I can't help but think "finally" and "told ya so" regarding this news.
It's difficult to describe how massively my life changed when I started keto.
Like the subject of the article, I've had Bipolar (1 in my case, they didn't specify their version) for most of my life, since way before it's supposed to manifest in late adolescence. I was misdiagnosed here and there since I was a very young child, but I finally got on the right treatment plan at 20 years old.
The maintenance of that treatment plan has been taking a medium dose of Lamictal, an epilepsy drug, daily. It worked damn well compared to the regular mania, often culminating in psychosis and occasional full-on can't-even-hold-a-job levels of suicidal depression, but within a week of full-blown ketosis, I was a new person.
I found out about it through some documentary disguised as "In Defense of Fat" or something similar, and I was fascinated by the epilepsy cure thing. I had always known there was a connection between my condition and epilepsy, given that I was on seizure drugs and often experienced what I figured were mini-seizures (often described as brain zaps, I think).
I couldn't find any information on links except a few random, very weak studies, and sorta just told everyone who naysayed me to fuck off cuz it works for me. I lost 20 lbs of excess covid weight as a very nice side-effect, but I can safely say this is the most effective treatment I've ever experienced for my condition (of the many, many I've tried) and I feel like I have superpowers in comparison.
It is very obvious if I get kicked out of ketosis now after a few days or so. I've done it purposefully on vacations or just random cheat times. After a while I feel worse in the head, body, and soul. I make dumb or impulsive decisions (like my old self), or am grumpy in a way I haven't been since starting. I start to have awful dreams again and wake up my wife sleep-talking in distress, and am tired all the time like the old days.
It's certainly not the easiest diet to adhere to, it's also surely not the best for the environment unless you're really strict in specific ways like some, and it's potentially disruptive socially, but it's a lifestyle choice that has given me personally a truly new and improved life that I don't ever want to or plan to return from.
When I was on a keto phase, one day I noticed that I was so clear headed and energetic that I thought something broke inside me. It was like a persistent coffee kick without the side-effects. I realized that the feeling was probably how "normal" should feel. It changed my views about a lot of things. I would walk down the road and realize how many business fronts were restaurants, of which I had no desire to enter. I never bothered with any checks for keto, I just ate loads of low carb veggies, a little bit of meat, and coconut oil for added fat. A note on the oil, I had to make sure that I took it with meat, or else I would get sick to my stomach.
My lifestyle changed once I got a live-in partner. I need to get back on it.
I have a similar story. I made major lifestyle change. But the thing is, I have got back to eating carbs and retained all the benefits (i.e. clear headless and energy all day long). Bear in mind by carbs I mean whole grain. But still, I wonder if macros are really the culprit and if keto is not placebo on top of something else (at least for me). Maybe it has something to do with insulin and glucose metabolism.
It's same for fasting, your body wants clarity for you to be able to hunt & provide food. After a meal you rest & digest. Take Lions after a meal, even though we are different it's a common pattern.
Interesting. Is that all you eat in a day? It looks like the lowest carb flavor is unsweetened and unflavored at 65g net for the daily 5x meals/servings (assuming there are no sugar alcohols, which they don't list on the label). That's pretty close to my maximum but definitely doable if I'm active. I could see doing 2 servings or half a day's worth and then continuing with the old eggs, avocados, and meat. Wouldn't be crazy to do vegetarian with something like that. I love the idea - have a vegan keto book too, and let's just say it's hit or miss at best.
>I can't help but think "finally" and "told ya so" regarding this news.
I don't want to dismiss your personal experiences, but I think that's the wrong conclusion to draw.
Common mental illnesses - particularly depression and anxiety - have incredibly high placebo response rates. Everything looks like a promising treatment for depression in an uncontrolled trial. You can pick practically any intervention - including literal sugar pills - and get ~40% remission rates in an open-label pilot study. Many thousands of potential treatments supported by plausible theories, anecdotal accounts, case reports and small uncontrolled trials have fallen flat as soon as they were tested rigorously. The base rate suggests that the chance of a keto diet (or any other intervention with this level of evidence) being an effective treatment for depression is on the order of 0.1%.
If keto works for you then you should stick with it. The problem is that it's overwhelmingly likely to be no more effective for other people than a low-fat diet or a low-GI diet or sugar pills or faith healing. Articles like this one do a huge disservice to patients, because they completely neglect the base rate and perpetuate a cycle of hype and disappointment that can ultimately lead to distrust and despair.
