How many carbs should you target? – Keto and Low-carb diets

My life health has improved since learning from so many intersting people on the Diet Doctor site. Started strict Keto and now off most medicines will remain on moderate carbs. Almost three years and have never felt better than now at seventy one.

I would eat about 50 net grams of carbs a day. Its way easier to do than Keto and still have most of the benefits, im able to keep my weight stable and have a clearer mind. Keto was too difficult and lead to not having much on my plate other than protein and fat. That said I know i could of experimented much more and got more variety but it was too hard. This way I can eat what the family eats and just modify it a bit.

(Harry here) That was a big big question for me when we started this journey. I settled on 20 carbs a day and I saw a remarkable diffence when I reached that amount. Great Video

Whenever I eat around 80-100g carbs I always fee like I “pig out” but then thinking back to my previous 300-600g carbs a day… Far from that, lol.
These days I am everywhere between 0g-100g carbs depending on activity, mood, energy. Suits me well. ^^

Very helpful. I have reached my desired weight and metabolic health level. I’ve been eating up 100 net carbs once a week or so and my weight is still stabilized. Nice to hear I’m good with my strategy.

Me too. Same age.

This is a great overview of the various low carb approaches. I am directing many of my friends and acquaintances to Diet Doctor for guidance on Keto without the the efforts to sell eating programs or supplements. I started watching DD on YouTube but opted to become a member because I made so much use of their podcasts and programs.

What baffles me: I am a type 2 diabetic and around 10 years ago I spoke to a couple of nutritionists about weight loss and blood sugar regulation. Not a single one of them advised me to cut sugar and starch for good from my menu. Certainly one or the other advised me to reduce sugar, but kept it very general and referred to the nutritional pyramid scheme. Now only a handful of YouTube videos helped me a) reduce weight drastically and b) bring my sugar level under control. makes me think somehow btw a big thanks to all of the low carb / keto channels
for the valuable and factually presented information

I was feeling old and tired until last April when I got lucky and found Keto, I got the flu, but it wasn’t that bad and it was gone in 2 or 3 days. My symptom was dizziness. I found I slept a lot better and got the energy to start walking a lot. My mood elevated and I just plain felt better. I went from 215 lbs to todays 165. I never got hungry even during a couple of fasts 4 days long. I either OMAD or use a 18:6 eating window. Gave away 78 lbs of prepared foods if they had high fructose syrup. I stay away from the inside aisles except for the canned fish. With the money saved I buy grass fed meats and lots of pasture raised eggs. I satisfy the sweet tooth with berries and 85% dark chocolate with I used to hate. My ice cream is now good full fat yogurt with some sour cream, nuts and berries sweetened with stevia. I stay around 50 to 100 carbs a day, I find that easy to do. I walk 40 miles a week on average now, when I started it was about 15 a week. A1C last month was 4.8. Not bad for 67 yrs old. Side benefit was I stopped a lifelong heavy beer habit.

A benefit of starting at a liberal low carb level and then slowly adjusting downward is that I never suffered from keto flu symptoms, even though I ended up on the very strict end.

I’ve been living the keto lifestyle for 15 months now, lost 40 pounds quickly, and have kept it off for a year. I really don’t “need” to lose anymore weight. I have mostly read & heard that general keto is under 50 carbs a day, strict keto being under 20, but I have never counted my carbs–just ball-parked them & I’ve had great results. I do keto the best I can but have never overtly cheated. I know I’ve gone over 20 carbs/day but have kept them under 50. Overall I’m very satisfied with my results.

Thanks for your support, George!

That’s great to read, Robert! Keep it up!

After two years of very low carb, I started adding some carbs back. By this standard I’d say I vary between moderate and liberal carb now, and it is working well. That said, I’m still keeping sugar, including fruit or any processed food, at zero. I’m now at three years from when I started low carb/IF, and I can’t imagine going back to eating sugar and eating throughout the day.

I am also over 70 and trying to lose weight, keeping my carb intake low…if I lower carb gradually I do not get keto flu…happy to learn I am not alone.

