Still dealing with slow metabolism after restrictive eating. How to restore?

[nobody]

Been peating consistently for a handful of months now... still dealing with low metabolic rate and tendency to store calories as fat easily. I also naturally lean towards a macronutrient ratio higher in fat. How do sedentary folks increase their caloric requirements? Estimating to ingest anywhere between 2000 - 2500 calories each day according to hunger, with half the calories coming from fat, 80-100g protein and less than what is generally recommended in carbs (maybe 150g or less). Simple yet enjoyable diet- whole milk, raw butter, organ meat, honey, dates, and oranges.

 

[Nomane Euger]

Been peating consistently for a handful of months now... still dealing with low metabolic rate and tendency to store calories as fat easily. I also naturally lean towards a macronutrient ratio higher in fat. How do sedentary folks increase their caloric requirements? Estimating to ingest anywhere between 2000 - 2500 calories each day according to hunger, with half the calories coming from fat, 80-100g protein and less than what is generally recommended in carbs (maybe 150g or less). Simple yet enjoyable diet- whole milk, raw butter, organ meat, honey, dates, and oranges.

Hi,

what do you define a low metabolism?how does these foods you listed make you feel each on their own?do you eat muscle meat,do you eat salt?which organs do you eat,do they make you feel good,or do you eat them because you potentially think they are good for you in theory?do you feel warm?

i wish you fun

 

[nobody]

I generally feel warm and okay. And I eat the organ meat just for the vitamins and health benefits. I would prefer to only have milk if that was complete on its own, but I’d have to consume a lot more milk than I could possibly imagine. I felt best having a quart alone or with some honey/dates/cardamom/saffron for each of the 3 meals and no snacks in between.

 

[Nomane Euger]

I generally feel warm and okay. And I eat the organ meat just for the vitamins and health benefits. I would prefer to only have milk if that was complete on its own, but I’d have to consume a lot more milk than I could possibly imagine. I felt best having a quart alone or with some honey/dates/cardamom/saffron for each of the 3 meals and no snacks in between.

hi,wich organs do you eat?do you feel better from it?is your sleep deep?is your propency to store fat the only factor that make you think you have "low metabolism" ?

i wish you fun

 

[LadyRae]

It can take a year, meanwhile, be cautious with fat from food.

 

[Momma]

meanwhile, be cautious with fat from food.

Why?

 

[LadyRae]

Why?

People who've been restricting calories will gain weight fast afterwards. Keeping fat intake low will help the transition without gaining a ton of weight.

 

[Peatful]

Been peating consistently for a handful of months now... still dealing with low metabolic rate and tendency to store calories as fat easily. I also naturally lean towards a macronutrient ratio higher in fat. How do sedentary folks increase their caloric requirements? Estimating to ingest anywhere between 2000 - 2500 calories each day according to hunger, with half the calories coming from fat, 80-100g protein and less than what is generally recommended in carbs (maybe 150g or less). Simple yet enjoyable diet- whole milk, raw butter, organ meat, honey, dates, and oranges.

Are you male or female?
Age?

How long did you restrict?



Is you current diet milk, butter, liver, honey, oranges and dates?
If so- Why are you still restricting?

 

[nobody]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I restricted for a few years. I'm male and 23 years. I know it may appear restrictive, but I am not limiting my foods with any intention of orthorexic behavior. I have tried all sorts of food combinations with many varieties of fruits, dairy products, meat, lentils, starch, vegetables, etc. My digestion is not good, and I prefer to eat what is appealing to taste. So yeah, it is mainly milk because cheese doesn't work for me, nor does meat really fare well, so I have some kidney, heart, liver, thymus, and pancreas as a dense source of nutrients, and jasmine rice didn't work as it sits in my stomach no matter how well cooked. I wasn't a picky eater as a kid, but I do seem to have developed a specific palate for sweet foods such as fresh milk, cream, butter, honey, aromatic white rice, raw eggnogs, coconut cream, ripe fruits of all kinds, etc.

 

[Peatful]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I restricted for a few years. I'm male and 23 years. I know it may appear restrictive, but I am not limiting my foods with any intention of orthorexic behavior. I have tried all sorts of food combinations with many varieties of fruits, dairy products, meat, lentils, starch, vegetables, etc. My digestion is not good, and I prefer to eat what is appealing to taste. So yeah, it is mainly milk because cheese doesn't work for me, nor does meat really fare well, so I have some kidney, heart, liver, thymus, and pancreas as a dense source of nutrients, and jasmine rice didn't work as it sits in my stomach no matter how well cooked. I wasn't a picky eater as a kid, but I do seem to have developed a specific palate for sweet foods such as fresh milk, cream, butter, honey, aromatic white rice, raw eggnogs, coconut cream, ripe fruits of all kinds, etc.

