Disastrous Exit From Keto

[johnb46]

Subsequent to https://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/threads/help-me-stay-keto-please.175058/
Well, I lasted 3 more weeks, 20 in total, and continued feeling rubbish and unable to exercise strenuously, despite the various advice you guys gave (thank you).
I abandoned Keto 30/6/20. Nausea and faintness disappeared in a couple of weeks and I recovered proper fitness in a few more.
I continued on a low carb diet (< 130g as I have read) with average carbs/protein/fat = 99g/183g/174g - less carbs and about the same protein as I averaged for the HbA1c = 45 I got 4 weeks into the Keto diet; and lower carbs and much lower protein than I averaged in 2014 when I got HbA1c = 41, but that was a long time ago.
Disaster! The average 99g/183g/174g has got me HbA1c = 53, up from 47 pre-Keto, after 16 weeks and my self-measured fasting BG has gone up from the upper 6's/lower 7's to between 9 and 10.
OK, in the grand scheme of things it doesn't register, especially this year.
This is worse than ever before and guarantees the need for medication (haven't seen the doc yet, but 49 previously got me an haranguing).
I hadn't bothered measuring my BG since abandoning keto because I thought things would revert to normal and I'd be back to pre-diabetic.
It's a few days since I got my result and I've got through the shock, devastation and denial, so I thought I'd record this on the forum and ask whether this is an unique experience - I never came across anything like this when researching Keto, only the great experiences people have had.
I have not been ill. I have not had Covid so far as I know - one of my grasping at straws is that I had asymptomatic Covid and Long Covid has zapped my BG control - I understand you can get Long Covid even after being asymptomatic.
Why would my fasting BG deteriorate so badly (my background BG must be the main cause of the HbA1c increase)?
BTW: I recorded my food intake every day from 12/12/19 onward and I 'cheated'/deviated more often when on Keto than I have subsequently.
Yours, Distraught and Distressed.

 

[LaoDan]

What sort of exercise? Consider having your hormones / vitamins checked, there could be other reasons for not feeling in tip top shape. Usually your body can adapt to a well balanced diet. Maybe you’re deficient in some nutrients

 

[Tophat1900]

The rise could be down to 99g of carbs per day is no longer what your pancreas can tolerate. It may be that lowering the carb count will show an improvement in BG levels. Worth a try I'd think. And testing will be your guide to what is happening post meals and for collecting data to show trends, problems, when things went well etc. If you are still feeling rubbish, then some blood work would help, electrolytes, vit/min levels and perhaps checking your iron level. Low iron can make you feel like rubbish. I've been there, make exercising really hard, especially strength training or strenuous activity.

Good luck

 

[scooterlad75]

What sort of exercise? Consider having your hormones / vitamins checked, there could be other reasons for not feeling in tip top shape. Usually your body can adapt to a well balanced diet. Maybe you’re deficient in some nutrients

Great advice. I did exactly that as I have been lethargic and sleepy continuosly ever since having Covid in March. My testosterone levels are rock bottom, something I never even considered! Worth getting it checked out, also coupled with very low levels of vitamin d. Just had my repeat bloods done this morning.

 

[Hugo_P]

Given that fats are a bigger problem for diabetics than simple sugars - it's actually good that you had to exit from this experiment. Keto diets are confusing the symptom—high blood sugars—with the disease, which is carbohydrate intolerance.

Please google the American Diabetic Association:
- Intrahepatic Fat and Postprandial Glycemia Increase After Consumption of a Diet Enriched in Saturated Fat Compared With Free Sugars
- Saturated Fat Is More Metabolically Harmful for the Human Liver Than Unsaturated Fat or Simple Sugars

Since 1999, sugar consumption has been declining in the US and Europe. Today, we are back to levels of the 70s. What we have been consuming much more off since 1999 is cheese.

This is not just bad news for our liver/kidney as the research shows, but also for our BMI.
1g of sugar = 4 cals
1g of cheese fat = 9 cals

If one had to choose between lowering your saturated fats or your simple sugars, the research suggests lowering your saturated fat first. It would have more impact on your health. Ideally however, we try to lower both and especially, we should not mix them together.

