Too Much Protein?

wrote:
:: On Jul 25, 10:25 am, "Roger Zoul" wrote:
::
::: I've never noticed any affect on my BG as a result of eating too
::: much protein. Of course, figuring what too much is is an issue on
::: its on. I've been up near 300 g on various ocassions.
:::
::: When you say it raises BG, does it really do it like a carb hit
::: will? A big carb hit will cause a rapid increase in BG - a spike
::: to high levels over a short period of time. If eating extra
::: protein, does that, I'd be surprised. I'd expect a much more slow
::: rise, perhaps not evening to damaging levels. And perhaps it would
::: knock one out of ketosis....but ketosis isn't so much of an issue
::: if you're not dieting, but instead using LC to control T2DM. So,
::: I'm wondering if eating extra protein can serve as a means to
::: effectively "carb load" and replenish glycogen stores without
::: eating a lot of carbs.
:::
::: Gotta go.
::
:: Protein raises bg much more gradually than carb. It's WAY less
:: spiky... more of a slow, gradual rise. If you're testing 1 and 2 hr
:: postprandial numbers, you may not even see the effects of protein
:: much as they're not coming until later.

I've tried to test for the late rise...but either I didn't eat enough it the
readings were somehow masked....maybe I'll try again....

::
:: Still, overeating it *can* knock you out of ketosis cause your body
:: turns excess protein into glucose. I think some of the folks who
:: stall are experiencing this.

I want this provided it doesn't send BG too high....

::
:: And yes, this means protein replenishes glycogen, though much more
:: slowly than carbs do. But if you overeat protein regularly, you'd
:: pretty much keep your glycogen stores up all the time.

And that's what I'm searching for....what is the time frame for this to
happen? Hours? And, what excess amount do I need to eat to be sure that it
converts over to glycogen and gets stored?

::
:: I don't think you overeat protein cause I bet there is a correlation
:: between high protein intake and your biking. You're burning up
:: excess protein just as you can burn up excess carb - hence they're
:: not really "excess" at all.

As a rule, though, I don't eat lots of protein. Typical may be around 100gs
unless I start in on the chicken breasts. If I eat 300g of protein today,
would that really be like eating 178g of carbs? That's a lot of
protein.....I find protein heavy meals to be very boring, too.

::
:: Those who take insulin need to account for both carb and protein
:: intake. For example, if I eat 12 g carb and 3 oz protein for lunch,
:: I'll need less insulin for that meal than for a 12 g carb dinner that
:: has 5 oz protein. That I need a larger dose of insulin to cover the
:: extra protein makes it obvious to me that protein raises my bg.
::
:: (Also, different types of insulin work with different speeds, so it's
:: a very complex situation overall - but that's for another newsgroup.)
::

So you take a slow-acting insulin to deal with a high protein intake, right?

:: Fat has a very small effect on bg and therefore can mostly be ignored
:: on it's own. A a high fat meal slows down the bg rise due to carbs.
:: But the increase of bg due to fat itself is practically nearly nil
:: and can practically be ignored. The overall rise is the same
:: whether I eat a lot of fat or a little fat, just it's spread out
:: over more time.
::

I would like to think that the peak is less with more fat, but perhaps the
area under the curve is the same.

:: This is one of the explanations for Dawn Phenomenon, that the liver
:: dumps it's glycogen at night when bg goes low. Lots of people on
:: extremely low-carb, like the Bernstein diet, still experience DP -
:: the glycogen is coming from somewhere.

Fortunately, I haven't experienced DP yet.

::
:: Before I began insulin, my bg was running high ALL THE TIME - even
:: when I was completely fasting for several days. The glucose has to
:: come from somewhere - I suspect I was burning muscle mass at that
:: time. Hence turning protein into glucose...

Yes. If I fast, my BG will get into the upper 60s and sit there...still
buring some muscle...

RRzVRR wrote:
Aaron Baugher wrote:

I'd really rather not just eat butter by the stick.

If you're trying to increase your fat intake by ingesting it straight,
you might want to look into flax seed oil.

I agree. Fish oil and flax seed oil in liquid
form (not tablets) taken by the tablespoon might
end up benefiting you more than saturated fat.

The "magic" of low carb is the anorectic effect
of benign dietary ketosis that curbs hunger even
in the face of severe caloric reduction. At 235
I don't lose weight on low carb at 2000-2500
calories a day either. Like me you may end up
experimenting with more moderate macronutrient
ratios and more meals per day in order to
continue to lose weight and keep blood sugar
levels under control.

On Jul 25, 3:51 pm, Susan wrote:

From all the research I did in the past on this question protein
actualy doesn't cause a rise at all, due to such slow digestion of it.
Exception is type 1 diabetes.