To anybody starting, I would suggest start with the liberal low-carb. Once you get used to that, move to low-carb. Once you get used to that, you would like to, go even further. The most important thing is do not be in a hurry. Take it easy and good things happen.

I’ve found that even if I keep my carbs between 50-100g, I’m able to maintain decent ketone level if I workout fasted in the morning. Exercise in general seems to work really well for increasing ketone levels for me. And it is also the reason I had significant side effects even with that much carbs. Experienced keto flu as well as constant dizziness from salt loss. Keto electrolytes helped a ton.

@Dianne I have been finding that electrolyte powders really help the keto flu. I am on very low keto right now. A
lso, diet dr, has a simple electrolyte elixir recipe.

@Mary if you miss fruit would it be useful to have a little sometimes? I eat blueberries and blackberries. I’ll even have an apple if I really want one because there’s a lot of fiber in it and it’s a healthy thing to eat. I think there is a risk with this way of doing things to go too far in the other direction. There is a significant difference between having an apple and eating a box of donuts or even a big glass of orange juice.

I don’t know your specific situation. If you are in the weight loss phase or if eating additional carbs is a trigger for you, then of course please don’t. But for me if I really want some fruit, I have some. Otherwise it begins to feel like deprivation. If it gets to that point, I’m no longer doing good for myself.

For me and I suspect many others, a feeling of constant or persistent deprivation leads to longing and a kind of sorrow. I don’t want to feel that way. I want to take a certain amount of joy in my choices, Joy might be the wrong word, I mean that I want to be happy that I am choosing well for myself. There is a difference between choosing to not have something and feeling deprived. It’s good to choose to not have things that are harmful or that make it more difficult to reach our goals.

There is a universe of difference between having some fruit and eating the standard American diet of processed food, processed vegetable oils and lots of carbs, eating many times a day, all of it. If I am eating a moderate carb diet, between 40-55 g a day for me and I begin to long for something I pay attention to the longing. If it is transient, it’s not a problem. If it persists then that’s an indication that I should do something about it, figure out if it’s an emotional issue or if I am craving something in the food.

A good example is cranberry sauce. I love cranberries and I always made fresh cranberry sauce. Cranberries are healthy but the several cups of sugar in most recipes isn’t. My solution was to come up with a recipe that worked. I don’t like artificial sweeteners or semi-natural sweeteners so I use the juice and pulp of one orange and a half cup of honey or maple syrup or even sugar. This is for 24 oz of cranberries. I found a website that lets you input all of the ingredients and it gives you the nutritional breakdown. My recipe ended up at 7 g net carb per serving. That was a reasonable compromise for me. I don’t eat a big bowl of it but I can have some without feeling bad if I really want to (and when I serve it to other people after they get over the surprise of so little sugar, they mostly like it and then come to prefer it that way).

This is my approach with other things. I love chocolate, if I want some chocolate I’ll have an ounce of dark chocolate if I think I am in a place where it won’t cause me to eat more. That requires emotional honesty. Do I really want the chocolate or is it something else, will eating an ounce of chocolate lead to eating the whole bar and then looking for more? I found a brand that tastes good and is very low in sugar. It’s not extremely dark and bitter, I think it’s 72% cocoa with 7 grams net carb per serving. Being able to have some chocolate if I want some helps me ward off that feeling of deprivation.

I don’t want to misrepresent myself, I don’t have cranberry sauce or chocolate every.day. But I know that if I want to, I can make that choice and it will be okay. Each of us has our own psychological background, it’s going to be very different for each person but this is what works for me.

For general background, I fast between 16 to 18 hours a day and have two meals each day. If I’m not hungry then I don’t eat the first meal. I eat 1600 to 1800 calories and I try to get 30-45 minutes of cardio most days in addition to stretching and strength training.

