> Also, it’s day 9 and my Non-24 has not come back.
Oh wonderful, I am so happy for you! Something is perhaps fixed or fixing.... Are you going to try low-protein swamping next? It would be interesting if you're fine either side but have issues in the middle.
Maybe this is a stupid question, but why did the version of Keto you did "necessarily" change completely?? It's not like you *have* to eat lots of beef and cheese if you're in the U.S. Did you try just recreating the same keto diet you did in Asia? Or maybe I missed that...
Well, you're right I could've not eaten beef and cheese in the US, that's true. I don't eat a lot of beef (but a little) and very little cheese right now.
I didn't try that, since I thought it was "just keto" and was at the time actually thinking my limited (vs US options) access made it "worse keto."
In a way maybe I have now recreated it a little with ex150 :)
I have a story pretty similar to yours. I found low-carb before keto was popularized, about 15 years ago, and have been ketarded ever since. I followed strict low-carb principles and lost over 150 lbs. I ate pretty much ad libitum meat, eggs, cheese, and low-carb veggies, etc., only counting carbs and keeping them well under 20 most days. Initially, I would even call it “effortless.”
However, over the years, the weight crept back up—about 100 lbs over the course of the next 10 years. During those years, my stress levels increased, my sleep decreased, and I had more cheat days and keto “treats.” Still, I kept carbs under 20 on most days.
When the carnivore diet started gaining traction, I became convinced that nuts, stevia, and PUFA in the remaining non-meat keto foods I was eating might be the issue. So I switched to a more strict carnivore approach, especially during COVID, eating almost exclusively 80/20 ground beef, salt, and water. But I didn’t see much weight loss from that at all.
I believe keto/carnivore works well for people who are just trying to get healthier by eliminating a lot of addictive and inflammatory foods and replacing them with more nutrient-dense, satiating options. For people who are “normally” overweight and just need to lose 20-50 lbs gained from a lack of dietary awareness, keto/carnivore can “effortlessly” help them return to a normal weight. As highlighted in Burn (thanks for the recommendation), these diets likely work mainly because people feel more satiated on fewer “calories.” Although that’s the primary mechanism, keto does have additional metabolic benefits.
I find it strange that keto followers are always looking for a “boogieman” to pin their problems on. Some major influencers in the space are eating only meat, fat, water, and salt. When followers still have issues on that, they blame the salt—or vitamin A, or too much protein, and so on.
So, why did you regain 100 lbs on keto? What was the mechanism, if not overeating? For me, I’m pretty sure I just started overeating because keto never really solved my relationship with food. I saw carbs as the root of all my weight problems, thinking that if I just avoided them, I’d be fine. I wanted a simple solution that would place the blame on the food, not on my tendency to overeat.
I think the flaw with the “swamp” hypothesis is that it assumes the same methods that kept these cultures “effortlessly” lean can be used to make a very overweight person lean. Staying lean and losing significant weight are very different challenges. Also, it might be unrealistic to expect that someone needing to lose over 100 lbs should find the process “effortless.” It likely requires work to overcome whatever initially caused such an excess of body fat.
I’ve come to the conclusion that these diets have “failed” for weight loss because they never directly address energy intake. While they might work for the “normally” overweight, my satiety point seems to be much higher. Even when I was eating just 80/20 ground beef, salt, and water for over a year, I felt like I had an endless appetite. On certain days, I could easily consume 3,500+ “calories” without feeling overly full.
When I came across ex150, something clicked. After my initial 100 lb loss, I hit a plateau. One of my own experiments was to try a keto, vegetarian-forward diet—still ad libitum but replacing a lot of meat and cheese with low-carb veggies. This approach had three effects: it definitely lowered my protein intake, reduced my overall “calories,” and increased satiety with all the added bulk. This broke through my plateau, and I lost the final 50 lbs. This was before I was aware of PUFA, so during this period, my PUFA intake was likely higher due to things like salad dressings and nutbutters.
Something the keto community often overlooks is the bodybuilding community. These individuals can cut down to single-digit body fat, and almost all follow the same basic principle: “calories” are king. They meticulously track their intake and eat fewer “calories.” I’ve seen some of their diets, which would blow a ketard’s mind (PUFAs, processed food, cereals, etc.)—diets that would even be labeled as being in the “swamp”—and yet they still lose weight. Yes, it requires effort, discipline, and mindfulness, but it works, and their metabolisms don’t get “ruined.”