You have zero proof & did zero research on this person, yet trying to put someone who down sees profound benefit with the good old: "it's just placebo".
Just because there is no direct studies backing it up yet doesn't mean there isn't real effect. Could be keto, could be lack of certain starches or other foods, could be the focus & rhytm, whatever it is let's not discourage someone who is having a great practical benefit.
I’m not drawing any conclusions or promoting it for anyone else. I’m expressing excitement that there is clearly _something there_ that other people see too and are willing to put through research rigor. It’s validating to see that others might have found treatment this way in their own vacuum and is worth looking into.
Regarding placebo - they do touch on this in the article. I have pretty high confidence it’s not placebo for me. But that’s the point, we just don’t know yet and all I’m saying is I’m glad we will soon know more based on my experience.
It's questionable whether it's placebo, or whether the placebo intervention itself is a non-placebo intervention.
To partake in a study you need to get out of the house, go somewhere new, talk to new people a few times, do something new, get some daylight, etc. Those are all things we know has a positive effect on depression.
Big part of treating depression is to make people do those sorts of things, despite their bodies and mind screaming stay in bed, it's not worth it.
> Common mental illnesses - particularly depression and anxiety - have incredibly high placebo response rates.
In my experience, both long term, major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder only substantially improve through understanding, which of course is realized in at least 2 ways: experience and/or therapy.
We can say with some certainty that antidepressants' effectiveness is questionable, at best, long term, but of particular interest for effective indication would be any number of psychoactive substances, which routinely make headlines for this type of treatment but remain taboo for some still yet to be resolved reasons.
Of course this ultimately boils down to personal choices, but attitudes towards drugs will change before we see any real progress in this area, I'm afraid.
The brain likes keto, no question. I'm not sure it is a good to do it for longer periods of time, it supposedly stresses the body [0]. I did it for a year and continually lost weight, and it wasn't for lack of calories.
How often per day did you eat and did you measure your keto levels?
Thing is that if you over-do it and have too high keto-levels, you can get poisoned by it and that certainly have a high level of stress on the body. (The old man points this out in your video)
Also, if you don't eat often enough, you may not trigger insulin and thus won't get hungry at all and get to little calories (thus dropping in weight).
The brain likes keto because of betahydroxybutyrate, though it's the only organ to require glucose (not a problem in keto as we have gluconeogenesis from fat and proteins)
You know what likes keto even more? Your heart. There are studies and research of fatty acids being able to reverse heart disease, and them being incredibly more efficient fuels than glucose is. N=1 placebo, but I certainly feel my heart (in an overweight body) pumping better and with less effort 1+ weeks into very low carb.
Adaptation takes a while because our mitochondria are dysfunctional due to standard diets being so high in glucose. Fatty acids are the better fuel for muscles, and mitochondria in general.
In currently taking Lamictal for similar reasons, and your comment really made me curious. Any particular resources you would recommend on how to switch to keto?
Honestly, the subreddit is one of the better places to start. Check out the FAQ here: https://www.reddit.com/r/keto/wiki/faq, and go through the resources in the sidebar on the sub!
I've read the book "the glucose revolution" and it is pretty interesting how regulating glucose spikes can affect your mental clarity, energy levels and general health and wellbeing.
When you eat carbs, your blood sugar rises. At first it fuels your muscles, then at some point your body has to release insulin to protect itself, keeping your blood sugar low using fat storage. Later, the blood sugar will crash, leading to a lack of energy and brain fog.
There are some hacks in the book to help with this, like walking after eating (muscles take up more of the spike), or eating in order (fiber first to moderate blood sugar, followed by protein/fat, and finally any carbs)
I think a keto diet probably has the same effects, as a consequence of removing simple carbs from your diet.
It might be better to understand this all holistically and manage it with decent nutrition, not just cutting out all <x>.
Eating things is order really is "life-hack" if you're into low-carb/keto. If do some extended fasting and break it with only meat, I usually have some mild gastric distress side effects. Not really a problem for me, but for some people, it can be a distraction that they would rather not have to deal with. However, if I start eating again by first consuming a large amount of fiber, a big (150g+) salad for example, the effect is much reduced.
Another benefit of starting with fiber, is that your body will begin processing it and sending signals of satiety earlier than if you started carbs. Another hack I suppose is waiting 10 minutes between courses in your meals. Giving your body time to digest can help you feel fuller and prevent overeating. Especially when you grew up with the "clean your plate" form of parenting, learning to break that habit and stop when you're actually full can be a game changer for managing weight and body composition.