It's been a long time since I had the research in front of me, but I
recall back in graduate school seeing bg curves for normal people,
Type I's and Type II's eating meals of just carb, just protein and
just fat. Even the fat in non-diabetics caused a rise, but it was
very tiny and slow.

Looking back, I don't know how much of that may have been changes
based on stuff other than the meal though. The stuff I've been
reading recently about the changes in basal bg throughout the day
raises some questions about what those curves actually meant.

I know I have to change my insulin dosage based on the protein in my
meals even if the carb is kept constant. So yes, it is having an
effect. I don't see the effect at the 1 and 2 hr postprandials, but
at the next meal's preprandial.

On Jul 25, 12:37 pm, "Roger Zoul" wrote:

:: And yes, this means protein replenishes glycogen, though much more
:: slowly than carbs do. But if you overeat protein regularly, you'd
:: pretty much keep your glycogen stores up all the time.

And that's what I'm searching for....what is the time frame for this to
happen? Hours? And, what excess amount do I need to eat to be sure that it
converts over to glycogen and gets stored?

I don't think there's an easy answer for this.

I think all the calculations about getting adequate protein are
estimates.

And I don't think anyone knows if you eat X amount of protein, how
much of it exactly winds up as glucose, and how much of that glucose
winds up stored as glycogen. There's just too many variables.

What I'd suggest as an experiment is... presumably you know how much
you gain/lose when you lose the water weight when you burn off all
your glycogen as you've been low-carbing forever.

So... when you know you're in ketosis, eat chicken breasts until
you've gained that amount. Then you'll know how much it takes for
you.

But if you're not significantly overweight, your bg is relatively
controlled and you exercise a lot (all of which I believe are true
based on your posts), it may take a long time to get there.

As a rule, though, I don't eat lots of protein. Typical may be around 100gs
unless I start in on the chicken breasts. If I eat 300g of protein today,
would that really be like eating 178g of carbs? That's a lot of
protein.....I find protein heavy meals to be very boring, too.

No, it's not that simple. Potentially, protein can yield a certain
amount of glucose... but your body is not turning all your protein
into glucose. It's using it as protein too.

So you take a slow-acting insulin to deal with a high protein intake, right?

I told my husband today that if he's ever bored and wants to learn
about insulin, I could babble on about it for several hours.

It's new to me, so I'm learning lots.

I take Lantus every evening. It has a gradual curve... and lasts a
total of 20-24 hours. That's a *very* slow-acting insulin.

I take Humalog before each meal. It has a very sharp curve, starts
working in 15 minutes, and is mostly done by 2-3 hours, though it has
some activity up to 4-5 hours. It is a fast-acting insulin.

According to everything I understand... Humalog should work better for
me if taken after meals because my meals are so high fat. But I did
that experiment and it doesn't work.

What happens in general versus what happens in a particular individual
are not the same thing.

I would like to think that the peak is less with more fat, but perhaps the
area under the curve is the same.

I suspect the area under the curve is the same. But it is believed
that it's the spikes that cause the most damage... so evening out the
curve is a good thing.

"Roger Zoul" writes:

Aaron Baugher wrote:
:: Right. That's why I do want to increase the amount of fat in my
:: diet, and make sure I'm not drastically overdoing the protein.
:: It'll just take a little more planning and effort, because the most
:: common protein sources -- meat and eggs -- don't have that high a
:: fat/protein ratio, so I'll have to supplement with things that do.

This has not been my experience at all. Also, do you consider fish
to be meat? Have you tried salmon?

I love fish. I just had some tilapia fillets for supper last night
and lunch today, but they have a 1/8 fat/protein ratio. Very lean, so
I deep fried them in lard and melted some butter over them.

On that 2000 calorie diet, if I'm eating 30g of carbs and 120g of
protein, I need 155g of fat. That's about 1.3g of fat for every gram
of protein, or just over 5/4.

According to FitDay, fried eggs have a 31/28 ratio -- leaner than that
5/4. Bacon is a bit fattier, about 5/3. Regular ground beef is 7/8
-- much leaner. Pork chops: 23/36, not even close! Catfish (I
thought it'd be fatty): 20/27. Salmon: 10/32! Cheddar cheese is
pretty close: 46/35.

Bacon is the only meat I see that's actually fattier than I need, and
most meats have much more protein than fat. It looks to me like a
certain amount of fat has to come from condiments, oils, desserts with
artificial sweetener, etc. It just isn't possible to eat "high-fat"
on meat without eating "even-higher-protein" at the same time. That's
why I was running into trouble when I was just slapping meat on the
grill or frying pan and not bothering to add anything to it.

Day 1 of journaling went pretty well:

2515 calories
16 carb
168 protein
197 fat

That included bacon and eggs, fried fish with butter, hamburgers with
mayo, and green beans with butter. Maybe a bit high on the protein,
but at least I wasn't upside down, and I didn't have a craving all
day. Good start, I think.