I’m interested to see the results of your rice experiment. However, it seems like your ex150 results have plateaued. While you have a lot of positive things to say about keto and hyper-keto ex150, instead of considering the ad libitum “calories don’t matter” nature of the diet, you’re exploring entirely new answers despite all the good biomarkers. I’d love to see you try an ex150-calorie-controlled experiment with the same foods, just mindful of the calorie intake, to see if managing energy expenditure vs. intake has an impact. As for me, that’s the experiment I’m currently conducting. I’ll report back with my results.
1. Ok, overeating - but what caused the overeating? Why did keto (in both of us!) first cause massive undereating ("effortless"), and then suddenly reversed into massive overeating? And, in my case, another bout of massive undereating (-75lbs) again, years later? Overeating isn't a root cause, it's at best a proximate cause.
2. I haven't had a "bad relationship" with food in... I don't know, a decade or so. I think as a teen and in college I did a bunch of emotional eating. But ever since I started paleo and then keto 9 years ago, and definitely in the last 2 years, my relationship with food is... austere, scientific? I'm living on a rice + tomato sauce diet right now, and I don't even miss anything. I think I have about the most detached relationship to food you could possibly have.
3. When you say things like "boogieman" and "place blame on the food".. yea, ok, but what causes your tendency to overeat? And how come it suddenly reverses and you lose 150lbs? Isn't that weird, at least? Doesn't that make you wonder what changed?
4. I agree that staying lean and losing weight are different, or at least can be. But the swamp hypothesis actually came from weight loss. If you read that Denise Minger post I've linked a bunch of times, she says that both keto and carbo people seem to have disproportionate success losing fat and reversing obesity.
5. I don't know if it's unrealistic to expect if you've experienced it. I've lost 100lbs effortlessly. This time around, I've lost 75lbs effortlessly. I have experienced it, so yea I sort of "expect" it and find it realistic. There are plenty of anecdotes like this, including yours. We're just not sure how exactly we did it :)
6. "It likely requires work to overcome whatever initially caused such an excess of body fat." Yea, exactly. That's what I'm trying to figure out - what caused it in the first place?!
7. I also didn't lose any weight on carnivore. I would now suspect it was the high protein. 80/20 ground beef is 27% protein, which is extremely high. 4.5x the amount I'm eating on ex150.
8. Bodybuilders do something I'm not interested in: starve themselves down, at very high cost to health, for a single day of show or photoshoot. Then it all comes back. This is not what I'm trying to do. I don't care about single digit body fat percentages, I want to reverse the obesity epidemic. These are fundamentally different challenges. You could describe it as "normalizing the setpoint" (even though I don't really believe in the setpoint theory). Bodybuilder levels of body fat are not normal, which is why they bounce back up when they eat normally after a show. Obesity is also not normal. I don't want to get to BB levels, I want to get people to say 15-25% bf. Btw, yes their metabolisms ABSOLUTELY get ruined. Bodybuilding is infamous for this. Hormones go down, depression, sex drive disappears, the women lose their period. This is normal and expected in the community. Bodybuilding books openly talk about this.
9. I have thought about say ex150_2000kcal. I did one with 2000kcal, but it wasn't normal ex150, it was chocolate truffle - which I made myself sick of during that experiment. So it was sort of confounded. I think of reversing obesity this way; you need to fix fuel partitioning, and then maybe you can restrict calories to a degrees. Most obese people, upon finally having access to their own body fat, will naturally be less hungry and lose fat when they fix their fuel partitioning is fixed. This is the "effortless, magical" part of fuel partitioning diets. Often times, this stops working eventually. It could be that the fuel partitioning isn't quite fixed yet (e.g. carnivores eating bacon/ketoers eating nuts), or it takes a long time (dePUFAcation), or it's not possible for whatever reason. Possibly, you can then restrict calories and get lower sustainably. But as my 2x5 day fasts showed, even when I lose 10lbs, it just comes back the next time I eat ad lib. Therefore I'm very skeptical of "restricting calories works" because it only "works" for a definition of "works" that I don't much care for. I know I can starve myself down, I just don't think that's a very useful thing unless you're a bodybuilder or photo model. For health reasons, I want something sustainable.
Good luck with your experiment, and let me know how it goes!
