whatashock said:
Her reasoning was down to the fact that you need Carbs else you were burn away all the muscles, and the low carb option is not sustainable long term.
Her main concenr for me now is weight loss, and this is her key over the next four weeks, and beleives it will be most achievable by low cal, not low carb.
Hello,
When glycogen stores are not available in the cells (glycogen is primarily created when carbohydrates such as starch and sugar are consumed in the diet), fat (triacylglycerol) is cleaved to give 3 fatty acid chains and 1 glycerol molecule in a process called lipolysis. Which is by the way a key way to lower your blood lipids.
Most of the body is able to utilize fatty acids as an alternative source of energy in a process where fatty acid chains are cleaved to form acetyl-CoA, which can then be fed into the Krebs Cycle. It is important to note that acetyl-CoA can only enter the Krebs Cycle bound to oxaloacetate. When carbohydrate supplies are inadequate, however, the liver naturally converts oxaloacetate to glucose via gluconeogenesis for use by the brain and other tissues. When acetyl CoA does not bind with oxaloacetate, the liver converts it to ketones (or ketone bodies), leading to a state of ketosis.
During this process a high concentration of glucagon is present in the serum and this inactivates hexokinase and phosphofructokinase-1 (regulators of glycolysis) indirectly, causing most cells in the body to use fatty acids as their primary energy source. At the same time, glucose is synthesized in the liver from lactic acid, glucogenic amino acids, and glycerol, in a process called gluconeogenesis. This glucose is used for energy by cells such as neurons and red blood cells.
If the diet is changed from a highly glycemic diet to a diet that does not provide sufficient carbohydrate to replenish glycogen stores, the body goes through a set of stages to enter ketosis. During the initial stages of this process the adult brain does not burn ketones, however the brain makes immediate use of this important substrate for lipid synthesis in the brain. After about 48 hours of this process, the brain starts burning ketones in order to more directly utilize the energy from the fat stores that are being depended upon, and to reserve the glucose only for its absolute needs, thus avoiding the depletion of the body's protein store in the muscles.
So a low carb diet will mean that your body breaks down fatty acids primarilly and not protein (this happens in ketoacidosis and not ketosis) and synthesises its own glucose in the liver for the use in the brain, etc.,
A lot of diabetic nurses and especially dieticians don't seem to understand or be interested in this distinction, and how do I know about it? Wikipedia of course, doesn't make it wrong though... :wink:
The point about weight loss is also dealt with on a low-carb diet with suitable exercise.
Dillinger