Ok I have read the entire thread, which is growing by leaps and bounds, and I have a question that I don't think has been asked, forgive me if it has, 53 pages of posts is alot to remember. My question is this, why is it that after I ingest a high fat meal, or drink, I get extremely warm thereafter? This usually only lasts a few minuets, but I get warm enough that it is very noticable. Also I have noticed that since I have been eating strictly meats, eggs, and fat that I get really hot doing simple things. I mean sweat dripping hot, standing doing dishes or some other such activity. Why is that? Any thoughts or advice is appreciated.

Bear thank you for this post, it has made alot of sense to me.

Hi Bear, have you heard of Vince Gironda? He was a body building guru who trained Arnold. He wrote The Wild Physique (now out of print) and was very adamant on eating the way you do. He was often called too 'defined' by judges in bodybuilding competitions.

Yes, this thread has grown like the mythic Topsy.

I have no idea about feeling warm after a fat meal. I think it is probably due to some other cause, unrelated to eating... like standing over a sink of hot water... But I must admit to not knowing of any cause- or of any other case.

It is very common to flush with warmth after ingesting sweets or sugary drinks, since the body produces some waste heat during glucose to fat conversion, but fatty zero-carb meals are- to me at least, heat-neutral or cooling.

Vince Gironda was Arnold's coach- his idea of a power-drink was like mine, milk-protein powder, eggs and heavy cream. Vince insisted that you could not develop any significant muscle mass on a low fat regime, and of course- he was right.

Gironda was only 50+ years ahead of his time in most aspects.

I have his Wild Physique book, plus some of his training courses, and there are many GEMS in there....

His «Ultimate Definition Diet»: «The only foods allowed are meats, fish, eggs, butter and cream...all carbohydrates must be removed»

One thing on which I do not agree with him is concerning the need for a carb meal every 4 days while on a zero-carb regime to «replenish glycogen».

Let us not forget that Arnold took lots of steroids.

Actually, at the time he trained at Gironda's gym, his steroid use was very mild, just oral Dianabol, a relatively weak anabolic. 'Monster-maker' drugs came later- and he then turned into a huge, truly freaky mass of muscle. In any event, a proper diet is even more important if anabolics are to be used while training. Most steroid-taking pros have a truly bad idea of what a proper diet for muscle mass development is if you can believe the bodybuilding magazines. I do not know how they do it. A superhuman tolerance to massive amounts of weird drugs, I reckon.

If you can find a first edition (white cover) of Arnold's bodybuilding book, he talks quite frankly about steroids, but edited it out for the second edition (black cover).

After being Reagan's fitness advisor, he figured it was not PC to have just the original book floating around and edited a new sanitised edition to release just before his run for governor of CA. As for PC, if you can find a copy of the classic movie Pumping Iron, check out what they pass around after the competition... So much for hypocrisy in politics... Did Bill C REALLY not inhale?

Of course. Gironda believed in the then current myth of glycogen-depletion, it is still current amongst the supplement-maker-owned bodybuilding magazines, which make the most money off of selling carby protein drinks.

Careful research has shown that glycogen is not depleted during exercise.

I'm glad this thread was started and grateful for your shared knowledge and experience Bear!!!

Hey Bear,
Just thought i would tell you my brother would be completely jealous to know i am talking to you. He is a dead head! He followed the grateful dead around for years and lived out of his car eating bologna!! lol His daughters rooms is decorated with the dancing Bears and other Dead stuff!
I went googling and was surprised to find you in wikipedia. There is alot about you out there on the net, and i found out about your Grandpa the politician too!
i was impressed to find out that songs about you were written not only by the Dead but by Steely Dan and Frank Zappa too!
The one thing i can't seem to find is a picture of you! i am still searching..lol
I'm telling my brother you told me how to make mayo..he he!!
karen

I would greatly appreciate links to this research.

Bear thanks for your time to answer my question. Though I still don't know why I have this going on, at least you were honest and told me you don't know why. Thank you for that. I will continue to avidly read this thread, as I find it very informative. Again thanks for taking the time to answer my question.

Bear,

I believe that your diet is healthy. What I have a hard time with is that VLC is not. You have stated that people around you eating carbs are in poor health and dying. We all know that's the case with the general public. But can you honestly say that you know people who have intentionally reduced their intake to only 50g of carbs or so/day for an extended period of time who are still in poor health?