Thanks for your detailed response! Here are a few of my thoughts:
1. Good point. For me, the first time I did keto, the weight loss felt effortless. However, every subsequent attempt required me to consciously restrict rather than simply eating to satiety. That’s where my perspective comes from. As I mentioned, there are likely many non-diet factors at play, such as increased stress, less sleep, etc. In my case, I wouldn’t describe the shift as going from massive under-eating to massive over-eating. I lost 150 pounds over two years, but I regained 100 pounds over the course of 10 years—so “only” about 10 pounds per year. This was probably reflective of my pre-keto habits. After hitting my goal, I simply returned to my old patterns, though I continued avoiding carbs for the most part. I have no doubt that if I had been eating a non-keto diet to satiety, the weight gain would have been more significant, with greater health consequences.
2. Most people would consider eating a 90% cream diet—or now a 90% rice diet—a bit disordered. I’m fine calling it scientific, though, and I think we’re both on the same page there.
I’ve always wondered why some people stay effortlessly lean. Anecdotally, my partner has been naturally lean (visible abs, no gym) his entire life, and we’re in our mid-30s now. He eats whatever he wants, whenever he wants, and it’s often not “healthy” food—lots of sugary, processed, PUFA-heavy options. Over the years, I’ve studied this and concluded that he just eats fewer calories naturally. He gets full quickly, naturally fasts most of the day, has little to no cravings, and in emotional situations, he doesn’t eat, whereas I tend to overeat. This seems similar to the mechanism of GLP-1 medications: having a hormone/peptide profile that suppresses appetite and promotes satiety. In his case, it's natural/genetic.
I even experimented with a GLP-1 (Trizepatide) for a few months—shoutout to those bodybuilding bros and their research peptides. Even on a low dose, I experienced a level of satiety I’d never felt before. It was more profound than the “cement truck” fullness from cream, and it also eliminated the pleasure I used to get from food that would drive me to overeat. I thought this must be what my partner feels like. The only side effect I experienced was some excessive burping. That experiment gave me a new understanding of appetite regulation. Was my overeating a GLP-1 deficiency? And my partners leanness a result of proper GLP-1 production? And that realization sent me down the rabbit hole of exploring total energy. Something being a ketard for a long time was often ignored.
3-5. You’ve probably seen studies showing that after initial weight loss, it becomes significantly harder to lose weight again. These studies show how resting energy expenditure (REE) is suppressed, hunger remains upregulated, and other compensatory mechanisms kick in. This might help explain the natural (albeit frustrating) “rubberband” effect. Here are two examples: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15331386/ and https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3823159/.
6. Of course—that’s why we’re all here!
7. I don’t understand how there are so many weight-loss success stories with carnivore, given our experiences and the high protein focus. I assumed the “high fat” aspect would help, but my ketone levels were barely above 1 whenever I checked. On something like ex150, I can easily hit 5. Maybe for some people, it’s their first time on a “keto” diet, and they’re experiencing the same beginner results we did.
8. I’m not interested in bodybuilding or achieving extremely low body fat levels. I agree that those who do so on restrictive diets likely aren’t having a good time—it’s incredibly challenging. That said, some people seem able to eat “swampy,” junk-filled diets and still lose weight as long as they control calories. While calorie control isn’t the only factor in health and wellness, it’s definitely a significant one for weight management.
9. I’ve been doing ex150 since September. At first, I didn’t plan for it to be “calorie-controlled,” but I found myself naturally satiated after my morning coffee with cream and my beef/veggie dinner. I maintain a 90% fat ratio and found my daily intake was under 1700 calories, according to Chronometer. Honestly, I was probably too lazy to whip up more cream when I occasionally felt hungry at the end of the day. So, I don’t have a “control” for a higher-calorie version of ex150. But so far, I’m down ~30 pounds! To clarify, I wasn’t suggesting intense restriction that would make the process very difficult—just a slight reduction, say 200–300 calories per day. That’s easy to manage with something like cream, and I hypothesize it could accelerate weight loss and help avoid plateaus. Keeping my fingers crossed!
1. I regained all my weight in about 2 years. Maybe a little less. So pretty much the exact same time frame I lost it. Why did it stop working? Why did it start working again with the cream? This seems pretty important to me.
2. That's why I don't think "disordered" or "relationship to food" is useful. Most people (93% in the US) are metabolically unhealthy. It is not surprising that you'd have to do something pretty extreme to unobese yourself. If the order is unhealthy, only the disordered will be healthy.
