Low-carb update
Wednesday, August 22nd, 2012 08:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chanaleh
After about 4 weeks, I basically ditched the Primal regime (LJ | DW) as of a week ago Sunday, making fantastic banana-cinnamon-walnut-flaxseed-chocolate-chip pancakes and sweet potato home fries for brunch, and ending later with a fantastic burger from the Harlem Tavern which was (if slow in coming) exactly what I wanted.
So now I've had about 10 days off, to compare with 4 weeks on.
Things I have noticed:
Groceries: Expenditures up about 50% from past few months' average, no joke. My previous set of normal cooking habits has been heavily based for years on BEANS AND GRAINS ALL THE TIME. Guess what? Fresh vegetables (especially nice salad greens), fish and meat, and organic eggs? Cost a lot more. At, like, Passover levels -- not by coincidence, of course, since Passover is also a meat-and-vegetable-heavy time period.
Conversely, my impulse spending on outside snack food (not proper meals out or actual groceries) went way way down, because guess what? 90% of grab-n-go food options are sugar- and starch-based crap. And I'm including pizza and burritos in that basket as well as pastries and Clif Mojo bars. Which brings me to...
Planning: Again, this approach requires Preparedness at near-Passover levels. I have never been so scrupulous about bringing exactly one day's worth of meals and snacks to work every single day (rather than keeping the usual stash of chocolate, nuts, and Luna bars in my desk). And I have a new appreciation for the convenience of pouring out a bowl of Cheerios every morning, or pulling a quart of homemade bean chili out of the freezer as food for the next few days. (I'm sure there are other food categories one could pre-make and freeze, but I haven't really gotten a handle on them.) It eventually occurred to me that I should maybe hard-boil some eggs as instant/travel food, but in all seriousness I got stumped on: how are you supposed to check them for blood spots? But anyway.
Digestion: Really nothing to report. I am generally blessed with kind of an iron stomach, which basically goes "sure, whatever" no matter what I do or don't throw at it.
Cravings: I don't seem to experience major ongoing cravings for bread, chocolate, candy, or most carby things. What I DO get noticeable cravings for:
(1) CAKE
(2) FROSTING
(3) cake WITH frosting
(4) Starbucks' Maple Oatmeal Scones, which, arrgh! they seem to have largely discontinued, but I finally made some this past Sunday adapted from the Smitten Kitchen version, and that did the trick (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jessruth and justom also declared them pretty nommable).
With the rest of these observations, I found in writing them out that they all seem to be strongly interrelated, because they meander back and forth and cross-connect. So:
Hunger signals: What I've noticed most in the low-carb mode is that I don't get the sharp OMG HUNGRY stomach-feelings I am used to. I also don't get the strong "sated" feelings I am used to (which suggests to me that both are driven by insulin levels). Rather, I have a fairly constant low-grade feeling of the can't-quite-concentrate, "hmm, might be low on blood sugar" brain fog... which gets WORSE at various intervals and then I think "ah, perhaps this means I am now hungry". And eating something does help, but it never quite goes away.
Energy levels: I did seem to get past the "low-carb flu" stage, which apparently has to do with "metabolic flexibility" (developing the pathways to rely on burning proteins and fats rather than glucose), but I never noticed any particular increase in energy after that. -- It also occurred to me, though, that what I did not do is cut out dairy -- the Primal Blueprint says of whole dairy products, "use in moderation", but I was basically relying on cheese and (plain whole) yogurt among my daily food sources. Not that this seems to bother me -- I always eat a fair amount of dairy and it doesn't give me any noticeable trouble -- but part of the point of this was to see if my "baseline" changed at all. If I were going to do a full elimination-style diet, maybe I'd see something different...? but really, I feel like I am in a generally good enough state that the marginal utility of messing with it is not that high.
Weight: According to my highly questionable home scale, dropped about 6 lbs down (kind of all at once, AFTER a week or two, with a religious fast day in there), maybe another pound or two after that, and seemed to stabilize at 180 for the last couple weeks. This is not quite down to where I was last fall, but it's comfortable.
