Day 7 – Friday, January 1, 2016 – Wt: 269.0 Blood Glucose 96 – 4.6 Lbs. Lost – 74.0 pounds to go – In Ketosis

Happy New Year to you – and may happiness, health, and prosperity for you and your families come with this new year.

And for the specific readers of these sorts of blogs, may you reach your weight loss goals, safely, and with serenity.

Me – I achieved my week 1 goals:

1. Got into ketosis
2. Lost more than the 2 pounds per week I’m aiming for
3. Got under 270
4. Got under the 75 pound mark of weight I need to lose

The fact that I was in ketosis this morning is interesting. Probably leftover ketones from the day before. I’ll probably clear those out today, then back on the diet today and they’ll be back in a day or two. My big win is I proved to myself I still can do this – and it’s not that hard.

I woke up late and was hungry after having my coffee with heavy cream. Not supised – eating carbs makes me hungry. It is a simple, reliable cause and effect. We still had some of that wonderful beef from the other day slowly transforming from leftover to chemistry experiment in the fridge so I thought I’d abort the process and have that.

My God, was it fatty. The fat was soft, with an excellent texture. I recall long ago being grossed out by eating chunks of pure fat, but an extreme low carb diet is an acquired taste like oysters, or frog legs, or sashimi, or anchovies, or an almost nameless amount of other foods that never touch the lips of ‘picky eaters’.

I would imagine that an aggressive ketogenic low carb diet must be hell for these people. My only encouragement is that I was once a ‘picky eater’ and not at all interested in trying new foods. I grew up in the 70s in a middle class family that chose from a pretty narrow group of foods.

It was only in adulthood – and through sometimes closing my eyes while I ate something – that I learned that there are a world of tastes out there and if other people eat it and it doesn’t kill them, it’s worth trying at least. You might not like it – but then again you might love it.

Sashimi – just a slab of cold, raw fish – is a prime example for me. Up until my 30s, just the though would set off a gag reflex, but as I began to get more adventuresome by always keeping in mind: ‘millions of people eat this stuff every day’, I tried the stuff and it has become a favorite of mine.

A slab of extremely fresh raw tuna, with a little soy sauce and wasabi is a taste that I am glad I did not miss in this life.

I went from a picky eater to an explorer: I began to seek out the more esoteric items on the menu, and learned that I love some of them, are OK with others, and don’t like some things at all. I did not die nore even barf from this exercise, and became exposed to amazing foods from many different cultures.

Here’s an example of one I didn’t particularly like: chicken feet. They actually don’t taste bad, but there are so many little bones that it is a hassle. The Chinese are used to pulling bones from their mouth while they eat. This isn’t an American thing. I do it sometimes, and sometimes it’s worth it, but I’ve just never gotten used to it, so I could eat chicken feet, but just prefer not to.

If you are starting a ketogenic diet, if you are a picky eater you might want to consider a New Year’s resolution to be more adventurous. You don’t have to start with chicken feet – go out of your comfort zone slowly. You don’t have to like something immediately – sometimes it takes a few tries. If after a few tries you still hate the stuff, then it’s OK to hate it – just keep trying new things.

The more variety in your diet, the better the chance of success. You can’t eat scrambled eggs with bacon every day.

You have to also discard any notion of ‘eating light’. This might be real hard for a newbie. I was eating semi-vegetarian when I first went on low carb and I stopped after a week because the heavy, greasiness disgusted me – but went back on low carb after a day or two because I realized I felt like crap eating the way I used to after a week on low carb.

Ramble aside, the rest of the day was OK, but not perfect. I had an energy drink, y psyllium, and then had some dinner my wife had made. There was chicken and vegetables with scrambled eggs, and I had that. There wew also Chinese dumplings and i could not but help to have maybe a half-dozen.

I also had a plain yogurt with a few drops of EZ_Sweetz and 2 clementines.

Something wasn’t right, however. I felt real tired after this and went to bed – and then dealt with what I believe were the consequences of maybe eating too much before bed – coughing and choking and burning in my throat – GERD, I believe.

I also had an amazingly vivid dream though I will spare you the details as most people’s dreams are actually quite dull in the retelling.

 

Day 6 – Thursday, December 31, 2015 – Wt: 267.0 Blood Glucose 88 – 6.6 Lbs. Lost – 72.0 pounds to go – In Ketosis

I’ll be honest: I am so pleased with how well I am responding that I feel *something* has to go wrong.

I had to go to work this morning but they released us around 12:30. When I came home just for fun I weighed myself as well as checked my blood glucose.

Weight: 265.8

Blood Glucose: 77

Those are some impressive numbers. The weight of 265 is a milestone number for me. It was at 265 that I started low carb in 2003. So now I am at least no fatter than I was 15 years ago at my fattest. It’s not much of an achievement, but I’ll take what I can get.

The blood glucose at 88 in the morning before taking my meds? Unbelievable. I usually suffer from the ‘dawn effect’ where your blood sugar spikes as your body wakes, so a number that low is remarkable. Even more remarkable is the 77 when I came home at 2:30.

It’s almost worrying, in fact. The blood sugar plunge, the weight loss, and the ketones leaving me with no appetite – I might have gone 24 hours without eating now – might be too much progress too fast.

I might need to persuade myself to eat something as I’m not all that hungry right now. This isn’t a sprint – it’s a marathon, and I need to pace myself or someone – me – might get hurt.

I was actually concerned about that 77 blood glucose number and while I had some steak, for lunch, I also had maybe 1 slice of the leftover kid’s frozen pizza and a few of these bite-sized mini tacos that were left over.

Then I took a nap.

I woke up before 6, catching up on a bit of sleep, at least, then headed over to our friends house for New Year’s. I decided I would drink wine but wasn’t all that hungry. I had white wine mostly, had a small amounts of the low carb main course (turkey, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, chopped spinach) as well as some escargot – snails – by themselves and in dough. When cheese came out I had some of that, and when dessert came out I had some of that also. I didn’t restrict myself but I didn’t gorge, either.

At midnight I took a sip of champagne and left the rest. We went home soon after 12. It seems everyone was tired or just not in the mood.

Whatever the damage is – it is – I’ll do what I’ve been doing since the beginning and be back to normal in a day or two. No big deal.