I also wonder why some people stay lean. Whatever in the environment has made more and more people overweight and obese, not everyone is affected. Although it is almost everyone at this point. The number of people unaffected shrinks every year. I think we tripled (!) the number of diabetics since 2000. Soon, even people like your partner might no longer be immune. But we should figure out what makes him immune, cause it might help us understand the root cause.
He is naturally satiated whereas we are not. Why?!
To me, GLP-1 is an excuse. It's saying "I don't want to know." 99% of people were lean 100 years ago. Now it's <25%. Why?! Again, this seems really important to understand.
3. Yes, but those studies restricted calories. My REE is not suppressed after losing 75lbs. Clearly, you shouldn't be losing weight by restricting calories. It's a terrible idea! That's one of the reasons I think GLP-1 drugs are so dangerous. Instead of fixing the root cause, they just use a sledgehammer and probably do a lot of damage in the long run.
7. There must be individual differences, maybe genetic or something else. We know there are HUGE differences when it comes to dairy, glucose, fat, and protein metabolism. It would not be a huge surprise if some people reacted better to some diets than others.
It's pretty normal to see what you describe: less protein (w/ carbs held equal) -> higher ketones.
If there are "beginner results" on keto, why? What causes keto to work and then stop working?
8. Yes, some people. But most are not. Like your partner.
9. Congrats, 30lbs is amazing! That spontaneous appetite & reduction in food intake is what we're looking for. Overweight people have so much energy in their adipose tissue, they should be satiated all day long! That's thousands of carolies dumped into your bloodstream all day long. How come overweight people are able to eat at all?!
Diets that fix fuel partitioning lead to this spontaneous satiety and potentially eating less. That's good, cause it means you unlocked access to your body fat.
If you simply eat less, but you don't unlock your body fat, guess what's being burned instead... lean tissue. That's why I highly recommend against restricting calories.
You liked and commented on every comment except this one. I love what you do and think it provides valuable insights into the community but there are legit questions and anecdotes specifically against some of these assumptions. I would love to get your thoughts on some of them.
Nice post, I had been trying to figure out exactly where you thinking is and I feel like this lays it out well.
I am confused about this sentence: "Experiment to see if swamping carbs + fat causes you issues. If so, avoid it until metabolically fixed." in your previous post you cal the "swamp" the messy middle of doing carbs and fats in moderation. Is that what you are proposing? For someone to try and have an equal (ish) amount of carbs and fats and see if that affects anything? Relatedly, how do you judge if you are "metabolically fixed"? Is it weight loss or a blood marker?
Yea, most people eat somewhat swampy these days, so you could try getting out of the swamp in either direction and see if things improve.
Of course knowing what markers/symptoms to look for is important, good point.
For one it should "feel good" subjectively, if you're grossly overweight like I was, it should lead to somewhat rapid fat loss. If you have glucose control issues, those should improve. There could be a few others, depending on if you have issues there. E.g. if your thyroid is bad, or your testosterone is bad, or something like that. It should get better.
The idea that we can’t “peat”, the subjective sensation of elevated body temperatures I see peaters describe as proof of his theory, on keto is silly.
I’ve been doing a poorly controlled high fat protein restricted diet for 3 weeks and can see my body temp rise on wrist temp measurements when I have my herbal tea with heavy cream in about 10 min, accompanied by the burst of energy and warm sensation.
I’ve got an Apple Watch. It’s consistent enough to be used by ladies for their cycle tracking, so I consistent the delta measurement to be “good enough”
I would love to learn more about how to eat more fat in my meals with less protein. When I just add butter/ghee into my warm food, the liquid doesn't fill me up. I feel like I need a full bowl of solid food and I haven't had much luck finding good low protein keto recipes. I admire your ability to go straight for the heavy cream! Thanks for all the great content.
This might be an individual thing, but "being full" has never correlated with satiety for me. I used to regularly be "bloated full to the point of pain" and "starving" at the same time. So a very-low-volume, mostly-liquid diet with the cream actually works super well for me.
Of course, you might be wired differently. You could try it for a month and see if you get used to it, but if not, maybe you'll fare better with something solid? E.g. you could make one meal that is very bulky (maybe with green vegetables + protein), and that could "fill you up" and then add energy with cream or another fat source at other times of the day?
> Also, it’s day 9 and my Non-24 has not come back.
Oh wonderful, I am so happy for you! Something is perhaps fixed or fixing.... Are you going to try low-protein swamping next? It would be interesting if you're fine either side but have issues in the middle.