I wrote a lot more than I intended to. Again, I don’t know your specific situation but if it won’t be a trigger for you to eat a lot more and if it won’t harm you, then having a little fruit every now and then should be okay. Dr Fung talks about how he went on a cruise with his family and ate the cruise food. He gained some weight, came home and then was stricter about carbs and fasting for a couple of weeks and dropped the weight he gained. If we maintain low carb most of the time, we can have a slice of birthday cake if we want and if it won’t cause us to eat lots of cake. Feast and famine, a time to eat and a time to not eat. It’s a pendulum, it can swing too far in either direction. The standard or typical American diet is much too far in one direction but it’s also possible to be too rigid in the other direction. I am not suggesting that you are, I think part of this comment is prompted by other comments I’ve read where people have scolded others for deviating.or referred to eating things as “cheating.”

This is why I like Dr Jason Fung’s approach. You don’t want to eat cruise ship food all the time. You don’t want to have birthday cake everyday or every week. But when you find yourself on a cruise, enjoy it. When you are celebrating a special event, if somebody makes you a cake, you have a slice of it. There is a place in life for these kinds of foods. The problem is when they become what everyone eats on a daily basis. An occasional treat is fine as long as it’s genuinely occasional.

I think your comment prompted this long response because I felt sad thinking of someone wanting some fruit and never having any. I went back and forth between wanting to say, have some fruit and worrying that it would be the wrong thing to say.

I really would like to see more people geetting this message. Instead fro going full on blindfold mode, every person should “test” what is best for his body. Great presentation.

Do you feel any fluctuations in your energy with that carb amount? I’ve found that being in between keto and moderate carb (say 80-100g) might have possibly had such effect on me

@Me, The I Am yeah i dont feel all that energetic but I can get from meal to meal without snacking or craving sugar too much. Plus don’t feel guilty for having a splash of milk in my tea if I’m at my mother’s. Etc. I don’t have to refuse that slice of cake worrying that it’ll take me out of ketosis

I’ve been on a very liberal of low carb for about 2 weeks now. 120-160g a day while training hard and getting in 10-12k steps a day. Lost 6 lbs already and hit a 375 bench press during this deficit of carbohydrates and on higher fats. Pretty amazing stuff

Just what I was looking for! Trying to get into keto for a few weeks now through gradual cut-backs and starting to feel depressed. I’m on a very limited keto ‘introductory’ diet because I have to also follow a LOW FODMAP diet and also have SIBO off and on. I’ve gotten it down to between 80-100g of carbs most days, also take phentermine once a day. I’m averaging 1-2 lbs off per week. I AM insulin resistant, but it’s a recent condition with me. Also done a lot of yo-yo diets in the past the ruined my metabolism.

I am a 210lbs 55 year old male. I lift weights every other day and run trail ultras. I am very active but my cholesterol in my family is high . I love what he said and that it is an experiment. last time I really counted my carbs I was around 500 a day plus. When I reduced them, I dropped 14 lbs in two weeks. I did not watch closely the protein sources and they were too high in fat. I want to be doing these workouts for a long time. choosing leaner protein, and reducing the carbs under even 150 a day is huge. a lot of ultra runners believe they can eat anything in any amount. As I have aged I have had to train smarter.

99% of people who do keto is weight losing related!…keto not a diet u can follow long time

@Olivia thanks for this I don’t think I’ve been eating enough for my body to cope. So I’ve re calculated everything and feeling much better. I was very successful years ago on keto before and I ended up flooding for 7 months severe heavy periods. I already have 2 chronic illnesses too so I ate some carbs and my weight has just blown up again. So I’m a bit scared of that happening again. But last time, I was fasting too much living on a peice of cheese and a pepperami . So yes it lead me to a eating disorder. But I’m much more aware now. Just this last few weeks intense hunger was killing me. Eating more fat now too xx thank you xx

@Lily Kim thanks my dear yes I really enjoy keto as a lifestyle I just keep getting setback with hormones and severe periods. I’ve levelled up now and not giving up. I’ve not been eating enough calories or carbs or fat for that matter lol! Stopped intermittent fasting for now xx 😘

@Olivia thanks so much my dear! I’ll keep going , your words of encouragement got me through ! Thanks xxx

@Jo mac Keep it up, sis!! 🤗 Wishing you all the good luck as well!!