Some will attack my approach
But i would love to see you heal

Being male and young
You certainly need more kcal

Are you familiar with The Minnesota Starvation Experiment?
It’s fascinating
Those lean men at maintenance coming into the experiment were eating 3200 kcal a day
Starved at 1350 iirc

You are still in a semi restricted state
Healing may look like it happening
But it’s pseudo recovery

Slowly up your calories
Try to get 4000
Also if possible i would do 40/30/30 or 50/20/20 c/f/p
This helps blood sugar regulation and less stress on your adrenals which in turn helps your thyroid

Will you gain weight?
Of course
You are in a healing process
Then the weight will come off pretty effortlessly
But you will feel so good again
The weight gain is tertiary

With your age you should heal pretty quickly
But healing takes energy
And your current diet isn’t supplying enough
Hence no restoration as noted in your title

 

[Jessie]

I think it'll be impossible to correct low metabolism if the predominate caloric intake is from fat. It's counter intuitive to oxidative phosphorylation. Carbohydrate should be at least 50%. Maybe higher for sick people.

If someone has good thyroid function and great liver health they might be able to get away with higher fat diets (still not anywhere near low carb), but that's only because they're utilizing glycogen more efficiently and sparingly.

The moment someone kicks in the catabolic hormones to start breaking down tissue for glucose is the moment they've went too low. And for low metabolic people that can literally start happening a couple hours after their last meal. Whereas healthy people it's usually 5-6 hours.

My advice is to focus on a high-carb, moderate/low fat, and low protein. No lower than 50% carbs, no higher than 20% protein. Fat can fluctuate between the remaining calories since it's the most expendable, i.e drop or raise depending on if you're trying to maintain or lose weight.

The goal is to minimize gluconeogenesis and lipolysis while increasing carbon dioxide. I would also recommend getting labs, because you may need thyroid.

 

[nobody]

Some will attack my approach
But i would love to see you heal

Being male and young
You certainly need more kcal

Are you familiar with The Minnesota Starvation Experiment?
It’s fascinating
Those lean men at maintenance coming into the experiment were eating 3200 kcal a day
Starved at 1350 iirc

You are still in a semi restricted state
Healing may look like it happening
But it’s pseudo recovery

Slowly up your calories
Try to get 4000
Also if possible i would do 40/30/30 or 50/20/20 c/f/p
This helps blood sugar regulation and less stress on your adrenals which in turn helps your thyroid

Will you gain weight?
Of course
You are in a healing process
Then the weight will come off pretty effortlessly
But you will feel so good again
The weight gain is tertiary

With your age you should heal pretty quickly
But healing takes energy
And your current diet isn’t supplying enough
Hence no restoration as noted in your title

I've read similar advice on Gwyneth Olwyn's blog. In honesty, I'm not sure if it is a one size fits all approach. I've discovered written reports from folks saying they just kept getting fatter on this protocol, which in effect created more severe health issues over time. Maybe it's worth a try even with my discernment.

 

[area51puy]

People who've been restricting calories will gain weight fast afterwards. Keeping fat intake low will help the transition without gaining a ton of weight.

This

@haidut said in a generative energy podcast a few years ago there was a study were the cell would drop the function of burning glucose for energy with extended keto and or fasting.

So your body adapts to burning fat and that’s why people on keto gain so much weight right back after stopping.

So how long it would take? I guess would depend how far your body went into burning fat for fuel.

Your age should be plus , thyroid function and how much damage to your metabolism has happen due too pufa consumption and other environmental toxins.

So low fat and higher carbohydrates and moderate protein and supplementing with aspirin or niacinamide which will lower fatty acid oxidation and help your cells transitions back to burning glucose for fuel.

 

[Peatful]

I've read similar advice on Gwyneth Olwyn's blog. In honesty, I'm not sure if it is a one size fits all approach. I've discovered written reports from folks saying they just kept getting fatter on this protocol, which in effect created more severe health issues over time. Maybe it's worth a try even with my discernment.

Don’t know who that is or what they endorse.
Nor why you are reading it.

I was so sick. So underfed. So malnourished.
As much as I didn’t know how it would end up; i intuitively knew i had to eat.
My desire to heal was bigger than any fear.

Slowly upping calories to nourish yourself isn’t radical or even testimony worthy.

If you have a difficult relationship to food or to yourself i can see how this approach would be challenging.

I learned a lot.
I didn’t do it all right.
But my body still healed and i am well now.

Our bodies are amazing are working for us.

Best.