I suppose that would be a reasonable next experiment, right? To see if it's "PUFA depletion" or just "staying out of the swamp" who done it.
Totes! Still fine I trust?
Yup. Calling it today (day 13)
That is such good news. Congratulations!
Maybe this is a stupid question, but why did the version of Keto you did "necessarily" change completely?? It's not like you *have* to eat lots of beef and cheese if you're in the U.S. Did you try just recreating the same keto diet you did in Asia? Or maybe I missed that...
Well, you're right I could've not eaten beef and cheese in the US, that's true. I don't eat a lot of beef (but a little) and very little cheese right now.
I didn't try that, since I thought it was "just keto" and was at the time actually thinking my limited (vs US options) access made it "worse keto."
In a way maybe I have now recreated it a little with ex150 :)
I have a story pretty similar to yours. I found low-carb before keto was popularized, about 15 years ago, and have been ketarded ever since. I followed strict low-carb principles and lost over 150 lbs. I ate pretty much ad libitum meat, eggs, cheese, and low-carb veggies, etc., only counting carbs and keeping them well under 20 most days. Initially, I would even call it “effortless.”
However, over the years, the weight crept back up—about 100 lbs over the course of the next 10 years. During those years, my stress levels increased, my sleep decreased, and I had more cheat days and keto “treats.” Still, I kept carbs under 20 on most days.
When the carnivore diet started gaining traction, I became convinced that nuts, stevia, and PUFA in the remaining non-meat keto foods I was eating might be the issue. So I switched to a more strict carnivore approach, especially during COVID, eating almost exclusively 80/20 ground beef, salt, and water. But I didn’t see much weight loss from that at all.
I believe keto/carnivore works well for people who are just trying to get healthier by eliminating a lot of addictive and inflammatory foods and replacing them with more nutrient-dense, satiating options. For people who are “normally” overweight and just need to lose 20-50 lbs gained from a lack of dietary awareness, keto/carnivore can “effortlessly” help them return to a normal weight. As highlighted in Burn (thanks for the recommendation), these diets likely work mainly because people feel more satiated on fewer “calories.” Although that’s the primary mechanism, keto does have additional metabolic benefits.
I find it strange that keto followers are always looking for a “boogieman” to pin their problems on. Some major influencers in the space are eating only meat, fat, water, and salt. When followers still have issues on that, they blame the salt—or vitamin A, or too much protein, and so on.
So, why did you regain 100 lbs on keto? What was the mechanism, if not overeating? For me, I’m pretty sure I just started overeating because keto never really solved my relationship with food. I saw carbs as the root of all my weight problems, thinking that if I just avoided them, I’d be fine. I wanted a simple solution that would place the blame on the food, not on my tendency to overeat.
I think the flaw with the “swamp” hypothesis is that it assumes the same methods that kept these cultures “effortlessly” lean can be used to make a very overweight person lean. Staying lean and losing significant weight are very different challenges. Also, it might be unrealistic to expect that someone needing to lose over 100 lbs should find the process “effortless.” It likely requires work to overcome whatever initially caused such an excess of body fat.
I’ve come to the conclusion that these diets have “failed” for weight loss because they never directly address energy intake. While they might work for the “normally” overweight, my satiety point seems to be much higher. Even when I was eating just 80/20 ground beef, salt, and water for over a year, I felt like I had an endless appetite. On certain days, I could easily consume 3,500+ “calories” without feeling overly full.
When I came across ex150, something clicked. After my initial 100 lb loss, I hit a plateau. One of my own experiments was to try a keto, vegetarian-forward diet—still ad libitum but replacing a lot of meat and cheese with low-carb veggies. This approach had three effects: it definitely lowered my protein intake, reduced my overall “calories,” and increased satiety with all the added bulk. This broke through my plateau, and I lost the final 50 lbs. This was before I was aware of PUFA, so during this period, my PUFA intake was likely higher due to things like salad dressings and nutbutters.
Something the keto community often overlooks is the bodybuilding community. These individuals can cut down to single-digit body fat, and almost all follow the same basic principle: “calories” are king. They meticulously track their intake and eat fewer “calories.” I’ve seen some of their diets, which would blow a ketard’s mind (PUFAs, processed food, cereals, etc.)—diets that would even be labeled as being in the “swamp”—and yet they still lose weight. Yes, it requires effort, discipline, and mindfulness, but it works, and their metabolisms don’t get “ruined.”
