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Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

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Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#71

Post by shafyy »

spidersenses wrote: post #42

As a person of normal weight, I tried a keto diet a couple of times but just couldn't get it working under vegetarian/vegan dietary restrictions for a daily work + workout schedule. I got either underfed to the point of fainting, had to rely on expensive restaurant meals and questionable supplements, or had to spent an enormous amount of time on meal preparation. So either I approached this in a completely wrong way…

Yes, because there's also no scientific evidence to support these fad diets. Of course, somebody who has been eating like shit and then switches to a "keto" diet will lose weight and might feel better.

Scientific evidence is clear that a whole food, plant-based is the best diet. I mean, it also makes common sense to eat a balanced diet to get all the different macro and micro nutritients, minerals and vitamins.

The "carb is bad!" line is just wrong. Eating one or two slices if fresh, whole weat bread is not unhealthy, it's healthy! It contains a lot of fiber, protein, vitamins and minerals. But of course, eating frozen pizza is unhealthy because it contains jackshit. Carbs != Carbs.

So why do these intermittent fasting, keto and what not diets work? Well, because people just live a silver bullet and quick fix. And many companies and people make a lot of money by selling these alleged quick fixes to people in the form of ready-made meals, books, coachings and what not.

Nobody is getting rich if people would just eat fresh vegetables.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#72

Post by yurishimo »

sigmoid10 wrote: post #31
Almondsetat wrote: post #22

People have shit diets (and they don't realize it) so when they finally decide to stick with a famous one they get results. Every popular diet tells you to eat less and eat natural, keto amongst them. Unless you have allergies: no, it'a not keto, no, it's not Atkins, no, it's not veganism: it's not eating crap.

This is the real answer. Keto, Paleo, intermittent fasting... all these things work exactly the same way: by limiting your calorie intake. When the population approaches an obesity rate of 40% (not overweight, clinical obesity!), anything you try will help to counteract the highly processed, far too calorie dense food we get on every corner. People swear on their own diet approach because of some biochemical aspect,…

> all these things work exactly the same way: by limiting your calorie intake.

While this is broadly true, I think it's also important to convey that the hormones involved also play a huge role. There are plenty of people who stay in a calorie deficit* and still gain weight because they spike insulin with a snack or a meal every two hours.

Keto works so well because it doesn't spike insulin as much, on top of the greater satiety signals sent by popular foods associated with the diet. Eventually you feel more full for longer and the insulin spike is further reduced from the omission of calories entirely.

*: By constantly spiking insulin, the body will down regulate your metabolism since it can no longer access stored fat deposits for energy. If your BMR is lowered, then technically you are burning less calories than you are eating. Assuming a person stops spiking their insulin, their BMR will rise back to "normal" levels when the body realizes that it has access to stored fat again.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#73

Post by mmcgaha »

adaptbrian wrote: post #2

Ketosis will likely be what I credit for saving my marriage and actual life once science catches up with reasoning. The last year for me has been profound. Cluster headaches are mental warfare and ketosis has played a major role in my body's ability to chill the hell out. Can't wait to see more research here.

The surprising benefit that I noticed on a keto diet was the lack of joint pain.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#74

Post by yurishimo »

edu wrote: post #33
rkho wrote: post #28

I lost a lot of weight on ketosis several years ago but could not maintain the diet and gained it all back shortly after. Since then I've found something that works better for my body that I can sustain which keeps some of the principles of keto. I no longer limit my carbs, but when I eat carbs they come from rice and potatoes instead of wheat because I wore a CGM for two-week periods of time multiple times last year…

Interesting, I ended in the same position but just from observing myself.

I'm envious of people who can realize these things about themselves. For me, I almost always need concrete data to make me stop and think about how I'm feeling and put two and two together. Otherwise my scatterbrain is thinking about anything and everything else.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#75

Post by MrBuddyCasino »

tmikaeld wrote: post #70
MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The brain likes keto, no question. I'm not sure it is a good to do it for longer periods of time, it supposedly stresses the body [0]. I did it for a year and continually lost weight, and it wasn't for lack of calories. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qcAStYJwpg

How often per day did you eat and did you measure your keto levels? Thing is that if you over-do it and have too high keto-levels, you can get poisoned by it and that certainly have a high level of stress on the body. (The old man points this out in your video) Also, if you don't eat often enough, you may not trigger insulin and thus won't get hungry at all and get to little calories (thus dropping in weight).