--
Aaron -- 285/235/200 -- aaron.baugher.biz

writes:

Yup. This is why I always say that it's a high-fat diet.

It's inescapable when you do the math. It's interesting that none of
the books really get into that. Some say not to worry about fat, but
they gloss over it as much as possible. I can understand that, as a
self-preservation move: if you state clearly in your book that people
will be eating 100+ grams of fat a day, you'll be pilloried. Imply it
and let people figure it out for themselves, and the usual suspects
won't make the connection.

I only aim at 1400-1600 calories/day... but keeping my carbs under
50g and my protein around 80-100 g means my diet needs to be more
than half fat by calories.

Right now my goal is 30 carb, 120 protein, 155 fat. If I'm able to
raise my carbs after I hit my goal without hurting my BG, the fat may
come down a little, but I'd guess it'll still be 50% or a bit more.

I frankly get most of that from dairy. That is not the healthiest
fat there is out there, but it's the one I can eat in large enough
quanitity to get the calories in. Fullfat cottage cheese, cream
cheese, ricotta, yogurt and hard cheeses. And a good bit of heavy
cream for my coffee a few times a day.

I should use a lot more cream cheese, especially since I make it
myself. A 3-egg cream cheese omelet instead of 4 scrambled eggs would
help.

When I first started reading this group, years ago, there was a
group of people posting about sipping oil. Seriously... to get the
fat content up. I didn't find that an appetizing idea, myself.
Never tried it.

I remember that too; never sounded very tasty to me either.



--
Aaron -- 285/235/200 -- aaron.baugher.biz

Aaron Baugher wrote:
:: "Roger Zoul" writes:
::
::: Aaron Baugher wrote:
::::: Right. That's why I do want to increase the amount of fat in my
::::: diet, and make sure I'm not drastically overdoing the protein.
::::: It'll just take a little more planning and effort, because the
::::: most common protein sources -- meat and eggs -- don't have that
::::: high a fat/protein ratio, so I'll have to supplement with things
::::: that do.
:::
::: This has not been my experience at all. Also, do you consider fish
::: to be meat? Have you tried salmon?
::
:: I love fish. I just had some tilapia fillets for supper last night
:: and lunch today, but they have a 1/8 fat/protein ratio. Very lean,
:: so I deep fried them in lard and melted some butter over them.
::
:: On that 2000 calorie diet, if I'm eating 30g of carbs and 120g of
:: protein, I need 155g of fat. That's about 1.3g of fat for every gram
:: of protein, or just over 5/4.
::
:: According to FitDay, fried eggs have a 31/28 ratio -- leaner than
:: that 5/4. Bacon is a bit fattier, about 5/3. Regular ground beef
:: is 7/8 -- much leaner. Pork chops: 23/36, not even close! Catfish
:: (I thought it'd be fatty): 20/27. Salmon: 10/32! Cheddar cheese is
:: pretty close: 46/35.
::
:: Bacon is the only meat I see that's actually fattier than I need, and
:: most meats have much more protein than fat. It looks to me like a
:: certain amount of fat has to come from condiments, oils, desserts
:: with artificial sweetener, etc. It just isn't possible to eat
:: "high-fat" on meat without eating "even-higher-protein" at the same
:: time. That's why I was running into trouble when I was just
:: slapping meat on the grill or frying pan and not bothering to add
:: anything to it.
::
:: Day 1 of journaling went pretty well:
::
:: 2515 calories
:: 16 carb
:: 168 protein
:: 197 fat

You're counting grams here...but the largest portion of your diet comes from
fat...calorie-wise.

::
:: That included bacon and eggs, fried fish with butter, hamburgers with
:: mayo, and green beans with butter. Maybe a bit high on the protein,
:: but at least I wasn't upside down, and I didn't have a craving all
:: day. Good start, I think.
::
::
::
:: --
:: Aaron -- 285/235/200 -- aaron.baugher.biz

Here you go, how to add fat to Tilapia, this is delicious. I go heavy on
the coconut milk, usually make a double batch of this and use a whole can of
coconut milk.

Thai-Style Tilapia

1/2 cup coconut milk

6 whole almonds

2 tablespoons chopped white onion

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric

1 teaspoon chopped fresh lemon grass

1/4 teaspoon salt

4 (4 ounce) fillets tilapia

salt and pepper to taste

1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes, or to taste

In a food processor or blender, combine the coconut milk, almonds, onion,
ginger, turmeric, lemon grass, and 1/4 teaspoon of salt. Process until
smooth. Heat a large non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Season the
fish fillets with salt and pepper on both sides, then place them skin-side
up in the skillet. Pour the pureed sauce over the fish. Use a spatula to
coat the fish evenly with the sauce. Sprinkle with red pepper flakes. Reduce
heat to medium, cover, and simmer for about 15 minutes, until the puree is
thickened and fish flakes easily with a fork.