I’m interested to see the results of your rice experiment. However, it seems like your ex150 results have plateaued. While you have a lot of positive things to say about keto and hyper-keto ex150, instead of considering the ad libitum “calories don’t matter” nature of the diet, you’re exploring entirely new answers despite all the good biomarkers. I’d love to see you try an ex150-calorie-controlled experiment with the same foods, just mindful of the calorie intake, to see if managing energy expenditure vs. intake has an impact. As for me, that’s the experiment I’m currently conducting. I’ll report back with my results.
Hey, thanks for the very detailed comment!
Some thoughts:
1. Ok, overeating - but what caused the overeating? Why did keto (in both of us!) first cause massive undereating ("effortless"), and then suddenly reversed into massive overeating? And, in my case, another bout of massive undereating (-75lbs) again, years later? Overeating isn't a root cause, it's at best a proximate cause.
2. I haven't had a "bad relationship" with food in... I don't know, a decade or so. I think as a teen and in college I did a bunch of emotional eating. But ever since I started paleo and then keto 9 years ago, and definitely in the last 2 years, my relationship with food is... austere, scientific? I'm living on a rice + tomato sauce diet right now, and I don't even miss anything. I think I have about the most detached relationship to food you could possibly have.
3. When you say things like "boogieman" and "place blame on the food".. yea, ok, but what causes your tendency to overeat? And how come it suddenly reverses and you lose 150lbs? Isn't that weird, at least? Doesn't that make you wonder what changed?
4. I agree that staying lean and losing weight are different, or at least can be. But the swamp hypothesis actually came from weight loss. If you read that Denise Minger post I've linked a bunch of times, she says that both keto and carbo people seem to have disproportionate success losing fat and reversing obesity.
5. I don't know if it's unrealistic to expect if you've experienced it. I've lost 100lbs effortlessly. This time around, I've lost 75lbs effortlessly. I have experienced it, so yea I sort of "expect" it and find it realistic. There are plenty of anecdotes like this, including yours. We're just not sure how exactly we did it :)
6. "It likely requires work to overcome whatever initially caused such an excess of body fat." Yea, exactly. That's what I'm trying to figure out - what caused it in the first place?!
7. I also didn't lose any weight on carnivore. I would now suspect it was the high protein. 80/20 ground beef is 27% protein, which is extremely high. 4.5x the amount I'm eating on ex150.
8. Bodybuilders do something I'm not interested in: starve themselves down, at very high cost to health, for a single day of show or photoshoot. Then it all comes back. This is not what I'm trying to do. I don't care about single digit body fat percentages, I want to reverse the obesity epidemic. These are fundamentally different challenges. You could describe it as "normalizing the setpoint" (even though I don't really believe in the setpoint theory). Bodybuilder levels of body fat are not normal, which is why they bounce back up when they eat normally after a show. Obesity is also not normal. I don't want to get to BB levels, I want to get people to say 15-25% bf. Btw, yes their metabolisms ABSOLUTELY get ruined. Bodybuilding is infamous for this. Hormones go down, depression, sex drive disappears, the women lose their period. This is normal and expected in the community. Bodybuilding books openly talk about this.
9. I have thought about say ex150_2000kcal. I did one with 2000kcal, but it wasn't normal ex150, it was chocolate truffle - which I made myself sick of during that experiment. So it was sort of confounded. I think of reversing obesity this way; you need to fix fuel partitioning, and then maybe you can restrict calories to a degrees. Most obese people, upon finally having access to their own body fat, will naturally be less hungry and lose fat when they fix their fuel partitioning is fixed. This is the "effortless, magical" part of fuel partitioning diets. Often times, this stops working eventually. It could be that the fuel partitioning isn't quite fixed yet (e.g. carnivores eating bacon/ketoers eating nuts), or it takes a long time (dePUFAcation), or it's not possible for whatever reason. Possibly, you can then restrict calories and get lower sustainably. But as my 2x5 day fasts showed, even when I lose 10lbs, it just comes back the next time I eat ad lib. Therefore I'm very skeptical of "restricting calories works" because it only "works" for a definition of "works" that I don't much care for. I know I can starve myself down, I just don't think that's a very useful thing unless you're a bodybuilder or photo model. For health reasons, I want something sustainable.
Good luck with your experiment, and let me know how it goes!
