Healthy Diet at Home

Am I Getting Enough Protein? (Photo by Florian ) With Nutritional Ketosis being held up lately as the Holy Grail of low-carb eating, there’s a lot of confusion regarding protein consumption, and just how much you need. Most of those who are turning to the Nutritional Ketosis way of eating are doing that because they have stalled in their weight-loss efforts. They are not dropping their protein intake because it’s healthier than a traditional low-carb diet. They are doing what they need to do to succeed. So How Much Protein Do You Need? Some of the numbers being tossed around lately are as low as .6 grams of protein per pound of lean body mass, but that’s the bare minimum a sedentary person needs to keep up with muscle repair. That doesn’t cover gluconeogenesis to supply the amount of glucose the brain, red blood cells, and kidney needs to function properly or the extra damage you do to your muscles during heavy exercise. That’s just the bare minimum a person who’s eating carbohydrates ...

The masses within the low-carb community tend to stick to about 20 to 35 net carbohydrates per day. The current perspective on Ketosis is that it takes 50 grams or less for most people to maintain that metabolic state. You’d think that asking, “How low is low carb?” would be rather silly. Wouldn’t the obvious answer be less than 50 carbohydrates per day? How Low is Low Carb? Well, maybe…but maybe not. How low is low carb exactly? Like almost anything, it all depends on which low-carb expert you ask, and how much weight you place on their theory and belief. It wasn’t very long ago that the same people who are currently trying to talk us into converting to a low protein, low carb, high-fat lifestyle (for our own good, of course) were preaching something very different. Gluten Exposure Has Resulted in Weight Gain  Understanding where the line is between a low-carb diet and something else is particularly important to me because I’ve recently found myself in the unwelcomed position of...

(This is part 9 and the final installment of a multi-part series on How to Tweak a Low Carb Diet . It explains the path I have traveled in my weight loss journey. If you arrived here without reading part 1, you can do so by clicking on the how-to link. Part 1 also contains links to the other posts in this series.) When you begin to restrict carbohydrates to less than about 100 carbs per day, the body is forced to draw upon its liver glycogen to keep your blood glucose levels steady. That’s according to Dr. Michael Eades. I can also tell you from experience, that during those first few days, the brain doesn’t get the proper amount of fuel to function correctly. Or at least, I don’t. I know that because I start having severe vertigo attacks. Other people have talked about being tired or having brain fog. Now, the way it’s supposed to work is that the liver converts the protein you don’t need for immediate repair purposes to glucose to feed the brain. The brain can partially run on ketone...