@Steve C so how many carbs is low carbs though in a day? Especially when ur trying to balance glucose(blood sugar)?

@Jb 444 Low carb is usually considered under 100/day, keto 20-50, but it’s individualistic. I think I may have become carb sensitive, meaning I’ve eaten so few that when I do my glucose level reacts by staying over 100 even when intermittent fasting for 16 hours, but never going higher than about 125. I think that I may have the dawn effect where my glucose spikes in the morning, but the amount is small. Evolutionary to ramp us up for the day.

@Steve C thanks

@brad h …Yes…Fructose is a fruit sugar which is converted by the 2 organs into sucrose and glucose…both sugars for energy. Eating far too much fruit and vegg, causes the pancreas to become insulin resistant from continual bombardment with overdoses of fructose and veg carbs…therefore the energy goes into the organs and stored as fat for a later date, as do carbohydrates…This is why people on low carb keto type diets become clear headed, energetic, drop tons of weight and feel amazing after a period of time. If you look around you will find over half the western worls has fatty liver and half insulin resistence, with doctors knowing about it, but accepting it as “normal” and treating foggy head, excess weight, digestive problems with pills and potions that can never fix it unless the person stops consuming far too much end product sugars and carbs.

Went from a regular diet straight to 15-ish carbs per day (margin well under 20). Added an additional (give or take) 2 liters of water, 5g of salt and 250ml of bone broth per day on top of the “normal”.
0 symptoms – I’ve honestly no idea what the whole keto flu stuff is all about. Either’s it’s very easy to avoid, or perhaps I’m just lucky??

@Lizard008 Yes, I noticed my water consumption shot almost straight up to 4 litres a day, from 2 litres too…and I wondered what happens to it as I surely do not pee it out…and my tummy areas, seem flat and empty all the time. It’s really weird. I don’t need to lose weight, but a losing a bit of cellulite could be nice. Am wondering how much a fatty liver and pancreas weighs, as the weight loss must be coming from that….Must look it up somewhere and see, as I have lost 4 kilos in 3 or 4 fairly strict weeks of under 20 carbs and no added fats, due to no gall bladder, and am doing fine, I think. Am feeling clearer headed and jog a couple of Klms 3 or 4 mornings a week again, getting back to my normal 6 days of 3 klms a day.

Oh NOOOO not the BEER !

@Kekkai tl;dr, but blueberries for the win!

@youtuber42 actually I think blackberries are probably better, lower in sugar

@Kekkai great practical response!

@Mary McLean you kinda got that backwards, sucrose is a disaccharide of fructose and glucose. Also, realistically, it’s the fruits far more than the vegetables, though it does vary wildly, carrots are really sugary for example.

@Oatmeal …That is probably because I’m also dyslexic, so I see a lot of thengs in reverse. You should see me trying to type this on a Hungarian keyboard…!

@Kawa Gonzo I have been keto for about 11 or 12 yrs, I use keto to manage my prediabeties.. keto is very easy to follow long term, it becomes a way of life, not just a diet.

@Suzi B no long term study has been done on keto!. most of people been on keto from 5 to 10 years …lets wait and see!

I found the keto diet didn’t agree with me and made me feel ill all the time, but a low carb diet still keeps the weight off and I feel much healthier

Rubbish. Do it or don’t. I went right into full blown keto and lost 38lbs in 5 months. I’m not introducing small amounts of carbs here and there, but rarely.

@Olivia Yes because it’s not sustainable long term.

I found that 50-100g is too little for me, seeing how I fast a couple of days a week (not back-to-back) now, and exercise; I get a keto rash really quickly.

So what is your approximate carbs : fat: Protein ratio?

@Prajakta Meshram I’ve never really measured it, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it isn’t really important, as long as one is eating real, whole food. Well, at first I cut grains way down, so I guess I measured that at zero, but other than that I eat real food that I can afford in a combination that I like. I tend to eat a lot of beans, veggies, eggs, some meat, and some grains that are as whole as I can get. I eat very little fruit, but that is just me. Almost no sugar. Avoid ultra processed foods, that is the key for me, including canola oil, protein powder.

