goals beyond fat loss

I was thinking about the kind of goal that helps you choose a permanent dietary plan....  What do you want to do, eat as much as possible without gaining (or while still losing), or be able to eat as little as you can and still be healthy and comfortable?

Of course, "we" know that our low-carb plan does both, but what do we really WANT out of it?

When we come to low-carb from a "normal" diet, i think the former goal is the attractive one.  Eating all the steak, bacon, butter, cheese, cream, whatever it was i wanted and shorted myself on, back in my calorie/fat restrictive days, seemed like a vision of heaven.  Imagine eating that stuff, and being able to lose weight at the same time...!!!

Nowadays, i actually relish the other aspect of it.  The ability to go most of the day without HAVING to refuel myself is a real luxury.

You'll probably get sick of hear this, but back in the old low-fat days, i was ALWAYS "hungry" ... that is, when i was eating for weight loss.  My belly may have been crammed to bursting with pasta, fruits, vegetables, and chicken breasts, but i was never satisfied.  That's a nasty feeling, and it pours over into other aspects of life.  I was NOT HAPPY in those days.  "Triumphs" didn't come close to often-enough to be encouraging, and although not actually depressed, i was more like constantly irritable.  Doing my best, i might be able to lose one pound in a week, and that was when i was in my 30s!  Walking the dogs every night and riding the stationary bike regularly.  It's no wonder that people can't keep going on that kind of program -- there's way too much privation and effort for very little return when you're young, and when you're at my current age ... well, "best of British luck" as they used to say....

My mother is a stick-in-the-mud for moderation.  She's one of those lucky types who was always healthy, though as far back as i can remember she was considered "pleasingly plump" -- it's been a long time since you heard that expression, isn't it?  :-)  In her later years, she's had a number of problems:  high-blood pressure for decades, GERD, both knees replaced, skin cancers, breast cancer, recently some colon cancer, too (she'll be 89 this month).  She thinks i'm some kind of nut because i try to eat to improve my health, and she loves to remind me of the old low-fat days ... even though she believes the saturated-fat nonsense.  For decades she hasn't been able to delay a meal for more than a half-hour without extreme loss of energy and mood.  If unavoidable circumstances take things farther, she gets shaky and weak.  She likes to keep peanut-butter-cheese-crackers in her purse, just in case.  I tell her why she feels so bad, but i don't think she believes it.  In any case, for her to improve metabolic flexibility at this age is probably a pipe dream.

Compare this food-dependent situation with my recent experiences:  one of the best examples is what i carry in the car to eat and drink, when i do one of my marathon drives.  I USED to pack (in my Atkins days) a bagful of bars and shakes, nuts, cheese, and processed meat along with the cooler full of diet sodas and water.  Last trip (coming back from Houston, a 13-14 hour drive), i had the cooler and the remains of a bag of home-processed pumpkin seeds.  Oh, i was fully prepared to stop for a bunless double hamburger (and i ended up doing so, in Atoka, Oklahoma when i stopped for the dog's sake), but the bit is -- it's now easy to go for a LO-O-O-ONG time without refueling.  No snacks.  It's a rare glucose-burner who can say that.

Along with low-carbing and eating whole foods, i have also come to believe in eating instinctively, in the sense of not eating when not hungry.  If a certain food really calls my name these days, it probably means i need something that it provides.  I track nutrients and calories in Fitday not because i'm really CONCERNED about them, but because it can be interesting to "keep score."  For example, one day this week i consumed about 2200 kcal (protein refeed day), and yesterday less than 1000.  I wasn't planning to, it just happened through eating TO APPETITE.

Once the carbohydrate "addictions" are overcome, i think it becomes possible to listen to your appetite cues again.  Of course, being a predominant fat-burner is important in this equation, otherwise you'll be cued to eat when the fuel switchover drags a little.  Regaining the best possible degree of metabolic flexibility seems to be the other goal that low-carb-diet-success aspirants need to aim for.

Training your body to primarily burn fats and ketones for fuel seems to be like training a child or dog -- until the lesson is well ingrained you need to be very consistent.  If i ALWAYS require Spenser to be patient and submissive before i reward him, his behavior is reliable.  Switching back and forth, confusing him with unfamiliar demands and allowing him to run amok occasionally makes him an unruly and self-willed dog.