Thanksgiving

I had roughly 30 grams of fat today, and around 3500 total calories. The fat came mostly from cheese, coconut oil, and butter.

I plan to try to be strict for another 2-3 weeks, but keep my calories around 3500 calories and maybe less (but definitely not less than 3000). I have seen that I can maintain my weight at around 4000 calories for 16 days. I have also seen that I can gain about 6-8 pounds at 4000 calories over the span of 3 months and with a fat intake between 35 and 50 grams on average. Now to see if I can lean out at over 3000 calories with very low fat. I will just as active as I have been.

Day 16 Update

So tomorrow is Thanksgiving Day and I am not sure how much fat I will end up eating. I could be really strict and just not eat anything. That is stressful and rude though, so I plan to eat some fat and just keep the total low to not mess up my experiment. I can not promise I will keep fat very low though, so I am gonna post some results now. I just wish the fat I would be eating would be coconut, egg yolks, and chocolate.

Here are the total averages for the last 16 days.
3878 calories
822g carbs (593g sugar, 157g starch, 56g fiber)
172g protein
7.6g fat (1.4g PUFA, 1.4g MUFA, 2.7g Saturated fat)   -1.7% of calories
116mg cholesterol
2g alcohol 

I weighed 149 pounds today, which is more than when I started the experiment. I was a little surprised also, since I averaged around 3500 the last few(4-5) days. Activity has included walking (not 5+ miles though, a little less), gymnastic bodies training 3-4 days a week, some deadlifting and squatting once a week, and some added pullups and dips.

Overall, I've felt pretty good over the last 2 weeks. The only problem I've encountered was not being able to sleep the last 3 nights. I'm not sure if the diet (or perhaps the drop in calories from 4000 to 3500) is effecting my sleep, or if the sleep has made me put on the pound, or if it's just a coincidence. I will try to keep the calories around 3500 the next 2-3 weeks with the fat very low still, to see if I lose some fat. I can hypothesize that at 3500-4000 calories and very very low fat, I can maintain (or maybe slightly gain?) fat.

Day 12 update

The experiment has been going pretty well. I feel good overall, have lots of energy, sleep is deep when I am asleep. Libido is still there even with lack of fat.

Here is a summary of the last 12 days. Two days were higher in fat. Last Saturday with the trout incident (25g), and today I had about 10 grams of fat due to 2 big bowls of captain crunch, which happened to be about 4 grams of saturated fat.

3985 calories
849g carbs (605g sugar, 172g starch, 57g fiber)  - 80% of cals
172g protein  - 17.3% of cals
8.4g fat (1.5g PUFA, 1.6g MUFA, 3g saturated) - 2% of cals
128mg cholesterol
2.8g alcohol

I weighed in at 148 today, same as I was on the first day. I do notice a slight body composition change in the mirror, where I appear leaner. It might just be an illusion though. I have been doing more pullups and dips the past two weeks (in addition to the gymnastic bodies training), so that could be a reason. Tomorrow I am going to deadlift and squat.

It's kind of hard to eat 4000 calories doing this, unless I go to Waldbaums and buy the 28oz deglet noor package for 6 dollars. There were about 10 of them 2 weeks ago, and they are down to 4. I'm pretty sure I'm the only one buying them. I have been getting most of my calories from the dates (the stomach twisting has gone away for the most part) I also eat a good amount of rice (2-3 cups almost daily), and I have been drinking almost half gallon of skim milk most days. And I pound the non fat yogurt, that is why my protein has been higher. Anyway, I might end up eating closer to 3500 cals for the next 2 weeks to see if I lean out. I have been hungry at night if I haven't been hitting 4000 however, so time will tell.

Day 6

Update for anyone following, today I was out to eat at Cracker Barrel, and ordered trout thinking it was a lean fish. Apparently 2 fillets contain about 10g of fat, 3g of it PUFA. After reading the info, I finished my potatoes with some butter and ate some coconut oil when I got home. Total fat for today will be around 25 grams. The plan is to get back to less than 10grams total fat tomorrow.