Dr. Wolfgang Lutz experimented for 40 years putting patients on low carb diets and determined that they remained healthy (and existing disease disappeared) as long as intake was below 72g of carbs per day. He saw no significant difference even if carbs were totally eliminated.

Another question: Do you get calculus on your teeth?

I'll step in for a moment, and mention that Lutz does NOT recommend dropping carbs to very low levels, and does not even believe in the Atkins induction approach and recommends against it. He did experiment early on with very low carb levels, but settled on the 6 bread units, roughly 72 grams of starchy carbs per day, for a number of reasons mentioned in his german-langauge books.

Unfortunately his english version of Life Without Bread does not really cover that point as well, from what I recall - I loaned my english version out, so I'm going from memory of some years back.

Kwasniewski is another that doesn't recommend following under a certain level of carbs per day; I believe about 50 in his case.

You're right in that he does recommend easing down the carbs more gradually for older people and those with compromised health, but what I read (in English, yes) was that once well into the diet, he determined that below 72g simply resulted in no additional benefits, not that it was harmful. If you can remember the specific reasons for not going below 72 I'd be interested. I can't read German.

What Bear doesn't realize is that he started eating zero carb when he was in his 20s. Dr. Lutz was treating people of all ages, but many much older who were already ill or had suffered permanent damage. I don't think Atkins thought of that either. I gather he used induction to jump start the body into fat metabolism (yeilding initially quick results and hence enthusiasm about the diet), not realizing that that might not be appropriate for older or more compromised individuals.

Yes, you're correct that Lutz does recommend lowering gradually, and that going much under 70 or so doesn't result in any added benefits, even with regards to weight loss. He did spend time himself with extremely low carbs at first, and then moved back to the 6 bread units, used by Austrian hospitals so successfully prior to WWII.

Apparently he feels that going much under 70 or so grams of carbs means that the body will be stressed unnecessarily in producing the amounts of glucose it needs for certain functions through protein conversion.

He also feels it can lead to an excess in growth hormone, that results in dental problems such as bleeding of the gums, that usually is misdiagnosed as lack of Vitamin C. The relationship between carbs and hormones is something he also talks about as being a reason for having a modest intake of carbs.

He's certainly a low-carber, but appears to feel that humans have become accustomed to at least some modest amount of carbs, so from his medical standpoint is suggesting the 6 BE as a proven, effective and safe level to follow. He also recognizes that many aren't going to be able to follow low-carb with at least some perks, such as a quarter-liter of beer with his meal...

Bear -

meat hardly has any calcium or magnesium - where are you getting your numbers from? I'm getting mine from nutritiondata.com.

Beef flank for an example - 3oz has ~ 5mg calcium and 20mg magnesium.

1 chicken drumstick - 6mg Ca and 12mg Mg

1oz hard goat cheese - 253mg Ca and 15mg Mg

On the contrary -

1 cup cooked spinach - 245mg Ca and 157mg Mg

1 oz almonds - 70mg Ca and 78mg Mg

Now obviously you'll just say - well, you feel great so obviously you get everything you need, but I'm telling ya - my Mg consumption goes down and I am the pmt monster from hell and I get depressed.

I need like 400mg Mg to feel good - indeed when I get close to this amount through diet I feel much better - how on earth am I supposed to get that from meat/eggs/cheese etc????

I just want to understand how this is supposed to work?

And surely it would be the same for everybody, unless I have a severe genetic glitch - and I know I'm not the only one.

Everything else makes sense - dropping grains and raw spinach etc because of the phytates interfering with mineral absorption.

Thanks Bear, great advice.
You really think that I could get down to 95-105 lbs? That would be awesome!
It would take me something like 3 years, but who cares; as long as I am losing fat, I am happy! I will relax a bit re. counting the calories, your explanation makes sense, and I must trust that the weight will keep coming off as long as I don't eat carbs. Which I don't. Absolutely none, except the one contained in 2 eggs (as per fitday). I eat cheese, but only camembert and brie for their total lack of carbs (again per fitday).

I read the following article re. alcohol consumption on the Banting Diet. I remember you mentioning something about alcohol and liver enzymes, and I wonder what your comments might be on this. Can you tell I like my glass of wine with dinner!





