Personally, I have found that eggs are the key ingredient for success. I have been surprised just how much more energy I have during the day by the addition of a little protein in the morning. Of course this is a big step up from the old carbohydrate packed energy bars and my 20 ounce home brewed coffee.<\/p>\n

Now for some reporting<\/strong>. It has been about a month since I have started using Tim\u2019s slow carb diet with my patient population. In all I have recruited about 30 patients. This has been easier than I ever expected. After years of telling people to just cut fat and sugar and eat more fruits and veggies (this never worked by the way) offering a creative solution with well defined goals and and an easy to follow routing has been very well received. In fact, I have had patients in the community come to my office having heard about the diet and ask to receive the instructions (that is unbelievable). So how have the results been after just 30 days? Pretty amazing so far. I will tell you about 3 cases that have some good teaching points.<\/p>\n

\n
1. \n
   \n
   1. Case 1<\/strong><\/span>: A 21 year old obese Hispanic female (approximately 5 foot 6 and 235 pounds).\n
      \n
      • had spent 2 years trying conventional low fat diets and religious about exercise, performing treadmill workouts in home for about 40 minutes per day 6 days per week without significant weight loss.<\/li>\n
      • Week one of the slow carb diet lost 8 pounds, week 2 lost 6 pounds, week 3 lost 6 pounds and week 4? Well, after one month she was 24 pounds lighter and had dropped 2 pant sizes.<\/li>\n
      • Her exercise routine was a bit intense and maybe a bit excessive. She continued to exercise on the treadmill for 40 minutes per day, and her cheat day was light. But she did cheat.<\/li>\n
      • My early recommendations<\/strong><\/span>:\n
        \n
        • Try to get 20 grams of net carbs prior to a workout, or\u00a0 you will bonk, if you time this 20 gram carb load 30 minutes prior to a workout or 30 minutes afterwards you should be able to stay in ketosis.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n

           <\/p>\n

        • Case 2<\/span><\/strong>: A 46 year old morbidly obese Caucasian female with insulin dependent type 2 diabetes. Approximately 5 foot 7 inches and 314 pounds.\n
          \n
          • She did not weigh in at all during the first month of this diet. After 30 days she had lost 26 pounds.<\/li>\n
          • After just one week her blood sugars were stable.\u00a0 She had been using 60 unites of Lantus once at night.<\/li>\n
          • She continued her Metformin at a dose of 1000mg twice daily. And Amaryl 4 mg tabs one twice daily.<\/li>\n
          • She has supplemented with Magnesium, Calcium, Fish Oil, Vitamin D and Potassium.<\/li>\n
          • She feels great. Has been exercising about 20-30 minutes twice per week. Drinks a ton of water.<\/li>\n
          • My early recommendations<\/span><\/strong>:\n
            \n
            • To counteract the excretion of minerals on a ketogenic diet, additional mineral intake is required. Although exact amounts vary, suggested amounts of the three primary electrolytes appears below:\n
              \n
              1. \n
                 \n
                 1. Sodium<\/span>: 3-5 grams in addition to the sodium which occurs in food<\/li>\n
                 2. Potassium<\/span>: 1 gram in addition to the 1-1.5 grams of potassium which occurs in food<\/li>\n
                 3. Magnesium<\/span>: 300 mg<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n
                 4. Note: an excessive intake of any single mineral (especially potassium) can be just as dangerous as deficiency. Although the values listed above are averages, individuals are encouraged to have mineral levels checked to determine the required level of mineral supplementation. At no time should mineral supplements be taken in excess.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n

                     <\/p>\n

                 5. Case 3<\/span><\/strong>: A 46 year old African American female 5 foot 6 and 175 pounds. Suffers from hypertension and chronic low back pain.\n
                    \n
                    • After 30 days lost 0 pounds.<\/li>\n
                    • Was surprised that on urine testing she failed to produce ketones.<\/li>\n
                    • My early recommendations<\/span><\/strong>:\n
                      \n
                      • This patient loves cheese.\u00a0 Also we found out that although she was going to Carl\u2019s Junior for lunch and removing the bun, fries and soda from the equation, she was eating fried zucchini<\/a>!<\/li>\n
                      • We have done some modifying on her diet, but I can tell her motivation is low. She is doing this diet with a friend, who has lost 10.6% of her body weight in the first 30 days.<\/li>\n
                      • Like Tim Say\u2019s if you are not sure if a food is ok to eat, then don\u2019t eat it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

                        Many people are asking about weight\/fat regain here are my feelings on this.<\/p>\n

                        It is well known that dieting alone shows extremely poor rates of long term success. Typically less than 5-10% of individuals who lose weight through dieting alone will maintain that weight loss in the long term. In brief any fat loss efforts based on caloric restriction alone are typically bound for failure, regardless of whether the diet used is ketogenic or not!<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

                        There will be a lot more to come on this topic, especially as more case data comes in and we get farther past the new year. I am interested to see what will happen in the long term. And we will need to address what Tim didn\u2019t in his book:\u00a0 how do we help educate people about a long term low carbohydrate diet that will result in sustained weight loss?<\/p>\n

                        If you are looking for some great books to supplement the wonderful <\/strong>four hour body<\/strong><\/a> start here:<\/strong><\/p>\n

                        \n
                        • \n
                          \n
                          • The Atkins Diabetes Revolution<\/strong><\/a>:\u00a0 This book is chocked full of so much good information I can not even put it into words. I got it as a free download from my library<\/a> and listened to it in my car on my way to work. <\/span><\/li>\n
                          • The Ketogenic Diet by Lyle McDonald<\/strong><\/a>: This is the single best resource I have ever read about Ketogenic diets, it is full of wonderful information and supported by \u201creal\u201d science. <\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

                            Having trouble finding the perfect recipe to curb those carb cravings? Well, Tim himself released a pretty great guide. I have included it here for your reference just in case you missed it when he posted it on his web site. The Slow Carb Cookbook Personally, I have found that eggs are the key ingredient […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[39,34,3],"tags":[37,6,36,1116,23,35],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1tiSR-S","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.4hourlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}