 

[superhappy]

you can use cyproheptadine to increase apetite and then eat high carb low fat. You'll gain water weight from the glycogen when you increase carbs which is not a bad thing. There was some post somewhere on here showing how metabolisms responds fairly quickly when you increase carb intake.

 

[Jonk]

One hypothesis is that with restrictive eating you're not only consuming less calories, you are relying on serotonin and stress hormones to get your digestion and metabolism going. When switching over to a state of less stress hormones you are also taking away the things that kept things going. Trying to facilitate a more gentle transition is what I would have done differently if I could do it all over again. Being mindful of cravings is a good thing, and I think it helps digestion a lot, and eating a lot of fat isn't necessarily a bad thing. Remember fat isn't just a fuel source that the body has to burn off, it's important for hormones and androgens and can help a lot in digestion and making carbs more easily digested. Something that makes me feel really good is having about three meals/day, and with each meal I have orange juice and a lot of beef tallow. Longer chained fats will stimulate CCK and slowing down the gastric emptying. If I have just a big glass of OJ without the fat my blood sugar is all over the place. Keeping your blood sugar in check might be something to look out for. One other thing is to be mindful of how you react to certain foods. I know Mike Fave on the Energy Balance podcast spoke about how he lost a lot of weight when he quit dairy, because for him it was a source of intestinal stress.

Remember, you need to find what works for you. Your cravings might be misguided sometimes, but they usually tell you something.

 

[LLight]

How much liquid are you drinking in a day?
If it's too much, it can be a problem.

 

[Nik665]

Been peating consistently for a handful of months now... still dealing with low metabolic rate and tendency to store calories as fat easily. I also naturally lean towards a macronutrient ratio higher in fat. How do sedentary folks increase their caloric requirements? Estimating to ingest anywhere between 2000 - 2500 calories each day according to hunger, with half the calories coming from fat, 80-100g protein and less than what is generally recommended in carbs (maybe 150g or less). Simple yet enjoyable diet- whole milk, raw butter, organ meat, honey, dates, and oranges.

How many calories are you eating now and what’s your height weight. Why do you think you have a low metabolic rate

 

[PopSocket]

People who've been restricting calories will gain weight fast afterwards. Keeping fat intake low will help the transition without gaining a ton of weight.

^^^ This is the best advice you can get when starting a Ray Peat inspired nutrition.

I like many others experienced a lot of weight gain(fat and water, used to be super shredded) first 7-8 months even though I had 3,500-4,000+ calorie diet prior. Was 12-13 years ultra strict keto/carni and my body just didn't know how to respond to carbs and ballooned up. And I had no thyroid issues with TSH below 1 and hormones all in optimal range. Essentially I was doing Keto + carbs for the first few months because I could not let go of fats and it was a disaster :-D

Best to limit fats for awhile, later on you can add more and more until feeling optimal. Now I am back to my old body but feeling less tense/stressed due to chronically lower cortisol/adrenaline. Best switch ever, thanks Ray !

 

[Mazzle]

I think it'll be impossible to correct low metabolism if the predominate caloric intake is from fat. It's counter intuitive to oxidative phosphorylation. Carbohydrate should be at least 50%. Maybe higher for sick people.

If someone has good thyroid function and great liver health they might be able to get away with higher fat diets (still not anywhere near low carb), but that's only because they're utilizing glycogen more efficiently and sparingly.

The moment someone kicks in the catabolic hormones to start breaking down tissue for glucose is the moment they've went too low. And for low metabolic people that can literally start happening a couple hours after their last meal. Whereas healthy people it's usually 5-6 hours.

My advice is to focus on a high-carb, moderate/low fat, and low protein. No lower than 50% carbs, no higher than 20% protein. Fat can fluctuate between the remaining calories since it's the most expendable, i.e drop or raise depending on if you're trying to maintain or lose weight.

The goal is to minimize gluconeogenesis and lipolysis while increasing carbon dioxide. I would also recommend getting labs, because you may need thyroid.

!!!!! This makes me wonder. Always after eating a low carby meal I crave something sweet. I never feel nourished unless I have something carby. If I have a carby meal, I do not get sweet cravings and feel satisfied. I trashed my metabolism with strict zero cal alt day fasting for years in a punishing effort to loose weight (after an initial drop it just gradually went up instead) I still struggle to eat three times a day. I am going to try high carb and see what gives. My weight has been steady (but obese) for almost a year now so I know my cal intake v exercise is balancing out or I would still be gaining. (I had to mention that because it's the only thing that has kept me sane and helped me ignore the 'calories in v calories out' argument and keeps me from punishing starvation diets!) I have no idea what to eat though