Interesting, the "hack" of eating in order is just return to the traditional way of eating veggie appetizer first, then meat main dish, and then dessert.
Ketosis will likely be what I credit for saving my marriage and actual life once science catches up with reasoning. The last year for me has been profound. Cluster headaches are mental warfare and ketosis has played a major role in my body's ability to chill the hell out. Can't wait to see more research here.
I started with intermittent fasting (16H) and I reached ketosis within a few days. I've been on lchf/atkins before, but getting there via fasting was easier and less brain-fog. Being in ketosis is such a drastic difference in energy and mental clarity that it's ridiculous.
I'm also doing the 16/8 IF schedule, but I honestly don't feel like I am able to enter ketosis. However, I do have better sleep and I would say more energy. It also helps me to limit "junk" intake.
I don't think you really need keto, but I think many people could benefit from just training themselves to eat fewer times a day, and developing an aversion to sugar and unhealthy food in general. I don't eat breakfast - haven't done so for more than 20 years. It doesn't affect my enerygy levels or mood. It always made me wonder why we even had it in the first place. All I have is a cup of black coffee, no sugar. Sometimes tea with no milk. And that's only when I start work, which is around 2 hours after I wake up.
These days I only eat after 5pm. My body is so used to it that I don't really get hungry during the day. Even if I go to gym in the morning. Do I notice a difference if I change my eating schedule or diet? Absolutely. If I eat during the day, I tend to want to eat more during the day. If I eat a lot of carbs and junk food, I tend to want to eat more. Also I feel like shit and my skin looks horrible. I think somewhere in all this mess there are mental health concerns as well, but I can't really quantify them in a meaningful way.
You must realize the world and humanity is bigger than you. Some people with low blood sugar would be very weak without breakfast (ie my wife and most of her family, tested repeatedly under various real world situations ie in wilderness). Some thrive like that. Some, like me, don't care if they have or don't have breakfast, nothing visibly changes for me (unless I want to bulk a bit from ie weightlifting or generally doing very strenuous activity especially if its multiday).
Another case point for each' uniqueness - you mention you just drink black coffee on empty stomach. On university one of my classmates went through mandatory military service back then and he did exactly this. He
utterly and forever destroyed his stomach lining (as per doctor's findings it was due to that coffee habit, even sugar or milk would help but he didn't know) and till end of his days. Tons of basic food that would make him cramp painfully or shit badly for hours. That he achieved within 1 year while you did 20 years of same seemingly without any issue.
> as per doctor's findings it was due to that coffee habit,
This doesn't mean much. It's not like the doctor put your classmate under a "causo-scope" and that indicated beyond any shadow of a doubt that it was the black coffee which caused the issue.
It's more like the doctor performed tests for a few things it could be and when found no other alternative explanation he just said something. At best the doctor was thinking about a study showing correlation between black coffee drinking and stomach problems. At worst he just propagated some old wives tale.
This is no dig on the doctor. And certainly no opinion on what caused your classmate's problem. It's just sometimes the answer is that we do not know and cannot know. And the "as per doctor's findings" makes it sound more authoritative than it truly is.
> I don't eat breakfast - haven't done so for more than 20 years. It doesn't affect my enerygy levels or mood. It always made me wonder why we even had it in the first place
I noticed it is closely related to habit. When travelling I usually eat breakfast, lunch and dinner while I usually skip breakfast and sometimes lunch outside of travel. After travelling is done I feel a hunger pang in the morning where I would have taken breakfast as my body starts to "expect" it. Few days after ignoring it, it goes away...
well, "you don't think" but it'd be nice to know. the article discusses a lot of problems that may or may not linked to each other and keto might have positive effects, but the "why" and "how" isn't completely proven. there's a mention of reduced insulin sensitivity, where insulin medication has the same effect as keto. this you probably wouldn't get from just eating less if the diet choice doesn't take insulin levels into account. some improvements might come from the weight loss, that often - but not necessarily - comes with keto. a big part of the ketogenic diet are leafy greens (i mean, besides meat, what else is there to eat?) which might have a huge impact on the microbial landscape in the gut, which also affects the immune system, etc.
so the question isn't "keto is the cure-all so why don't you do it?" but "the ketogenic diet results in curious effects, so what part of the diet affects which issues and why" and "how do the effects of the ketogenic diet differ from (pure weight-loss effects of) other diets"?
