The FastDay Forum

Just chiming in with my anecdotal data I've lost alot of weight in the past year (see my signature) but have not eaten a particularly low carb diet. Looking back at my food diaries it's made no difference whether one week has been particularly low in carbs and higher in protein - for me it's a simple calorie deficit that's worked.

Revisiting http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 05.79/full I spotted that the more successful combinations halved their leptin from baseline to week 16 whereas the less successful combinations had small reductions and both ended up at 25 ng/ml which is I think a high leptin level (?)

[carorees]

As leptin is a mechanism to signal the state of the fat stores, it suggests that in those whose leptin levels did not decrease lipolysis was not occurring to such a great extent (i.e. the fat stores were not greatly depleted), which would make sense with the high insulin. The question is, how did they keep going without burning fat?

Regarding those with low insulin levels, it's possible that conversion of carbs to fat is less efficient so that some of the carbs were wasted.

In both cases it suggests that the hypocaloric diet would have resulted in a small weight loss on the purely calories in/calories out equation but that metabolic differences between the two populations enhanced the loss in the "favoured" diet.

However, there is a major weakness in the study in that subject were free living so they could have consumed more than the foods given to them, and they may have reduced exercise. Although they were questioned to determine compliance, I'd bet there were some who cheated! So it could come down to an appetite effect.

Nonetheless, if the observed differences in weight loss are real, for whatever the reason, then it still suggests that it is worth tinkering with your carb intake if weight loss is slow...it might work!

As leptin is a mechanism to signal the state of the fat stores, it suggests that in those whose leptin levels did not decrease lipolysis was not occurring to such a great extent (i.e. the fat stores were not greatly depleted), which would make sense with the high insulin. The question is, how did they keep going without burning fat?

Unfortunately the free fatty acids didn't show statistically significant differences. However the means of the FFAs in the two better combinations were 813 and 801 whereas the two less successful combinations were at 532 and 718 at week 16. The differences at baseline were noticeable too, but not flagged up as significant. In any case plenty of fat in circulation.

This may be where the small sample size caught them out, as 858 ± 110 and 659 ± 34 are quite a way apart to my eye, as are 691 ± 48 and 836 ± 74 (baseline FFAs).

We didn't get the RQ values to judge what they were burning.

[carorees]

But circulating FFAs don't necessarily indicate fat burning as they can be re-stored, I suppose?

Think you're probably right but I like my carbs.

But circulating FFAs don't necessarily indicate fat burning as they can be re-stored, I suppose?

Elevated fasting FFA levels indicate burning I feel, as there's no ingestion to be providing them.

http://www.nature.com/ijo/journal/v25/n ... 1528a.html pumped FFAs into blood and observed increased oxidation of fats.

Geenrally speaking FFAs rise with fasting / calorie deficit and this is reflected in substrate oxidation switching towards fats http://jap.physiology.org/content/90/1/155.full.pdf

Wow, there are a whole bunch of folks here, (carolees and PhilT and others too) that are so smart and can help the rest of us. I just copied this thread into Word so I read it slowly and look up the references. just amazing!!! Thanks.

I did well on the first two weeks and I ate carbs-only on my fast days.
This week I ate no-crabs on one fast day but I feel that it won't make much difference since I kinda ate more than I should on my non-fast days.

To be honest, I find it hard to follow all the chemical/medical/whatever stuff. I just follow 5:2...

This week I ate no-crabs on one fast day

Well it's obviously those damned shellfish causing all the problems then

In belated response to Susan's original question, I lost weight quickly I think because I had gained it quickly - over a period of 4 months I had gained 7 lbs - by over-eating (winter approaching, dark, Xmas season) and a lot of the excess was carbs. I have picked up and lost again a few pounds most years recently. The surprising thing is that now I am losing old fat that has been around for a long time, almost as quickly and apparently without much lean mass loss, even though I am aiming to maintain. OK, I had norovirus on holiday last week but recovered quickly and feel fine now, running again etc. Calories in/energy out seems to work for me. Would like to go carb-free but am still veggie (might go back to meat as an experiment in the near future). Trying to fix arthritic hips by diet...

I have read this thread with great interest. Now I could do with some practical advice if anyone can help. I'm a vegetarian, I don't eat meat or fish, very few eggs (although I have no objection to eating them, and I use eggs when baking etc) and not much cheese. I use lentils and beans, and some nuts for protein. My normal fast day meal is home made vegie soup, so no carbs there, but I love bread and other carbs (all wholegrain)and eat them on my non- fast days. I am losing rather slowly ( taking the scenic route in a caravan, it seems)
So, any advice on how to tweak my non fasting days to cut carbs out? It seems easy, just stop eating bread, but in practice it is I'm struggling, so any suggestions will be most gratefully received.
Thanks
Pat

[carorees]

Hi Pat

I hope that the answers to the questionnaire will give a clue as to whether carbs are key or not. I would say that perhaps cutting carbs on the evening before and the morning after a fast might be enough rather than trying to avoid bread and pasta etc forever! That's why I gave up on Atkins as I couldn't cope with cutting out all carbs for good. It is the simple carbs that are worst (and possibly wheat) but it doesn't sound like you have too much of those. A low carb diet usually means replacing the energy that you would get from carbs with fats so more nuts and seeds would be good.

Hopefully we will know more when we get the questionnaire results.

Thanks for such a speedy reply Caroline, you are a star. I will give that a try, big relief to think I can still eat home made bread!
Pat

I'm a vegetarian, I don't eat meat or fish, very few eggs (although I have no objection to eating them, and I use eggs when baking etc) and not much cheese. I use lentils and beans, and some nuts for protein. My normal fast day meal is home made vegie soup, so no carbs there, but I love bread and other carbs (all wholegrain)and eat them on my non- fast days. I am losing rather slowly ( taking the scenic route in a caravan, it seems)
So, any advice on how to tweak my non fasting days to cut carbs out? It seems easy, just stop eating bread, but in practice it is I'm struggling, so any suggestions will be most gratefully received.

Combining two food restrictions - vegetarian and low carb - is never easy especially if you're fussy about some foods.

Total or Lidl's own full fat 10% greek yoghurt, almonds, flaxseed, peanut or almond butter, cream etc can all help - you need fats to provide the calories if you're reducing the carbohydrates.

There are low carb "bread" recipes if you make your own - lots of seeds etc in the mix.