Day Four update

The last four days have been pretty good. I've been pretty low in starch everyday except today, where I ate a good amount of sweet potatoes and frosted flakes. I've keep the liquid up, but added more salt. I also have been sweating more by playing basketball 2 of the last days. I did bodyweight training yesterday, and will do lighter dead lifts and squats tomorrow.

Feeling some mood swings of feeling kinda down, but it might be mostly because of the lack of sunlight/vitamin D and the weather getting cold. Another problem I noticed was the last two days my stomach having an uncomfortable cramping twisting feeling. I think it's due to my rapid increase in dates (over 1 lb each day). Otherwise, no problem, lots of energy, and very "outgoing/social" for myself.

I weighed 148 again today.

Last 4 days averages.
3936 calories
861g carbs (633g sugar, 145g starch, 65g fiber) - the fiber is from the dates   81% of cals
159g protein
6.1g fat (1.1g PUFA)   -1.3% of calories
115mg cholesterol - from shrimps

I had 1 drink with vodka last night.

First day of very low fat diet

I'll try to update every 5-7 days

I ended up keeping both fat and starch very low today, mainly due to me eating only dates all day. Ideally, I'd like to have more starch, particularly from root vegetables and rice. I'm gonna get a steamer soon, so I can easily steam the root vegetables instead of boiling them.

I had some trouble logging the dates accurately. I am going to log 5 deglet noor dates as 1.25 ounces.

Here are my macros at the end of the day.
3742 calories
813 carbs (689 sugar, 52 starch, 64 fiber) (80% of cals)
176 protein
5.7g fat (1.3% of cals)   0.6 grams PUFA

That basically looks like 20+ oz of dates, half a gallon of skim milk, 32ish oz of nonfat greek yogurt, some honey and bananas, and a Mexican coca cola (which uses real sugar).

I noticed that my hands and feet are a bit colder today. I have used salt liberally though. Maybe the amount of skim milk plus a glass of OJ and the coca cola made my temperature drop a bit. I"ll chill with the liquids and add more starch, maybe that will keep me warmer. Energy was pretty high today. I also luckily got to spend 90 minutes tanning in shorts today (it was 60 degrees and sunny).

Very low fat diet experiment (and last 3 months nutrition).

If you watch my video from June 2014, you could see how I ate a relatively low fat diet for almost a complete year. In the last 3 months, I've upped the fat AND the starch (mainly cause I stopped being very strict), and upped the calories. This past week, for example, I averaged about 4300 calories per day. I do have very high calorie days here and there though, up to 6000 some days. (I have been logging my diet daily since last December on http://cronometer.com/ ).

So, here is my total average for the last 3 months.
3971 calories
749grams carbs (432g sugar, 227g starch, 49g fiber) -  72%
156g protein  - 15.7%
49g fat (5.4g poly-unsaturated, 12.1g monounsaturated, 25.3g saturated) -  11%
8.3g alcohol  - 1.5%
317mg cholesterol

I take a daily Vitamin E supplement.

In those three months, my weight has gone up from about 142 pounds to about 147-148. It is most likely fat, but could be some muscle due to the gymnastic training I was doing. My deadlift also reached a new max of 285 pounds, so it might be some muscle in the legs. If not, its just a better nervous system and more fat.

My Plan starting Monday November 10 is to go on a 45 day experiment, where I will aim to eat a very very low fat diet. My plan is to eat below 15 grams of fat almost daily. My protein should vary between 125-150 grams ideally, and my carbs are going to come from a combination of sugars and starches. I am aiming between 3500-4000 calories a day at least. If my body craves more due to desire or hunger, I will exceed 4000 calories.
The one day that will be problematic will be Thanksgiving, because I spend it with my family. I will try my best to keep all the fats I eat that day saturated.

