Low Carb nutrition question

Kimia

Hey all. So I'm a low carber and loving it at the mo but one thing confuses me so I'm hoping you wise ones can explain it for me. When you're doing the Atkins or IPD for example, during induction you're told (in dire doom filled tones) that you must not fall off the wagon and let any bit of sugar/carbs pass your lips or else it will be a MAJOR setback.

So my question is why? I mean, if everything is down to calories in vs calories out at the end of the weight loss day, why does it matter if you have say allocated yourself 50g of carbs a day, and you 'spend' 20 of them on half a chocolate bar.

I imagine it's something to do with your blood sugar level and spiking it etc? I haven't done it but I have seen it on all the low carb websites and I was wondering what would happen if you did (shock horror :eek:) let one bite of chocolate pass your lips during the induction phase.

Any opinions welcome!

Sapsorrow

Because you're trying to trigger ketosis and if you have even one carb binge you'll reload your glycogen stores etc and set yourself back to square one, it takes 2 days or so with pretty much no carb intake for your cells to make the change to burning fatty acids rather than glucose as their primary fuel source.

Sapsorrow

Kimia wrote: »

So my question is why? I mean, if everything is down to calories in vs calories out at the end of the weight loss day, why does it matter if you have say allocated yourself 50g of carbs a day, and you 'spend' 20 of them on half a chocolate bar.

That's not really true either, it's infinately more complicated than calories in calories out.

Kimia

Thanks a mill for the quick answer Sapsorrow! I see what you mean. So if I'm in ketosis, if i eat a chocolate dessert for example what I'm actually doing is forcing my body to jump into Glycogen burning rather than fat burning, so if I want to go back to fat burning it'll take me another 2 days, setting the whole process back.

Have I got it right?

El_Dangeroso

Sapsorrow is right, it'll kick you right out of optimal fat-burning for a day or two. Plus you're trying to keep your blood sugar as stable as possible and 20g carbs in the form of chocolate could make it spike.

But I think it also is to do with 'resetting' the sugar response on your palate. 2 weeks with zero sugar and you start to taste the sweetness in vegetables again. You start to taste everything better, your desire for salt goes down, some things you liked before start to taste unbelievably salty.

Sapsorrow

Kimia wrote: »

Thanks a mill for the quick answer Sapsorrow! I see what you mean. So if I'm in ketosis, if i eat a chocolate dessert for example what I'm actually doing is forcing my body to jump into Glycogen burning rather than fat burning, so if I want to go back to fat burning it'll take me another 2 days, setting the whole process back.

Have I got it right?

Ehm kind of ya, although glycogen doesn't last a really significant amount of time, so you'd be burning a combination of glycogen, blood glucose, proteins, fatty acids etc but to different degrees. It more to do with hormones that are released as your body enters what it perceives to be starvation, so when you eat a load of carbs you get loads of insulin released and insulin will inhibit the use of fatty acids and the switch over the ketogenesis, but ya if you eat a dose of carbs after entering ketosis you're setting yourself back 2 days or so and those hapen to be the two days where you feel like crap so you don't want to go throught them more than once ideally. There's a better explanation of ketones on Dr Eades blog here:

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/ketones-and-ketosis/metabolism-and-ketosis/

Sorry it's way to early for me to be thinking about biochemistry, I know I'm probably making zero sense

Kimia

No it makes sense and thanks for taking the time to answer! You too Temple. You're absolutely right about things tasting sweeter - strawberries are unreal! Before I used to need sugar on the strawberries (terrible i know) and now they are very vry sweet on their own. Same with chocolate - i'm eating 85% now and it tastes normal to me. I haven't tried milk but I'd say my teeth would feel like falling out!

El_Dangeroso

I remember dipping strawberries in sugar when I was a kid too. In fact I remember just eating sugar out of the bag with a spoon, my teeth tingle just thinking about it now!

totoal

I thought the general advice was to get a low carb diet book and stick too it.
This would probably be explained in the book and possible other things you may be missing out on

Macha

Temple_Grandin wrote: »

But I think it also is to do with 'resetting' the sugar response on your palate. 2 weeks with zero sugar and you start to taste the sweetness in vegetables again. You start to taste everything better, your desire for salt goes down, some things you liked before start to taste unbelievably salty.

That is so true - I ate some celery & peanut butter yesterday and thought I must have spilled some salt on the celery by mistake! V weird.

beatrice33

This post is like someone has been reading my mind.

I am also doing a low carb diet (oh, hiya Kimia!) and so far it has been succesfull because I know (the books says) that if I cheat, even if its a mouthful, everything will go to feck. In low fat diets i was always picking, thinking, "meh, what harm is a little tiyny biscuit going to do? i only ate a lettuce leaf for lunch :rolleyes:"

I have a work party in 2 weeks, and the food is not a problem, Im sure i will find a way to eat low carb, but i dont really want to drink alcohol...but it will be hard to be all sober and find everyone else pisshead funny... and Im sure that alcohol has the same effect as any carby food? It is recommended vodka... will that be OK to drink and wont stop the ketosis mode?