I should note that the two times in my life I "effortlessly" dropped a noticeable amount of weight in a short time, say 2-3 months, there were two significant common factors: (1) I was poor (therefore not spending money on frivolous/snacky foods), and (2) I was walking an hour or more a day, either to get back and forth to work (the summer of 1991 at Brandeis, so 20+ years ago), or because I was unemployed in a new city and did it for fun (last fall). N.B. also: Both those episodes were also followed by a quick rebound -- slightly surpassing my starting weight -- within another 6-8 weeks once I got back to more sedentary and well-fed habits. Thank you, evolutionary biology!
But I think about all those people who say "If I don't get an hour of exercise every single day, I just get into the most APPALLING/peevish/easily-overwhelmed mood", and I think, maybe that is the lifestyle change I need to take up? If I really want to experiment with shifting my baseline-normal? Maybe I'm living in those people's "before" states?
Mindfulness vs. food policing: The thing I really *disliked* about this experiment was feeling it necessary to log all my food intake (in order to evaluate the macronutrient proportions), which led to a general feeling of policing myself on What and How Much, rather than simply "follow these general guidelines and eat whatever quantities you want" as the Primal Blueprint suggests. Because, as we all know, committing to the simple act of writing down all your transactions (whether it's food consumed or money spent) makes you much more conscious of your choices in every moment and of their cumulative effect.
I don't mind this when it comes to financial budgeting (I'm very good/disciplined about writing down Every Single Penny, I did it happily for years as a single person and took it up again as a step toward reclaiming my personal freedom after my divorce) -- and in fact, I actually feel *more* comfortable when I'm doing it, because I feel strongly that in the end, that increased mindfulness is helping me support my core values. With food, on the other hand, it really feels like it goes against all the activism I have striven to internalize for many many years about Listen To Your Body and Eat What You Need and No Food Shame. Historically, if I wanted a maple oatmeal scone, I fucking well went out and got one and enjoyed it; and if they only had cinnamon chip, I might say "oh, yeah, that still sounds like a thing I want" or I might say "you know, that just isn't it" and walk on. But NEVER would I allow myself to say "Eew, 450 calories? Not worth it!!", and I hated hearing that voice in my head, even if translating it into "Yikes, 75g carbs" made it feel slightly less horrible and phobia-feeding.
[Sidebar: I am not at all convinced that FitDay's database of nutritional composition is reliable. It's skewed way too far toward the processed/packaged, which I guess makes sense because that's where the bank of available data is focused? but there are wide discrepancies between entries that sound very similar on the surface, and no entries at all for lots of things that I consider perfectly standard. So it's easy to say "Oh, I'm sure what I had was ITALIAN DRESSING, MADE WITH VINEGAR AND OIL (43 cals/tbsp) and not SALAD DRESSING (60 cals/tbsp)." Eventually I started breaking things out by ingredient where possible -- say, "Olive oil, 1 tablespoon" and "Cider vinegar, 1 tablespoon" and leave the guessing out of it.]
On the other hand, even when I make a conscious decision that I'm not going to give myself the tzuris of trying to assess and log my "normal" intake, the short-term logging has made me aware of just how much I am probably taking in, otherwise, normally. And that in turn leads to some insights about just why it is that seemingly small changes can send my weight creeping up without my really noticing, just as it can go down without my really noticing.
The major conclusion I draw from the experiment is that it is way easier to feel well fed on 1800-2000 calories/day if that intake comprises at least 75% proteins and fats and less than 25% carbs (or else, perhaps, when all of those carbs are green vegetables and a little fruit). In other words, perhaps what I really need is guidelines that ensure there is more FOOD in my food, and to acknowledge that the maple oatmeal scones of the world may certainly be Treats, but are not themselves to be confused with Food, even if they come out of the Food budget (in both a money and nutrient sense).