I am aware that this is probably not healthy, but I am willing to experiment with myself (plus, it's a short time period anyway). My only concern is lack of cholesterol intake (although I am planning to eat shrimp) and the possibility of feeling signs of depression (the changing of the seasons to winter won't help either).

Why? I want to see if I will gain, maintain, or lose weight with the dietary fat restriction. I am trying to see, if at 3500-4000 calories, it is possible for me to lose fat at all, or if I will maintain fat. Maybe I will gain fat, who knows?

The diet will be mainly Ray Peat oriented (aside from the lack of fat). My planned staples are going to be rice, dates, potatoes, nonfat greek and normal yogurt, nonfat milk, bananas, other fruit, honey, shrimp, coffee, gelatin. I will also eat pasta, bread, nonfat frozen yogurt, lowfat breakfast cereals and white sugar in smaller amounts.  I'll continue using a ton of salt. I'll take a vitamin E supplement daily, and a vitamin k1/k2 supplement every other day. I'll try to get sunlight daily also, and sleep as well as I can. If I'm out and want alcohol, I'll stick to hard ciders or liquor, but I don't plan to have to much.

I plan to walk a lot daily (I end up walking 5+ miles everyday without trying to). I also will be doing calisthenics and/or gymnastic style training (lots of static holds) 3-4 times a week. I'll squat for mobility and deadlift heavy once a week.

Here I am on November 7th 2014.

In other news, I'm studying the NASM textbook because I am thinking about becoming a personal trainer.

Update Novemeber 6th 2014. What's different from when I strated this in 2013

So I am deciding to post on this blog again. I have this bad habit of having a great idea, starting a project, not touching it for a long time, and then randomly starting on it again. This would be a perfect example of that. I also have this bad habit of going "all or nothing" for almost everything in my life, but maybe I'll write a post about that another day.

Anyway, I want to update on how my life has been going since I blogged about a year and a half ago.

1) I no longer run, or do any type of endurance exercise unless I have to (such as riding a bike for transportation). I stopped running when I graduated college because I was sick of it, unfortunately. The 7 years of high mileage took it's toll on me mentally and physically, and I just didn't have my heart in it to continue competing.
Also, when I stopped running, I was obsessed with learning about metabolism, and it was clear to me that excessive endurance exercise can cause a down-regulated or lower metabolism. So that was enough for me to stop completely.

2) I eat gluten, and I love it.

3) When I stopped running, I got really into weight training. I was watching a lot of Elliott Hulse and Omar Isuf videos, and I jumped on board with Medhi's Stronglifts 5x5 program. The program is great for beginners, since it builds a foundation and is a safe and steady way to increase strength in the ways that matter (full body raw strength).
I followed that program for a while, and obviously I lost interest and incorporated other exercises to fit my current interest at the time. I stopped doing weights in November when I got a minor inguinal hernia (which I'll write a post about, maybe). I started again in Decemeber, and stopped completely doing weights in late April, except I kept the deadlift and the squat, and I kept them heavy (for me...).

4) Last summer, I fell in love with what Matt Stone writes about, Eating for Heat. The idea is to rehabilitate your health and metabolism if you are coming from a damaged state. In my opinion, I had a damaged metabolism from years of distance running, cutting calories, fasting, low carb etc. I wrote about it in my previous post, which was a thread I made for the forum's on Matt's side. So go read that post.

5) I mostly follow a low fat diet, with the exception of this past August and the first half of September. I believe a low fat diet is better for health and body composition, and being able to eat more food without body fat gain due to the thermogenic effect of carbohydrate. When I talk low fat, I'm talking below 40 grams. Most days I ate between 20-30 grams. Protein varies from 100-200 grams based on what I eat. I have done both higher sugar and high starch + sugar.

