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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

#111

Post by 2devnull »

villmann wrote: post #84
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…

Newphew of Freud invented breakfast (: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/nov/28/breakfa...

According to the Guardian.

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

#112

Post by 2devnull »

Llamamoe wrote: post #76

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…

It changes electrolyte balance from what I’ve experienced, so that’s another likely way. Try being dehydrated and depressed. You can’t! The will to live kicks in and overrides depression. Like the guy who jumped off Golden Gate Bridge who on hitting the water was filled with sudden will to live. Near death is a good cure for a lot of things. That’s why keto works.

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

#113

Post by 2devnull »

freedomben wrote: post #47
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…

Yeah Keto when you can't have dairy or eggs (food sensitivities) is really, really difficult to do. I'm in that boat too and my weight got dangerously low when I was trying to keto.

People who drink dairy are probably not in keto. Dairy has a ton of sugar.

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

#114

Post by 2devnull »

kilmanio wrote: post #82
yurishimo wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 gre…

But then aren't they by definition not at a calorie deficit?

You’ll eventually lower your caloric intake on a keto diet the same way most people over consume calories in a carb heavy diet. It’s just a side effect of decreased food cravings and the obstacles inherent to the diet. You get sick of avacado and coconut oil pretty quickly if it’s all you get to eat. Calorie counting is a fiction mostly.

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

#115

Post by sigmoid10 »

watwut wrote: post #60
sigmoid10 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most prevalent eating disorder is still (unintentional) overeating. Not eating 2000+ extra calories of fast food every day has never put anyone in danger.

That wont kill you the way anorexia easily can. And fun fact: being slightly overweight is associated with best health results. The malnutrition from eating disorder really really sux and damages the body big time. > Not eating 2000+ extra calories of fast food every day has never put anyone in danger. Adolescents need 2500 or more daily, depending on gender activity level etc.

I was talking about extra calories above your maintenance level. Which is basically one large Mcdonalds meal these days.

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

#116

Post by bvvg »

jdietrich wrote: post #43
elliotec wrote: post #4

I can't help but think "finally" and "told ya so" regarding this news. It's difficult to describe how massively my life changed when I started keto. Like the subject of the article, I've had Bipolar (1 in my case, they didn't specify their version) for most of my life, since way before it's supposed to manifest in late adolescence. I was misdiagnosed here and there since I was a very young child, but I finally got on…

>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…

> Common mental illnesses - particularly depression and anxiety - have incredibly high placebo response rates.

In my experience, both long term, major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder only substantially improve through understanding, which of course is realized in at least 2 ways: experience and/or therapy.

We can say with some certainty that antidepressants' effectiveness is questionable, at best, long term, but of particular interest for effective indication would be any number of psychoactive substances, which routinely make headlines for this type of treatment but remain taboo for some still yet to be resolved reasons.

Of course this ultimately boils down to personal choices, but attitudes towards drugs will change before we see any real progress in this area, I'm afraid.

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

#117

Post by watwut »

2devnull wrote: post #112
Llamamoe wrote: post #76

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…

It changes electrolyte balance from what I’ve experienced, so that’s another likely way. Try being dehydrated and depressed. You can’t! The will to live kicks in and overrides depression. Like the guy who jumped off Golden Gate Bridge who on hitting the water was filled with sudden will to live. Near death is a good cure for a lot of things. That’s why keto works.

It is very possible to be dehydrated and depressed. Or starwing and depressed. Moreover, people in acute mortal danger situations (wars) commit suicides.

Depressed people dehydrate and starw themselves. Starwing people (including those with eating disorders) get depressed as result of starvation.

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

#118

Post by watwut »

kilmanio wrote: post #82
yurishimo wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 gre…

But then aren't they by definition not at a calorie deficit?

Body can start to decompose your protein tissues even if fat is there. So, eating your functional cells - muscles for example. It can also turn off less important functions like thermoregulation, impulse/mood control, slows the heartbeat, your activity levels, etc.

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

#119

Post by watwut »

sigmoid10 wrote: post #115
watwut wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That wont kill you the way anorexia easily can. And fun fact: being slightly overweight is associated with best health results. The malnutrition from eating disorder really really sux and damages the body big time. > Not eating 2000+ extra calories of fast food every day has never put anyone in danger. Adolescents need 2500 or more daily, depending on gender activity level etc.

I was talking about extra calories above your maintenance level. Which is basically one large Mcdonalds meal these days.

I actually checked local McDonald's meal nutrition information. It had around the dinner amount of calories with reasonable split between sacharids, proteins and fats.

It would not be healthy every day, but it was not even approaching whole day amount of calories.

It was not far off any other restaurant food calories content.

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

#120

Post by UtopiaPunk »

NotSuspicious wrote: post #61
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…

Except OP has noticed that when they go out of ketosis everything gets worse again. They've effectively run numerous trials on themselves.

Surely you realize that this not an effective test against the placebo effect.

If society wants to determine if X is generally an effective treatment for Y, there need to be robust experiments that involve multiple people as subjects.

If, however, one guy feels a lot better doing X, and feels worse they stop doing X, then sure, that person should probably keep doing X. Why does X work for that person? Who knows?

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