My Big Fat Experiment

Have you ever seen or read something, or had an experience, that led you down a long and convoluted path? In this tech age I’m betting you have. Happens to me daily. Some of these excursions are short and sweet, like a brief interest in the types of frogs found in our local area. This one, it turns out, was a wood frog – one I’ve never seen in my garden until this year.

Others are much more involved and are triggered by more serious and life implicating events. Once such event occurred early in the summer for me.

My Dad, who has been struggling for several years with complications due to poor circulation, was hospitalized. This was neither surprising or unexpected but something about it heightened my awareness of the effects of diabetes. Just planted the seed of a question in my mind.

“How can I prevent myself from having to endure what he is going through?”, “What are my chances of having this disease affect my future?”

As Universal forces often work, a video came across my path shortly after asking myself this question. A TEDX talk by Dr. Sarah Hallberg discussing the seemingly backwards treatment approach that is currently employed in treating diabetes; and there it began. I was sent down a trail of reading, researching and searching for content with regard to metabolic syndrome, obesity and diabetes. Now, to be clear, I don’t have any of these things. However both Steve and I have strong histories of diabetes, and frankly we could both stand to lose a few pounds. My goal is to prevent metabolic syndrome rather than treat it.

There is a small but growing group of doctors, researchers and nutrition writers who are determined to have their voices heard despite strong opposition from multiple directions (read private interest groups and public interest groups with private backers), who are convinced that since diabetes is a dietary disease, the only true way to treat it is with diet. I love arguments that make sense.

These smart people conclude that insulin is the culprit in weight gain. Not the calories in calories out BS that we’ve been sold, not the fat in our diets, not our lack of movement. Insulin, a hormone that regulates blood sugar and also determines where and how that sugar is to be used. Insulin sensitivity, or lack of it, is what controls our body weight.

So, how do we keep our insulin levels low? We kick out the carbohydrate. Most specifically refined carbohydrate like sugar and wheat, but for some people who are insulin resistant this includes all but the lowest glycemic vegetables. The problem is that when we reduce our carbohydrate, we have to replace it with something. Since there are only 3 macronutrients, protein, carbohydrate and fat, and protein is not healthy for us in high doses, guess which one we must increase. Fat.

Yup, fat.

I have been removing myself from the low fat club over time for quite a few years now but even then it takes some faith to go full out and embrace what is essentially a low carbohydrate, high fat diet (known in Sweden and increasingly worldwide as LCHF). However, the truth is that the studies that we have all been told conclude that we should be decreasing our fat intake turn out to be ever-so-much-less than compelling, and in fact the low fat, high carbohydrate way that we’ve been told to eat has increased our rate of diabetes by something like 400% since 1970! (this despite having adopted these guidelines for the most part – North Americans have indeed decreased their fat intake overall)

Now the LCHF diet is not that much different than the Paleo diet that I have already pretty much embraced, it’s just a bit more strict on the carb intake, at least if one is making an effort to drop some weight. The one bonus for me is that cheese is back on the menu! Yay!

Anyway, I won’t bore you with all the details, you can find them yourself at the sites and books listed below, but after much reading I am convinced enough to give it a go. I happen to think these folks are on to something and so have committed to eating an LCHF/ketogenic diet for a 6 month period.

I began at the end of June (with a 10 lb weight loss so far) and intend to continue until the end of the year. This has meant doing some adjusting to my diet as well as immersing myself in recipes that are a bit (though for the most part not drastically) different than what I am used to. Though I am pretty good about processed foods, they are nearly ALL gone for now. Label reading has become more intensive with hidden sugars, carbs and grains being the main culprits. This has meant keeping meals pretty simple, which may or may not be very interesting on a food blog.

However, along with all of my researching I have actually tried a few new recipes, like these cauliflower tortillas (not bad but not perfect IMO) which I will be posting along with my progress/impressions along the way.

I hope that you will follow along with me as I conduct my own N=1 experiment.

Just a few of the books and sites that I recommend if you are interested in exploring these ideas for yourself are:

websites:

www.dietdoctor.com (a free one month trial offers access to tons of video interviews and presentations)

www.eatingacademy.com (the blog of Dr. Peter Attia)

Books:

The Big Fat Surprise, by Nina Teicholz

Why We Get Fat and What to do About it, by Gary Taubes

The Obesity Code, by Dr. Jason Fung

The Art and Science of Low Carb Living, by Drs. Stephen Phinney and Jeff Volek

Movies/Videos:

Fathead (available on Netflix)

Cereal Killers

Sugar Coated (available on Netflix)

Fed Up (available on Netflix)