I wrote several papers about the keto diet in college. The gist of it all is that all carbs (no matter the source outside of fiber and sugar alcohols, of course) are converted into sugar during digestion. Some break down more rapidly than others causing a rapid increase in blood sugar levels followed by a rapid increase in insulin as a response. Some break down much slower causing a gradual increase in blood sugar with a gradual insulin response.

Causing a sharp raise in blood sugar/insulin response repeatedly over time is what leads to insulin resistance and subsequently type 2 diabetes if nothing changes. Over time, your body has to produce and release an increasing amount of insulin in order for it to have the same effect that a little bit used to. Eventually, this wears out your pancreas and it becomes unable to continue producing insulin.

Your body breaks down carbs first, converts them to glycogen, and uses it to repair your body as well as replacing depleted energy that was stored in your body. Whatever is leftover is then stored inside of your fat cells for use later. If you're constantly consuming large amounts of carbs and fat, then the leftover carbs, protein, and fat all get stored in your fat cells for later.

The ketogenic diet reverses this. The carnivore diet would be a form of ketogenic diet. It doesn't happen immediately, just like getting to where you are didn't happen immediately. A doctor in the 1910s to 1920s stumbled upon it when trying to come up with a way to help his patients with epilepsy. He found that a fast followed by a carb restricted diet either reduced the frequency of seizures or eliminated them altogether. It wasn't until many years later that the weight loss effect became known.

Carbs are inflammatory and cause many health issues. The tin foil hat version of history points towards the 50s and 60s as the turning point in history leading to the obesity epidemic seen today. What changed? A congressional committee was looking into why so many of their colleagues were starting to have heart attacks. Using bad science (or purposefully bad science), fat was given the blame.

What was the recommended diet after that study? Think about the food pyramid introduced in the early 90s. Their recommendations were for a little bit of fat, moderate protein, and a heavy dose of oats and other carbs as the majority. Remember, all carbs except fiber and sugar alcohols are turned into sugar inside of your body. Does fat make you fat? Nope. Carbs do. The pyramid is upside down from what it should be.

Think about all of the diseases that are increasingly seeing record numbers since then. What changed? We replaced fat with sugar. What does cancer love? Sugar.

If you want to reverse type 2 diabetes/pre-diabetes and lose a massive amount of body fat and keep it off, then follow a keto diet. 50g or less of carbs per day, moderate protein, and as much fat (preferably good fats) as you can stomach. As long as you limit your carbs (I do 20-30 per day), get some protein and enough fat, calories won't matter so much. Your body will stop using sugar for fuel and begin breaking body fat down into ketones for fuel. Your body will break down its fat stores, and your fat cells will shrink as a result. You won't get sugar highs and crashes. Your labs will improve drastically. You'll feel the best you ever have once the sugar withdrawals subside.

As a side note, type 1 diabetics shouldn't do this at all. Following a keto diet will lead to a fatal condition for type 1 diabetics called ketoacidosis, though I'm sure you all are already aware of that.

This is as brief as possible of an overview of keto as well as the obesity epidemic. It goes much deeper if you're interested in learning more about it. I'm super ADD, so hopefully I wasn't all over the place 😁

I wrote several papers about the keto diet in college. The gist of it all is that all carbs (no matter the source outside of fiber, of course) are converted into sugar during digestion. Some break down more rapidly that others causing a rapid increase in blood sugar levels followed by a rapid increase in insulin as a response. Some break down much slower causing a gradual increase in blood sugar with a gradual insulin response.

Causing a sharp raise in blood sugar/insulin response repeatedly over time is what leads to insulin resistance and subsequently type 2 diabetes if nothing changes. Over time, your body has to produce and release an increasing amount of insulin in order for it to have the same effect that a little bit used to. Eventually, this wears out your pancreas and it becomes unable to continue producing insulin.

Your body breaks down carbs first, converts them to glycogen, and uses it to repair your body as well as replaced depleted energy that was stored in your body. Whatever is leftover is then stored inside of your fat cells for use later. If you're constantly consuming large amounts of carbs and fat, then the leftover carbs, protein, and fat all get stored in your fat cells for later.

The ketogenic diet reverses this. The carnivore diet would be a form of ketogenic diet. It doesn't happen immediately, just like getting to where you are didn't happen immediately. A doctor in the 1910s to 1920s stumbled upon it when trying to come up with a way to help his patients with epilepsy. He found that a fast followed by a carb restricted diet either reduced the frequency of seizures or eliminated them altogether. It wasn't until many years later that the weight loss effect became known.

Carbs are inflammatory, and cause many lots of health issues. The tin foil hat version of history points towards the 50s and 60s as the turning point in history leading to the obesity epidemic seen today. What changed? A congressional committee was looking into why so many of their colleagues were starting to have heart attacks. Using bad science (or purposefully bad science), fat was given the blame.

What was the recommended diet after that study? Think about the food pyramid introduced in the early 90s. Their recommendations were for a little bit of fat, moderate protein, and a heavy dose of oats and other carbs as the majority. Remember, all carbs except fiber (and sugar alcohols) are turned into sugar inside of your body. Does fat make you fat? Nope. Carbs do. The pyramid is upside down from what is should be.

Think about all of the diseases increasingly seeing record numbers since then. What changed? We replaced fat with sugar. What does cancer love? Sugar.

If you want to reverse type 2 diabetes/pre-diabetes and lose a massive amount of body fat and keep it off, then follow a keto diet. 50g or less of carbs per day, moderate protein, and as much fat (preferably good fats) as you can stomach. As long as you limit your carbs (I do 20-30 per day), get some protein and enough fat, calories won't matter so much. Your body will stop using sugar for fuel and begin breaking body fat down into ketone for fuel. Your body will breakdown its fat stores, and your fat cells will shrink as a result. You won't get sugar highs and crashes. Your labs will improve drastically. You'll feel the best you ever have once the sugar withdrawals subside.

As a side note, type 1 diabetics shouldn't do this at all. Following a keto diet will lead to a fatal condition for type 1 diabetics called ketoacidosis, though I'm sure you all are already aware of that.

This is only a brief (as brief as possible, at least) overview of keto as the obesity epidemic. It goes much deeper if you're interested in learning more about it. I'm super ADD, so hopefully I wasn't all over the place 😁