I heard people say that keto diets would damage your kidney.
what’s your take on that?
I mean there are vegans out there who would love to tell people that any meat would cause organ damage and that the healthiest lifestyle is vegan (with people saying all the isolated tribes that live to 120 are all vegans)
People make up all sorts of nonsense about low-carb - it’s every critic’s favourite “fad diet”. These attacks are invariably strawmen. So in the case of “damaging your kidneys”, the argument is: OMG, all that protein, don’t you know that’s going to overload your kidneys? To which there are two answers:
There have been all sorts of studies on vegan vs. vegetarian vs. whatever. The upshot is that it makes very little difference either way. Some diseases appear to go slightly up, some go slightly down, and every study shows something slightly different. The idea that there’s an ideal diet that’ll make you live forever is a fairy story. There are ranchers living in Ecuador subsisting on nothing but meat and moonshine who are in peak health. There are vegans living in San Francisco who are on statins and metformin.
You may get kidney stones from certain compounds in cruciferous vegetables, which are a staple in keto diets, but they are not the only reason and actually, anyone is at danger of kidney stones. Here, my crush can explain it better:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoMRcsejMGc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3o2UikvsMo
As to isolated tribes, or indigenous tribes or any kind, being vegan, buahahahahaha, sent those folks to the Amazon. Vegan my foot. Moreover, with a life expectancy of less than 30 years old, I wouldn´t set that as a standard of health.
Disagree. My understanding is that a “pure” unsupplemented vegan diet will contain no vitamin B12, and that, long term, that is absolutely guaranteed to kill you.
So some diets CAN make a difference
God bless them.
I only said there was no such thing as a perfect diet … not that your diet doesnt make any difference at all, or that there is no such thing as a crap diet.
Vegan diets - at least as conceived by Western treehugger types - are horribly unhealthy. The b12 thing is just one of the more obvious problems.
Its just the “noble savage” myth.
To be fair, those guys living in the amazon usually die in early childhood or due to violence, not diet-related illnesses. That brings their life-expectancy average sharply downwards, but adults who aren’t murdered typically remain in good health into their 60s.
But it is so illogical. These people are foragers or very basic if any agriculture. Hunting, fishing, gathering bugs as protein sources, yes.
Three weeks in: Down 2 more pounds to 215lbs (15lbs total). Measurements are down another cm or so. I have noticed I need to cut another notch in my belt to tighten it as well; good news! Progress has slowed down a bit, but 2 lbs a week is just fine.
On a side note, instead of a cheat last night, I had pizza using the “Fathead pizza crust” and it was awesome!!! Super filling too. It might be difficult to find some of the ingredients in Taiwan though, and be very careful with your sauce choice (which can be loaded with sugar) - maybe make your own.
Here is the recipe: https://www.wholesomeyum.com/recipes/fathead-pizza-crust-low-carb-keto-gluten-free-nut-free/
A lot of nutrition lore is illogical 
But yeah, as far as I’m aware, they eat what would be described as “low carb high fat” in mainstream terminology - meat, fish, some plants, and relatively little in the way of starches unless they cultivate cassava or corn (which, as you say, they rarely bother with). Vegans … LOL.
My impression is they don’t eat much of anything usually. All the TV shows of tribal hunters going out on the hunt for a couple of days, it’s rare they bag much game meat and they have to split it with the whole village.
September 25
Body weight: 87.5 kilos (started at 90 kilos)
Body fat: 26.2% (started at 27%)
I would say I am using calorie restriction now as my primary means to lose weight. I try to watch carb intake at most times (except breakfast), and I’m sure that also helps. When I reach my target weight, the plan is to maintain the weight by going more low carb and high fat.
Well, this last week was a bit of a bust. I kind of lost willpower knowing I had hit my goals already at 215 lbs, went for wings and beer on Tuesday, and then had chicken and fries with a beer last night.
After about a month of Keto, I think it can be manageable. But I found carb cravings to be a problem. I likely would not fast in the day, but only have a very small lunch of some sort.
Although it kind of goes against the whole idea, I would likely have carbs either on weekends, or every 4 days or so. At least until I can figure out how to not love carbs!!!
Final results: Lost 15lbs overall. Missed carbs.
On August 29 I weighed in at 237 lbs. It’s been almost a month and my weight today is 224.6. So I’ve lost 12.4 lbs in a month.
I intend to continue with my low carb eating and see if the downward trend continues.
For me the hardest part is starting this diet, because I have a psychological or emotional desire to eat tasty carbs. Once I make the decision, however, it is been very easy for me. I only need the discipline to “get started.”
I say it has been easy, and for me this is because I feel little to no sensation of hunger on a very low carb diet. And then I simply stick to the same routine everyday, which may be too boring for some people!
In the morning I either skip breakfast or eat some scrambled eggs, maybe add sausage, spinach leaves, or cheese. When I am at work five days a week, I go to the same place and eat a Cobb salad. (Boring? I like this predictability because I don’t have to fuss about thinking about where to go and what to eat.)
Dinner is either a low-carb meal prepared by my wife, or I eat the same thing as everyone else minus the noodles and rice. I rarely want to snack, but my snacks are roasted almonds, or a bit of cheese.
I have not done any exercise. If I begin consistent exercise this may increase my need for calories and or carbs, and increase appetite.
If I discount the loss of water weight at the beginning of the month, it appears I’m losing roughly 2 pounds per week. I will continue through the next month and see if this holds steady.
I’m trying to keep up with your inputs here, and this is just an observation but I’m not sure you were truly in ketosis on keto. You were just on low-carb diet.
For example, you can’t have cheat days on keto diet. It takes 2 or 3 days to get into ketosis, so if you have a cheat day it takes two or three more days to again get into ketosis. Having a cheat day actually creates up to 3 or more days out of keto.
If you have one cheat day a week, you’re actually only in ketosis one or two days a week, and a few days of low-carb eating.
And you lose your appetite for carbs when in ketosis.
Good point. It might explain my continuous cravings for carbs - the cheat days actually made it harder. Still, I was happy with the success achieved.
I find having a routine certainly helps. My biggest challenge are my biz social obligations to drink. I know it sounds funny but that is the big one especially in East Asia. Some folks in these kind of jobs deal it with by doing fairly intense sessions at the gym or running .
This works for me too. What I eat is incredibly monotonous - I eat the same half-dozen meals on rotation. My default meal is 火鍋 minus the rice, which I probably eat 4-5 times a week on average, sometimes as my only meal of the day.
Surprisingly I don’t get sick of eating the same things every day. When I was eating a high-carb “healthy” diet, I was endlessly thinking: “uhhh, what shall I have for dinner?”. The need for variety seems to have gone away. Nobody’s ever mentioned it in the literature, but I wonder if that feeling that you’re “bored” with high-carb low-fat meals is simply your body telling you “this stuff ain’t right, please eat something different”?
My body keeps telling me “These buckets of fried chicken are damn good, eat more of them. And have a few pints while you’re at it.”
So does mine. Luckily, there’s nothing wrong with fried chicken 
And the occasional few pints doesn’t seem to hurt, either.