A PSA: Pigs and chickens (and likely most Monogastric animals, which includes you) tend to bioaccumulate polyunsaturated fat from their feed, though the specifics will depend on the breed and circumstances. Pigs and chickens fed on soybean meal can have polyunsaturated fat percentages that rival or exceed what you see in vegetable oils. Also note that the nutrition label can often be outright wrong/outdated.
Polyunsaturated fat has a big tendency to exacerbate mental issues, for a variety of possible reasons but a big one likely being that it can result in chronic systemic inflammation.
So don’t make the mistake of thinking “animal fat = saturated fat” like I did, and ending up triggering a major depressive episode. Ruminants (cows/goats/sheep) seem remarkably resistant to this accumulation even when fed shitty meal.
There's at least two possible ways for it to help:
1) Feeding different gut microbes. Often, pathogenic fungi and bacteria feed on simple carbs, which are abundant in normal diets, and drive inflammation that causes mental and physical illness
2) Ketone bodies are an alternative fuel for the brain that does not rely on glucose uptake mechanisms, which are often impaired by (pre)diabetes, inflammation, shit sleep, etc. all of which are very common.
It changes electrolyte balance from what I’ve experienced, so that’s another likely way. Try being dehydrated and depressed. You can’t! The will to live kicks in and overrides depression. Like the guy who jumped off Golden Gate Bridge who on hitting the water was filled with sudden will to live. Near death is a good cure for a lot of things. That’s why keto works.
It is very possible to be dehydrated and depressed. Or starwing and depressed. Moreover, people in acute mortal danger situations (wars) commit suicides.
Depressed people dehydrate and starw themselves. Starwing people (including those with eating disorders) get depressed as result of starvation.
As a person of normal weight, I tried a keto diet a couple of times but just couldn't get it working under vegetarian/vegan dietary restrictions for a daily work + workout schedule.
I got either underfed to the point of fainting, had to rely on expensive restaurant meals and questionable supplements, or had to spent an enormous amount of time on meal preparation.
So either I approached this in a completely wrong way or keto just isn't for "normal" folks like myself with busy schedules.
Vegan is decidedly not "normal" if we define normal in the sense that it is common. Only 0.5% of the American adult population is vegan (only 2% vegeterian).[1]
Not that there's anything wrong with being vegan! But it definitely a minority position.
Sure, eating meat and vegetables avoiding processes cereals is not normal, but eating only plants with no animal proteins and fat is? A diet that literally is harmful to human children, and to adults without B12 supplementation?
Some people have negative knowledge on diets and how the body metabolises foods, yet are ready to share advice on the internet.
Yeah Keto when you can't have dairy or eggs (food sensitivities) is really, really difficult to do. I'm in that boat too and my weight got dangerously low when I was trying to keto.
Yes, because there's also no scientific evidence to support these fad diets. Of course, somebody who has been eating like shit and then switches to a "keto" diet will lose weight and might feel better.
Scientific evidence is clear that a whole food, plant-based is the best diet. I mean, it also makes common sense to eat a balanced diet to get all the different macro and micro nutritients, minerals and vitamins.
The "carb is bad!" line is just wrong. Eating one or two slices if fresh, whole weat bread is not unhealthy, it's healthy! It contains a lot of fiber, protein, vitamins and minerals. But of course, eating frozen pizza is unhealthy because it contains jackshit. Carbs != Carbs.
So why do these intermittent fasting, keto and what not diets work? Well, because people just live a silver bullet and quick fix. And many companies and people make a lot of money by selling these alleged quick fixes to people in the form of ready-made meals, books, coachings and what not.
Nobody is getting rich if people would just eat fresh vegetables.
this is completely undifferentiated. whole wheat bread may work well for you but it completely fucks me up. a few slices a day for a few days and i'll start being at risk for throwing up at random times. nutrition is a hightly emotional laden topic and criticizing someone's diet often means criticizing their core values, but that doesn't mean medical experts can't bring their patient's dietary preferences into question.
while you are _probably_ correct that a whole food-plant based, balanced diet is the best way, it just does not work for everyone the same way. some might have allergies and intolerances, some might have a microbial gut biome that doesn't do well on certain foods, some might have other medical conditions (i.e. diabetes) which influences things. for all of them, having a "balanced diet" that doesn't fuck them up means different things.
