
And it was absolutely positively worth it

 

[kimbriel]

Thanks all - I am printing these tips out and putting them on the fridge!

 

[Dapose]

I recommend not changing your diet too drastically because it sounds like you were doing low Pufa high protein. Which sounds good to me. I would just add a fruit that you like that’s sugary sweet like grapes and maybe milk and sugar coffee. After awhile idk a few months start eating bigger meals. adding more dairy.
I would skip coconut oil. Your body in my estimation is just going to store C oil until you get better at eating.
Focus on foods and meals not goofy snacks. Once your metabolism is running better with high thyroid function snack all you want.
-For context of my opinion… This is my recommendation based on 2.5 years of doing a very low carb keto carnivore diet that destroyed my metabolism. I always ate two or less meals a day a worked a labor job.
Good luck and bon appetite!

 

[tokimaturi]

It takes time for your metabolic rate to go up. If you're gaining weight with peaty eating, you're eating over your metabolic capacity and should slow down with increasing your calories. Peat has talked about this. I suppose it's possible to get too high blood sugar even if you keep your fat moderate if you've got excessive lipolysis. To prevent this, It's important to eat smaller amounts more frequently. Things like nicotinamide and aspirin also help with excessive lipolysis. Keep your vitamin D, salt and calcium intake up. Drinking plenty of milk helps keep your metabolic rate up. Take your pulse and temperature at waking, 30 minutes after breakfast and in the afternoon. If they're low, don't be afraid to consider supplementary thyroid.

It's definitely important not to eat too many calories when you're unable to metabolise them. Eating frequently is more important. Other than that, Peat has said there's not really any need to transition slowly to a higher carb ratio and my experience reflects this as well. But don't try to push something that feels off to you. Listen to your body and I'm sure you'll be fine.

 

[kimbriel]

I recommend not changing your diet too drastically because it sounds like you were doing low Pufa high protein. Which sounds good to me. I would just add a fruit that you like that’s sugary sweet like grapes and maybe milk and sugar coffee. After awhile idk a few months start eating bigger meals. adding more dairy.
I would skip coconut oil. Your body in my estimation is just going to store C oil until you get better at eating.
Focus on foods and meals not goofy snacks. Once your metabolism is running better with high thyroid function snack all you want.
-For context of my opinion… This is my recommendation based on 2.5 years of doing a very low carb keto carnivore diet that destroyed my metabolism. I always ate two or less meals a day a worked a labor job.
Good luck and bon appetite!

Thank you, I'll start snacking on grapes.

 

[kimbriel]

It takes time for your metabolic rate to go up. If you're gaining weight with peaty eating, you're eating over your metabolic capacity and should slow down with increasing your calories. Peat has talked about this. I suppose it's possible to get too high blood sugar even if you keep your fat moderate if you've got excessive lipolysis. To prevent this, It's important to eat smaller amounts more frequently. Things like nicotinamide and aspirin also help with excessive lipolysis. Keep your vitamin D, salt and calcium intake up. Drinking plenty of milk helps keep your metabolic rate up. Take your pulse and temperature at waking, 30 minutes after breakfast and in the afternoon. If they're low, don't be afraid to consider supplementary thyroid.

It's definitely important not to eat too many calories when you're unable to metabolise them. Eating frequently is more important. Other than that, Peat has said there's not really any need to transition slowly to a higher carb ratio and my experience reflects this as well. But don't try to push something that feels off to you. Listen to your body and I'm sure you'll be fine.

I believe that the extreme weight loss I've had (somewhere between 40 and 45 lbs in less than 4 months) probably released a lot of free fatty acids into my bloodstream. I'll start supplementing with aspirin.

I actually do a full T3 supplementation daily (45mcg) and 1 grain of NP Thyroid, to make up for all the FT3 my thyroid should be producing but isn't. I'm sure it's raised my temps a bit (and my bpm is somewhere between 75-85) but my temps still tend to remain pretty low, though I generally forget to take temps in the afternoon. I do supplement with 50mcg Vit D because my Vit D levels tend to be on the lowest end of normal.

 

[tokimaturi]

I find things that greatly help with T3's effectiveness are taking it in small doses throughout the day and getting sugar frequently. I believe you should be very sensitive to how you react to thyroid and adjusting as necessary instead of relying too strictly on the numbers. If eating breakfast drops your temps, then taking anti-stress countermeasures before going to bed helps. Thing like reducing the length of the fast and drinking warm milk with a tablespoon of sugar. I also get a very strong anti-stress effect that lasts 'till morning by taking niacinamide and a good dose of baking soda right before going to sleep.