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Originally Posted by TBoneMitch
I agree 100% with Tom Sawyer and Bluesmoke.
The reasons (in my humble opinion) why some people seem to take low carb like ducks to water while some seem to struggle are twofold:
1) as Tom said, the more nutritional abuse your body has had to deal with, the slower and longer the habituation to a new, proper way of nutrition will be.
2) Fear of fat. In my mind, avoiding saturated fats while lowcarbing is almost a ticket to failure. Of course, the goal is not to FORCE DOWN fat, but rather to go with fats you like and in the quantities necessary for you to kill cravings and feel full.
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Food addiction is one reason. I think a lot of people also tend to use food like a drug. They invent all kinds of ways to justify continuing the use of their drug. To a food addict, low carb is the same thing as rehab. If you're not ready, you're not ready... even if you try, you won't succeed long term until truly ready to change the way you use food.
Another reason is they are following the wrong plan and eating too few carbs.
I do think there's a lot of individual variance on how LOW you can go and thrive, just as there's individual variance on how HIGH you can go and thrive, so I also think others may simply be eating far too low carb for their bodies. I feel absolutely terribly low on energy when ketogenically doing LC. I feel weak, dizzy, chronically hypoglycemic. I mean, truly mildly hypoglycemic. Both blood tests I had while extreme low carbing (taken while fasting) showed BS levels under 70. The one I had done in september was 69 (this was eating very few carbs, but not ketosis). The one I had taken over a year ago when I was still 200 pounds was 60 (my fasting BS was lower despite the fact I was heavier then and more recently comming off of high carb... but I WAS eating less carbs than I was later).
The form of hypoglycemia I get while keeping carbs really really low isn't a typical insulin-swing induced one with hunger and those terrible symptoms (since it's not caused by too HIGH insulin, but rather insufficient glucose output without high insulin). I just feel the "low sugar" hypoglycemic symptoms (mildly dizzy & weak), not the "sharp swing from high insulin" ones (jittery & suddenly starving).
I'm not the only person who has reported this problem tolerating ketosis, it's actually very common. My theory is that we are all unique people, some of us have metabolisms that can more efficiently make glucose in its absense... others cannot, so their bodies struggle to make sugar. Just like some people can eat all the carbs they want and do fine, some people can feel awesome on no carbs at all.
Anyway, there are lots of reasons why someone would fail to thrive on LC I'm sure, many might be because of objectively valid reasons (not being ready for a lifestyle change, or choosing a plan that's nutritional composition did not agree with you)