<<<Dr. Pennington, who has probably had more experience of high-fat, high-protein diets in the treatment of obesity than anyone else, says that alcohol checks the combustion of fat in the body.
On the other hand, there is Banting's evidence. He took six glasses of claret a day and a glass of rum or something like that most nights when he went to bed, and still he lost weight. And Dr. Pawan has mentioned to me the intriguing possibility that alcoholic drinks, by dilating the blood vessels in the skin and making it work harder, may step up metabolism to an extent which more than compensates for the calories taken in as alcohol.
This increased metabolism, coupled with increased loss of water from the skin and in the urine, could then result in weight loss. There is experimental evidence for this.
Professor Kekwick found that obese patients who were losing weight satisfactorily on a high-fat, low-calorie diet, continued to lose if alcohol was added in amounts up to 500 calories a day (equivalent to about a third of a pint of gin). But if the extra 500 calories were given as chocolate or other carbohydrate food, they stopped losing weight and started to gain.
This confirms the belief-quite widely held--that pink gins are slimming. Probably all alcoholic drinks except those like beer which contain large amounts of carbohydrate, are slimming too.
But it must be remembered that the stimulation of appetite and the removal of inhibitions by alcohol may mask the slimming effect by tempting you to overeat the fattening, carbohydrate foods which are so often provided with drinks.>>>

Hell, I can eat 3 ounces of meat in just a couple bites!

I can easily eat anywhere from 1-2 pounds of meat a day
Three ounces of tri-tip, according to the website you listed has 10mg of calcium and 22mg of magnesium. Maybe I'm missing something, but if I extend those numbers across for 32 ounces thats approximately 100mg of calcium and 220mg magnesium. That's not including whatever else I eat that has it. Eggs are loaded with calcium, 156mg per egg according to the site.

Four scrambled eggs, a couple pounds of meat and a hunk of cheese goes a long way.

For me, it's more like 2 scrambled eggs and not quite a pound of meat a day; am I short in nutrients then?

I was searching for my collection of studies, including the one on glycogen depletion. I have to deal with cyclone damage right now, so it may be awhile before I can resume the search. I should not even be dealing with the thread, but feel I must.

50 gms? I have no idea what people who say they are on a low carb diet are really eating- unless they tell me they are not losing and ask me why, then I ask them to tell me exactly... in fine detail... each and every bit, water included, which passes their lips. Some people do not get fat no matter what they eat, some may lose BF on 100 gm/day- Atkins gave that as one of his 'levels' in the second edition. Some few may be able to tolerate 50 gm or even 20 gm. BUT most who are obese, I mean not just a few kg overweight, need to go down to 5 gm (or less if possible). Ill health? I never followed anyone who was on any LC diet for long enough to evaluate whether it was bad or good for their health- that might take 10 years or more.

Quite frankly I have never known anyone other than a very few who could follow the LC regime even for a full year without returning to their old dietary habits. Those who make it past a year generally have been in the <5 gm regime. Remember, I have been telling people about this way of life for very long time, and have had contact over that period with a great many who have attempted it.

Calculus? Only really noticeable if I am drinking mineralised water, and even that was back before I lost function in my salivary glands. I usually drink/drank only rainwater. Calculus is basically the calcium salts present in saliva depositing on the teeth, it generally requires scraping with a tool to remove- brushing does little even with a hard toothbrush. It is not damaging unless you ingest carbs, which hang in it and feed caries-bacteria, which also get into it. Carnivores can ignore the deposits if they don't mind have cruddy-looking teeth- and perhaps worse breath due to meat-putrifying bacteria which will cause odour, but do not damage the enamel.

In my experience, no one af any age has had problems keto-adapting by going directly to a zero-carb regime. Books are written by people who are still in the cultural/social grip of the belief we must have carbs for health, energy, etc. This is false, and their recommendations are likewise... inappropriate.

Hey, ANYTHING which could increase growth hormone would be a godsend to older people, much of what is 'aging' and slow healing is due to the steady decline in HGH with age. The regrettable fact is there is NO SUCH THING, no matter what the author of a book and/or supplement manufacturers claim. You have to inject daily doses of synthetic hormone to raise your levels by any amount. 1/4 litre of beer? Get serious!

loops- If you eat at least a POUND of red meat a day, trust me, you will get all the Ca you need or can use. The body is very conservative with minerals as well as proteins. If you ate only meat from childhood you would have super-dense bones as did ALL the stone age Inuit. Recommendations for Ca in supplements use data based on chemicals, not bioactive Ca compounds. If you still feel some sort of Ca based fear, then take hydroxyapatite (or chew on bones)- it is better than mineral Ca, but is only a fraction as effective as the bioactive Ca in muscle tissues. The Ca in vegetables is practically worthless, it is as bad or worse than the mineral kind.