6) Training wise, I follow gymnastic based training created by Olympic gymnast Coach Sommers. The program is called Foundation. In addition to the strength and mobility I get from that, I also add in more stretching, body weight calisthenics (pullups, dips etc) when I feel like it. I also deadlift heavy following Jim Wendler's 5/3/1. I stopped heavy squatting to switch to "ass to grass" squatting, which I can do comfortably with 135 pounds. I practice sitting/resting in a deep squat daily to work on this mobility.
One thing I do is to train only 4-5 times a week, and not too much anymore. I learned (due to my all or nothing habit) that I can burn myself out from overworking. I did it with years of running. I did it with pullups too. This past summer I would do endless pullups and chin-ups, up to 50-100 daily, sometimes more. Come mid September, I could not bring myself to do even 1 pullup some days. Last Novemeber, when I decided to deadlift 3 times a week because I though I was super strong or something (I wasn't), I ended up possibly getting a minor hernia. So anyway, I make sure to train the way I like without going overboard.

Update I wrote in August 2014

This is from a forum post.

I was a competitive long distance for 7 years, and did many things to damage my metabolism. When I was 19, I dramatically cut my food intake to about 2000 calories a day (usually I must have eaten a ton more), while averaging 10 miles a day running. I dropped from 135 pounds to 115 (I’m 5’5). I suffered most of the semi-starvation symptoms, such as being depressed, constant urination, always cold, no energy, no libido, obsessed over looking at food pictures, eating the core of apples and shells of peanuts etc… I also was doing low sugar, low salt, low fat, and conventional wisdom healthy. Here is a picture of me from then.





For the last 3 years of my running career, I found paleo/primal and though it was the best thing ever. It made so much sense. So I decided to cut out all grains, potatoes, and fruit. I spent a year gorging myself on a ridiculously high fat/ high meat diet. In a state of damaged metabolism, I regained all the weight and more (probably 140-145 pound), while running up to 10 miles a day.
The last 2 years of my running career I wised up and ate some carbs, fruits, potatoes, and occasionally rice. I seemed to maintain a weight, but it was mostly due to my chronic running. I didn’t count, but I must have been eating around 2500-3000 calories, and I would purposely eat less at the end of the season to slim down for the big end of the races.
Last year, when I was 22, I graduated college and stopped running. I also started reading about Matt Stone and Ray Peat. I decided to “Eat for Heat” and up more calories to close to 4000 over the summer. I also ate mostly everything, just avoiding PUFA. I put on about 20-25 pounds, going from 130 to 150-155. I felt like I might have avoided the fat gain if I ate less dietary fat, but I think some of the gain was necessary.

Here is a comparison from last summer to today.

In September of 2013 I decided to lower my dietary fat. For over the course of the year, I ate a lower fat, moderate-high protein, high sugar, high carb diet. I followed most of the guidelines of ray peat. I kept fat between 30-40 grams most days. I ate lots of salt. I ate around 3000 calories in the fall, but upped it to 3500-4000 in the winter, pounding the fruits (especially dates). Up until this summer, I had thought that I had to keep my dietary fat very low to not gain fat, but over the past months I’ve been averaging 50-80 grams of fat a day, mostly saturated. I have leaned out even more, despite averaging 3500-4000 calories. I do think that keeping dietary fat lower is better for fat loss though, especially when you have some to lose.

Although I stopped running, I do continue to walk and move a lot. I try to not to sit a lot, and I do a lot of body weight training. I stopped upper body weights in the Spring. The only lifts I do is squat and deadlift.

Staple foods are fruit, juice, low fat yogurt/cheese, potatoes, rice, shellfish, gelatin. Often wheat, eggs, beef, low fat milk, ice cream. When I eat higher fat, it’s chocolate, dairy, coconut oil. I have alcohol 1-2 times a week, usually less, and mostly cider or liquor.

I also keep pufa below 5 grams almost every day, and I think that’s the most important thing I do.

How I rose my metabolism on a high sugar diet.

This video is from June 2014, 6 months after I started logging my nutrition daily.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Laj7g5tfD-s