Thanks for your detailed response! Here are a few of my thoughts:
1. Good point. For me, the first time I did keto, the weight loss felt effortless. However, every subsequent attempt required me to consciously restrict rather than simply eating to satiety. That’s where my perspective comes from. As I mentioned, there are likely many non-diet factors at play, such as increased stress, less sleep, etc. In my case, I wouldn’t describe the shift as going from massive under-eating to massive over-eating. I lost 150 pounds over two years, but I regained 100 pounds over the course of 10 years—so “only” about 10 pounds per year. This was probably reflective of my pre-keto habits. After hitting my goal, I simply returned to my old patterns, though I continued avoiding carbs for the most part. I have no doubt that if I had been eating a non-keto diet to satiety, the weight gain would have been more significant, with greater health consequences.
2. Most people would consider eating a 90% cream diet—or now a 90% rice diet—a bit disordered. I’m fine calling it scientific, though, and I think we’re both on the same page there.
I’ve always wondered why some people stay effortlessly lean. Anecdotally, my partner has been naturally lean (visible abs, no gym) his entire life, and we’re in our mid-30s now. He eats whatever he wants, whenever he wants, and it’s often not “healthy” food—lots of sugary, processed, PUFA-heavy options. Over the years, I’ve studied this and concluded that he just eats fewer calories naturally. He gets full quickly, naturally fasts most of the day, has little to no cravings, and in emotional situations, he doesn’t eat, whereas I tend to overeat. This seems similar to the mechanism of GLP-1 medications: having a hormone/peptide profile that suppresses appetite and promotes satiety. In his case, it's natural/genetic.
I even experimented with a GLP-1 (Trizepatide) for a few months—shoutout to those bodybuilding bros and their research peptides. Even on a low dose, I experienced a level of satiety I’d never felt before. It was more profound than the “cement truck” fullness from cream, and it also eliminated the pleasure I used to get from food that would drive me to overeat. I thought this must be what my partner feels like. The only side effect I experienced was some excessive burping. That experiment gave me a new understanding of appetite regulation. Was my overeating a GLP-1 deficiency? And my partners leanness a result of proper GLP-1 production? And that realization sent me down the rabbit hole of exploring total energy. Something being a ketard for a long time was often ignored.
3-5. You’ve probably seen studies showing that after initial weight loss, it becomes significantly harder to lose weight again. These studies show how resting energy expenditure (REE) is suppressed, hunger remains upregulated, and other compensatory mechanisms kick in. This might help explain the natural (albeit frustrating) “rubberband” effect. Here are two examples: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15331386/ and https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3823159/.
6. Of course—that’s why we’re all here!
7. I don’t understand how there are so many weight-loss success stories with carnivore, given our experiences and the high protein focus. I assumed the “high fat” aspect would help, but my ketone levels were barely above 1 whenever I checked. On something like ex150, I can easily hit 5. Maybe for some people, it’s their first time on a “keto” diet, and they’re experiencing the same beginner results we did.
8. I’m not interested in bodybuilding or achieving extremely low body fat levels. I agree that those who do so on restrictive diets likely aren’t having a good time—it’s incredibly challenging. That said, some people seem able to eat “swampy,” junk-filled diets and still lose weight as long as they control calories. While calorie control isn’t the only factor in health and wellness, it’s definitely a significant one for weight management.
9. I’ve been doing ex150 since September. At first, I didn’t plan for it to be “calorie-controlled,” but I found myself naturally satiated after my morning coffee with cream and my beef/veggie dinner. I maintain a 90% fat ratio and found my daily intake was under 1700 calories, according to Chronometer. Honestly, I was probably too lazy to whip up more cream when I occasionally felt hungry at the end of the day. So, I don’t have a “control” for a higher-calorie version of ex150. But so far, I’m down ~30 pounds! To clarify, I wasn’t suggesting intense restriction that would make the process very difficult—just a slight reduction, say 200–300 calories per day. That’s easy to manage with something like cream, and I hypothesize it could accelerate weight loss and help avoid plateaus. Keeping my fingers crossed!
1. I regained all my weight in about 2 years. Maybe a little less. So pretty much the exact same time frame I lost it. Why did it stop working? Why did it start working again with the cream? This seems pretty important to me.
2. That's why I don't think "disordered" or "relationship to food" is useful. Most people (93% in the US) are metabolically unhealthy. It is not surprising that you'd have to do something pretty extreme to unobese yourself. If the order is unhealthy, only the disordered will be healthy.