Aaron Baugher wrote:
|
| I love fish. I just had some tilapia fillets for supper last night
| and lunch today, but they have a 1/8 fat/protein ratio. Very lean, so
| I deep fried them in lard and melted some butter over them.
|
| On that 2000 calorie diet, if I'm eating 30g of carbs and 120g of
| protein, I need 155g of fat. That's about 1.3g of fat for every gram
| of protein, or just over 5/4.
|
| According to FitDay, fried eggs have a 31/28 ratio -- leaner than that
| 5/4. Bacon is a bit fattier, about 5/3. Regular ground beef is 7/8
| -- much leaner. Pork chops: 23/36, not even close! Catfish (I
| thought it'd be fatty): 20/27. Salmon: 10/32! Cheddar cheese is
| pretty close: 46/35.
|
| Bacon is the only meat I see that's actually fattier than I need, and
| most meats have much more protein than fat. It looks to me like a
| certain amount of fat has to come from condiments, oils, desserts with
| artificial sweetener, etc. It just isn't possible to eat "high-fat"
| on meat without eating "even-higher-protein" at the same time. That's
| why I was running into trouble when I was just slapping meat on the
| grill or frying pan and not bothering to add anything to it.
|
| Day 1 of journaling went pretty well:
|
| 2515 calories
| 16 carb
| 168 protein
| 197 fat
|
| That included bacon and eggs, fried fish with butter, hamburgers with
| mayo, and green beans with butter. Maybe a bit high on the protein,
| but at least I wasn't upside down, and I didn't have a craving all
| day. Good start, I think.

Aaron Baugher wrote:
:: Susan writes:
::
::: That's what the fat is for. Plus, unless you're dragging boulders
::: up a hill all day, WTF do you need so many calories for?
::
:: 2000 calories is "so many"? The USDA puts 2000 and 2500 calorie info
:: on labels as examples for smaller and larger people. The rule of
:: thumb I've seen in this group for maintenance is 10 calories/pound,
:: which would be 2350 for me. I just tried a couple "daily calorie
:: requirements" calculators I found online, and they say a 5'10", 235
:: lb., 38-year-old man who gets moderate exercise needs around 3200
:: calories! When the first one said that, I thought it was broken, but
:: I'm getting that result consistently.
::
:: And some days, I do drag boulders, or large fence posts and farm
:: implements, anyway.
::
::: I don't know why you feel you need something to "fill" you up? The
::: idea is to eat til you're no longer hungry, not til you're filled
::: up.
::
:: "Filled up" means the same thing as "no longer hungry" to me. I
:: don't mean stuffed, just feeling full -- not feeling the need for
:: more. I only get that
:: stuffed-and-needing-to-lie-down-and-stretch-out feeling when I eat a
:: lot of carbs.
::
::: Tonight, for example, my husband and I each had about 6 oz. of
::: mahi mahi, marinated and grilled. I sauteed a lb. of baby spinach
::: in olive oil with garlic and red pepper flakes and we split that.
::: We each had salad of mixed baby greens with nuts, cheese and tomato
::: with dressing.
::
:: Sounds great. I rubbed two 4-ounce tilapia fillets with spices and
:: fried them in lard, then ate them with some mayo and cayenne pepper.
:: That gave me my 40g of protein, but only 27g of fat, so I'll have to
:: work on that. Some veggies swimming in butter/cheese sauce should do
:: the trick.
::

That gave you 160 kals from protein and 243 kcals from fat.

Also, when you fry your fish, how do you really know how much fat that adds
to what you eat? A better plan would be to make some kind of sauce for the
fish.

"Roger Zoul" writes:

You're counting grams here...but the largest portion of your diet
comes from fat...calorie-wise.

Yes. I calculated my fat-gram needs by working backwards from the
number of calories I had left after my 30g of carbs and 120g of
protein. Since the labels give each component in grams, it's easier
to set goals for grams than for calories. If I compared calories, the
ratio of fat to protein would be a much bigger number:

1400 calories fat / 480 calories protein = 35/12 = 2.92 fat calories
for each protein calorie

155 grams fat / 120 grams protein ~ 5/4 = 1.2 fat grams for each
protein gram

As a percentage of dietary calories, I'd be getting 70% (1400/2000)
from fat, 24% from protein, and 6% from carbohydrates. That's why I'm
not surprised that none of the books focuses on the fat, even though
it's the largest part of the diet. People would scream and run away
if you were straightforward about it, and you'd never get invited to
be on Oprah with "The 70% Fat Diet!"



--
Aaron -- 285/235/200 -- aaron.baugher.biz