However, keep in mind that excess Ca intake is definitely not good for your health. I do not fully understand why so many people on the thread seem to be so paranoid of everything and anything, seeking the most obscure reasons why NOT to become comfortable on this regime. I have eaten this way for nearly a half century. I do not take, nor have I ever, Ca supplements, and my bone density is through the roof- my dentist is completely gobsmacked by my dental x-rays. You do not 'drop' certain vegetable due to toxins, but because they are not (and I mean ALL vegetables/fruits) an optimum food for humans- as is indicated by the title of this thread. That vegetables can be taken as food, and it will not immediately kill you is not in contention. This is about the great benefits to be gained with a meat-only diet, which has no deficiencies of any kind- other than what might be termed 'entertainment value'. IMHO your 'glitch' is strictly mental and definitely NOT 'genetic'.

Alcohol is a social drug. It is a simple, easy to make and cheap, it is a body and brain damaging toxin- the metabolic waste of the fermenting organism. It is actually a carbohydrate, assigned a value of 7 cal.gm, nearly twice that of glucose, and is fattening. Furthermore, detoxifying it seriously interferes with the liver's normal processes. I gave it away after noting its effect on my weight training, which lasted for three days after drinking a single glass. I never drank much, maybe a single 4-6 oz glass with dinner, twice or three times a week. On testing- by reducing the amount taken to <2 oz, I still found the effect, so I no longer drink any alcohol. I have been informed that it is not PC on this forum to discuss anything 'illegal' so I will just leave it at this.

I'll admit now, I've read a few posts on this thread but not all 7+ pages so sorry if this has already been discussed.

Wondering: wouldn't you get bored with a totally carnivorous diet? There are only so many types of meats and without adding veggies to them, wouldn't you get bored with their flavours?

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I didn't respond earlier because I thought someone else would step in to correct that ridiculous statement. 95-105 pounds is considerably underweight for someone 5'3. 95 pounds is a BMI of 16, which is lower than the thresshold of anorexia. Even 105 pounds at 5'3 is still underweight. Your goal weight is slightly overweight, but it isa more realistic and healthy weight for you than 95-105.

156 mg per egg is probably if you consume the shell. Fitday says a raw egg has only 25 mg of calcium.

Bones and shells are likely good sources of calcium. If you consume the bone portion of fowl (I do) to get at marrow, that's likely a good source of lots of minerals. However I do not consume shells as I don't see the point. Bones have a nice texture to me and replete with tasty marrow, egg shells are not.

145lbs is the weight my doctor recommended; I had chosen 125 lbs, the weight I was at in my twenties and thirties, but she says that it is not realistic. I don't know, but my body will probably stop losing by itself at some point. I am curious to see where!

Fauve, I think it's realistic for you. I am a lot shorter than you and might be able to pull off 95, but that would be skeletal, trust me. I am pretty small framed too, there are so many factors. You can't just throw out some number and say it's going to be alright for everyone. I was told 95-100 and I laughed. I am aiming for 105. Whatever, your 125 sounds better to me. Go for it!

No one stepped in because it's not ridiculous. My wife is 5'5" and weighs 100 lbs. and I can assure you that she is neither underweight nor anorexic. She eats like a truck driver--at dinner we evenly split 3 pounds of meat without difficulty. She can also eat an entire 5 pound chicken. (Sorry, I like to brag about her) She was 105, and after eating VLC for a year (for health), dropped down to 100 and stayed there. It does depends on frame size, but barring an unusual disorder, as long as she (Fauve, that is) eats enough fat and protein she'll never be underweight. And if 105 happens to be underweight for her, she'll never achieve it anyway.

I happen to think that most of the goal weights here are set are too high, but I can understand wanting to set incremental goals for motivational purposes.

I am really confused at the responses I'm getting.
Might I point out you are 4'10 while fauve is 5'3? 95 pounds is not very underweight for you, for fauve it would be considerably underweight. Even you admit that at 95 pounds you would be skeletal - imagine how you would look if you were 5 inches taller.
You think it is a good idea to advice Fauve to obtain a BMI of 16?

Remember people, this is first and foremost about health not about "lets see how skinny I can get!"
I don't doubt I could obtain a similar BMI as well. Anyone can. You just don't eat. It's not hard at all. My low weight was 104 and I could have easily dropped under 100 pounds provided I did not make the effort to stop (I am 5'5).

Is it healthy, though? Will you look good or feel good? Definitely not.