@Turn Right You way is not the only way. Gheesh.

@Eyes that smile – Heart that Loves That’s true. It’s not the only way. But it’s definitely the best way.

@Kawa Gonzo True. However, we do know the traditional high carb (food pyramid) diet has been proven to bad on so many levels. I highly doubt the significant benefits of keto (weight loss, lower BP, insulin resistance, etc.) would be worse than the former.

this is all fascinating…
i initially thought if i cut out grains and ate 6oz meat a day with a chicken salad at evening and a chard wrap burger for breakfast everyday i’d be fine.
6 weeks later i was feeling subtle acute chest pains.
any idea why?
so i stopped eating meat again and the chest pangs stopped.
then i started doing more research.
discovered i ate a lot of berries, kombucha tea and coconut water which all add to the lvl of sugar in the blood! LOL
but y’all say berries are fine.
just no fruit.
is there really a difference?
what about grease?
i used to warm up my bone broth in the grease from the chicken the night b4.
isn’t grease liquid fat?
how is ghee any different??
the other documentaries claimed that saturated fat, i.e. cholesterol levels, don’t matter and have NOTHING at all to do with the cholesterol buildup inside blood vessels.
they say that those accumulations are derived from high carb high sugar diets w/o explaining how or why.
…
questions…
QUESTIONS THAT NEED ANSWERING!!!
gratsi

Yes low carb is definitely the way to go. AHA has actually put this in the magazines that the doctors are supposed to be reading, but most if reading are not telling this to their patients. Nutritionists actually has to go by the protocol of the facility they work in and if they question the diet they no is wrong for a diabetic will be asked to go by the protocol or leave. So there you have it. We have to take our own health in our hands and do the research. It’s time consuming, but the best way to get healthy. I do not listen to these doctors who are promoting their own products because they all have chemicals that our bodies don’t need. Especially all the keto processed foods. ♥️♥️

@Clueless Go away. Nobody needs your negativity

When you say all the time, how long? The transition can take a few weeks.

@Clueless Your name is appropriate. 🤡

@Clueless your name says it all

How’s your sex drive and erections with keto? I’ve always wondered how it goes

modern medicine is geared towards selling pharmaceuticals and not curing people.

Excellent video, thank you! Ket-carnivore for 1 year here due to severe autoimmune issues and this diet got me off the bed 🙌🏻

That’s astonishing. Ty[e 2 is a disease of excess sugar and they didn’t recommend to lower sugar. Here, take this pill…

Doctors don’t have much faith in dietary changes to fix a medical disorder/disease. They’re focused on drugs and operations as the way to cure a condition. Their whole training and the updates they receive back up their beliefs. The drug companies are not going to tell Doctors that conditions can be cured or fixed with dietary changes. After all, where’s the profit in that?. The drug companies don’t want to cure people anyway, they want us on a maintenance drug for the rest of our lives.
The other people who send updates and pseudo medical study results to Doctors are the major food manufacturers. They want to keep us on a diet of highly processed produce. The last thing they want is people eating steak, eggs, butter and fresh low carb vegetables. I know I’m coming across as a conspiracy theorist, but just look at the evidence.

@Paul Weston you are exactly right in what you are saying. There is no money to be made with healthy people and it’s sad what greed can do. But a lot of people will continue to be sick because they don’t want to give up eating the foods they love! Mainly sugary sweets and starchy carbs. Plain and simple.

@Turn Right Definitely not the best way for all, ‘Keto’ doesn’t work for me and I did it for over a year thinking I’d adapt.

@Funtimefranky What have you tried since? How has that worked for you? I’ve recommended Dr Bernstein to many diabetics and many say that’s no way to live. He lives on ANIMAL protein with veggies. He doesn’t eat grains or fruit. His blood sugar is normal all the time even though he’s a type ONE diabetic.

HealthPhreak

How many carbs should you target? – Keto and Low-carb diets

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