And it's easy to laze out and make suboptimal choices unless I have that "program" mentality actually reinforcing my commitment to the better choices.
So we'll see. For today, it's still back to lentil salad and quinoa pilaf for lunch. :-)
So now I've had about 10 days off, to compare with 4 weeks on.
Things I have noticed:
Groceries: Expenditures up about 50% from past few months' average, no joke. My previous set of normal cooking habits has been heavily based for years on BEANS AND GRAINS ALL THE TIME. Guess what? Fresh vegetables (especially nice salad greens), fish and meat, and organic eggs? Cost a lot more. At, like, Passover levels -- not by coincidence, of course, since Passover is also a meat-and-vegetable-heavy time period.
Conversely, my impulse spending on outside snack food (not proper meals out or actual groceries) went way way down, because guess what? 90% of grab-n-go food options are sugar- and starch-based crap. And I'm including pizza and burritos in that basket as well as pastries and Clif Mojo bars. Which brings me to...
Planning: Again, this approach requires Preparedness at near-Passover levels. I have never been so scrupulous about bringing exactly one day's worth of meals and snacks to work every single day (rather than keeping the usual stash of chocolate, nuts, and Luna bars in my desk). And I have a new appreciation for the convenience of pouring out a bowl of Cheerios every morning, or pulling a quart of homemade bean chili out of the freezer as food for the next few days. (I'm sure there are other food categories one could pre-make and freeze, but I haven't really gotten a handle on them.) It eventually occurred to me that I should maybe hard-boil some eggs as instant/travel food, but in all seriousness I got stumped on: how are you supposed to check them for blood spots? But anyway.
Digestion: Really nothing to report. I am generally blessed with kind of an iron stomach, which basically goes "sure, whatever" no matter what I do or don't throw at it.
Cravings: I don't seem to experience major ongoing cravings for bread, chocolate, candy, or most carby things. What I DO get noticeable cravings for:
(1) CAKE
(2) FROSTING
(3) cake WITH frosting
(4) Starbucks' Maple Oatmeal Scones, which, arrgh! they seem to have largely discontinued, but I finally made some this past Sunday adapted from the Smitten Kitchen version, and that did the trick (
jessruth and justom also declared them pretty nommable).With the rest of these observations, I found in writing them out that they all seem to be strongly interrelated, because they meander back and forth and cross-connect. So:
Hunger signals: What I've noticed most in the low-carb mode is that I don't get the sharp OMG HUNGRY stomach-feelings I am used to. I also don't get the strong "sated" feelings I am used to (which suggests to me that both are driven by insulin levels). Rather, I have a fairly constant low-grade feeling of the can't-quite-concentrate, "hmm, might be low on blood sugar" brain fog... which gets WORSE at various intervals and then I think "ah, perhaps this means I am now hungry". And eating something does help, but it never quite goes away.
Energy levels: I did seem to get past the "low-carb flu" stage, which apparently has to do with "metabolic flexibility" (developing the pathways to rely on burning proteins and fats rather than glucose), but I never noticed any particular increase in energy after that. -- It also occurred to me, though, that what I did not do is cut out dairy -- the Primal Blueprint says of whole dairy products, "use in moderation", but I was basically relying on cheese and (plain whole) yogurt among my daily food sources. Not that this seems to bother me -- I always eat a fair amount of dairy and it doesn't give me any noticeable trouble -- but part of the point of this was to see if my "baseline" changed at all. If I were going to do a full elimination-style diet, maybe I'd see something different...? but really, I feel like I am in a generally good enough state that the marginal utility of messing with it is not that high.
Weight: According to my highly questionable home scale, dropped about 6 lbs down (kind of all at once, AFTER a week or two, with a religious fast day in there), maybe another pound or two after that, and seemed to stabilize at 180 for the last couple weeks. This is not quite down to where I was last fall, but it's comfortable.