I also wonder why some people stay lean. Whatever in the environment has made more and more people overweight and obese, not everyone is affected. Although it is almost everyone at this point. The number of people unaffected shrinks every year. I think we tripled (!) the number of diabetics since 2000. Soon, even people like your partner might no longer be immune. But we should figure out what makes him immune, cause it might help us understand the root cause.
He is naturally satiated whereas we are not. Why?!
To me, GLP-1 is an excuse. It's saying "I don't want to know." 99% of people were lean 100 years ago. Now it's <25%. Why?! Again, this seems really important to understand.
3. Yes, but those studies restricted calories. My REE is not suppressed after losing 75lbs. Clearly, you shouldn't be losing weight by restricting calories. It's a terrible idea! That's one of the reasons I think GLP-1 drugs are so dangerous. Instead of fixing the root cause, they just use a sledgehammer and probably do a lot of damage in the long run.
7. There must be individual differences, maybe genetic or something else. We know there are HUGE differences when it comes to dairy, glucose, fat, and protein metabolism. It would not be a huge surprise if some people reacted better to some diets than others.
It's pretty normal to see what you describe: less protein (w/ carbs held equal) -> higher ketones.
If there are "beginner results" on keto, why? What causes keto to work and then stop working?
8. Yes, some people. But most are not. Like your partner.
9. Congrats, 30lbs is amazing! That spontaneous appetite & reduction in food intake is what we're looking for. Overweight people have so much energy in their adipose tissue, they should be satiated all day long! That's thousands of carolies dumped into your bloodstream all day long. How come overweight people are able to eat at all?!
Diets that fix fuel partitioning lead to this spontaneous satiety and potentially eating less. That's good, cause it means you unlocked access to your body fat.
If you simply eat less, but you don't unlock your body fat, guess what's being burned instead... lean tissue. That's why I highly recommend against restricting calories.
Good luck!
You liked and commented on every comment except this one. I love what you do and think it provides valuable insights into the community but there are legit questions and anecdotes specifically against some of these assumptions. I would love to get your thoughts on some of them.
Sorry, I legit have had your comment open in a tab the entire time :) Just haven't found the time to read it yet.
Nice post, I had been trying to figure out exactly where you thinking is and I feel like this lays it out well.
I am confused about this sentence: "Experiment to see if swamping carbs + fat causes you issues. If so, avoid it until metabolically fixed." in your previous post you cal the "swamp" the messy middle of doing carbs and fats in moderation. Is that what you are proposing? For someone to try and have an equal (ish) amount of carbs and fats and see if that affects anything? Relatedly, how do you judge if you are "metabolically fixed"? Is it weight loss or a blood marker?
Yea, most people eat somewhat swampy these days, so you could try getting out of the swamp in either direction and see if things improve.
Of course knowing what markers/symptoms to look for is important, good point.
For one it should "feel good" subjectively, if you're grossly overweight like I was, it should lead to somewhat rapid fat loss. If you have glucose control issues, those should improve. There could be a few others, depending on if you have issues there. E.g. if your thyroid is bad, or your testosterone is bad, or something like that. It should get better.
The idea that we can’t “peat”, the subjective sensation of elevated body temperatures I see peaters describe as proof of his theory, on keto is silly.
I’ve been doing a poorly controlled high fat protein restricted diet for 3 weeks and can see my body temp rise on wrist temp measurements when I have my herbal tea with heavy cream in about 10 min, accompanied by the burst of energy and warm sensation.
How do you measure wrist temp? Fit bit or something of that sort?
I’ve got an Apple Watch. It’s consistent enough to be used by ladies for their cycle tracking, so I consistent the delta measurement to be “good enough”
I would love to learn more about how to eat more fat in my meals with less protein. When I just add butter/ghee into my warm food, the liquid doesn't fill me up. I feel like I need a full bowl of solid food and I haven't had much luck finding good low protein keto recipes. I admire your ability to go straight for the heavy cream! Thanks for all the great content.
This might be an individual thing, but "being full" has never correlated with satiety for me. I used to regularly be "bloated full to the point of pain" and "starving" at the same time. So a very-low-volume, mostly-liquid diet with the cream actually works super well for me.
Of course, you might be wired differently. You could try it for a month and see if you get used to it, but if not, maybe you'll fare better with something solid? E.g. you could make one meal that is very bulky (maybe with green vegetables + protein), and that could "fill you up" and then add energy with cream or another fat source at other times of the day?
Thank you for putting the Peaters in their place. I'm always worrying at my Bandaid. Very interested to see your end of month rice results.