more fat = better?
 

HI there, my husband has started low carb and of course instead of looking for anything himself he asks me every technical question he can imagine.. many of them about ketosis because he is obsessed with peeing on the strips...
Anyway. One thing which I have failed to satisfactorily (a real word?) explain to him is why eating more fat is good. His argument is that if you're already eating lots of fat and you have no carbs why would you body bother to burn it's own fat rather than the stuff you're eating, wouldn't you burn more fat eating low carb low fat? Can anyone help with this question? Basically I am responsible for the information that everyone in his work gets about low carb so I better get it right :)
Thanks,
Meg

This is probably why I am not married...
 

He needs to read the book. He is responsible for his own weight. He will never be motivated to stick to the WOL unless he takes some responsibility for learning about it. He'll continue to be lazy as long as he's allowed.

This is from the Atkins web site:

"One of insulin's jobs is to convert all your excess carbohydrate into stores of body fat. In a normally functioning body, fatty acids and ketones are readily converted from fat tissue to fuel. But in overweight people, high insulin levels prevent this from happening.

Most obese people become so adept at releasing insulin that their blood is never really free of it and they’re never able to use up their fat stores. By primarily burning fat instead of carbohydrates, lipolysis breaks the cycle of excess insulin and resultant stored fat. So by following a fat containing, controlled carbohydrate regimen, you bypass the process of converting large amounts of carbohydrate into glucose. When your carbohydrate intake drops low enough to induce fat burning, abnormal insulin levels return to normal—perhaps for the first time in years or decades."

Now your body has to have some kind of fuel to keep going-so on Atkins you use fat as your food fuel instead of carbs. Doing a low carb/low fat thing would be dangerous as your body would then move to burning muscle tissue instead of fat.

Thanks Paleoanth, I appreciate the response!

So.. what about in a normal person rather than an overweight one? I have a softer belly than I'd like but I am not "overweight" and my husband is very slim... only wants to drop some fat quickly to see the stomach muscles again..help with athletic performance etc.

I'll let him know what you think grlygrl, although I he is in a different position than you think :) He is by no means lazy or overweight, and eats less carbs than the general public because he knows the health benefits. I am simply trying to find out why more fat is better while eating low carb than less. Not from a health stand point, but from a fat loss.

take care,
Meg

ps: this is purely for the sake of interest and argument. We love our bacon and cheese and dressings

This thread: Confused and scared to eat fat has a pretty decent explanation for how fat processes in the absence of insulin. Here's a good quote from it:

Does that help? :D

yes, thanks a lot! The link was great too.

take care,
Meg

ok, I just have to repeat WOW that was an awesome link, with a link to another great thread... thanks again. This is something I had been hoping to find for quite some time.