> How often per day did you eat and did you measure your keto levels?

You mean using a breathalyzer? I did not find them to be very consistent.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#76

Post by Llamamoe »

There's at least two possible ways for it to help:

1) Feeding different gut microbes. Often, pathogenic fungi and bacteria feed on simple carbs, which are abundant in normal diets, and drive inflammation that causes mental and physical illness

2) Ketone bodies are an alternative fuel for the brain that does not rely on glucose uptake mechanisms, which are often impaired by (pre)diabetes, inflammation, shit sleep, etc. all of which are very common.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#77

Post by spidersenses »

OJFord wrote: post #64
spidersenses wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The “normal” in my comment referred to the average weight and busy life. I am primarily an ovo-lacto vegetarian, only occasionally vegan.

> primarily an ovo-lacto vegetarian, only occasionally vegan That's like an omnivore saying they're occasionally vegan because not 100% meals contain meat or dairy?

Let's just say, that every once in a while I go vegan for a couple of days or weeks. That's slightly different from the "accidentally vegan" meal.

If it was possible to combine keto, a meat-free diet, and intermittent fasting, without breaking the bank or breaking the body, that would be the dream.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#78

Post by zczc »

m463 wrote: post #17

I've read the book "the glucose revolution" and it is pretty interesting how regulating glucose spikes can affect your mental clarity, energy levels and general health and wellbeing. When you eat carbs, your blood sugar rises. At first it fuels your muscles, then at some point your body has to release insulin to protect itself, keeping your blood sugar low using fat storage. Later, the blood sugar will crash, leading…

Interesting, the "hack" of eating in order is just return to the traditional way of eating veggie appetizer first, then meat main dish, and then dessert.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#79

Post by offices »

saiya-jin wrote: post #58
ilitirit wrote: post #51

I don't think you really need keto, but I think many people could benefit from just training themselves to eat fewer times a day, and developing an aversion to sugar and unhealthy food in general. I don't eat breakfast - haven't done so for more than 20 years. It doesn't affect my enerygy levels or mood. It always made me wonder why we even had it in the first place. All I have is a cup of black coffee, no sugar. Som…

You must realize the world and humanity is bigger than you. Some people with low blood sugar would be very weak without breakfast (ie my wife and most of her family, tested repeatedly under various real world situations ie in wilderness). Some thrive like that. Some, like me, don't care if they have or don't have breakfast, nothing visibly changes for me (unless I want to bulk a bit from ie weightlifting or generally…

That's why they said 'many'.

Re: Patients say keto helps with mental illness. Science is racing to understand why

#80

Post by jdietrich »

wouldbecouldbe wrote: post #63
jdietrich wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I can't help but think "finally" and "told ya so" regarding this news. I don't want to dismiss your personal experiences, but I think that's the wrong conclusion to draw. Common mental illnesses - particularly depression and anxiety - have incredibly high placebo response rates. Everything looks like a promising treatment for depression in an uncontrolled trial. You can pick practically any intervention - including…

Jeez, chill out. You have zero proof & did zero research on this person, yet trying to put someone who down sees profound benefit with the good old: "it's just placebo". Just because there is no direct studies backing it up yet doesn't mean there isn't real effect. Could be keto, could be lack of certain starches or other foods, could be the focus & rhytm, whatever it is let's not discourage someone who is having a g…

>You have zero proof

Proof of what? I fully accept that this guy finds keto really helpful and I have made no effort to dispute that. There is a world of difference between "a thing that some people find helpful" and "an evidence-based clinical intervention".

>Just because there is no direct studies backing it up yet doesn't mean there isn't real effect.

The entire point of my comment is that the chance of there being a "real" effect (i.e. greater than placebo) is extremely low. That isn't the same as saying "this is definitely, 100% bogus".

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