[RobertW]

If your typical diet is based on "BK Croisandwiches" (as per your last fitday entry) then it could stand some cleaning up.

I don't seem to lose too much muscle even when dieting in the 1,500-2,000 Cal range, as long as I keep lifting. I only added cardio recently (6xweek, LifeCycle, 30-55min, HR=140-150) but so far I haven't had any dramatic strength loss or ammonia smells. I sweat buckets during my cardio and get a huge pump in my leg muscles, but that is about it.

I gather that you do end up making a significant amount of glucose from protein while you are dieting via gluconeogenesis, but i am unclear as to what extent you can off-set that by consuming protein. I have really been focusing on pure calorie counting, but maybe I should set some protein goals to stave off the muscle loss to gluconeogenesis during my diet.

May be you need to increase the amount of protein in your diet and step up your weight training?

[RobertW]

Now that I think about it some more, shouldn't that ammonia be ending up as urea or uric acid rather than coming out in your breath or sweat?

I wonder if you are either 1) Breaking down protein so fast that you are producing more ammonia than you can turn into urea or

2) There is some metabolic problem keeping the ammonia you produce from being converted to urea.

Maybe you should ask your doctor about this problem, just in case it is something serious?