Newcastle diet.

So I have been thinking about it for a while, and the window of opportunity opened so I have dived in and am going to try my best at my first attempt of the Newcastle diet. I intend to use shakes and supplement the three meals with the prescribed green veg.

I started this morning and had one shake for lunch. Not brilliant compared to a nice bit of salmon and veg but hey ho.
The shake has 18gs of carbs in it - which is pretty much my daily limit for the last three months. So a bit of a spike, higher than I like, 5 - 7.3 in about 45mins then a slow down to 6.2 after two hours.

I am using the Tesco shakes because whilst I could get the ones used in the ND study off of amazon, they had limited supply. The Tesco ones correlate almost exactly carbs/fat/protein to the ones used so ideal.

I have to say I am the least confident, though very motivated, I have ever been mainly due to the complexities of a job with a bit of international travel which is going to make the next 8 weeks complex.

I will post updates here including weight on a Saturday which is when I weigh myself. Only have between 1 & 2 stone to lose though I would like to get my body fat percent below 18 if I could and visceral fat below 8.

Wish me luck!

Well day 2 is over - and that is the end of the really good news. Only 54 more days to go and that is the end of the really bad news.

FBG was normal at 5.7 Didn't get my normal morning spike despite having a shake before I left for work!

I decided to half the morning shake I do not think I could, just now, tolerate 25g of carbs first thing. I will aim to start doing that late week 2. I was pleased with my 12g results actually.

My spikes after the carbs have not been too bad - not great mind you. After dinner yesterday I had a rise of over 2.2 which would not decay after 2 hours. It sharply declined in hour 3. Peeked at 6.9.
Today morning spiked 1.9 after 2 hours, lunch the same (but declined rapidly in hour 3). Dinner a much smaller spike, 1.5 after 2 hours and no idea yet where that will go.

As I had half the milk in my morning shake I have allowed myself a couple of cups of tea with a tiny amount of milk.

It is hard to know whether the shakes are worse than veg with no oil or butter. I spiced them up a bit but not great.
I have not been hungry yet but I did do a 600 cal 5 day fast a couple of months ago so perhaps my body is getting the idea.

I know that in 8 days I would of apparently exhausted my liver and then the next seven weeks will be the slog to get fat out of the pancreas if it exists.

My total carb was 70g today - typically I aim for around 10 a day.

Lower FBG than before so far - just around 5.
The breakfast (which is 14g carbs because I only have half) looks to be good. I am hungry though.
In the first hour it rose by 1.8 but started to fall rapidly in second hour - now just .7 up in two hours.

So coping quite well with the carbs so far. Lunch time is the full 25g so we will see how that goes.

Oh yes mine to. But now the calories have gone - I guess the body is just sucking it up for energy and replenishing the space created in the liver. My liver dumps stopped before the diet as a result of me cutting food down - forced upon me as a result of business travel so I just decided to eat less to prepare for these 8 weeks. I had lost a lot of weight over the last four months too so hopefully things are over all improving somewhat.

ziggy_w said:

Hi @Fleegle,

How's your Newcastle diet going?

Are you feeling hungry at all? How is your body dealing with all these carbs?

Looking forward to an update.

Click to expand...

Well it is not going as well as I wanted it to - but it is only day 4.
Firstly weekly weigh in today not Saturday because I was away.
The really good news is I lost 6lbs in the week - not an average week - business travel over last weekend meant I didn't eat very much and according to my scales most of the weight loss was fat not water, which is good because I have been trying to drink more.

But the BG is not such a good story and it feels cumulative.
The first couple of days I was seeing peeks I could live with but Friday evenings peek and then yesterdays were too high for my liking though short lived.

I went from about 5.5 to 8.3 within about 1 hour of the shake and then dropped down to high 6's after two hours. Then a rapid decent in hour 3. I am going to change my consumption so I split the shakes more evenly morning, lunch and evening as currently I consume half a shake in the morning. Yesterday's morning peek was not to bad.

But here I have a problem. Sunday morning I go for a cycle - a tough (for me) 45min hilly route. FBG this morning 5.2.
After the ride, no breakfast and a shower 7.1. No choice, as I am absolutely starving but to have my shake. I can see myself going for a long walk to try and bring the BG down. If the shake raises by it's traditional 2.8 I will be in 10 territory which I haven't seen since a BBQ in June went terribly wrong for me.

My worry is that whatever I have done over the last 4 months ridding my body of the dreaded sugar through trying to stay below 15g of carbs most days is now being topped up with 80g of carbs a day. And I am not even getting my 600 shake calories and 200 calories of veg. The Veg is dull and with nothing to go with it even 50 calories worth is hard so I think I am lucky if I get 600 calories in total a day.

But I am not in a state of panic yet - I am going to see what the next week does. If things progress worse - then I will have to think again about a lower carb alternative. Interesting to see how today goes after the shake I have just had (20g carbs starting at 7.1!).

Not terribly hungry most of the time - just before bed - and after my cycle this morning the worse.

ziggy_w said:

Hi @Fleegle,

Some interesting observations.

I don't really believe your results are as bad as you think. First, even if your blood sugars go up more than usual, they come down quite quickly -- meaning your insulin kicks in. Second, you are only four days in after being on a low carb diet -- I would give it a little longer to get your body get used to the carbs again. (Easy for me to say, though -- given that I panicked last week after seeing fasting and average blood sugars rise to over 5.6).

Did you have a shake before going on your bike ride? Or was it on an empty tummy? When you are exercising your muscles burn glucose. If you don't have enough glucose in your system, your liver will provide the glucose needed, thus the rise. If you have a shake before, your muscles will use the glucose in the shake.

I imagine that vegetables without butter or some kind of sauce or dressing can get quite boring. Have you thought about having your vegetables in a soup maybe with some bouillon?

Click to expand...

I agree it is early days - and I am going to consider some soups or something to do with the veg. In fact @Pipp has just suggested I take in some oil so I might just add a tiny amount and count the calories and fat to ensure I stay in the experiments macros. I am currently on track of carbs (just a little below) calorie deficit - similarly but to a less extent fat and protein.

The two hour post shake results are in. So from 7.1 before I started, to 6.7 after first hour then 5.8 after second hour. I cannot predict this stuff but I am guessing after exercise insulin already abundant due to liver dump and it slurps up my carbs. I bet that darn liver gives them back to me later with interest

Very happy with that - no walking required and for the first time a shake that stayed under 7.5 in hour 1.

Last post for perhaps a couple of days as I have to go away on business.
May mean fasting on Tuesday if I cannot find anywhere to buy some semi-skimmed milk but that will be ok.

Lunch - had my meal - and I didn't hit 8.3. After 1 hour is was 7.7. After that hour we went for our normal sunday afternoon walk. The reason I am so pleased with lunch is because of timing (Sunday compresses meal times so I typically skip lunch) I took the second shake 10mins after the two hour of my breakfast shake. So about 42ish g's of carb within just 3 hours. It came down really well after the walk to 5.5. It was a good walk though (40mins).

Then this evening 6.1 after one hour 6.1 after second hour just sitting watching tv.
So a better day than Friday and Saturday but Sunday always has a lot of exercise in it so not typical.

Will let you know how it is all going Tuesday or Wednesday which will be the one week mark.
According to Prof T - I should get normal FBG but to be honest my FBG are rarely above 6, really rarely so I consider them to be elevated but not to bad. It is when I eat I have problems.