I should note that the two times in my life I "effortlessly" dropped a noticeable amount of weight in a short time, say 2-3 months, there were two significant common factors: (1) I was poor (therefore not spending money on frivolous/snacky foods), and (2) I was walking an hour or more a day, either to get back and forth to work (the summer of 1991 at Brandeis, so 20+ years ago), or because I was unemployed in a new city and did it for fun (last fall). N.B. also: Both those episodes were also followed by a quick rebound -- slightly surpassing my starting weight -- within another 6-8 weeks once I got back to more sedentary and well-fed habits. Thank you, evolutionary biology!
But I think about all those people who say "If I don't get an hour of exercise every single day, I just get into the most APPALLING/peevish/easily-overwhelmed mood", and I think, maybe that is the lifestyle change I need to take up? If I really want to experiment with shifting my baseline-normal? Maybe I'm living in those people's "before" states?
Mindfulness vs. food policing: The thing I really *disliked* about this experiment was feeling it necessary to log all my food intake (in order to evaluate the macronutrient proportions), which led to a general feeling of policing myself on What and How Much, rather than simply "follow these general guidelines and eat whatever quantities you want" as the Primal Blueprint suggests. Because, as we all know, committing to the simple act of writing down all your transactions (whether it's food consumed or money spent) makes you much more conscious of your choices in every moment and of their cumulative effect.
I don't mind this when it comes to financial budgeting (I'm very good/disciplined about writing down Every Single Penny, I did it happily for years as a single person and took it up again as a step toward reclaiming my personal freedom after my divorce) -- and in fact, I actually feel *more* comfortable when I'm doing it, because I feel strongly that in the end, that increased mindfulness is helping me support my core values. With food, on the other hand, it really feels like it goes against all the activism I have striven to internalize for many many years about Listen To Your Body and Eat What You Need and No Food Shame. Historically, if I wanted a maple oatmeal scone, I fucking well went out and got one and enjoyed it; and if they only had cinnamon chip, I might say "oh, yeah, that still sounds like a thing I want" or I might say "you know, that just isn't it" and walk on. But NEVER would I allow myself to say "Eew, 450 calories? Not worth it!!", and I hated hearing that voice in my head, even if translating it into "Yikes, 75g carbs" made it feel slightly less horrible and phobia-feeding.
[Sidebar: I am not at all convinced that FitDay's database of nutritional composition is reliable. It's skewed way too far toward the processed/packaged, which I guess makes sense because that's where the bank of available data is focused? but there are wide discrepancies between entries that sound very similar on the surface, and no entries at all for lots of things that I consider perfectly standard. So it's easy to say "Oh, I'm sure what I had was ITALIAN DRESSING, MADE WITH VINEGAR AND OIL (43 cals/tbsp) and not SALAD DRESSING (60 cals/tbsp)." Eventually I started breaking things out by ingredient where possible -- say, "Olive oil, 1 tablespoon" and "Cider vinegar, 1 tablespoon" and leave the guessing out of it.]
On the other hand, even when I make a conscious decision that I'm not going to give myself the tzuris of trying to assess and log my "normal" intake, the short-term logging has made me aware of just how much I am probably taking in, otherwise, normally. And that in turn leads to some insights about just why it is that seemingly small changes can send my weight creeping up without my really noticing, just as it can go down without my really noticing.
The major conclusion I draw from the experiment is that it is way easier to feel well fed on 1800-2000 calories/day if that intake comprises at least 75% proteins and fats and less than 25% carbs (or else, perhaps, when all of those carbs are green vegetables and a little fruit). In other words, perhaps what I really need is guidelines that ensure there is more FOOD in my food, and to acknowledge that the maple oatmeal scones of the world may certainly be Treats, but are not themselves to be confused with Food, even if they come out of the Food budget (in both a money and nutrient sense).
And it's easy to laze out and make suboptimal choices unless I have that "program" mentality actually reinforcing my commitment to the better choices.
So we'll see. For today, it's still back to lentil salad and quinoa pilaf for lunch. :-)