Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Suggestions for a healthy diet

About 6 months ago I severely limited my daily carb intake. No more bread, cereal, pasta, and potatoes. I started eating 3-6 eggs a day, lots of cheese, moderate amounts of Greek yogurt, and bacon, sausage, hamburger, pork, chicken, deli meats, venison, and fish. Once every couple weeks a nice ribeye. Usually we have a green salad and grilled veggies with dinner. I lost about 15 pounds and have a lot more energy. I went from 182 to 167 at 5’8” tall. 52 years old, and I haven’t had this much energy in 10 years.
My biggest concern with maintaining this diet is heart and digestive tract health. Bacon and eggs for breakfast, cheese and deli meat for lunch, and half a pound of chicken at dinner time makes me wonder what’s going to happen to my long term health.
I have started eating apples, plums, and pears again in moderation, like one a day. I couldn’t believe that a pear has almost 30 carbs. Most days I don’t intake that many carbs all day long.

You can be overweight and hard on yourself eating the right foods. Weight is more about how much you eat than what you eat. You can be at a healthy weight eating nothing but twinkies. Eat a balanced diet and count your calories.

I made the same change about four years ago. The only major difference I see is that I limit cured meats (anything with sodium nitrite), eat a bit more fish (usually at least a can of sardines for lunch), and a LOT of vegetables (think a pound of asparagus for dinner), and quite a bit of berries.

Had my annual physical last week. LDL VERY low, HDL high, Triglycerides extremely low, blood sugar a little high (100), which is common for a low carb diet. Blood pressure 110/72. I'm 57. Doc was quite concerned when I made the change, and has been doing blood work every year. In those four years, I have seen his knowledge on nutrition grow: he was basically unfamiliar with low carb four years ago, this year we had an in depth discussion about it, and he strongly encouraged me to not change a thing. He called me the "poster child for health".

Sample of one. But I'm not changing a dang thing.

I’m not a dietitian, but I believe all these diets are not sustainable and likely not healthy.
In my “opinion” a balanced diet of vegetables, fruits, grains, and meats are the way to go.
It’s not so much what you eat, but how much you eat, relative to your physical activity, exercise.

Eat plenty of non starchy veggies with the meat and drink plenty of water. That will keep the food moving through you and your digestive tract will be fine. Also eat less of the processed food.

When I go strict KETO, like your initial diet, I can lose a pound a day. Adding fruit does increase your carb count but the fiber keeps digestion straight, avoid the juice - eat the whole fruit. I do cheat a bit and throw in a brownie or cookie. If I have a slice of pizza, my joints will ache for days. I try to avoid all processed foods (pasta, breads ...), but at times I cheat and I pay for it. Some weight has come back, but after COVID I can't taste anyway, so I eat the stuff I don't normally like (veggies).

Your body burns 3 things for energy:
Fat
Carbs
Alcohol

All kidding aside I don't recommend anybody try to live on alcohol. Burning carbs is like burning newspaper to stay warm. It works but you are constantly hungry/eating (feeding the fire). Burning fat is like a log on the fire. If you combine carbs and fat, your body will burn the carbs and store the fat, thus making you gain weight.

Initially it clogged my bowels but once you get thru it your body adjusts. I did get fidgety from keytones but got thru that to. It’s not a diet but a lifestyle. It doesn’t seem right but you certainly feel better. I try to avoid too much of the pastrami, capicola type meat. Fat is a must but you can get it with olive oil. I’d encourage everyone to try it, it can also be a little pricey.

Take a Statin pill once a day.

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Traditional oatmeal with raisons and honey is my almost everday begin the day meal. Midmorning granola , nuts or peanut butter on wheat. Whatever I want for lunch but in sensible sized portion. Dinner "supper" depends on how much I cheated during the day. A lot of fried or scrambled eggs and toast for supper.

I agree with you that weight loss is about limiting calorie intake.

Where I disagree is that the ONLY long term sustainable way to limit calorie intake for the average person is to reduce appetite. Limiting carbs (and I'm not talking keto, just eliminating all "empty calories", i.e. grains and potatoes) automatically limits appetite, which results in reduced calorie consumption.

Up until about 10,000 years ago, humans did not even have the genetic ability to digest starch. That mutation allowed agriculture, which allowed civilization, and here we are. Anyone who didn't eat starch 10,000 years ago was at a huge disadvantage because of the economic advantages. Today, we can afford to eat REAL food and don't have to challenge our bodies every day to digest food it didn't evolve to consume.

I have lost 80# since January,i cut out carbs and salt,i eat Mulsi ceral with skim milk for breakfast,tuna in water (drained)with thawed frozen peas and lemon juice rolled in a pita bread for lunch,and steamed vegtables with lemon and plain chicken or fish (or small piece of steak)for dinner.For deserts i have fresh fruit or cashew yougurt with mulsi ceral in it for crunch.I also walk 3 miles a day every day.Cut out the junk,exercise every day without fail and you can drop and maintain the weight loss.Cutting out the pasta and the Italian bread with butter ,and desserts was the hardest part,after that,it just fell into a habit.

My guess is that your lipid and chemistry profiles look better than they ever have.

What do they show and how do they compare to previous labs?

I haven’t been to the doctor in quite some time, I couldn’t tell you what my numbers are.

I can't even remember what I ate 10K years ago but I'm sure it tasted better than it does now. Dang I miss those smothered hamburger steaks at Possum Kingdom and hamburgers and fries at the Mesquite drive in.

Eat what you want, but only eat once a day. I’ve done all the diets and this one is the one that works best for me. It’s hard at first but ok after a few weeks.

I lost 40 lbs on Atkins 20 years ago. The weight came off easily but I kept the severe carb restriction going too long. When I hit the 40 lb mark, I had also lost a fair bit of muscle mass and felt pretty weak. I switched to a more balanced diet focusing on complex carbs, lean protein and no processed foods. That, and lots of strength training got me back to being healthy and fairly lean.

With that, I agree a severely carb restricted diet isn't sustainable and eliminating processed food as much as possible is the best approach. I feel much better avoiding starchy foods and try to focus on lean protein, fruits and vegetables as my primary diet.

I have been eating quite a bit of white tuna in water, but i can’t do sardines. Maybe I’ll bump up my tuna intake to offset the deli meats. I also think I’m going to bump up my fruits and berries. I already eat lots of peanuts, almonds and cashews.

^^^^ Deli meat, prepackaged meals are a no go.

OK, so what is it you are worried about again? You are losing weight and feel great. If you add in lab data that looks good, why would you change?