many of those "fad diets" are actually nothing but tricks to actually introduce something that resembles a balanced diet into the lives of people whose diets are critically off. keto doesn't work because people believe in quick fixes, it PROBABLY works because you can't subsist on dougnuts, frozen pizza and beer anymore. suddenly it's water, spinach, broccoli, carrots and nuts for snacking. for those people, "carbs are ok" doesn't just open the door to bread but also to cake.
furthermore, keto wasn't invented by a snake oil salesman to get rich quick, it's been used as a medical intervention for at least a hundred years.
if you had actually read the article it's precisely about the scientific support for "this fad diet" keto for its effects, which actually aren't well understood. it's clearly stated that there are actually benefits for some people suffering from certain mental illnesses. don't just discard that.
As a counterexample, a dear friend of mine has a cluster of mental illnesses which are clearly made worse by his ceaseless keto diet obsession.
He didn't need an eating disorder on top of all the other issues he already had, but that's where he's ended up by consuming diet advice from the internet.
Diet advice I collected from HN: no matter how much you eat, you should eat less. Ideally you should eat once a day and exercise a lot. You should pick one of those highly restricted diets too, completely excluding at least one food group.
Also, no reason to ever worry about lack of anything (iron, vitamins, minerals, whatever), none of that is ever an issue.
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It's difficult to describe how massively my life changed when I started keto.
Like the subject of the article, I've had Bipolar (1 in my case, they didn't specify their version) for most of my life, since way before it's supposed to manifest in late adolescence. I was misdiagnosed here and there since I was a very young child, but I finally got on the right treatment plan at 20 years old.
The maintenance of that treatment plan has been taking a medium dose of Lamictal, an epilepsy drug, daily. It worked damn well compared to the regular mania, often culminating in psychosis and occasional full-on can't-even-hold-a-job levels of suicidal depression, but within a week of full-blown ketosis, I was a new person.
I found out about it through some documentary disguised as "In Defense of Fat" or something similar, and I was fascinated by the epilepsy cure thing. I had always known there was a connection between my condition and epilepsy, given that I was on seizure drugs and often experienced what I figured were mini-seizures (often described as brain zaps, I think).
I couldn't find any information on links except a few random, very weak studies, and sorta just told everyone who naysayed me to fuck off cuz it works for me. I lost 20 lbs of excess covid weight as a very nice side-effect, but I can safely say this is the most effective treatment I've ever experienced for my condition (of the many, many I've tried) and I feel like I have superpowers in comparison.
It is very obvious if I get kicked out of ketosis now after a few days or so. I've done it purposefully on vacations or just random cheat times. After a while I feel worse in the head, body, and soul. I make dumb or impulsive decisions (like my old self), or am grumpy in a way I haven't been since starting. I start to have awful dreams again and wake up my wife sleep-talking in distress, and am tired all the time like the old days.
It's certainly not the easiest diet to adhere to, it's also surely not the best for the environment unless you're really strict in specific ways like some, and it's potentially disruptive socially, but it's a lifestyle choice that has given me personally a truly new and improved life that I don't ever want to or plan to return from.
My lifestyle changed once I got a live-in partner. I need to get back on it.
I'm able to sustain keto when using Huel Black (17% carbs), but your mileage may vary.
And Huel is both vegan and sustainable.
(I'm not affiliated, just a user)
Deleted Comment
I don't want to dismiss your personal experiences, but I think that's the wrong conclusion to draw.
Common mental illnesses - particularly depression and anxiety - have incredibly high placebo response rates. Everything looks like a promising treatment for depression in an uncontrolled trial. You can pick practically any intervention - including literal sugar pills - and get ~40% remission rates in an open-label pilot study. Many thousands of potential treatments supported by plausible theories, anecdotal accounts, case reports and small uncontrolled trials have fallen flat as soon as they were tested rigorously. The base rate suggests that the chance of a keto diet (or any other intervention with this level of evidence) being an effective treatment for depression is on the order of 0.1%.
If keto works for you then you should stick with it. The problem is that it's overwhelmingly likely to be no more effective for other people than a low-fat diet or a low-GI diet or sugar pills or faith healing. Articles like this one do a huge disservice to patients, because they completely neglect the base rate and perpetuate a cycle of hype and disappointment that can ultimately lead to distrust and despair.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7945737/
You have zero proof & did zero research on this person, yet trying to put someone who down sees profound benefit with the good old: "it's just placebo".