There is increasing evidence that the combination of (long-chained animal) saturated fats with simple sugars is the worst food combination of all. In nature, foods that combine long-chained saturated fats and simple sugars are very rare. A cat doesn't add carbs to her meat, apes do not add saturated fats to their fruits. We humans invented this combination of nutrients. Having the best of both worlds often means not having it all at the same time?

 

[Roggg]

@Hugo_P The studies you quote are... um... flawed. To put it as kindly as I can. A quick search reveals that in the first study, they added 30g of saturated fat to a diet consisting of about 250g of carbs. In fact all of the diets in both of these studies were high carb SAD diets. Nothing in either of them is anything remotely like a low carb or keto diet. The second study involved adding 1000 extra calories per day of either fat or carb to a diet and seeing which form of gluttony was worse. Again, not really relevant to a keto diet as actually practiced in the real world.

 

[Resurgam]

Given that fats are a bigger problem for diabetics than simple sugars - it's actually good that you had to exit from this experiment. Keto diets are confusing the symptom—high blood sugars—with the disease, which is carbohydrate intolerance.

That was a joke perhaps?

 

[Roggg]

That was a joke perhaps?

New account to post a single post propagating mis-information that is antagonistic towards an approach that has been broadly successful in this community. I'm going to say either straight up troll, or shill for one of the fringe anti-keto interests. IMO of course. Doesn't look like a joke, but could possibly be serious.

 

[zand]

New account to post a single post propagating mis-information that is antagonistic towards an approach that has been broadly successful in this community. I'm going to say either straight up troll, or shill for one of the fringe anti-keto interests. IMO of course. Doesn't look like a joke, but could possibly be serious.

There was another post of similar ilk but it wasn't appropriate for the thread it was on so has been removed. Well one thing is for sure, this person isn't diabetic, just likes to tell diabetics what to do. The old 'fat has more calories and therefore has to be bad for us' is a giveaway. I thought that too...until I became T2.

 

[johnb46]

@Hugo_P Your quoted papers appear to be about fatty livers and predisposition to metabolic syndrome (and potential diabetes). I would have to know a lot more about the liver and metabolic syndrome to have a handle on them.
Whatever they check my liver for when I have my blood tests seems to be ok; no concern has ever been raised. I also note that I was on low saturated fat diets for the first 5 years after diagnosis, but my diabetes did not improve. And I was eating low fat before diagnosis as well.
I was pre-diabetic and am now diabetic and am not overweight (now or previously). My sugar levels are too high and that is dangerous for my long term health - peripheral nerve damage and potential amputations (diabetic grandfather died with a leg full of gangrene), retina damage and blindness, etc., etc. I find these to be horrific potential outcomes.
My experience over 20 weeks this year was that a ketogenic diet dramatically reduced my blood sugar, as measured by HbA1c. If I hadn't been unlucky and felt queasy, faint and unable to exercise properly - so my body failed to keto-adapt - I would have regarded the diet as a wonderful find. If I had been able to get medical help and private, all-encompassing blood tests (they cost, but would be worth it) I'd have done so. If only I'd heard of Keto in less troubled times.
Plenty of people seem to be benefitting greatly from Keto diets on an ongoing basis. I only wish I were one of them.
Having qualified in chemistry (but not biochemistry) it was obvious to me when I was diagnosed 6 years ago that all carbs were a danger. Simple experiments with an empty stomach, a blood sugar meter and various foods showed me I was right and I still regard carbohydrates as my number 1 enemy, no matter which sort - other than fibre.
Proteins also get converted to blood sugar by the liver, but the rise in blood sugar is delayed by a couple of hours and is less pronounced, so I watch out for proteins as well.
Fat seems to produce little or no effect on blood sugar.
Hey presto, from the above and at a first glance, the Keto diet's recommended macronutrient proportions make a lot of sense for me.
I hope you find your way through, John.