Just because there is no direct studies backing it up yet doesn't mean there isn't real effect. Could be keto, could be lack of certain starches or other foods, could be the focus & rhytm, whatever it is let's not discourage someone who is having a great practical benefit.
In this case there is literature & studies on epilepsy and keto, and OP was on put on epileptic medicine & describes a link: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6361831/
Regarding placebo - they do touch on this in the article. I have pretty high confidence it’s not placebo for me. But that’s the point, we just don’t know yet and all I’m saying is I’m glad we will soon know more based on my experience.
To partake in a study you need to get out of the house, go somewhere new, talk to new people a few times, do something new, get some daylight, etc. Those are all things we know has a positive effect on depression.
Big part of treating depression is to make people do those sorts of things, despite their bodies and mind screaming stay in bed, it's not worth it.
In my experience, both long term, major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder only substantially improve through understanding, which of course is realized in at least 2 ways: experience and/or therapy.
We can say with some certainty that antidepressants' effectiveness is questionable, at best, long term, but of particular interest for effective indication would be any number of psychoactive substances, which routinely make headlines for this type of treatment but remain taboo for some still yet to be resolved reasons.
Of course this ultimately boils down to personal choices, but attitudes towards drugs will change before we see any real progress in this area, I'm afraid.
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qcAStYJwpg
Thing is that if you over-do it and have too high keto-levels, you can get poisoned by it and that certainly have a high level of stress on the body. (The old man points this out in your video)
Also, if you don't eat often enough, you may not trigger insulin and thus won't get hungry at all and get to little calories (thus dropping in weight).
You know what likes keto even more? Your heart. There are studies and research of fatty acids being able to reverse heart disease, and them being incredibly more efficient fuels than glucose is. N=1 placebo, but I certainly feel my heart (in an overweight body) pumping better and with less effort 1+ weeks into very low carb.
Adaptation takes a while because our mitochondria are dysfunctional due to standard diets being so high in glucose. Fatty acids are the better fuel for muscles, and mitochondria in general.
When you eat carbs, your blood sugar rises. At first it fuels your muscles, then at some point your body has to release insulin to protect itself, keeping your blood sugar low using fat storage. Later, the blood sugar will crash, leading to a lack of energy and brain fog.
There are some hacks in the book to help with this, like walking after eating (muscles take up more of the spike), or eating in order (fiber first to moderate blood sugar, followed by protein/fat, and finally any carbs)
I think a keto diet probably has the same effects, as a consequence of removing simple carbs from your diet.
It might be better to understand this all holistically and manage it with decent nutrition, not just cutting out all <x>.
Another benefit of starting with fiber, is that your body will begin processing it and sending signals of satiety earlier than if you started carbs. Another hack I suppose is waiting 10 minutes between courses in your meals. Giving your body time to digest can help you feel fuller and prevent overeating. Especially when you grew up with the "clean your plate" form of parenting, learning to break that habit and stop when you're actually full can be a game changer for managing weight and body composition.
Some restaurants "traditionally" bring out bread or chips while you're waiting for the food (even the appetizers) to arrive.
And in most restaurants, many appetizers are not plant-based.
These days I only eat after 5pm. My body is so used to it that I don't really get hungry during the day. Even if I go to gym in the morning. Do I notice a difference if I change my eating schedule or diet? Absolutely. If I eat during the day, I tend to want to eat more during the day. If I eat a lot of carbs and junk food, I tend to want to eat more. Also I feel like shit and my skin looks horrible. I think somewhere in all this mess there are mental health concerns as well, but I can't really quantify them in a meaningful way.
Another case point for each' uniqueness - you mention you just drink black coffee on empty stomach. On university one of my classmates went through mandatory military service back then and he did exactly this. He utterly and forever destroyed his stomach lining (as per doctor's findings it was due to that coffee habit, even sugar or milk would help but he didn't know) and till end of his days. Tons of basic food that would make him cramp painfully or shit badly for hours. That he achieved within 1 year while you did 20 years of same seemingly without any issue.
This doesn't mean much. It's not like the doctor put your classmate under a "causo-scope" and that indicated beyond any shadow of a doubt that it was the black coffee which caused the issue.
It's more like the doctor performed tests for a few things it could be and when found no other alternative explanation he just said something. At best the doctor was thinking about a study showing correlation between black coffee drinking and stomach problems. At worst he just propagated some old wives tale.
This is no dig on the doctor. And certainly no opinion on what caused your classmate's problem. It's just sometimes the answer is that we do not know and cannot know. And the "as per doctor's findings" makes it sound more authoritative than it truly is.
That's exactly why I said "many people could", not "everyone will".
I noticed it is closely related to habit. When travelling I usually eat breakfast, lunch and dinner while I usually skip breakfast and sometimes lunch outside of travel. After travelling is done I feel a hunger pang in the morning where I would have taken breakfast as my body starts to "expect" it. Few days after ignoring it, it goes away...
so the question isn't "keto is the cure-all so why don't you do it?" but "the ketogenic diet results in curious effects, so what part of the diet affects which issues and why" and "how do the effects of the ketogenic diet differ from (pure weight-loss effects of) other diets"?
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/nov/28/breakfa...
Polyunsaturated fat has a big tendency to exacerbate mental issues, for a variety of possible reasons but a big one likely being that it can result in chronic systemic inflammation.
So don’t make the mistake of thinking “animal fat = saturated fat” like I did, and ending up triggering a major depressive episode. Ruminants (cows/goats/sheep) seem remarkably resistant to this accumulation even when fed shitty meal.
1) Feeding different gut microbes. Often, pathogenic fungi and bacteria feed on simple carbs, which are abundant in normal diets, and drive inflammation that causes mental and physical illness
2) Ketone bodies are an alternative fuel for the brain that does not rely on glucose uptake mechanisms, which are often impaired by (pre)diabetes, inflammation, shit sleep, etc. all of which are very common.
Depressed people dehydrate and starw themselves. Starwing people (including those with eating disorders) get depressed as result of starvation.
I got either underfed to the point of fainting, had to rely on expensive restaurant meals and questionable supplements, or had to spent an enormous amount of time on meal preparation.
So either I approached this in a completely wrong way or keto just isn't for "normal" folks like myself with busy schedules.
Not that there's anything wrong with being vegan! But it definitely a minority position.
1: https://veganbits.com/vegan-demographics/
It's your body going into emergency starving mode. It might be good to do every now and then, just like fasting, but it's not normal.
It's not easy for any type of diet and just a few carbs will kick you out of ketosis.
But especially for Vegan, then it's mostly nuts & avocado's you can eat.
Some people have negative knowledge on diets and how the body metabolises foods, yet are ready to share advice on the internet.
Scientific evidence is clear that a whole food, plant-based is the best diet. I mean, it also makes common sense to eat a balanced diet to get all the different macro and micro nutritients, minerals and vitamins.
The "carb is bad!" line is just wrong. Eating one or two slices if fresh, whole weat bread is not unhealthy, it's healthy! It contains a lot of fiber, protein, vitamins and minerals. But of course, eating frozen pizza is unhealthy because it contains jackshit. Carbs != Carbs.
So why do these intermittent fasting, keto and what not diets work? Well, because people just live a silver bullet and quick fix. And many companies and people make a lot of money by selling these alleged quick fixes to people in the form of ready-made meals, books, coachings and what not.
Nobody is getting rich if people would just eat fresh vegetables.
while you are _probably_ correct that a whole food-plant based, balanced diet is the best way, it just does not work for everyone the same way. some might have allergies and intolerances, some might have a microbial gut biome that doesn't do well on certain foods, some might have other medical conditions (i.e. diabetes) which influences things. for all of them, having a "balanced diet" that doesn't fuck them up means different things.
many of those "fad diets" are actually nothing but tricks to actually introduce something that resembles a balanced diet into the lives of people whose diets are critically off. keto doesn't work because people believe in quick fixes, it PROBABLY works because you can't subsist on dougnuts, frozen pizza and beer anymore. suddenly it's water, spinach, broccoli, carrots and nuts for snacking. for those people, "carbs are ok" doesn't just open the door to bread but also to cake.
furthermore, keto wasn't invented by a snake oil salesman to get rich quick, it's been used as a medical intervention for at least a hundred years.
if you had actually read the article it's precisely about the scientific support for "this fad diet" keto for its effects, which actually aren't well understood. it's clearly stated that there are actually benefits for some people suffering from certain mental illnesses. don't just discard that.
He didn't need an eating disorder on top of all the other issues he already had, but that's where he's ended up by consuming diet advice from the internet.
Also, no reason to ever worry about lack of anything (iron, vitamins, minerals, whatever), none of that is ever an issue.